30th Anniversary short written by Anno at celebration event in Japan

[Konja7]

Yeah, me too. Kind a goes beyond "It's just a comedy short." It seems that for Anno it's more than that. And though I still can't fit it in the canon, for me this ending is preferable to the Shin ending. Just emotionally, not necessarily as a story. But, maybe as a story too. If we knew what the story actually was, but it's hard to put the finger on that anyway.

This ending would be in the style of the ending of NGE episode 26, which is confusing and introspective.

Again. This appears to be an ending for Soryu, who is portrayed as unhappy with her original ending. Also, it's curious because she seems to choose to go to a world where there are Angels.

[kuribo-04]

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— twitter-user (@username) date

[BernardoCairo]

Also, it's curious because she seems to choose to go to a world where there are Angels.

Asuka never minded living in a world with Evangelions like Shinji. In fact, she realized that piloting EVA 02 kept her closer to her mother. Her desire to continue piloting makes a lot of sense for her character.
Episode 25 addresses how she used the Evangelion and piloting as a means of escaping and hiding from herself, but ultimately, I think she enjoyed doing it. We've never seen a character so happy to fight in the series as she was in Air.

@kuribo-04 Thanks for sharing that! I love how they are portraying Asuka as a somewhat silly character here. I've always liked this side of her.

[Konja7]

Asuka never minded living in a world with Evangelions like Shinji. In fact, she realized that piloting EVA 02 kept her closer to her mother. Her desire to continue piloting makes a lot of sense for her character.
Episode 25 addresses how she used the Evangelion and piloting as a means of escaping and hiding from herself, but ultimately, I think she enjoyed doing it. We've never seen a character so happy to fight in the series as she was in Air.

Honestly, I don't think Asuka's choice is because she enjoys pilotting Eva.

Although she decided to pilot the Eva as a way to find her own path, it's also mentioned her main goal is to protect the World. It doesn't appear to be a permanent job since her ultimate goal is to achieve a peaceful world (without Angels) in the end.

Asuka seems to have an issue with a peaceful world being handed to her. She wants to obtain it through her own means.


PS: I don't want to get into how the shippers have decided to interpret that

[BernardoCairo]

Asuka seems to have an issue with a peaceful world being handed to her. She wants to obtain it through her own means.

Great point! I agree with you. However, I think she enjoys being a pilot, at least. So, perhaps it's a combination of those two aspects of her personality.
All this to say that she wouldn't take the same route that Shinji took in Shin.

[Joseki]

Again. This appears to be an ending for Soryu, who is portrayed as unhappy with her original ending. Also, it's curious because she seems to choose to go to a world where there are Angels.

She didn't really chose a world with angels, she decided to reject anything that isn't the world she lived in.
It's conceptually Shinji's EoE/NGE ending but repackaged as a comedic sketch, that was also the most explicit implication of her showing up on the beach at the end of EoE.

[Aboo]

Again. This appears to be an ending for Soryu, who is portrayed as unhappy with her original ending. Also, it's curious because she seems to choose to go to a world where there are Angels.

It seems to me that Soryu has chosen to embrace her reality, which is NGE+EoE. Her lamenting her ending was portrayed as a running away from reality, but she has reframed her perspective and realizes there is hope for her there.

[Konja7]

She didn't really chose a world with angels, she decided to reject anything that isn't the world she lived in.
It's conceptually Shinji's EoE/NGE ending but repackaged as a comedic sketch, that was also the most explicit implication of her showing up on the beach at the end of EoE.

It seems to me that Soryu has chosen to embrace her reality, which is NGE+EoE. Her lamenting her ending was portrayed as a running away from reality, but she has reframed her perspective and realizes there is hope for her there.

I don't really agree.

Asuka Soryu mentioned that as long as there Angels she will Pilot Eva-02 to protect the World. That wish doesn't seem to fit EoE, since Eva-02 and Angels didn't exist there anymore. That's why it seems she's choosing a World with Angels where she will fight for her own happiness.

Also, Asuka Soryu seems to feel EoE is an ideal ending for Shinji (for some reason). So, she rejecting the ideal seems to still rejects EoE ending.

[Joseki]

I don't think you are supposed to read the short literally, that's not really post-EoE Asuka talking. She is a Asuka, talking with another Asuka, and they both represent in that context their respective "real" version reflecting on their journey.
The world where Asuka pilots the Eva-02 is just her original word, with everything that came from that. She reframed her reason for piloting as "to protect", but that's not really a wish to continue endlessly to pilot and fight.
That would be basically hitting the hard reset button on her entire character arc in the series back to Episode 8.

[Axx°N N.]

Yeah, I mean, 'piloting the Eva' has always been a bit figurative.

I have to say, after sitting with the short for a bit, I appreciate that it, in some way, restores Asuka as a strong personality, so much so she doesn't fit gracefully within the confines of multiple iterations of a metanarrative. It gives me the sense that she has, by her own choice, immortalized herself in a meaningful way.

Or more like Anno has immortalized her. I really do think this was necessary, because the Rebuilds had an extremely underwhelming, I'd even say damaging, detraction from her character in terms of how she holds up in posterity. Yes, you could say Shikinami wasn't Sohryu, but it's still a last taste left in the mouth. Like, most of Shikinami's problems seemingly get resolved just because she gets paired with a guy. Yet in this short, all Kensuke does is play keyboard ... that's so much better. Where was the Asuka who could recognize this as cheap wish fulfillment in Rebuild?

It seems worth pointing out that Anno was hands off in terms of Asuka's character for Rebuild ... and this is, unless I'm misunderstanding, his first time writing her since the original. And lo and behold, he chooses to mostly write Sohryu, lamenting and lampshading a poor treatment. That seems pretty noteworthy, to me.

I'm glad this exists, honestly. It's much preferable to if it didn't. It does give me the sense of someone who can't help themselves, and is picking at scabs, but ... that ship has long since sailed.

Yes, I know, it's 'non-canon' and a gag and whatever, but it's permanently recontextualized how I take in Rebuild. Like, it's going to be hard watching the final scene and not seeing it as Shinji 'relying on the newbie.' I mean, it's hard to forget that, even in jest, the profundity of a character arc was snarked in-universe. They spent a lot of time setting up Mari as the endgame (not in shipping terms, but in get-out-of-plot-jail-free card terms) and now retrospectively she's been pegged as a hollow plot device. Like, wow. That's hard not to keep in mind, as much of a joke as it might be; there was smoke for that fire.

I never really could wrap my head around how Shinji's character gets wrapped up, and what it really means for Evas to be wished away, and how all of that pans out in terms of being, uh, anything.

Honestly, Asuka's character has more integrity in this short than anything Shinji does in Instrumentality. Yes, he jesuses and self-sacrifices and does all the ethically correct things, but he totally dissolves as a character. Boring.

Maybe this says more about me than Shinji, but Asuka's conclusions in the short strike me as far more interesting/authentic. Even if it's just a conceit for gags, the fact that she tries out a bunch of scenarios and approaches is far more organic than everything slotting into place in a smooth glide in Rebuild. Shin's instrumentality is weirdly stoic and single-minded for what's supposed to be a mind-flaying. I'm actually shocked to say that this feels like it's filling actual gaps; and in a way, I'm kind of remiss to say that, because that shouldn't be the case.

Anyway, I take the "as long as people exist" line to mean that she, as a character, persists in spite of whatever mis-steps were taken.

[Kendrix]

I mean at the end she also says that she'll "find her happiness after protecting everyone" which suggests that she sees something beyond her piloting job, too.

It's her at first lamenting her ending/ thinking she 'missed out' - didn't win everything, become the MC/get all the glory, didn't "get the boy" etc.

Like, most of Shikinami's problems seemingly get resolved just because she gets paired with a guy.

I don't see it that way at all.

Actually they get resolved because she accepts emotional comfort from others. (Not just Kensuke, but Mari)
They leave it pretty ambiguous if they're even an item, easily be read as just friends. (probably precisely to avoid "dick fixes everything" type narrative) - if you want to imagine she got a BF you can (the 'departure' scene appears to have been directed to hint at it), but it's not the essential thing & if it was it wouldn've been explicit.

The main bit is becoming able to receive/ process comfort.
The final instrumentality sequence is just the last realization at the end after the development came before.

The younger Asuka always bristled away from anyone trying to show her comfort, usually she saw it as pity & it upset her even more. Certainly when it's Rei & Shinji you have the complication that they're not very good at it & also perceived as rivals, but she has that reaction even when it's Hikari being sincere & heartfelt.
At the same time she desperately wants it, so her contradictory desires trip each other up (endless back & forth of "I want to live alone... no that's tough, someone stay with me! No fuck you go away")

She reflects on how she always had to tough it up 'cause no one's there & then the realization is that hey that's no longer the truth, here is someone there.
The puppet that was a symbol of her needing to comfort herself plopps its head off and reveals a real person who's actually been by her side for a good while now.

The "crying inner child" depiction identical to what we've seen in eps 22, 15 and 25' representing her hidden emotional needs behind her tough facade but she gets told that actually she can be accepted/ is fine the way she is WITH her emotional needs.

She actually has friends who DID "stay with her" even at her worst as a grizzled scarred damaged war veteran (rather than a promising child prodigy), at this point all she had left to do is let them in, acknowledge that she wants & likes being comforted & stayed with.

It's someone who is "stuck" in a traumatic past realizing & processing that she's actually out of the sucky situation now that she's an adult. (which allows her to actually feel like an adult, represented by her looking like one / bursting out of her "old identity")

But rather than by rejecting "childlike" things & trying over the top to be independent (like she did as an adolescent) true maturity actually comes from accepting & acknowledging that childlike, needy part. We go directly from the shot of the "inner child" finally being validated to Asuka's wakeup cut as her "true self" / looking her actual age. Representing how she actually feels mature rather than feeling "stuck".

It doesn't really hinge on anything about romantic fulfillment/fantasy in particular. But she has to give up her toughguysm/ "wanting care is pathetic" mindset, which was always a limiting belief, & that involves accepting comfort from another human person.

If you see that as identical to "getting all problems solved by a guy" (= being a pathetic damself), maybe you have some problem with counterdependence & toughguyism yourself. I mean, how are you supposed to learn to accept comfort from others... without being comforted?

In a way she was already kinda getting there when she talked to Misato prior to the Bardiel fiasco but at that point everything went to hell causing her to end up somewhat fixated on her 'last few good memories' / the point where her adolescence rudely interrupted by the apocalypse (but at that point it's all very rebuild-specific)

What's particular about Kensuke & Mari is simply that they have enough 'people sense', confidence & goodwill to actually see through her facade. (which Shinji & Misato didn't)
But that's not a pie in the sky unrealistic wish fulfillment requirement, considering lots of more extroverted fans constantly go "why don't those idiots see her need for comfort"/ think it's not that difficult to see.
Although she still has to accept it/ allow it before it can make her happy (similar to how it takes Shinji several weeks in the village before it gets into his skull that Rei, Touji & co actually care about him / breaks through his own limiting inner axiom that everyone secretly hates him)


As for the classic Asuka in the short, she seems, if anything, to be set on a similar trajectory where she also arrives "protecting" & moves past "not getting the guy" but in a way that lets her have some positive/ validating closure on it/ feel like it was her choice.


Again in the end the short is very similar to the TV ending & it's emphasis on how when you stop seeing yourself as a passive victim of circumstance & realize how much of your life is a result of choices & of who you are, it becomes easier to accept what happened in the past & have a sense of agency for the future.

Asuka doesn't act passive on the surface, but the TV ending points out she actually had that same problem of expecting what she wants to just come to her.

The rationale with which Classic!Asuka rejects all the wish fulfillment scenarios is that they "don't feel right for her" / don't seem like they're really her.
She explicitly emphasis this in the one where she gets praised by her mother & step-mom. That just... didn't happen & she'd be a very different person if it did.

I think a point/ idea here is that when you're aiming for / trying to portray a grandiose version of yourself you're also rejecting the real you & you feel shame because of that mismatch. The "sillyness" of the scenarious isn't just for comedy but also underlining how they don't feel real or solid.

She's also briefly in the role of different characters similar to how in ep 22 we hear the other characters say her catchphrases to emphasize it's a facade anyone could perform. The one where she's on the moon in Kaworu's place is a "naked people are funny" gag but trying to be in the shoes of Shinji & Rei is probably a more serious examination of her envy/jealousy of them (bit sad there wasn't a Misato segment, but I guess there wasn't time... or they couldn't get a hold of Mitsuishi?)

So the journey in the short can be seen as an exercise of trying to get a feel of what feels authentic for her.


I feel like many ppl relate to her because they share her struggles with feeling a need to be tough/counter-dependent, but then never question it & how it's shown to effectively destroy her / don't go further to see the deconstruction of those traits & treat her like she's basically supposed to be correct by default in everything she says.

Way too many fics where she basically just lectures the other characters but never really changes (other than by having what she wants handed to her by Shinji suddenly transforming into ManlyMan McExtrovert). Extra points if she's calling out ppl on "wish fulfillment" as if getting to trash talk everyone isn't also just that.

& that's just... sad? Boring? There's enough meat to her that you can deconstruct/analyze her & show her growing/learning too. But step 1 is admitting you have a problem.

(this is why I've always liked the alt live action scene, cause it really analyzes/ deconstructs her MO)

I'm seeing a lot of takes like "Look Asuka does everything right unlike those other pathetic weaklings, look at her just instantly just giving the Designated Correct Answer", without focussing/ looking at what she actually learns during the short. (or elsewhere in the story) or giving a thought to why she arrives at the answer.

[Axx°N N.]

If you see that as identical to "getting all problems solved by a guy" (= being a pathetic damself), maybe you have some problem with counterdependence & toughguyism yourself.

Eh, quite the opposite. I'm too needy and too vocal about it, if anything. I'm not saying that doesn't have to do with why Asuka speaks to me, but it's maybe coming from another angle than 100% relatability. Maybe I'm an Asuka-type with the opposite crutch?

Is the suggestion here that a single "correct" take on the short or Shin exists, and that those who come to the wrong conclusions are wrong about how they exist as people?

I mean at the end she also says that she'll "find her happiness after protecting everyone" which suggests that she sees something beyond her piloting job, too.

Yes but she seems to reject the fantasy endings as being in direct contrast to what will follow the difficult work of reality. In a way it seems to be saying, or acknowledging, that inherent to her character is a kind of independence of mind that renders any ending decided for her by a creator as being wrong, or more external than internal. It feels very meaningful that this short is essentially Asuka working through multiple boardroom-designated conclusions and voicing out loud that they don't feel right.

I always felt that the Kensuke and Mari thing, where there's intentional romantic ambiguity, was kind of like having your cake and eating it too. Yes, you can't say they threw these characters at a member of the opposite sex and called it a day ... but that's because they came up with a way to bake-in plausible deniability. It still has the effect, to me at least, or sucking the autonomy and independence out of the characters. What does it mean that Shinji and Asuka have been dressed-down of their faults, and now walk away into a cohort with a blank slate person? It immortalizes them as opposites of their prior character and leaves them blank.

And it's not just the premise of attaching them to other people. It's that they're attached to people that exist to fill that role and have little inner life beyond serving that function. It detracts from Shinji and Asuka by paradoxically putting into relief how much more fleshed out they are ... it gives the impression of a full person not recognizing a half-person construct, and what a tidy trapping they've been placed into for benefit of the viewer. It makes them seem myopic in some abstract, unintentional way. If that's way too in the weeds, another way to put it is just that they don't convince me as character pairings, romantic or otherwise.

In the short, we can imagine anything for Asuka, and what we're left with is a stubborn definition. There's very little distraction here from Asuka as Asuka. In Shin, we can imagine that Shinji will very confidently continue to flirt about boobs and maybe gets a job as a studio head. Maybe him and Mari both like Raggae. Who cares? It's a diversion from Shinji as Shinji. And that's not to say the problem is attaching Shinji to another, like you say, that's precisely how to show his growth. Perhaps it would have meant more to show him successfully interacting with regular people?

It just feels like the short is belatedly acknowledging/apologizing and course-correcting, in that the better option was to be true to the characters without needing to 'fix' them or set them up on some digestible path of 0% flaw. I mean, it has only further abstracted Shinji's ending in Shin in that it's potentially an escapist fantasy, more credibly so now than prior.

Actually they get resolved because she accepts emotional comfort from others. (Not just Kensuke, but Mari)

*snip*

The final instrumentality sequence is just the last realization at the end after the development came before.

I guess I just fundamentally disagree that enough was enough. I feel like your comment is pulling more weight here than the material itself ... which is not to say that you're wrong, and that this all doesn't exist in the material, just that I personally would have liked more connective tissue.

What's particular about Kensuke & Mari is simply that they have enough 'people sense', confidence & goodwill to actually see through her facade. (which Shinji & Misato didn't)

For one, again, I don't think Mari and Kensuke were worthwhile narrative tools. We don't know who Mari is at all, and we see nothing of Kensuke's own development journey. To say they have more people sense is comparing a trace of a character to real person. They're just two actualized people placed down by hand of god, and we're to immediately accept them as such without any persuasion. We know the faults of Asuka and Shinji intimately, but we're given a lot of material where a convincingly flawed character is guided by a non-character into saying they feel mature out loud, and then non-verbally just existing within the narrative.

As you point out, we have Asuka rip/fill her suit up to demonstrate that she feels mature (and show some skin, duh) but does she even say or do anything beyond flare her eyes wide in that scene, after that point? No, she's just talked at by Shinji, who more or less could be saying in that moment "you have matured, congrats, bye." But nothing is meaningfully demonstrated. It's all talk.

I wouldn't bat an eye if long-hair Rei had a line that was, like, "being emotionally mature is good because being emotionally mature is good."

A good chunk of the film devolves into aphorism without material representation. It gives me the feeling that, almost in complete contrast to how the original treated Instrumentality, that the tack here was sleight of hand, where abstracting things meant a vacuum was opened up to be able to then expositorily name them, and that this meant no longer having to address or fulfill any other condition back in grounded reality. And it's all seemingly motivated by desperation for closure.

The film treats it as a tablecloth pull, impressed with its own success rate, applying the trick across the board. I can't help but see it as indeed exactly like a tablecloth pull, where something surface-level has changed but, yes, the diningware hasn't changed a bit.

bit sad there wasn't a Misato segment, but I guess there wasn't time... or they couldn't get a hold of Mitsuishi?)

Given that it's Sohryu, it's also surprising there's no Kaji segment. The shot of Misato/Kaji taking the place of Rei/Kaworu does a lot of load-bearing and heavy-lifting, though, which is sorely needed.

'm seeing a lot of takes like "Look Asuka does everything right unlike those other pathetic weaklings, look at her just instantly just giving the Designated Correct Answer", without focussing/ looking at what she actually learns during the short. (or elsewhere in the story) or giving a thought to why she arrives at the answer.

But it sounds like you're more accurately describing Shin here, or at least mine and others' complaints about Shin. This is what I mean when I say the short is more authentic; Asuka rummages through her character baggage to arrive at her conclusion ... but in Shin, Shinji just magically suppresses everything that makes him who he is in order to become narratively purposeful, ethically correct, and reflective of what a roundtable of psychologists would agree he needs to become to fix everyone else, including those several times older. There was a way to draw a line between point A and point B without eliminating Shinji's character flaws, and the short, albeit through gags, at least tries with Asuka. I mean, the fact that she arrives at a conclusion that's somewhat abstract or hard to parse only affirms that it's a singular, independent decision coming from inside of her, compared to Shinji in Shin, who merely jettisons anything that informs his character to have the Correct Emotional Maturity Required for a Happy End.

You say what Asuka accepts is that she has needs. What does Shinji do in a similar vein? He doesn't seem to come to terms with anything, but instead has inner axioms magically/surgically removed.

Anyway, I feel like psycho-analyzing why a lot of Asuka fans are pleased with the short, and trying to find some troubling and worrisome indicator of their flawed persons in that is ... failing to acknowledge that maybe the short just did more meaningful character work than Rebuild allotted her character specifically.

[Kendrix]

Given that it's Sohryu, it's also surprising there's no Kaji segment

I feel like the fantasy he represents to her would have been summed up in the "being grownup & sexy" fantasy (represented her by the joke segment of her in the test suit) - plus the same "generic romance will give me happiness" fantasy.
But if the point is going to be made that she could have it if she wanted to so that the can think about whether it would actually make her happy/ is truly what she wants, that point is better made using Shinji, as he's someone she could more realistically get with.

It's building towards the conclusion of "It doesn't fit me, so I'm ok with the reality where that (& all the other wish-fulfillment scenarios of power, winning, sexyness, mommy's praise etc.) didn't happen.", so it works best if "it doesn't fit me" is the main, primary objection, ie, that the primary obstacle really is her personality & life priorities. With Kaji you'd have to consider "he sees me more like a little sister" and "he's super into Misato" before she'd think about whether or not it fits her.

She's afraid of the emotional vulnerability that would come with a relationship (while also desiring it/ thinking it will "give her happiness" in an arrival fallacy kinda way), so in the series she's stuck "between" an unavailable, but idealized love interest and one that's available, but devalued. Both setups that protect her from vulnerability, but also keep her unsatisfied.
If someone actually reciprocated she'd freak out & pull the ejector seat. That's probably what happened to the ep 15 date guy (or indeed in the "cliff date" segment in the short where she imagines Shinji acting stereotypically romantic... but yeets him off a cliff the moment the mood actually gets romantic)
She tries to get her satisfaction by trying to get Kaji "available", but she also tries to make Shinji "respectable" (eg. complaining he doesn't act manly enough or doesn't act demonstrative enough)

So "getting" Kaji & making Shinji act stereotypically romantic are functionally equivalent for the purpose of resolving / exploring her fear of intimacy/vulnerability, & as mentioned above, Shinji is more suitable for exploring the "but what if it was handed to you on a platter?/ if you could have it" question.


which is not to say that it wouldn't have been interesting to see a segment focussed on her relationships with Misato & Kaji, but, more content would always be nice & time is limited.

What does Shinji do in a similar vein? He doesn't seem to come to terms with anything

Not in the instrumentality sequence, no, but that's because he dealt with his issue (refusing to trust/believe ppl can actually like him) back in the village segment.
Rei finally getting it through his skull that ppl do like him, & the example of Touji as showing a constructive way to deal with feelings of guilt & responsibility.
The bit where Touji talks about his job & how he copes with no always being able to save all patients by trying harder to do better next time is IMHO one of the most central scenes of the movie.

It goes to what Anno often says about how ppl nowadays lack role models of "proper adulthood" or an idea of what it's supposed to look like;
He attributes it to WWII and stuff but it's pretty common in modernity (with the alienation & lack of agency ppl feel) for ppl to feel like they're just big kids well into an age where in earlier historical periods they would already have been considered "old".
This is emphasized in that additional dialogue in 2.0 where Gendo tells Shinji to grow up & Shinji says he doesn't know how - Gendo has been precious little help.
Misato & Kaji sort of try (which puts them way above Shinji's bio parents) but they got their own imposter syndrome & stuff. If you imagine what Kaji might've said instead of Touji's Doctor dialogue it would probably have looked like his speech from the manga "Yes your survivors guilt is rational people like us don't deserve to be happy".

The grownup versions of the 3 classmates are supposed to be/represent those "proper adult rolemodels". There's Touji & Hikari who have a family & conventional 'respectable jobs' & are beloved by their community, but also Kensuke who didn't follow that conventional path, but has an established place in the village because of his skills & was able to build himself a cool DIY house.

They also act like proper adults in that they don't want to burden the kids. "No, Shinji, you fought enough you can just stay here" etc. but that's precisely what eventually makes Shinji want to step up & contribute on his own impulse/accord/desire, not cause he "has to" but because he wants to.

Before you can be an adult you first have to experience what it's like to be a kid (& at that point you'll naturally want to be an adult). Whereas both the main 3 pilots and Misato & Kaji had to grow up too fast & so some part of them didn't rly have space to mature - see also how Rei gets this arc about being adopted, while the temporary amnesia/ clone gimmick lets her experience this from an 'innocent' PoV. Or indeed how Asuka needs to accept her 'inner child' before she can start to truly feel grownup / 'unstuck'.

Far from a "magic solution", "have the poor kids spend several months in a proper community with good caretakers" seems like a fairly down-to-earth & realistic resolution, especially long quiet segment of just character development in what was otherwise supposed to be a sci fi war movie.
And I mean, it's sorta based on how Anno's own friends & wife helped him recover from burnout after making Q.

Kaworu explicitly says "Oh you had already recovered in reality, not imagination".

That's actually what frees him up to spend his turn with the reality warping artifact on helping his friends & unfucking the larger world, cause his own shit is already taken care of.
In EoE he was more "grant MY desire, now!" because he was in acute pain at the time it happened.

It's a reverse how in the latter half of the series he was too overwhelmed with his own stuff to support the other characters & just didn't feel or realize that he had the agency or maturity to do it (most clearly spelled out when he hides in his room while Misato cries her eyes out)


Granted, plainly you liked the short more than the movie in terms of style/ personal taste buttons / how much it landed for you, so I realize I'm not going to talk you out of it with reasoning, liking or disliking or being emotionally moved is ultimately subjective, you either feel an emotional response or you don't; I'm glad you enjoyed the short at least.

[Asunji_Yuko]

I don't think you are supposed to read the short literally, that's not really post-EoE Asuka talking. She is a Asuka, talking with another Asuka, and they both represent in that context their respective "real" version reflecting on their journey.
The world where Asuka pilots the Eva-02 is just her original word, with everything that came from that. She reframed her reason for piloting as "to protect", but that's not really a wish to continue endlessly to pilot and fight.
That would be basically hitting the hard reset button on her entire character arc in the series back to Episode 8.

Yeah. I can see her being a self declared marshall or sheriff of sorts in the mad max wild west of post-EoE.

[Asunji_Yuko]

It's building towards the conclusion of "It doesn't fit me, so I'm ok with the reality where that (& all the other wish-fulfillment scenarios of power, winning, sexyness, mommy's praise etc.) didn't happen.", so it works best if "it doesn't fit me" is the main, primary objection, ie, that the primary obstacle really is her personality & life priorities.

Her objection had nothing to do with "life priorities." It had to do with the fact that a generic romance with Shinji just being handed to her isn't what she wanted. She would want to build a life with him on her own in that desolate landscape because it would be from her (and Shinji's) real strength and effort.

[Asunji_Yuko]

You say what Asuka accepts is that she has needs. What does Shinji do in a similar vein? He doesn't seem to come to terms with anything, but instead has inner axioms magically/surgically removed.

This is why the original Shinji and the Rebuild Shinji are obviously not the same person and there is no time loop. The original Shinji chose the same as the original Asuka, to return to the world that had angels and Evangelions, in sharp contrast to what the Rebuild Shinji decided.

[Konja7]

This is why the original Shinji and the Rebuild Shinji are obviously not the same person and there is no time loop. The original Shinji chose the same as the original Asuka, to return to the world that had angels and Evangelions, in sharp contrast to what the Rebuild Shinji decided.

I feel original Asuka is choosing to go to a World where Evangelions and Angels still exists, but I guess that doesn't fits the interpretation of other people.

About Shinji, we don't exactly know that happened to Rebuild Shinji at the end. It's always possible Mari bring him back to Earth.

If you mean they're different because Shinji repaired the World. Rebuild Shinji didn't change the past, so the Evangelions and Angels existes un that World. He just repaired the Earth so humans could survive there, since 2.0, 3.0 and 3.0+1.0 established humanity couldn't survive in the red Earth.

[DTGee]

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— twitter-user (@username) date

Is there any translation for what the notes say?

[Shun]

Short project for Eva’s 30th anniversary — 2024 10/21
A conversation between Asuka Soryu and Asuka Shikinami.
The discussion becomes meta.

[Mr. Tines]

How they did the cel-animation effect in the short

tweet-body

— twitter-user (@username) date

translation  SPOILER: Show

This time, since old and new footage were intermingled, the challenge was to minimize the sense of incongruity when switching between old and new footage.
While referencing the in-house video masters of *Neon Genesis Evangelion*, we opted for a "physical approach" rather than digital effects to completely recreate the "atmosphere" of the cel animation from that era. We traced the roots of the film actually used back then and procured actual film stock from the successor manufacturer currently in circulation that's closest to the specifications of the time, and put effort into it.
We shot and developed gray board with a film camera to create "genuine film noise material" from scratch, then "digitally duped" (high-definition duplication and digitization) and composited it.
(*Evangelion Broadcast 30th Anniversary Special Engagement* Special Effects Director Yoakira Yabe)