Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone

Part of a series of articles on the Rebuild of Evangelion movie series Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone Evangelion 2.0: You Can (Not) Advance Evangelion 3.0: You Can (Not) Redo Evangelion: 3.0 + 1.0 Thrice Upon a Time

Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone is the first film in the Rebuild of Evangelion movie series. It will premiere in Japan on September 1st, 2007.

Shinji on the telephone after arriving in Tokyo 3

Remaining battery power timer running down

Misato at a bar with Ritsuko (not shown)

Ramiel heading toward Tokyo 3

A brief shot of Kaworu

Overview

Evangelion 1.0 will be an alternate retelling of the original Neon Genesis Evangelion series, covering material up to the battle against the Angel Ramiel in Episode 06 of the original series. Evangelion 1.0 very faithfully recreates many scenes from the original series, often shot for shot, but with better animation quality, using modern digital animation technniques.

Plot Summary

Shinji arrives at Tokyo-3 just in time for the attack of the Angel Sachiel. Shinji is forced to pilot Eva-01. Eva-01 goes berserk and defeats the Angel. Shinji becomes an Eva pilot, alongside the mysterious pilot of Eva-00, Rei Ayanami. Shinji runs into problems in school with Toji, but after defeating the next Angel Shamshel, Toji likes him more, along with his friend Kensuke. Another incredibly powerful Angel appears, Ramiel, who nearly kills Shinji with its powerful beam attack, then proceeds to drill down into the Geo-Front cavern below. A plan is developed to defeat it by using all of the electrical power of Japan to power up an experimental giant positron laser which Eva-01 will snipe Ramiel with while Eva-00 supports. Ramiel easily repulses attacks by all conventional weapons but eventually succumbs to Eva-01's attack.

Meanwhile, in the final scene, the camera pans up from the end of the battle with Ramiel and zooms in on Earth's Moon. On the Moon, a line of what appear to be coffin-like boxes is on the lunar surface, with a giant stain of blood intersecting the landscape through the middle of the row of boxes. Out of one of these rises a nude Kaworu Nagisa, who begins talking to Chairman Keele's Seele 01 "sound only" monolith communicator. Behind them on the Moon appears to be a secret Seele base, with what appears to be Lilith restrained behind them in a pit covered with scaffolding. Kaworu says that he cannot wait to meet Shinji "again"...

Similarities between Rebuild and Original Series

The following scenes from the original series are recreated almost shot-for-shot in Rebuild:

• Toji beating up Shinji
• Etc.

Differences between Rebuild and Original Series

• Nerv and Seele now have new logo designs:
  • Nerv's new logo has the word "Nerv" extending out of the left-hand side of an upside-down apple, with the old motto "God's in his heaven, all's right with the world" either coming out of the right side of the apple or below the word Nerv. The fig leaf from the old Nerv logo is retained, now superimposed onto the apple.
    • However, the original Nerv logo is still used on various equipment throughout the film. Apparently both the old and new logos are used by Nerv, though the new logo is more prominent and used on ID cards, etc.
  • Seele's new logo incorporates the old logo, a triangle with the seven eyes of Lilith on it, with an apple inset inside of the triangle with a snake coiled around it. Written on the middle of the Seele apple is the phrase "Überm Sternenzelt richtet Gott, wie wir gerichtet," which is taken from lines 71 and 72 of Friedrich Schiller's original poem Ode to Joy. This translates as "Above the starry canopy, God judges as we judged".
• Evangelion Unit-01's design has several minor changes, including a slightly different chest plate design and shoulder pylon shape, as well as having more green stripes in its paint scheme than it did in the original series. Evangelion Unit-00's color scheme is also different: instead of being solid orange, the bottom half of its body is colored white, while the top remains orange.
• Sachiel and Shamshel's designs are more or less identical to their designs in the original series, though updated with better animation.
  • Sachiel's blood is now red, when in the original series it was blue.
  • In the original version, Shamshel had eight insect-like legs beneath its head, which locked into position and did not move. Shamshel's new design has ten insect-like legs beneath its head, they are a bit longer, and constantly twitch back and forth convulsively. Shamshel now has a Sachiel-style bird-skull on its back (note that so did Gaghiel in the original series). When Shamshel died in the original series, its entire body just went limp, allowing Ritsuko's science teams to study an almost fully intact Angel. In Rebuild, Shamshel explodes in a shower of blood, leaving only its energy-whips impaled into Eva-01. In the original series, recovering Shamshel's damaged core allowed Nerv to eventually produce their own artificial S² Engines, which led to the destruction of Evangelion Unit-04 during an activation test, and ultimately were used in the Mass Production Evangelions. This raises the question of how Nerv will be able to produce artificial S² Engines if Shamshel's was destroyed, and thus they could not recover it.
• The Angel Ramiel also appears in Rebuild, and at first its design seems identical to the simple tetrahedron shape it had in the original series. However, it soon displays incredibly metamorphic capabilities, capable of instantly shifting into a bewildering array of geometrical designs (stars, pinwheels, etc.) While Ramiel's core was never seen in the original series, as it is internal, Ramiel's core is made visible in Rebuild during several of the alternate forms it morphs into. Ramiel also vocalizes much more in Rebuild, making several whale-like sounds, howling in pain unnaturally when it is injured.
• When Eva 01 screams as it goes berserk for the first time, unlike in the original version, a cloud of condensation visibily exits its mouth, reinforcing the effect that the Eva is actually a living breathing organism.
• Unlike in the original version, in Rebuild when Shinji goes to school and walks into class for the first time, he keeps his SDAT audio player's headphones on, "tuning out" socially interacting with the other students before he even walks in the door.
• The flashback to the incident in which Evangelion Unit-00 went berserk, resulting in Rei's injuries at the beginning of the story, is introduced a little differently. In the original series, it was first brought up when Shinji sees his father's burned hands when he is inspecting the core of the dead Shamshel. Because Shamshel leaves no corpse in Rebuild, this entire scene in the research tent doesn't happen. Further, when Eva-00 went berserk in Episode 05 it just punched the window Gendo was standing behind, while in the slightly reworked berserk incident in Episode 14 (caused by the mutual compatibility experiment with Shinji) Eva-00 stopped punching the window (which Rei was behind) and proceeded to bash its head into the wall. Because its probable that the events of Episode 14 won't be adapted into Rebuild (it was basically just a clip show), in Rebuild when Eva-00 goes berserk in flashback, it punches the window Gendo is behind, then proceeds to bash its head into the wall as it did in Episode 14, essentially combining the two berserk incidents into one scene.
  • Misato actually grabs and physically pulls up Shinji, after his defying her orders in the battle against Shamshel. Shinji running away after her rebuke.
• In the original series, Shinji having to deliver Rei her ID card at her apartment was set up by a humorous scene in which Ritsuko comes over to Misato's apartment for dinner, dressed informally. The dinner is really bad because its really hot and spicy insta-food curry that Misato made, and Misato comically gets really drunk, then teases Shinji about having an excuse to see Rei. In Rebuild, this has been replaced by a more subtle scene between Ritsuko and Misato in the restaurant they go to that offers a good view of the "ceiling city" (the underside of Tokyo-3 hanging from the top of the Geo-Front). Ritsuko gives Misato the card, who then gives it to Shinji later.
• "Operation Yashima", the final battle against Ramiel, is expanded a great deal in Rebuild. In the original series, Shinji's first shot from the positron rifle interacts with Ramiel's energy beam, causing both to warp and miss. Ramiel's second blast is deflected by Eva-00's shield, while Eva-01's next shot hits Ramiel and destroys it. In Rebuild, conventional military forces are used against Ramiel to try to distract it from the Evas, but Ramiel easily zaps missiles closing in on it from all directions and then completely levels a mountain an artillery battery is located in. Eva-01's first shot actually does hit Ramiel, but due to Ramiel's extreme toughness, this doesn't kill the Angel: it just shapeshifts again into a star-pattern and fires a shot which nearly fries Eva-01 and deals considerable damage to the mountain the Evas are based on. Shinji manages to crawl back to the positron rifle, just as Ramiel fires a second shot. However, Shinji is shielded from Ramiel's second beam attack by Eva-00, holding its shield, and Eva-01's second shot with the positron rifle kills Ramiel, whose body then explodes in a hail of blood.
• When Shinji has to save Rei from Eva-00's superheated Entry Plug at the end of the film, he doesn't just pull it out as in the original series, but actually has to use his progressive knife to pry it open.
• There's a lot more product placement in the film, though its nothing particularly gratuitous: Yebisu beer and UCC Coffee have returned, but there's a lingering shot when Shinji opens Misato's pantry and it's just filled with "junk food", and its full of "Doritos". This was apparently part of cross-promotion with Doritos, as to promote the film in Japan for a limited time Rebuild of Evangelion characters appeared on Doritos bags.
• In what has garnered a fair amount of publicity, because Rebuild of Evangelion is a movie series, not a TV series, there's much less censorship and therefore there's a lot more nudity. Little has been outright changed, but for example, in the original series when Shinji and Rei are in the pilots' locker room changing into their plug suits, there's a partition between Shinji and Rei, so both Shinji and the viewer just see from her silhouette that she is naked while she changes. In Rebuild, the camera actually shifts angles so its on the other side of the partition, and viewers see Rei fully naked as she changes. Her physical motions are pretty much what they were in the original series, it's just that they're not trying to artfully hide it anymore. Further (and this is a matter of some concern for a number of fans) in the original series, naked people weren't animated with nipples, as this probably would have upset the censors. That's just the style they used to animate naked people. Notably, in the original series' film, "The End of Evangelion", they did animate Rei with nipples when she was naked. In Rebuild of Evangelion, probably because it is also a movie, characters are actually animated with nipples, and its a lot easier to see because the animation quality is better. Further, in the original series (including the movies) Eva pilot plug suits are supposedly skin tight, but they don't have a "wet t-shirt" effect because there are various plastic bits over the breasts. In Rebuild of Evangelion, there are no such plastic sections and Rei has a full-on wet t-shirt effect when she wears her plug suit.
• Misato's rank is now "Lieutenant Colonel". In the original series, she was initially a Captain, and then promoted to Major in Episode 12. The rank structure of Nerv in Rebuild, however, hasn't really changed because of this as Misato neither outranks nor is subordinate to anyone in Nerv different than she was in the original series. So far it just seems to be a slight cosmetic change.
• The Angel numbering system has been altered - Sachiel is now the "Fourth Angel", Shamshel the "Fifth Angel", and Ramiel the "Sixth Angel", when in the original series Sachiel was the "Third Angel", and so forth. Presumably the numbering of all later Angels will be accordingly shifted up one. It has been theorized that this is because Kaworu is being counted as the "Third Angel" (given that Seele already knows about him), but this is pure conjecture and actually might be discredited by later revelations.
• Misato is now fully aware that Lilith is being held inside of Nerv HQ, and correctly identifies her. In the original series, Misato didn't know Lilith was being held in Terminal Dogma until Kaji revealed it in Episode 15, and even then, both of them thought she was really Adam. In Rebuild, Misato already knows about Lilith, and further, she knows its Lilith and not Adam. Misato actually shows Lilith to Shinji before Operation Yashima to encourage him to fight Ramiel.
• Lilith's design has been altered so she has the mask of Sachiel - When Misato shows shinji Lilith in Terminal Dogma, it does not have the purple triangle "seven eyes of God" mask it did in the original series...though Seele's new symbol in Rebuild still incorporates the triangle-with-seven-eyes symbol into its new design. Instead, Lilith's mask is shaped like the "bird-skull" mask of Sachiel. The hundreds of white feet sticking out of the stump of Lilith's torso are present once again, but with improved animation quality: they look a lot creepier, and additionally they constantly twitch convulsively. A new element is that Lilith now has a diagonal scar across her chest, with crucifix-shaped nails around the edges. Further, Lilith is already impaled by the Spear of Longinus, while in the original series she was not impaled on it until the end of Episode 14 (off screen). In the original series, Gendo and Fuytusuki had to go to Antarctica in Episode 12 on a mission to retrieve the Spear: they've apparently already retrieved in in Rebuild.
• There's a second "Lilith" revealed in the final scene, being excavated in Seele's Moon base. This "Lilith" does look like Lilith from the original series. This "Lilith" does have the original series' purple mask with a triangle intersecting holes for its seven eyes.
• Whenever the ocean is seen, it is curiously colored red now.

The Final Scene

What has generated a large amount of fan speculated is the cliffhanger final scene of the film: the movie cuts from the normal ending of the Ramiel battle, and shows one final scene on Earth's Moon.

On the Moon, a line of what appear to be coffin-like boxes is on the lunar surface, with a giant stain of blood intersecting the landscape through the middle of the row of boxes. Out of one of these rises a nude Kaworu Nagisa, who begins talking to Chairman Keele, who is communicating using his "Seele 01 - sound only" monolith. Behind them on the Moon appears to be a secret Seele base, with what appears to be Lilith restrained behind them in a pit covered with scaffolding. This Lilith, unlike the one Misato shows Shinji, actually looks exactly like the one from the original series. Kaworu says that he cannot wait to meet Shinji "again..."

There is a lot of speculation about what all of this means. On the whole, it at least seems that the film's creators were trying to ease fans back into accepting a new, altered version of Evangelion by making the first film and almost shot by shot recreation of the original story, but in the last scene turn this on its head, and effectively warn fans to expect big changes to the plot of this new series.

Soundtrack

• Hikari Utada's song "Beautiful World" is the main theme for the movie.

Notes

• The first trailer for the film was released online on July 13th, 2007