FGC:Episode 02 Scene 06

Reichu: Pfft. So much fuss over mere articles of clothing! These things should be no more unsettling (or mystically alluring, for that matter) than boxers, briefs, or, heck, even jock straps would be to a woman.

Sharp-kun: I pity Pen² in this shot.

Reichu: Non-humans are blissfully indifferent when it comes to matters of sex. I doubt it makes any difference at all to Pen² whether his roomies are nude or not. (It never did to the conure I used to shower with.)

tv33: And they say anime girls are too thin. They must not have been feeding him at his former teacher's home.

Reichu: Well, many adolescent boys have the bad habit of being ridiculously thin regardless of how much food you put into them.

Hexon.Arq: It's probably for comical effect that he is so thin. If he were as well-developed as he appears later on, this scene wouldn't be as funny. There'd be more hooting than laughing… none from me, of course.

Shin-seiki: Ah, but you fail to take into account that Acute Penguin Reaction Syndrome is not uncommon among the Japanese (at least in anime :P ).

Hexon.Arq: This is one of those things that makes me think they just wanted to allow the possibility for the series to not turn out quite as solemn as it did. The tones of this show can seem like patchwork at times. Was that intentional, or were they just toying around with "feels"? Either way, it worked.

Keisuke-kun: He couldn't have been so shocked that he forgot he was naked… could he have?

HeWhoPostsStuff: Well, that's sort of the whole concept behind "comic nudity," that for the character in question it isn't really even an issue (until the dreaded last-second realization, that is), despite all the undue attention he or she gets for the duration of his or her state of undress.

Hexon.Arq: Perhaps the experiment was to develop a penguin-shaped killing machine?

Reichu: I never really thought of comparing the two before… Interesting. Any speculation about exactly what Pen²'s 'backpack' is for, anyway?

Dr. Nick: A jet pack, maybe? Imagine the possibilities…

Mr. Tines: My guess is that it is, if not exactly life support, something that helps match the bird and his environment. Of course, if we take the manga ex-lab-animal origin, then it might be something connected with whatever experiments he was subject to.

Hexon.Arq: That living set is nicer than my room.

thewayneiac: Well, what do you expect? He's a V.I.P. (Very Important Penguin).

Reichu: I know a bird who's given me that look on more than one occasion…

HeWhoPostsStuff: Ah yes, the infamous "toothpicks" joke… I guess this is why Misato didn't seem particularly perturbed by this incident.

Hexon.Arq: I did enjoy this joke the first time I saw it, but I have to say this is one of the most overrated moments of the series. "Oh, I hope they put the toothpicks thing in the movie!" Pfft!

Reichu: This is one of perhaps two "wild takes" in the entire show (both performed by Shinji). All things considered, I'm surprised it's that many.

Reichu: To obscure the details of their nudity, of course!

Keisuke-kun: And does that flashback hint that he actually made the association between Rei and the girl he saw on the street? Realizing something like that would really freak me out.

Reichu: As wayneiac pointed out, Shinji doesn't seem to react to things the way a normal human being would — for example, being more frightened of a 4-foot penguin than a 50-meter green-eyed humanoid monster. Regardless, he does seem to have made the Girl on Street = Rei connection, on some level anyway.

HeWhoPostsStuff: I wonder what this wonky b/w pattern thingy is supposed to be. A lunar surface shot…?

Mr. Tines: It looks like the Mare Orientale. As we know, Rei is repeatedly associated with the Moon (More). Though why they'd picture a feature just barely visible on the limb beats me. (However, had the Moon rotated an extra 90° before settling down, Mare Orientale would be one to make the moon look like the Eye of God.)

Reichu: AHHHH ANNO'S MESSING WITH OUR MINDS AGAIN!!!

Reichu: I think he knows more than he's even willing to fully admit to himself.

Keisuke-kun: Just what the hell is the stop signal plug for? Can we assume that if the entry hole isn't constantly filled it will close up like a wound? Regenerate? Has this ever even been speculated on?

Reichu: Tying back to the extensive entry plug comments from the previous episode… I'm pretty sure that there has to be some kind of internal cyborg-ish implant to receive the entry plug, an artificial cavity of sorts, and that they don't just stick it straight into the Eva's raw thoracic cavity.

Sharp-kun: Another possibility is that it is a sure-fire way to prevent the Eva from moving. As a living being, it's still possible for an Eva to move with no plug (as we'll see in episode #05); the stop signal plug perhaps negates that possibility completely. Evas are unpredictable, and they perhaps don't want to take the risk of activation.

Reichu: Indeed; "stop signal plug" implies that it serves a… well… a stopper in the nervous system, to prevent the gap in the Eva's spinal cord from being bridged by the Eva herself. Granted, there do seem to be ways around this (as Shogouki demonstrated in the last episode), but no system is perfect.

HeWhoPostsStuff: I tend to think that Ritsuko is implying "While you were there, you DID stop to see your son, didn't you?" Which, of course, he had no intention of doing.

Reichu: Amazing how, without any power being supplied to their muscle tissues, Evas are able to hold poses flawlessly for months at a time. (Wait… Didn't I already rant about this?) Notice here how EVA-00's right arm is going through the wall; as you might remember, we saw her hand on the other side in the previous episode.

This is perhaps one of the only times where Ritsuko sounds like a human being and not the cold, scientific bitch that she is normally. Maybe someone else wants to go into it more, though.

OMF: Actually, rewatching this scene, I was struck by how the dialogue, tones and silences here make it clear that this is something more than a purely professional conversation. There is an undertone of intimacy here—rarely felt where Gendo is concerned—though mostly stemming from Ritsuko's side of the conversation.

Mr. Tines: With regards to the bakelite, this is one of my friction points. Call the stuff "unobtanium" and I'm happy. Call it after something real, then it should be like that stuff — and Eva bakelite isn't. Real bakelite is "cured" from the liquid precursor under heat and pressure, and in its pure form is very brittle. The brownish bakelite that made up the insulators of much early-mid 20th century electrical equipment is actually resin-soaked sawdust, with the wood fibres providing the strength. This makes it pretty much unlike the pour-and-set stuff that Nerv uses. That said, I just mentally replace the references to it with something appropriate to the context.

thewayneiac: Ah, but you see, Nerv is using special bakelite!

Keisuke-kun: Regarding "Shin-chan", Japanese have a habit of taking one or more syllables off a name and adding -chan. Like "Nakano-san", a girl at the Japanese school I attended, was called "Nacchan".

Shin-seiki: Somehow ADV turned "Shin-chan's Room" into "Shinji's Lovely Suite" in the old (pre-Platinum) version.

Reichu: Interestingly, this music piece was originally intended to serve as Asuka's theme music! But, for whatever reason, her theme ended up being the country-style B-16 (which we heard the "sans fiddle" version of a moment ago), and A-2 was demoted to having one SDAT cameo

thewayneiac: DAT players certainly exist. It means digital audio tape. I suppose that SDAT is an improvement on that: "Super Digital Audio Tape." They play audio tapes where the information has been digitally encoded, as opposed to standard magnetic tape, which is analog. They never really caught on here, but I've heard that they were popular in some parts of the world.

Reichu: That's interesting… The SDAT is actually referred to simply as "DAT" in this episode's script, but I suppose they had second thoughts and decided that the technology would advance just a little in 15+ years. ;;> Honestly, considering the kind of technology NGE has, even a Super DAT seems like a prehistoric relic.

Soluzar: Once again, current technology has already advanced past the "future" of NGE. You wouldn't accept anything using tapes as a free gift these days.

Treize X: You would think they'd heard of compact discs.

thewayneiac: I'm sure it must mean something that Shinji's SDAT player is always shown as playing tracks 25 & 26. Perhaps it is anticipating the importance of those episodes from the beginning.

Shin-seiki: The fact that we always see Shinji listening to the SDAT player represents how he tries to shut out reality and exist in his own little world. See more.

The Eva Monkey: Matt Greenfield of ADV proposed the idea that Shinji is shown listening to tracks 25 and 26 because he is viewing his life externally from within Instrumentality. It's an interesting idea, but I don't think it's really applicable, primarily due to the fact that the TV ending was supposed to have been like EoE, rather than the Instrumentality episodes that tie well with the theory.

Hexon.Arq: I suppose Matt's comment also led to the argument that the TV ending "feels" more valid than the films, or, as I've learned to see it, the ending ADV doesn't sell. ;)

OMF: Ritsuko's choice of words here is rather morbid, given the irony bomb ticking since 073. She may have also mentioned it to Gendo, a man with few scruples, for whom such things have worked well in the past. He's probably approved it.

Reichu: This suggestion fits in quite well with what Anno himself has said about Misato: "…a 29-year-old woman who lives life so lightly as to barely allow the possibility of a human touch. She protects herself by having only surface-level relationships, and running away."

Reichu: I also find this interesting, in that Misato has literally devoted her life to "avenging her father", yet, now that her vengeance is being achieved (by overseeing the slaughter of the Angels), she feels no satisfaction from it.

Incisivis: Yeah. I guess that Misato, like a lot of people, doesn't really have an idea of what will make her happy.

Reichu: This scene also serves to prove that, yes, Misato's breasts are 100% natural.

Keisuke-kun: Natural, as opposed to…?

Reichu: Silicone. ^_^; Breasts augmented this way apparently float in water (fat floats, but not like this!), which you can see in "Austin Powers" when Alotta Fagina gets in the hot tub with Austin…

HeWhoPostsStuff: If that's the case, maybe it's a hint as to the nature of the "nerve contamination" thing…