Neon Genesis Evangelion

I don't think the Rei clones were anything more than mooks and that everything in Nerv is likely done by machines.

And technically Gendo knew his son and his stubborness pretty well, and specifically wanted him and Rei to bond in order to manipulate him. Manipulating Kaworu was easy enough considering Kaworu considered himself close enough to Shinji to call Gendo father in 2.0.

Still, there are so many variables in that plan of his that is even one thing goes wrong, his entire scheme is foiled.

Plans that cannot afford to fail should be as simple as possible.

x2 I won't deny WILLE working out the way he wanted was likely bs, but for everything else I can see it working just because he knows those people well enough to expect their actions.

This is Eva, where a bunch of old men seek an overcomplicated way to turn everyone into tang/strawberry juice to live forever.

It may seem overcomplicated, but how do we know that it's not so? For all we know, they really had no choice but to do it the way they did, other than follow even more risky/unreliable courses of action. It's strongly implied that they need all of the Angels to be dead before instigating Human Instrumentality, probably because they could easily interfere with the process and derail it horribly. And then there's the implication that Seele's international political capital is a precious resource that they can't afford to squander without good reason, rather than a practically infinite pool with which they can drown any dissent within the UN and the national governments under their sway.

Just found this gem: Gendo and Kaoru's parenting skills.

everything in Nerv is likely done by machines.

Okay, and who does keep the machines working? Other machines? When the machines that do maintenance on the machines need maintenance, then what? Who put together all those machines for Gendo in the first place? None of this was ever part of SEELE's plans, so it's not likely they did it either.

technically Gendo knew his son and his stubborness pretty well

But this is BS on itself, Gendo never spent any time with Shinji and didn't know him well at all. He certainly didn't predict his initial reaction to being told pilot the EVA, or when Shinji left NERV (both times). And Misato didn't give him any psychological reports on Shinji after he moved in with her, and other than her, there was no adult he spent any decent measure of time with then.

edited 16th Mar '15 6:32:18 PM by NapoleonDeCheese

You know, canonically we know that Rei is 145 cm tall in the TV series (and Shinji seemed to be just as tall), and in Rebuild Asuka is given the height of 157 cm. Does anyone know how tall Mari looks compared to Asuka or Shinji?

Only the last image is not broken on my end.

edited 16th Mar '15 8:09:12 PM by MarqFJA

I can check the parachute scene tomorrow to see how she compares to Shinji.

That scene probably wouldn't be a good/helpful indicator, given that at no point do they stand upright next to each other, or even have simultaneous full-body shots next to each other (even in composite).

Well, never mind then. I can't remember if 3.0 has a scene with both Mari and Asuka on screen at the same time.

Nope.

Well, what about official artwork and promotional materials?

Crossposting from the Rebuild thread:

Cast interviews from the Q premiere just got translated into English for the first time. Of note, Kaworu's seiyuu may or may not have confirmed the time loop/cycle theory.

So what do you guys think about the recent WMG given in the Rebuild section? To copy/paste it:

"The Reason Final is taking so long to come out:

Is the writers have no idea what they are going to do with Shinji. If they punish him for his actions then they destroy Eva's message that it's okay for you to exist and you can be happy. If they have Shinji be happy, then it trivializes that his choices and actions have caused the deaths of billions, and makes him a Karma Houdini."

Or the more likely answer is that they want to make us suffer and force us to wait and wait until we're all spooky skeletons.

That and Anno is notorious perfectionist who needs to make the movie perfect...

edited 30th Mar '15 12:17:59 AM by GAP

... Then why didn't he make the previous three movies "perfect", then? Or are you saying that they are "perfect" by his standards? If 3.0 is what he considers "the perfect third entry in Rebuild of Evangelion", then I seriously question his mental health and suspect that someone has replaced his meds with placebos.

edited 30th Mar '15 2:25:30 AM by MarqFJA

@Interview: I couldn't help but laugh at the insistence of her Seiyuu that Asuka would find happiness.

Or because, like they've said, they aren't going into full-blown production on Final until the animator expo is over.

Ehh. The way I see it, there's more myth about Anno then there is Word of God. Perfectionist, probably. Depressed - but somewhere between getting better and getting worse - I think so, but there's next to no way to judge that objectively. Troll, a bit but not nearly as much as everyone plays it up to be. And I think that makes it hard to pinpoint what's going through his head, how he's thinking about the last film.

Even considering that, I think he just wants the nightmare to be over. He'll try and get the most personally enjoyed work out the door, which may or may not be what the fans expect, but even then he's stuck writing for a huge, rabid fanbase that will lynch him if the landing isn't an 8 or up, and that will influence what he'll consider for the movie whether he likes it or not. That'd be a pretty stressful experience.

Considering how they delayed the production on it till earlier in March, I wonder if they are holding off on working on the next film for as long as possible.

On another note, one popular theory I've seen floating around is that Rei's soul is inside Shinji's SDAT player, as it was the only thing that was retrieved with him, and when he brought it to Neo-NERV, that's when Rei Q began to have visions of her former self. With Rei Q now bringing it along with her as she's following Shinji and Asuka (complete with a near shot-for-shot scene of when Rei II retrieved the discarded SDAT in 2.22), this does bring up some interesting implications.

What say you?

Now that is an interesting theory.

Sounds too weird to be true.

May still happen though.