Sachiel displayed on the monitor (the two men in front).
He turns to face the screen.
Ikari (OFF):“It's an Angel.”
Reichu: ("Aa, machigai nai." & "Shito da.")Gendo's extremely casual demeanor is apparent as soon as he enters the stage. Although my knowledge of Japanese is somewhat limited, Gendo definitely gives me the impression of someone who is in control and under control. His speech is very informal (considering Japanese is a language inundated with honorifics), but it's also very simplistic — Gendo says no more than he has to, never louder than he has to. I am really not much of a Gendo fan, but I must profess: I'm a big fan of Fumihiko Tachiki's performance. The more I hear it, the more I appreciate its subtleties. Not to mention he has a great voice.
Sharp-kun: Not to turn this into a debate on the merits of the subbed/dubbed versions of Eva, but I find what Reichu says here on Gendo's voice to be very true, and something that was lacking in the dub. ADV Gendo was given a more “evil genius” type voice, which doesn't work as well.
Magami no Er: Gendo's voice also seems to convey a certain tone that accentuates people's names. Think of the way he says, "Shinji", "Rei", "Yui", "Fuyutsuki", and, in the movie, "Akagi Ritsuko-kun".
Reichu: That's an interesting observation. Now that you've pointed it out, I'll never be able to listen to Gendo without noticing. ::D
Additional Commentary
Kendrix: Ah, at times I'm rather envious of the Japanese writers, their language gives them so many tools to characterize both their characters and their relationships to others just by having them say some sentence.
On the point of Sachiel... I like these little scenes that hint at the Angel's intelligence/as monstrous or mechanical as they look... here, he seems to be looking at the camera, like he's aware of the tiny humans watching him... which is proven right when he later decides to shoot down cameras.
TheUserName: So how does the monitor work exactly? Orbital satellite perhaps, relaying signals back to Nerv HQ for a direct visual feed?
Reichu: Sometimes they receive feed from satellites, but they also have a number of cameras set up on the ground. In #25', you can see these feeds get sabotaged one-by-one by the JSSDF. Sachiel looks especially cute in this shot… although he looks suspiciously thin about the waist when he spins around.
