Art by Zair-dacorus, 'lettering' by Author0fntent.
Mana Kirishima just wanted to be a normal girl. She never had any desire to be a super heroine. But fate had other plans for her, and she'll be forced to face some of the most dangerous forces in Tokyo-3. Fortunately, she's got a secret weapon.
Superwomen of Eva 2: Girl of Steel
by Mike313 is a Superwomen of Eva story starring Mana Kirishima, from the Neon Genesis Evangelion video game Girlfriend of Steel.
Hired by Yamagishi Enterprises, brilliant robotics expert Hazumi Kirishima moves to Tokyo-3 with her equally brilliant daughter, Mana, who is enamored with the various superwomen and idolizes Power Girl in particular. Tragedy strikes, and in response, young Mana dons the Powered Armor they've been working on and becomes Tokyo-3's other Girl of Steel.
Tropes:
- All There in the Manual: the Light of the Divine doesn't really seem all that bad in this story, bordering on becoming
Unintentionally Sympathetic, as we initially only see their responses to the person in Powered Armor trashing their places of worship. - Anonymous Benefactor: Mana picks up one of these. It's Mayumi Yamagishi, Batgirl herself.
- Apocalypse Cult: The Light of the Divine makes a major appearance here. As a Red Herring subject to Bewildering Punishment.
- Arm Cannon: In the Steel suit. It fires rivets.
- Arms Dealer: The High Prophet of the Light of the Divine pays one a visit after Steel's rather violent debut.
- Battle in the Center of the Mind: Bardiel vs. Mana.
- BFG: The BG-80 "Toastmasters."
- City of Adventure: Tokyo-3 is definitely this. In addition to Steel, Power Girl/Supergirl, Wonder Girl and Batgirl are all confirmed as present (and only Wonder Girl has yet to appear), putting this story at the second highest superwomen count (at four) in the series.
- Clothes Make the Superman: In the form of Powered Armor. It comes with the usual Flying Brick power set, Flight, Immune to Bullets and Super-Strength.
- Convenient Coma: Narrowly avoiding Death by Origin Story.
- Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Inverted. If NERV wanted Kirishima's technology so badly, why didn't they bother just trying to buy it or hire her with the obscene budget that they canonically have?
- Darker and Edgier: Girl of Steel does involve repeated Cold-Blooded Torture (just off-screen), Metallo's Sense Loss Sadness, and a protagonist who is unwittingly attacking the wrong group, only to end up having to go into hiding.
- Energy Absorption: One of Mana's two hammers for her second suit can do this via a so-called "S2 battery."
- Even Evil Has Standards: Chiron, a Professional Killer who has no qualms about Cold-Blooded Torture, Wouldn't Hurt a Child. At first, anyway.
- Flash Back: Section Two Chief Chiron finally gets some backstory (not to mention a first name).
- Improperly Placed Firearms: Tokyo-3 seems to have a shocking number of illegal firearms on the black market. Girl of Steel adds cancelled military prototype BFGs available on Tokyo-3's black market.
- In Name Only: Aside from name and general appearance, Mana has pretty much nothing in common with her Girlfriend of Steel incarnation. Moreover, her origin story and initial motivation as Steel bears no resemblance to any version of the DC character by that name.
- Let's You and Him Fight: Variation of the trope in that all of the superheroines are (mostly) amiable to each other, so the one moment so far where the situation escalates into a full-on clash of the titans is when Bardiel takes over the Steel suit, forcing Batgirl to face off against it (and buy time for Mana to regain control).
- Mid-Season Upgrade: Mana's second suit definitely qualifies. One of the reasons why Batgirl "hires" Mana is to design one for her Batsuit.
- Morality Chain: Subverted. It looks like Sato is going to be this to Chiron when he protests the death of a scientist he's interrogating, but he's only protesting because it's going to make their job of hunting down the Steel suit harder.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Ritsuko has one of these moments. It doesn't seem to last.
- Mythology Gag: In case it wasn't clear, the titular main character of Girl of Steel debuted in a game called Girlfriend of Steel. Fittingly, over on the Marvel-ous side of the Superwomen of Eva fence, Mana's alter-ego is another instance, considering an alternate title for the game is Iron Maiden.
- Police Are Useless: If they weren't, Mana wouldn't have donned the Powered Armor to begin with.
- Poor Communication Kills: After the Wham Episode, if someone would just tell Asuka what NERV's been up to, the plot would fall apart rather quickly.
- Pragmatic Adaptation: The BG-80 "Toastmaster" plot was heavily truncated and underwent some significant changes, necessitated by it being a subplot for a fourteen-year-old girl already on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge, rather than the Call to Adventure for The Atoner Gentle Giant Badass Normal Gadgeteer Genius retired weapons designer.
- Ray Gun: For some reason, the BG-80 "Toastmasters" were changed to this. While the comic art could be seen as this, the description of John Henry Irons as a "ballistics genius" makes it almost certain the original weapons were conventional ballistic weapons, just really powerful ones.
- Roaring Rampage of Rescue: Why Mana first puts the suit on.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Why Mana keeps putting the suit back on. Too bad she fell for the deception by the real culprits.
- Secret Identity: Mana's first suit of Powered Armor conceals not just her face, but also her voice and apparent age and gender.
- Shaped Like Itself: After an explosion, Mana has this thought:Oh, now I know what it feels like to be...something that endures a lot of explosions.
- Sweet Polly Oliver: Despite the title, there is nothing remotely feminine-looking about Mana's first suit of Powered Armor. The second one, on the other hand...
- Shout-Out:
- In chapter 9, Mana's testing of the new boot jets for Batgirl's suit borrows extensively from Tony Stark's boot jet test in the first Iron Man movie (ironically based on a character from DC's 'Marvelous Competition'). She even says "Yeah, she can fly." And in the Omake of the chapter, the Iron Maiden version of Mana attacks her because of "copyright infringement".
- Mana donning the Batsuit could also be seen as a small nod to Cyclone's Superwomen of Eva: Legacies: Batgirl Beyond, where Mana herself is Batgirl.
- Mana donning the Batsuit could also be seen as a small nod to Cyclone's
- In chapter 9, Mana's testing of the new boot jets for Batgirl's suit borrows extensively from Tony Stark's boot jet test in the first Iron Man movie (ironically based on a character from DC's 'Marvelous Competition'). She even says "Yeah, she can fly."
- Supergirl Stays Locked Out of the Loop: Neither Batgirl nor Mana provide the full information about the conspiracies surrounding NERV to Supergirl, because they assume that she will jump the gun to try to take it out, and will unwillingly make things more difficult for everybody (especially Batgirl's investigation, so she is the most vocal proponent, although Mana agrees because she does not wants to know what may happen if she shatters the pedestal that Asuka has for NERV).
- Wham Episode: When Section Two finally identifies Mana as Steel and attempts to steal the suit and arrest/kidnap her.
- Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: The resources and manpower available to the Light of the Divine stretches Willing Suspension of Disbelief when you consider their manifesto.
