A girl (Asuka) stands upon a projection of the bridge.
MAN:“Attention flight deck. A U.N. helicopter is landing.”
Kendrix: And here she is, the last of our four main characters, the third of the main ladies and nr. 3 out of four love interests. Like most of the characters she has a story entirely of her own, but at the same time is a symbol in Shinji's story and the web of contrasts and symbols of the story as a whole.
Additional Commentary
Kendrix: As far as Asuka is concerned, that's first and foremost "difficulty of coexistence" and "eros".
1. Eros - as in sexual drive, puberty, lust, sex etc. but also vitality, excitement self-preservation, strength, dominance... something Shinji isn't always really in touch with.
You know how in Norse Mythology there is a reverse Adam and Eve, the last two humans leftover after ragnarök, the first in the new world - the man's name is "life" and the woman's is "desire to live". (Editor's note: The names here are reversed. The woman's name, Líf, means "life", the man's name, Lífþrasir means "Líf's lover; lover of life; desire to live.")
This is probably why she comes in somewhat later compared to the rest of the main cast, as a "foreigner". She represents the excitement of new, strange feelings, and perhaps the fallacy that the grass is greener & the girls hotter on the other side of the fence.
2. Difficulty in coexistence - At this point we'd already introduced the motif of the hedgehog's dillema as a theme, and almost all the characters have some difficulties connecting somehow, but Asuka is sort of the distilled avatar of that, leading up to that scene in EoE where she becomes a standing for all people difficulty.
The most difficult possible person for Shinji to get along with. For this ep and half of the next it stays pretty straightforward: She's just generally abrasive and fastidious, and they are forced to work together. She's the exact clashing opposite of Shinji, someone who wants to be a pilot, loud and assertive where he is meek and quiet.
Note later how in a lot of his inner dialogues, she is sort of the voice of self-hate, or of what youtube philosopher Natalie Wynn has termed "masochistic ontology"("The truth sometimes hurtshurts, so I, a person with low self esteem, conclude that what hurts must be the truth") Actually, the outer dialogues too, she is constantly dissing Shinji and pointing out his shortcomings. She talks over him, she calls him an idiot, she takes offense at his successes.
But if she stayed as simply a hostile rival, that would be too easy in a sense, let him tune her out when his great weakness is worrying too much about how people think about him.
So as the story advanced we'd get more into two aspects of human conflict that Anno finds especially salient - a) the frustration with needing ppl & getting attached to them in the first place (eventually they will lust for each other 'cause they're horny, stick together because they're lonely, try to get each other's attention etc.) and b) the possibility of you yourself hurting others, by your mere existence (the higher synch ratio etc.) or because of mistakes (feeling he couldn't help/save her)
They are people who reacted very differently to similar sort of adversity; From Shinji’s side that inherently calls into question his view that he is “forced” to be as he is. From her side, he’s difficult in part cause he reminds her of the parts of herself that she hates or doesn’t want to admit, particularly that very needyness and yearning for approval.
There's many ppl - especially ppl who skipped EoTV - that overlook the big, significant plot element and in a sense adopt Shinji's framing that he's to blame for everything, when the whole point is that this is his framing.
The three main ladies/ love interests are each designed to hit universal appeals that we all have but also universal follies.
Ie, this isn't a "who will win" soap opera but it's about being torn between the various forces that act on the human psyche, competing drives, contradictory wishes.
- see in eps 18 and 25' about the inability to completely grasp another or fit them into a simple role or archetype. (ie, Misato is unlikely to be a viable option but the "hot teacher"/"celebrity crush" experience is one most of us have growing up)
I know there's people who see this differently but as I see it it's important to stress the complexity here, that neither of them are "all good" or "all bad", Sadamoto describes Asuka and Rei as tying and yang once while discussing their designs.
They're indeed opposites even in their color palettes (red hair blue eyes vs blue hair, red eyes),
Asuka is a conventionally attractive, loud, confident, attention grabbing person
Rei is unkempt, quiet, sad with little sense of presence
Asuka Rei
Sun Moon
extrovert introvert
Body/instinct Spirit/mind
lust/physical love spiritual/idealized love
"Eros" "thanatos"
vitality sterility/ lifelessness
resistance resignation,
defiance fatalism
self-interest abnegation
(both selfishness (both selflessness and self-abandonment)
and positive self-assertion)
excitement, novelty,risk calm, security, peaceful
Pain in interaction Hope of Understanding
Misunderstanding Communication
artifice genuine
tangible, material ephemeral, ethereal
life death
I would not at all add feeling/intellect however - that's Misato & Ritsuko (as well as optimist/cynic)
Another thing worth noting is that Asuka can be seen as a twist on the slot, role & development of “The Rival” – Many Shonen protagonists have this one teammate who is super competent, better than them at everything, often more popular, rich or extremly gifted, who often has a similar backstory tragedy that they deal with differently, an opposite personality and a contemptuous disdain for the hero that morphs into envy when the MC eventually beats them.
Except that a) she is an attractive girl, which makes her disses hurt in a more personal way & while she gets some slapstick kick moments her treatment of Shinji is played very seriously especially later on… and b) Shinji does not act like a rival at all. He’s too conflict-averse to compete, and he certainly does not pull a Naruto and try outdo her with plucky optimism or hard work (he hates being good at piloting, & his gifts are probably entirely down to his particular neuroses and his mother’s plot, not any work or control on his part)
The gist of the story ends up thinking that Asuka thought she was in a fair skill based meritocratic system, but she’s not – she’s an exploited child soldier, a tool being worked until she breaks, and the world she lives in is uncaring and unfair.
Probably very relatable to many who had “stage parents” or were considered “gifted children” & then had this trauma of building their whole identity around that when they were just big fishes in small ponds being failed by the system. Eventually there’s always a bigger fish, someone with an unfair advantage that you cant just beat with hard work...
