Evangelion:3.0+1.0 Trailer 3 Discussion

[Joseki]

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[A Renegade Deserter]

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With all the fanarts that were made after the new teaser before the offical designs for Asukas and Maris new White/Rainbow colored Plugsuits were shown, it just confirms everyones Idea how the complete look would be.

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

October has been a great month to wake up in if you like Eva updates being the first thing you see in the morning.

[robersora]

Gotta love how they find ways to put the Slut-Suit of 2.22 to shame by alluding to Stripper gear around their vaginas. Thankfully they're actually 28 now. (jk, it's drawings)

[The_Max]

Not sure if this has been mentioned or anyone noticed... what about the train signal of Mark 10 mask? It's "no barrier level crossing of more than one railway"...

[Derantor]

Reichu's back with speculation! Her thoughts on the first few shots of Trailer 3.

[Kendrix]

I didn't realize Asuka was in the concept drawing of the room. Slumped on her side like that she looks kinda sad.
It's very much like her to insist on making sure that its clear what side of the room belongs to whom (it doesn't help that Mari has no concept of personal space)

Well, I'm glad that Asuka has not fallen victim to the "you must drop all your nerdy interests by 25" fallacy.

Kinda hoping for a detailed shot of the room where we see some of Mari's and Asuka's stuff lying around in ways that imply interesting things about them. Does Mari have photos of the many pets they were considering to give her? Does Asuka still have that hand doll lying around somewhere, or the cosmetics? I'm not expecting any of the later given the "serious, no time for any sentimentality" mood of Q, the only ones to own silly items on the Wunder are probably Mari and Kitakami.

The similarity of the shots has been read as a contrast & that can certainly be what it is, but given Gendo's words about how even WILLE's actions are "according to plan", it might foreshadow that Mari and Asuka are also going on a desperate, doomed mission - in the trailer they are fighting hordes of hostile EVAs like the mp EVA fight times a hundred.

That note about "dangerous" people is certainly interesting & could indicate the "pilot segretation theory"; Asuka might be quarantined for bardiel related reasons (see the eye glow), while Mari came out of nowhere & jacked an EVA. Asuka had that blue spike on her new plugsuit, but Mari never wears any symbol of allegiance to WILLE; She's just working with them like she once did with Kaji.
That said all the human pilots had situations in 2.0 where some techie remarked that they "wont be human anymore" (Asuka during the EVA 03 experiment, Mari when she went beast mode, and of course Shinji during the finale)

It's kind of sad that we didn't get to see their earlier interactions, particularly Misato being conflicted between "must protect 15 year old" and "can't trust mysterious person who knows way too much";

I don't think that will necessarily happen, but if Asuka & mari revealed that they're all wearing DSS chokers that would be one of the few things that would have an actual shot at getting Shinji to trust them again. That said so far there aren't many indications to support that as Asuka's interactions with Misato & Ritsuko looked pretty normal. (Complete with Asuka giving Misato the "name and rank" treatment like Misato & Ritsuko would do with each other when they're mad; If Misato has what used to be Gendo's job, Asuka is essentially in Misato's old job now as the one in charge of practical operations.)

[BusterMachine4]

Reichu's back with speculation! Her thoughts on the first few shots of Trailer 3.

Eh, I'm not really sure about that. I've never really liked Reichu's theories, because it always seems like she's reaching way too much. She takes the Christian symbolism as if it was actually supposed to mean something, even though the creators have confirmed it's meaningless. She also draws a bunch of connections between certain elements that are tenuous at best: Her theory here of "the rainbow plugsuits having X symbols on them means they're going to be sacrificed to start Fifth Impact" is especially unlikely.

Also, she uses the teaser with Unit 8+2 as evidence in her theorizing, almost assuming it's going to happen in the final movie. But from the footage we've seen, I don't think it's very likely. We've seen Asuka and Mari in action with their rainbow plugsuits, and they're clearly piloting separate Evas. I think the idea of Unit 2 being repaired with parts from another Eva was eventually changed to the cyborg Unit 2 that's been teased recently, and the rainbow plugsuits are just supposed to increase their synchronization during battle.

The idea of story parallelism between the relationships between Kaworu-Shinji and Mari-Asuka is interesting though. No matter what Reichu says, I still feel like Kaworu and Shinji had a real connection in 3.0, so it makes me wonder if they're gonna throw the yuri people a bone in this latest installment.

[Kendrix]

Ah, but isn't there a line in the trailer about how EVA 02 is going to be "modified for superposition capacity"? I think the double EVA still has a very good chance of happening.

Also "this has no Christian meaning" =/= "this has no meaning whatsoever"; Having a western cartoon use hindu/buddhist elements might not be intended to have a theologic discussion with Buddhists, but it would be drawing on common associations & archetypes. There's bound to be a meaning at least in the jungian archetypes kind of way.


I have never bought any form of evil Kaworu either & would certainly disagree with Reichu on that front; But there's a reason they had a fatal communication fail at the finale of Q, as genuine as I view their intentions to be, they're operating at different "levels" of understanding & ability to influence what's going on, & they each have their issues tied up in that; Shinji wanting badly to undo his previous error & Kaworu being frustrated that after finally meeting Shinji there's not much he can do to make him happy. (ep 24 Kaworu could cause ep 24 Shinji's problem was feeling lonely & abandoned; But Q Shinji has a bigger problem that some handholding isn't going to solve) If they were perfectly united, Kaworu would've managed to communicate his warning in such a way that Shinji gets the urgency of it, and Shinji would have listened.

I'm pretty sure Asuka is very hetero tho. We have no certain info on Mari's orientation, so I guess she could get with Nagara? They're around the same age chronologically, and Mari already calls her a term of endearment.

[BlueBasilisk]

Ah, but isn't there a line in the trailer about how EVA 02 is going to be "modified for superposition capacity"? I think the double EVA still has a very good chance of happening.

In 0706, Mari says they have parts to modify Eva 08 to be "overlapping-compatible" (she even says "overlapping" in English). It seems to be yet another reference to the Ultra franchise, where "Ultra Overlapping" is an ability that allows two or more Ultras to fuse together into a much more powerful being. The original design of Eva 08+02 seen in 3.0 has almost certainly been relegated to the outdated ideas bin since both Evas have been significantly redesigned, but the concept is still very possible. Eva 01 and the 10th Angel both fused with Eva 00, and some variations of the FoI and the Eva 04 series are made of multiple Evas fused together.

[Melkor]

I think it's more likely they'll go for the angle of Asuka and Mari being half-sisters rather than lovers. The woman next to Yui in the photo Fuyutsuki shows Shinji in 3.0 bears a great resemblance to both Asuka and Mari. I think that would make for a more interesting dynamic having them be siblings. Perhaps Asuka and Mari were living separately before 2.0 and were not on the best of terms because they have some sort of sibling rivalry where Asuka was always the "good child" that their mother showed more love and attention too, while Mari was more of the "problem child" that was often ignored by their mother. In a way, Mari might be similar to Shinji in that she wanted the love and approval of her parent, but went about it in a different way, in Mari's case purposely acting out and misbehaving, which is what some kids who want attention from their parents will often do, her bombastic and flashy personality being a reflection of that.

[Blockio]

I'm inclined to believe the Adams theory, so my guess is that they are sisters in a way, but of the more metaphysical kind

[Derantor]

Her theory here of "the rainbow plugsuits having X symbols on them means they're going to be sacrificed to start Fifth Impact" is especially unlikely.

I mean ... we already see in the trailer that another Impact is happening in some form, with Asuka and Mari diving towards it. Even without the crosses, there's very obvious parallelism going on, as you said yourself. So, to me it seems like making that connection is more stating the obvious than reaching. That Asuka and Mari are connected to the impact in some way is one of the things the trailer makes really clear. As far as I can see, Reichu's post doesn't state that they will be sacrificed, either; just that things will most likely not go according to whatever plan Wille has (which, going by EoE and Q, is also a given). That crosses are connected to impacts seems very obvious as well; the end of Ha shows a literal cross appearing in the ground, plus all the other examples in Reichu's post. (To add another one I found myself: when Unit 01 awakens during Operation US, there's a cross forming on the tesseract; the same kind of cross that appeared at Near Third Impact; the Wille-Shinji conversation alludes to the fact that something dangerous was going on during that time, and the connection via choker to impacts is there, as well). Same for the rainbows; one appears every time an angel dies. Saying that the rainbow appearing in that shot of Rei isn't random seems pretty obvious as well, since we already know that Rei is most likely Lilith. The movie is hinting at that fact through visual language.

No matter what Reichu says, I still feel like Kaworu and Shinji had a real connection in 3.0, so it makes me wonder if they're gonna throw the yuri people a bone in this latest installment.

From what I've read in her posts, she never denied they had a connection. That that connection isn't really healthy is a different matter, of course. Kaworu's plan almost caused the end of the world, and he didn't even ask Shinji for consent or inform him to the point where he could make an informed decision. The movie hammers home the point that you can't turn back time or change things by repeating your mistakes so viciously it's bordering on Anno flat out stating "Kaworu is a false hope! Don't trust Kaworu! Think for yourself, and grow up a little while you're at it!" Now that I think about it, Mari actually says that last line. Kaworu also doesn't have to be evil to do counterproductive or harmful things. You can love somebody like there's no tomorrow and still unknowingly do stuff that hurts them. Besides, even in the post on Arqa, she states that the emptiness between Kaworu and Shinji, in contrast to the bed separating Mari and Asuka, could mean that there's nothing that stands between them, so the emptiness becomes a positive thing.

I don't know, I found everything she wrote very convincing. None of the stuff in that post seems conjured up out of thin air, and again, I think it's mostly stating the obvious, supporting speculation that has gone on elsewhere as well, just at a higher level of resolution and using the visual language of the film directly.

[BusterMachine4]

I mean ... we already see in the trailer that another Impact is happening in some form, with Asuka and Mari diving towards it. Even without the crosses, there's very obvious parallelism going on, as you said yourself. So, to me it seems like making that connection is more stating the obvious than reaching. That Asuka and Mari are connected to the impact in some way is one of the things the trailer makes really clear. As far as I can see, Reichu's post doesn't state that they will be sacrificed, either; just that things will most likely not go according to whatever plan Wille has (which, going by EoE and Q, is also a given). That crosses are connected to impacts seems very obvious as well; the end of Ha shows a literal cross appearing in the ground, plus all the other examples in Reichu's post. (To add another one I found myself: when Unit 01 awakens during Operation US, there's a cross forming on the tesseract; the same kind of cross that appeared at Near Third Impact; the Wille-Shinji conversation alludes to the fact that something dangerous was going on during that time, and the connection via choker to impacts is there, as well). Same for the rainbows; one appears every time an angel dies. Saying that the rainbow appearing in that shot of Rei isn't random seems pretty obvious as well, since we already know that Rei is most likely Lilith. The movie is hinting at that fact through visual language.

Well, I was expecting the mission to not go according to plan as well, otherwise Shinji wouldn't have to intervene (and we know he will at some point). But Reichu's assumptions about how exactly it's going to happen don't really make sense to me. She implies that they're going to be absorbed into Unit 13, and uses some kind of weird ideas to support it. Like implying that rainbows denote a sacrifice, and that the X sign indicates an impact. It just feels like reaching to me. I think the much more likely role for Unit 13 is as a power source for the Evil Wunder, given that they're both awakened Adams.

From what I've read in her posts, she never denied they had a connection. That that connection isn't really healthy is a different matter, of course. Kaworu's plan almost caused the end of the world, and he didn't even ask Shinji for consent or inform him to the point where he could make an informed decision. The movie hammers home the point that you can't turn back time or change things by repeating your mistakes so viciously it's bordering on Anno flat out stating "Kaworu is a false hope! Don't trust Kaworu! Think for yourself, and grow up a little while you're at it!" Now that I think about it, Mari actually says that last line. Kaworu also doesn't have to be evil to do counterproductive or harmful things. You can love somebody like there's no tomorrow and still unknowingly do stuff that hurts them. Besides, even in the post on Arqa, she states that the emptiness between Kaworu and Shinji, in contrast to the bed separating Mari and Asuka, could mean that there's nothing that stands between them, so the emptiness becomes a positive thing.

I actually agree with what you just wrote, but I find your take to be a lot better and more nuanced than Reichu's. I understand the messaging, and I know that Kaworu and Shinji's relationship is supposed to be a doomed one. But Reichu is more fond of arguing that Kaworu is an evil rapist who doesn't really care about Shinji and just wants to advance SEELE's plans, which doesn't feel like a good take at all to me. It completely ignores several important plot elements. Kaworu doesn't know that SEELE wants, he was being manipulated. And his relationship to Shinji is clearly genuine, and based on at least some sort of love. In both continuities, he actively disobeyed SEELE's plans, sacrificing himself to save the person he loved. Doesn't sound very evil to me.

[Arcadia's legacy]

But Reichu is more fond of arguing that Kaworu is an evil rapist who doesn't really care about Shinji and just wants to advance SEELE's plans

Where exactly did you get that interpretation from? Seriously, i never recall Reichu describing Kaworu in such a manner

[Derantor]

@BusterMachine: Oh, I just paraphrased Reichu's take there, more or less. To be honest, I haven't thought much about Kaworu; he gave me "weird cultish messiah" vibes from the start and I never gave him the time of day to figure out what was actually going on. As for rainbows and crosses: well, again, visual storytelling. The rainbows appear in more than one context in NTE, as well. The rainbow plugsuits are a pretty obvious callback to rainbow-colored Unit 13 (I think that's also mentioned in the article), so in this case, it simply reinforces the parallels between Kaworu/Shinji and Asuka/Mari. And since Kaworu got absorbed into 13, and 13 absorbs that corpse of Lilith as well ... There are a lot of parallels, and NTE loves doing the same stuff over and over again. Rei got absorbed into 01; Shinji as well. Stuff constantly merges in NTE. The tenth with Rei and Unit 00 is another example. Anyway, there's still a lot missing in her article, and she said there would be detailed explanations of the concepts later on as the one given there is insufficient (by her own words).

As for 13 being the powersource for Dark Wunder: I don't think that's the case. Gendo wouldn't go through the trouble of making another Eva ready to start an impact and then simply use it as an engine. Wille uses 01 as an engine because they don't need it for anything else. Gendo wants his Impact, though. I could be wrong, but Gendo went through so much trouble with 13 that it seems unlikely to be downgraded to engine status.

(As an aside, please try to not quote the full text you're replying to. One or two lines are fine, depending on context, but blockquotes are generally unnecessary.)

[BusterMachine4]

Where exactly did you get that interpretation from? Seriously, i never recall Reichu describing Kaworu in such a manner

Well, a lot of Reichu’s descriptions of Kaworu have been unfavorable at best. I’m mainly reminded of the infamous piano thread, where she did some weird meta reading of the gay piano scene to argue that Kaworu is an evil manipulative rapist. She even said in the thread that she can’t watch the gay piano scene typically, because of how horrifically evil and abusive she thinks Kaworu was being in that scene. At some point, it just becomes bad faith character bashing.

[Arcadia's legacy]

When was this thread written? As what you're describing seems considerably different to her more recent analysis i've seen on this forum, at least from my memory

[BusterMachine4]

And as a response to Derantor, I think the idea of Unit 13 being the Evil Wunder’s power source is actually pretty plausible. It mainly resides in my personal interpretation of Gendo’s character. Mainly, I think that his goal for Instrumentality is very different to SEELE’s, and that the previous Impacts were never intended to be Gendo’s true goal. They were just meant to be concessions to SEELE, making them think he was going along with their plans. But in reality, Near Third Impact and Fourth Impact were actually designed to allow Gendo’s vision of Instrumentality to become true.

The Impact most relevant to our discussion, Fourth Impact, was intended by Gendo to make two things happen: Give him an excuse to get rid of SEELE once and for all, and awaken Unit 13. This isn’t even speculation, Gendo literally says this after Fourth Impact was stopped. The reason why he wanted to awaken Unit 13, in my opinion, was so he could power the Evil Wunder. This mirrors how Unit 1 was used as the Wunder’s power source after its awakening, and the mirroring probably has some sort of purpose for Gendo’s plans. Maybe his vision for Instrumentality involves activating all 4 Adams? I don’t know yet.

When was this thread written? As what you're describing seems considerably different to her more recent analysis i've seen on this forum, at least from my memory

From what I remember, it was written some time in 2019. I remember it using pretty loaded anti-Kaworu language, which made me absolutely convinced that Reichu is biased in her interpretation of his character.

Merged double post. -Derantor

[Mr. Tines]

From what I remember, it was written some time in 2019.

Did you mean this one?