Possibilities and theories for NTE

[Ray]

The GoatJesus theory seems to be suggesting that the fight with Unit 13 takes place just a few months after 2.0, which creates a contradiction. That's why I think that the fight with Unit 13 has to be taking place in the "present day" of the final movie, and that Shinji will pilot again.

He said that may be a case of doctored footage ex how Shinjis choker was edited out of trailers for 3.33, he thinks what Anno did was replace Mark 06 with Unit 13 in the trailers to trick the audience into thinking it's going to be a 'return to form' for Shinji. When in reality it's going to subvert things.

See how similar Unit 13 and Mark 06 are, it wouldn't take much effort to modify the CGI model for the trailer to trick the audience.



GJ also checked this out he swapped out the lighting of Unit 01 with the spear in the daytime with a background in the nighttime, and the lighting makes a lot more sense with how the figure is shaded.

[kuribo-04]

That Eva-13 is actually handrawn. It's CG in the shot right after.

I'm just guessing here obviously, but I have a feeling the shots just actually are as they are in the film, and tgat they are playing with us in that we can't possibly figure out their context.

[ShinjiStranglesAsuka]

The Evas are real but I think the backgrounds, especially that restored Tokyo-3, are fakeouts.

[ElMariachi]

I personally think the whole "imposter Angel Shinji gets confused for the real Shinji" theory that GoatJesus created doesn't really hold up, for one main reason: the presence of Unit 13. That unit was the latest one yet in the time of 3.0, and its construction was just completed before the climax of the movie. The GoatJesus theory seems to be suggesting that the fight with Unit 13 takes place just a few months after 2.0, which creates a contradiction. That's why I think that the fight with Unit 13 has to be taking place in the "present day" of the final movie, and that Shinji will pilot again.

There's also the fact that it wouldn't make sense for Yui or Rei to spawn some Shinji lookalike imposter to destroy the world, unless NTE's big twist is that Yui and/or Rei were evil all along.

The Evas are real but I think the backgrounds, especially that restored Tokyo-3, are fakeouts.

Note that we don't know if that city is Tokyo-3, I noted in the trailer thread that there are only three solar panel towers, while Tokyo-3 had six such towers, so it's possible that this city will be another city entirely. (those supplies and manpower for WILLE must come from somewhere)

[EscapismIsBad]

Whatever is happening with that imposter Shinji hypothesis really falls flat.
People could say that 3.0 Asuka is an imposter without one eye and with angellic powers, but they don't because it doesn't make sense at all.
Sorry but the foundation of this is weak.

Note that we don't know if that city is Tokyo-3, I noted in the trailer thread that there are only three solar panel towers, while Tokyo-3 had six such towers, so it's possible that this city will be another city entirely. (those supplies and manpower for WILLE must come from somewhere)

Indeed! This is not even far fetched in NTE universe, we are pretty sure there are more than one if not various Tokyo 3 like cities and it's not like the EVAs are incapable of going to such places since we have the Wunders which can transport them (or either way, they can somehow fly).

[Ray]

Whatever is happening with that imposter Shinji hypothesis really falls flat.
People could say that 3.0 Asuka is an imposter without one eye and with angellic powers, but they don't because it doesn't make sense at all.
Sorry but the foundation of this is weak.

There’s also the “Shinji has amnesia” hypothesis. Where he exited unit 01 without Rei, piloted it to fight Kaworu, caused an impact, was trapped again and in unit 01 sent into space in the coffin. And just doesn’t remember.

[EscapismIsBad]

Hmmm, that seems better, mostly because there seems to be technology to wipe memories of people in NTE, but even then I doubt it. For some reason this seems very reminiscent of 4chan to me, sincerely Shinji single handedly causing 3 impacts himself seems very far fetched and redundant, FINAL impact would be just like: "Ehhh, it's just another Impact, don't worry guys, Shinji causes it every 14 years"

[BernardoCairo]

There's also the fact that it wouldn't make sense for Yui or Rei to spawn some Shinji lookalike imposter to destroy the world, unless NTE's big twist is that Yui and/or Rei were evil all along.

Here lies my my biggest problem with the "Two Shinjis Theory". It is just too convoluted! Look at this mess! You think that, since this is the last Evangelion movie, the team behind it would want to simplify things and focus on completing the character arcs that we are already familiar with. But, no. Some people just want everything to be much more complicated than it should be.
Evangelion was never about pure lore. It was never a cryptic show. In the end, it was all about those mundane, realistic and beautiful interactions between the characters. It wasn't purely about the "big things" that were going on. It was about how those "big things" were influencing the characters' already existing internal struggles, in addition to other stuff. The "Theory of Two Shinjis" simply fails to serve this characteristic, in my opinion (for the narrative reasons pointed out by BM4)
By the way, that's just my take on it.

[FXArmaros98]

Guys since you are talking about the crazy possibility that there could be 2 Shinji I also want to share a theory crazy enough to be a Fan Fiction: the one who pilots Evangelion 13 is actually a Shinji clone who also possesses the DNA of both Kaworu and Rei and has no soul.For this crazy idea of ​​mine I obviously got inspired by another madness present in what we could call the official FanFiction of Ikuto Yamashita: Evangelion ANIMA. Here's what inspired me

SPOILER: Show

Armaros the main antagonist of these novels in the fourth volume is revealed to be the Shinji and Evangelion Unit 01 of a previous incarnation of the world, even crazier is the fact that in the original Japanese version of the novels sold in chapters and not in volumes the voice Kaworu appears in Shinji's dream and describes Armaros as some kind of his dark counterpart.

I hope I managed to make you laugh with this post of mine

[Zusuchan]

BernardoCairo wrote:
It is just too convoluted!

While I don't believe in the "Two Shinjis" theory either, I would argue that a fear of his works being too convoluted has never stopped Anno. Even though it is the emotional relationships and the characters who were the main focus of NGE and EoE, that did not stop those works from only hinting at important plot points and introducing seemingly unsolvable mysteries, and of course there's the latter halves of NGE and EoE. As for NTE, I doubt Anno would let himself be stopped by such measly concerns. Reichu has already theorized quite a few things that will most likely be true and would serve to convolute the plot of NTE very much.

[Gendo'sPapa]

1. Anyone can make a Youtube video. Doesn't mean they know what they're talking about.

2. I feel the final film is gonna be a lot simpler and intimate to character than all the alluring "Double Shinji/They're All Adams/It's Time Travel" fan theories people have been throwing about.

[BernardoCairo]

While I don't believe in the "Two Shinjis" theory either, I would argue that a fear of his works being too convoluted has never stopped Anno.

We all know that the original series has some weird stuff in it (with regard to episode 24', in specific). However, these were not elements that damaged the core story being told. They were simply some lore related material and served only to help the EVA team to convey Kaworu's nature as a character.
Aside from that, Evangelion is a very easy to understand show, to be honest (that's a great thing). Unlike some other anime, its lore serves as a mere background to what is truly important. As I said before, it's all about how external factors affect already existing intimate problems. Just look at the three last angels! Each one was design to take the most out of each pilot internal struggles. It's not simply about the attack, but how they managed to influence the main cast instead.
In my opinion, the "Theory of the Two Shinji's" not only adds nothing to the development of NTE characters, but it also damages the entire structure of Shinji's journey throughout these movies. Therefore, it's completely different from the "questionable" stuff that we saw from episode 24', for example.

I feel the final film is gonna be a lot simpler and intimate to character than all the alluring "Double Shinji/They're All Adams/It's Time Travel" fan theories people have been throwing about.

Honestly, that's all I want hahaha!

[ShinjiStranglesAsuka]

Jokes on you when it's shown that there are actually THREE Shinji's instead.

[Zusuchan]

Oh, NTE isn't going to be too hard to understand and I think the main message we're supposed to get won't be hidden or anything (even though I would argue that a metaexploration of NGE's origins and impact is a big part of these new films) -nevertheless, the lore is an important part of NTE and while Shin will be a lot easier to understand than Q, I still don't think it will be relatively simple and nice and easy and non-convoluted when it comes to the lore behind it.

As for the lore being simply the background, I do think the lore features some interesting stuff theme-wise even in NGE and EoE and sometimes even adds to the whole "human relationships" theme of the series. I also have a suspicion that the lore will maybe be even tied to the themes in NTE.

[kuribo-04]

I'm just gonna say I'd have no issue with Shin not clearing up lots of stuff from 3.0. I like that film being the imcomprensible Hell ot is at times.

[BernardoCairo]

As for the lore being simply the background, I do think the lore features some interesting stuff theme-wise even in NGE and EoE and sometimes even adds to the whole "human relationships" theme of the series.

Yes, I totally agree! When I said that lore serves as a "background" for the main story, that was what I was referring to (that's why I gave the example of angels). I don't think the lore is disposable and I even find it very interesting. I mean, episode 7 is one of my favorites precisely because of how it balances the relationship between Shinji and Misato with elements of geopolitics and world building. However, I don't think that's the most important part of Evangelion. I simply can't see Khara's team developing an entire movie just around that, or something (I'm aware that you don't think like that either).

even though I would argue that a metaexploration of NGE's origins and impact is a big part of these new films

I agree with this too! But that's something that almost everyone is aware of by this point. So there's not much for me to add.

Jokes on you when it's shown that there are actually THREE Shinji's instead.

In fact, we'll find out that this entire timeline is just a dream... Or rather, it's all about one of Shinji's children playing with giant robot action figures while wondering how his father met his mom, Asuka (I'm obviously horsing around, please don't kill me hahaha).

[Gendo'sPapa]

I'm just gonna say I'd have no issue with Shin not clearing up lots of stuff from 3.0. I like that film being the imcomprensible Hell ot is at times.

Same. And I don't think the film will either. I think like the last three films, outside of the action scenes and the occasional short moments with other characters setting up plot devices that will play a role later in the film, the majority of the film is going to be with Shinji and what he is going through emotionally.

If it doesn't matter to the STORY (Shinji overcoming his feelings of guilt and sense of worthlithness having been rejected by his father to move forward with his life on his own two feet)and isn't necessary for the immediate PLOT (to get Shinji in a room - literally or figuratively - with his father so they can hash it out a bunch of people need to work together to stop stop Gendo from opening the magic portal) to get that story told then I imagine the film won't cover it. Maybe a casual throw out line here and there from Ritsuko to provide a smidge of context and light a thousand fan theories.

So many fan theories for the final film right now are "Big flashback exposition scene where Misato explains all that happened before" and I just keep thinking how in NGE they flat out never gave an answer for who exactly killed Kaji. It really didn't matter to the story WHO pulled the trigger only that Kaji was gone and that hurt those who loved him. People have been arguing for years that it was Gendo or Ritsuko or Misato or The Flying Spaghetti Monster who fired the gun. And I'm sure every viewer has their own head canon to argue "Why it absolutely was this person! No doubt!" But the series never gave an answer cause it doesn't matter. We know Kaji was killed by someone he knows - "Hi. What took you so long?", we know Kaji is dead, and we know it affected those around him. That's all that mattered.

[BusterMachine4]

I'm one of the people who hopes that the movie won't get too bogged down in incomprehensible BS. I'd prefer to actually comprehend the movie on my first viewing.

But on the other hand, I don't think an Episode 25-style "drop every single mystery to focus on the characters' struggles" would really work either. There are some questions that must be resolved before we can get to the conclusion. If they didn't tell us anything about Near Third Impact or the nature of the Adams, I would be majorly disappointed. Even the infamously opaque EoE included some resolution to SEELE's plans and the origin of the Angels, and Anno explicitly said he would make a more satisfying ending than either ending we've gotten before. The audio commentary for 3.0 said that the reason people don't understand it is because they haven't seen the final movie yet, and I wouldn't want that to be a lie.

PS. Was Kaji's death even a mystery? The implication that he was killed by a SEELE goon was pretty clear. I think Anno actually said that he was surprised how people took it as a mystery, and altered the scenes surrounding Kaji's death to make it more obvious what happened.

[ShinjiStranglesAsuka]

I still see posts every now and then about how Misato was ackshually the one who killed Kaji so...

[BernardoCairo]

But on the other hand, I don't think an Episode 25-style "drop every single mystery to focus on the characters' struggles" would really work either. There are some questions that must be resolved before we can get to the conclusion.

I don't think that episode 25 dropped every single mystery of the series. I mean, we were literally going through Human Instrumentality alongside Shinji. That caught me off guard when I first watched it. It actually took me some minutes to realize what was happening in those illusory scenarios. So, the mystery was still in there. It was just being explored in a different format than usual. But you're right, most of the "lore" was dropped in favor of pure character development.
Anyway, as much as I like this approach, I don't believe that anyone really expects it to be in 3.0 + 1.0. It would be too unreasonable. Especially considering that the trailers are already showing that there will be a lot of shooting and a bunch of blasting in this movie, among other things.
Personally, I would like it to follow The End of Evangelion steps. That movie has some great lore elements (we finally see what the EVA Series is all about, we learn more about the Third Impact, Unit 01 and so on). But it still manages to convey a very personal and intimate message, nevertheless. We also got a bunch of memorable scenes like Misato's death, Ritsuko's breaking down and Asuka's recovery. And don't even get me started on "Yours Sincerely". What a great segment!
Well, I'm not saying that I won't enjoy the movie if it doesn't follow this line. I am open to it! I want to see what Anno and his team have prepared for us. Nothing more than that.