In Part 3 of the epic writeup for the first of the epic new Evangelion movies, Our Hero Shinji got punched in the face by friends, then epically defeated Rio from Rio: Rainbow Gate! in an epic battle of epic proportions.  There was all that stuff about him epically not crushing his friends, too... and by friends, I mean "people who punch Shinji in the face."  But now, now we begin with the post-battle debriefing.  And by debriefing, I mean...

...punching Shinji in the face.  Misato's kinda upset that Our Hero disobeyed orders  ("recover your friends and retreat") to kill Rio, and as she berates him, he just sits there going "yes."  Until, in his Shinji-like way, he quietly points out that he won.  At which point, she yanks him to his feet and prepares to jam his teeth down his throat... in friendship!

In anticipation of making a new friend, Our Hero smiles.  Y'know what?  Our boy Shinji here, he's a little tetched in the haid, he is.  Maybe all that being punched in the face has permanently rattled his marbles, maybe he's just a masochist, or maybe he craves attention... any attention... and this movie is deeper than we all could have possibly thought.  When Misato doesn't hit him, he walks away, boards a train, rides it until it doesn't go any farther, walks around for a while...

...then gets shanked in a dark alley and wrapped in a cardboard box.  The Angels will now win, the Earth is doomed, and we'll all die screaming.  Dammit, Misato, next time just hit the kid!  The next day, he wanders around some more until he comes across some of his handiwork... a destroyed highway, probably caused when he tripped over it or something.  He complains loudly that he wants to go back to NERV, and...

...the people who had been following him immediately spring into action.  It's pretty clear he knew they were there.  Maybe he wanted them to punch him in the face?

Back at NERV HQ, Our Hero complains that he doesn't have any freedom, but he'll pilot Unit-01 anyway because everybody wants him to.  Misato says "pshaa, whatever, it's your thang, do whatchawannado," and leaves him sitting in the dark.  'Bout time someone stood up to his whining.

Meanwhile, Gendo Plushyferret sits in his office and chuckles conspiritorially.  It's all going according to plan, a plan "written 14 years ago."  The next step is to get Our Hero closer to Teh (hot blue-haired) Rei.  OVER MY DEAD B... did I say that out loud?  I did?



Even Teh Rei seems a bit put out by this decree, and really, who could blame her?  Get closer to Shinji?  Really?  The only good part about that is the whole "punching him in the face" thing.  Well, that and we get to see more of Teh Rei onscreen.  Really, in this reboot of the franchise she gets the best reimagining.  Shinji doesn't whine as much, but dear god in heaven that's not saying a lot, but Teh Rei gets an entire personality.  Winner: Teh Rei (and us)!  Oooh!  Flashback time!  As we already knew, she's also an Eva pilot.  In fact, she was the pilot of Unit-00, the Eva prototype.  She has no recorded background: all her files were erased.  But you may remember that the first time we saw her, she was injured.  Here's how it happened (imagine everything getting foggy and wavy and people going "boodily-boop boodily-boop" in the background)

Apparently Unit-00 is like a fratboy after a bender.  Massive headaches, uncontrollable body movements and a hatred for authority figures.  In other words, it isn't responding to Teh Rei at all.  Which means that Unit-Fratboy apparently hasn't looked at its pilot.  Did I say that out loud again?  All power is cut, the emergency ejection device spits the Entry Plug out via rocket motors, and after taking a few punches at Gendo Plushyferret (who is standing behind ballistics glass, curse the luck)...

...Unit-00 decides to dig its way out of the test chamber by headbutting the wall.  Repeatedly.  I'm liking the "Fratboy" appellation more and more.  There is a certain technique to both throwing and receiving a headbutt so you don't actually hurt yourself, y'know.  I knew how to dispense a headbutt, but I never did quite learn how to take one... at least, I don't remember if I knew.  I'm also not sure how my nose got all crunchy that one time...

After all the fratboying ends and Unit-00 passes out, wrapped around the toilet, Gendo Plushyferret comes running down, pries the hatch off the Plug with his bare hands, losing his glasses in the process.  His concern for Teh Rei does not go unnoticed, though I'm sure it's strictly a business relationship.  Of course.  Nothing to it more than that.  End flashback, and Our Hero is running routine tests in Unit-01, and... oh dear.

Teh Rei fairly skips over to Gendo Plushyferret, acts all girly in front of him and actually giggles.  Gendo smiles back, and Shinji is left wondering if his father would pry him out of an ejected Plug with his bare hands.  Or, for that matter, show him any affection at all.  Maybe punch him in the face?  Look, Plushyferret didn't get to be head of NERV by being an idiot.  He's a cold, calculating bastard, but he's not an idiot.  If you had to choose between Shinji and Teh Rei, which would you pick?  Little known use for an EVA unit: spycam pics.

After a long day of keeping the world safe for people to punch Shinji in the face, Misato and NERV's chief scientist Ritsuko go have a drink at some underground bar.  Get it?  Underground?  It's funny because it really IS underground!  Ahem.  Ritsuko is one of the major changes between Eva, the anime, and Eva, the movies.  In the anime, she's a major secondary character, one who has quite an effect on the ultimate outcome of the series.  In the movies, her role is somewhat less important: as she leaves the bar, Ritsuko gives Misato Shinji's new ID card Teh Rei's renewed one, and asks her to deliver them.  Ladies and gentlemen, Ritsuko Akagi!  Being the hard-worker Misato is...

...she immediately foists the job off on Shinji, who takes the card to Teh Rei's apartment, which falls on what one could call the "bad side of town."  And by "bad side", I mean "derelict" and "possibly crushed under Angel carcass."  It needs a visit from the complex's maintenance crew, is what I'm saying.

Inside, it isn't much better.  No furnishings of any real import, a blood-stained bed, lots of old bandages in the garbage can, that sort of thing.  It doesn't look run-down, it looks depressing.  The one little bit of excitement in the whole place is the plot point on the dresser, which I've kindly made sure is clearly visible in the picture above.  He walks over, wondering where Teh Rei is, see's they are his father's glasses (as mentioned in the fratboy incident above), and puts them on... just as Teh Rei comes out of the shower.

Not that I expect any of you were interested or anything, but this is the way I go through life when I don't have my trifocals on... that is, at least, if whatever I'm looking at is more than six feet away.  Except for the fresh-out-of-the-shower Teh Rei, that is... I'm relatively sure that I've never had that in my line-of-sight.  It'd make for an interesting life if it was, though... I'm at work, blurry naked anime girl over in the textbooks.  I'm driving home, blurry naked anime girl standing on the hood of my car.  Having dinner at Stone Eagle, blurry naked anime girl eating a salad at the next table over.  I suspect that after a while, the novelty would wear off.  I don't know how long it would take, however.  I'm willing to experiment, though.  Oh, and speaking of experimenting...

...it's not what it looks like.  She walked in, yanked Gendo Plushyferret's glasses off of Our Hero's face, hijinks ensure, and down they go.  She, having all the emotional level of a piece of sod, just says "get off," and Shinji does.  Then he gets up.  (ba-dum-tssssssh!)  After she gets dressed, it's off to NERV for the two of 'em... a trip filled with awkwardness and an overarching sense of stupidness on the part of Our Hero.  Then, finally...

She slaps Our Hero so hard his face winds up splashed across half of Japan.  At this point, there are two things that need be said: 1) He deserved it; and B) I'm disappointed... we now have total proof that she likes him: she's punched Shinji in the face.  I'm sure the more astute of my readers have been wondering just exactly why the two of them went to NERV HQ instead of school.  Turns out there's a really good reason for that.

The world's largest eight-sided die has shown up, and it's heading straight for... um... the place where people punch Shinji in the face.  Nobody knows anything about it except that it'd probably hurt like the dickens if Unit-01 stepped on it.  Well, there's only one way to find out what it can do, and that's to send Our Hero up to fight it!  "Recon by stupid," I believe it's called in the military.  As it turns out, the Octahedron of Doom does have a secret weapon stored up one of its vertices.

It's a big ol' layzer!  It begins to burn through the outer skin of Unit-01, NERV command raises a blast shield up into the beam's path... until the Triangular Antiprism of Terror cranks it up a notch.  A BIG notch.  Really BIG notch.

All the LCL in the cockpit begins to boil, Shinji does his best impersonation of a can of soup.  I wonder... does this count as punching Our Hero in the face?  Or are energy beams right out?  Realizing that Shinji is about to discover what it's like to be a lobster, Misato orders that the entire city block Unit-01 is standing on needs to have its explosive bolts blown for emergency recovery.

...and as Unit-01 descends into the gizzard of NERV HQ, we'll draw a curtain across this installment.  Next time, the conclusion!  And more zombies!  And a dead Shinji!  We'll see you then!

Posted by: Wonderduck at 09:57 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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