FGC:Episode 01 Scene 07

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Screenshots	Cut #	Description/Dialogue	Commentary
	247	Ikari ascertains the situation. He faces the monitor and speaks. Ikari:“Fuyutsuki.”	TheAtomicWaffle: Gendo's expression looks rather sad in this shot, strange for a man like him. OMF: I always took Gendo's expression here to be one of regret and, dare I say it, remorse. He is, after all, the primary reason Shinji is such a wreck. Reichu: To me, this looks more like an expression of, “You disappoint me, Boy.” :shrug: Sailor Star Dust: Given what we discover in EoE, Gendo's expression (it's in the eyes) strikes me as remorseful too. Could be a mix of disappointment and remorse, of course. No need for either/or.
	248	One of the monitors replaces Shinji with Fuyutsuki. Ikari:“Go wake up Rei.” Fuyutsuki:“Can we use her?” Ikari:“She isn't dead.” Fuyutsuki:“Understood.” The display changes once again.	thewayneiac: (“She isn't dead.”) Well, that gets my vote for the most cold-hearted line of dialog in the entire series. tv33: This says a lot about Gendo. Even someone he at least likes more than his average puppet is expendable if it mean getting one step closer to his goal; everything is secondary to its completion. HeWhoPostsStuff: Or maybe he says it like that in order to make Shinji feel even more sorry for Rei, to further persuade him to take her place and pilot EVA-01? Reichu: Good ol' psychological manipulation, eh? HeWhoPostsStuff: Or, as everyone else seems to think, maybe he is really just a gigantic SOB. :D But I figured I'd attempt a guess at a more practical reason as to why he'd talk about Rei like that, especially after his having dramatically saved her from the overheated entry plug not long before…
	249	Shinji on the monitors reflected in Ikari's glasses. Ikari:“Rei.” Rei (OFF):“Yes?” Ikari:“Your spare is unusable. You will do it again.” Rei (OFF):“Yes, Sir.”	HeWhoPostsStuff: I think he might be doing it again here: note the language, “unusable”. He probably knows that that word will hurt Shinji a lot… and also makes sure to mention that Rei will “do it again”, making it clear that she has already done this, while Shinji refuses to comply even once. Then, of course, he wheels her in…
	250	Ritsuko:“… Reconfigure EVA-01's system to Rei. Restart!”	Reichu: Doh! They forgot Ritsuko's lipstick in this shot.And Shinji has apparently gone into “Silhouette Mode”…
	251	The Cage. Ritsuko and Misato walk away, leaving Shinji standing alone. Ibuki (Announcement - OFF):“Roger. Suspend the current operation. Begin reactivation.”	Reichu: Here is one of those minuscule details that you can miss if you're not watching closely: Misato is hesitant to leave Shinji's side, but Ritsuko takes off without a second thought. Keisuke-kun: Starting with this cut, the Renewal version of this scene is different; EVA-01's eyes “shutoff”. Apparently even the Eva lost faith in Shinji. Reichu: Very interesting… Although would that mean her eyes are supposed to be closed now? For some reason, that seems a little odd, considering the stunt she pulls presently. Or perhaps not — there's reason to think the Evas don't actually need their eyes for perceive their environment. (For one thing, the harpies get along just fine without them.)
	252	BGM START: A-1 [Rei I] Shinji becomes depressed Shinji (MONO):“I knew it.” (Insert: Young Shinji) Dejected, he lowers his head. Shinji (MONO):“…I'm not needed after all.”	thewayneiac: Does that mean he wanted them to put more pressure on him? First he insists that there's no way he can pilot the Eva, then he's upset when they accept that and send for Rei. He wishes they had continued to pressure him to pilot, so he would feel needed. OMF: I don't think just any pressure would do, though. Acknowledgement, of any kind, from his father was what he was ultimately looking for. Dream: Very appropiate that the Rei 1 theme starts here, in a way we are all replaceable aren't we?
	253	An intravenous drip bag moving through a corridor. The sound of casters.	MDWigs: Is that LCL?
	254	A bedridden girl, bandaged and wearing a plugsuit. It is Rei.	HeWhoPostsStuff: Seems a bit odd that Rei would already be ready and dressed in her plugsuit in her condition… or did she just never change out of it since the incident which injured her? Eww… In the manga it makes sense, since in that she'd already been piloting EVA-01 earlier, but here she hasn't done that. Reichu: Yeah, it does seem a bit odd that they'd be able to dress her up so fast on such short notice, unless, of course, she'd been lying around like that beforehand… Which wouldn't make any sense, since I don't think they were expecting to make her pilot. HeWhoPostsStuff: In all honesty, I wonder whether they were even really planning on having Rei pilot, and really only intended to use her as a “living guilt trip” to get Shinji to agree to do it… thewayneiac: These two notions aren't mutually exclusive; he could be trying to shame Shinji into piloting, but still be willing to use Rei, even in her condition.
	255	Shinji standing in front of the Cage gate as the door opens.	Incisivis: (253~293) Then, of course, Rei arrives. My ideal position on Shinji's strength of character is not to go to extremes, for either “victim” or “bastard”. Shinji may have taken the Eva out of compassion, but such compassion might contain Shinji's self-devaluation at work, automatically considering anyone more worthy than himself, and thus Rei's suffering is less justified than his. Of course, this could also be taken one step further and state that if not for his neurotic self, Shinji might not do anything compassionate at all. But I'm going to keep my Shin-fan cred intact and just go for something more neutral. :) Reichu: This makes me wonder about the layout of Nerv HQ. Shinji and the others had to cross all that coolant by hovercraft to get to the left side of the Cage, but Rei and her caretakers just have to take an elevator to get to the right. HeWhoPostsStuff: Maybe they were just keeping the “Port-a-Rei” purposely nearby in case of just such a situation, rather than taking her all the way to the med wing?
	256	The bed is pushed down the bridge towards him.
	257	Rei passes in front of Shinji.	felineki: Silhouette time! Doot-doot-doo-doot-doo! HeWhoPostsStuff: “Hmm, a shapely black silhouette… Ah, I remember you, you're the gal from the opening sequence!”
	258	Rei being transported.	Xana: The Goddess of bandages makes her big entrance! in bandages.... Actually, I couldn't think of any better way to introduce us to Rei, this was the perfect way to do it; seeing her lying on a bed injured from the very beginning gives her this aura of fragility which she maintains throughout the show and which is totally fitting for her; most viewers would feel pity and would want to grab her and protect her; most, I said. thewayneiac: No, she's not dead — just half dead. Does anyone have any idea whether Shinji recognizes her as the girl he saw on the street? Reichu: Given the amount of staring Shinji does in this scene, he's either (A) swamped with eerie feelings of déjà vu, (B) in love, or (C) some twisted combination of the two. Additional Commentary   HeWhoPostsStuff: To carry on my toot from earlier in the commentary, I'd say he's shocked at her condition, rather than any of the other things mentioned. Maybe he's also shocked that dear ol' Dad would resort to such a brutal form of blackmail to get him into the Eva. Also,note that Shinji doesn't ever ask her “Did I ever see you before I came to Nerv?” or otherwise bring the appearance up, to himself or others, any time in the series… though one could think up any number of other reasons for that aside from my crackpot idea. Reichu: There could be any number of reasons for this. It will be apparent in the next episode that he does, in fact, make the connection between “girl on street” and Rei, on some level of consciousness or another. tv33: Rei looks remarkably calm all things considered — but this is Rei, after all. Reichu: And even in her semi-crippled state, Rei manages to maintain a figure worthy of fanboys' salivation.
	259	missing number
	260	The bed stops and Shinji stares at it.
	261	Rei picks herself up with great difficulty.	Someone: Where are the nurses when she needs them? Reichu: It is interesting that the medical personnel didn't give Rei any help whatsoever… (Perhaps they were instructed beforehand not to; the more suffering Rei goes through, the more likely Gendo's ‘guilt trip’ tactic would work.) Around 269 in particular, one REALLY has to wonder where the hell they've gone to; they've literally disappeared from the set. Sharp-kun: Perhaps they aren't allowed too long near the Evas? Reichu: Oh, p'shaw… The Evas would just be giant robots to them. I bet they just left because the doctor had some unruly plans for the nurses.
	262	Acute pain warps Rei's face.	tv33: Oh, I can't watch! thewayneiac: At about this point, most audience members change their opinion from “Tell Gendo where to go” to “Pilot the thing already!” Reichu: They certainly do emphasize Rei's physical pain here, don't they? For some reason, though, it never made me feel particularly sorry for her. Probably a combination of the melodramatically melancholy piano music and the fact that, well, Rei and I never really got along. Xana: I'm in pain when Rei's in pain. I always admired the way Rei's so determined that she wouldn't refuse to fight even if she were dying and falling apart. And here I thought going to school with a mild headache would kill me
	263	Shinji watches helplessly. BGM END: A-1 [Rei I]	OMF: This shot really shows something important about Shinji's character. Despite his own misery and self-pity, Shinji hates to see others get hurt. He's really quite compassionate. Reichu: Only if by "others" you mean "anyone under 40 meters in height"...
	264	Aboveground, Sachiel. The holes in his face light up.	Reichu: [cough]Recycled animation![/cough] And recycled thumbnails, accordingly.
	265	Sachiel standing on a mountain overlooking an urban area. A pillar of light rises from the buildings.	felineki: The lights going out as an effect of that explosion is a nice detail.
	266	The pillar of light breaking through into the Geofront.	HeWhoPostsStuff: Does this mean that Sachiel can “aim” the cross-shaped explosions to go either “up” or “down”, or that both “ends” of the explosion always have that shape? If the latter is true, then the explosions really wouldn't be “crosses” in the classical sense of the word… more like a sideways letter “H”. Reichu: Well, as long as you only see half of it, it's a cross. ;;> But, hmm, that's a good question… Gainax probably didn't think about it that much. It's an explosion, it's big, it's pink, it's cross-shaped — what more do you want?!?! HeWhoPostsStuff: Well, what are we fans here for, if not to ask questions that would make Gainax's staff do the “bang head on desk repeatedly” thing if they ever heard them? :D
	267	Nerv Headquarters. Buildings from the ceiling of the Geofront come falling down, raising spouts of water and clouds of dust.
	268	The Cage shaking.
	269	Rei slips off her bed.
	270	Shinji falls onto his butt. Glass being broken and various other loud noises.
	271	Provisional lights on the ceiling become detached.
	272	Misato leans forward. Misato:“Look out!”
	273	As the lights fall directly overhead, Shinji brings his arms up.	HeWhoPostsStuff: Ah, another anime cliché to add to the list, the “totally black slo-mo background”, always there right at the “crisis moment” wherein it's needed to provide that extra dash of dramatic cheesiness. Reichu: Yeah, the only thing missing was putting Misato's “Abunai!” (“Look out!”) in slow-mo, as well.
	274	Out of the blue, the Eva's arm emerges from the water's surface
	275	It comes in beneath the falling lights.
	276	The lights ricochet off.	Reichu: At least those knuckle dusters are good for something.
	277	They fly up towards the booth where Ikari is.
	278	The lights split open. They fall apart, revealing Ikari.	thewayneiac: Ikari has a lot of confidence in his shatter-proof glass. The lights fly directly at him and he doesn't even flinch. MDWigs: He has nerves of steel. HeWhoPostsStuff: Well, considering that that same type of glass (presumably) has previously shielded him from much more threatening assaults on his person (as we'll see in a future episode), methinks a batch of lights wouldn't shake him too much… Reichu: I love that smug smile… obviously directed at Shogouki. HeWhoPostsStuff: Methinks that's the point when Gendo “really” knows he's gonna win as long as he can get Shinji into EVA-01. He knows for sure that she's willing to fight even if Shinji isn't, and that's all he needs for now… and for most of the rest of the series, really.
	279	Shinji peers out between his arms and looks up at his father. One by one, the lights can be heard falling into the water.	Shin-seiki: Well, now we know where Anno got the idea for C-080 of the OP…
	280	The Evangelion poised as if protecting Shinji. The workers are confounded. Worker B:“The Eva moved!” Worker C:“How could it!?” Worker D:“It wrenched off the restraints on the right arm!”	Keisuke-kun: I'm more curious about how she freed her arm. If EVA-01 lifts her arm up, the shoulder pylon should move back.(Though I swear Gainax has made a bunch of animation mistakes on this matter.) Problem is, they are in restraints that are a lot bigger and encase the entire shoulder pylon all the way around, not just in the back. Reichu: I'd surmise that by "restraints" here, they mean the actual pylon, not the plates surrounding it. Keisuke-kun: Plus, how do they get the arm down later? Reichu: Nerv seems to be fully equipped to transport entire Evas in even the stickiest circumstances. Fixing one arm back into place should be a fairly simple matter.
	281	Ritsuko, having fallen onto her butt. Ritsuko:“Impossible!! The entry plug hadn't been inserted!” Woman (OFF):“No abnormalities in the startup system!” Man (OFF):“Interior nerve connections not confirmed.”	Reichu: The more I stare at EVA-01's thumb in this shot, the weirder it looks.
	282	A distressed look of disbelief. Ritsuko:“It shouldn't have been able to move!!”	Reichu: “No way! A 50-meter-tall humanoid with an enormous brain and a complete human soul shouldn't be able to think for itself, let alone move of its own accord! Heaven forbid!!!” Sheesh, what a control freak. Sharp-kun: Well, it's not plugged in. ;) thewayneiac: (280~282) You can tell from the big deal they're making here that this will mean something important later on.
	283	A surprised Misato picks herself up. Misato:“It reacted without any interface…” She comes to a realization. Misato:“Or was it protecting something?”	InstrumentalityOne: So, she didn't fall on her butt from the explosion, but (harhar) from Shogouki lifting her arm? Really goes to show how massive that thing is.
	284	The Eva's arm hanging over Shinji. Misato (OFF):“—Him?”	felineki: “Gwwaarrr… head itches… can't… reach!!” Or maybe she's saluting… Sharp-kun: That pose is actually very awkward to be in. EVA-01 is very flexible, it seems. Reichu: Not to mention something called “muscle fatigue” seems to be unknown to her… With her resilience, Sho would be a big hit in the nude model business. On another note, one of the fun things about showing NGE to new people is to see how fast they can figure things out. I had this one friend who managed to deduce the maternal nature of the Evas from this one scene alone.Talk about your eerie powers of perception. On the other pole entirely, by the time I had shown another acquaintance the entire series, he still didn't have the slightest clue!
	285	Her expression turns to one of conviction and complete seriousness. Misato:“… We can do it.”	Reichu: Considering she knows virtually nothing about the Evas' true nature at this point, Misato seems to accept this event so easily. Has it even crossed her mind why this “giant mindless robot” would bother going out of its way to protect a pathetic little human? Dr. Nick: A good officer knows when to trust her intuition. DeepThought: I have a big issue here with the ADV dub. Whereas “We can do it” seems to suggest that the recent revelation of EVA-01 acting alone has given them hope in a victory, kind of like an omen, the dub confuses things. When we hear her say “It's him!”, immediately it assumes that Misato must have known that EVA-01 is connected to Shinji and that he is, for lack of a better term, “the chosen one”. Reichu: I should point out, Misato's line in Japanese is simply, “Ikeru”, just a verb alone, with the subject merely implied from the context. Of course, translators seem to be up in the air as to exactly who she was talking about. Is it “He (Shinji) can do it!” or “We can do it!”? I prefer the more general “we”, myself, since it would encompass Shinji anyway. Still, even “It's him!” and “He can do it!” are different things. I guess they ran out of ideas when they were trying to fit something in English into Misato's available lip flaps. “Screw the literal meaning… Just think of something that fits!”
	286	Shinji runs up to the collapsed Rei.	thewayneiac: At least someone is concerned about Rei. Reichu: But it's odd, how Shinji is more interested in Rei's well-being than giving the Great Purple-Clad One any confirmation whatsoever. tv33: If it were me, I'd be too busy ogling at the mecha to bother about Rei.
	287	He raises her in his arms.
	288	Rei breathes painfully.
	289	Shinji turns around and looks at the Eva. He looks back at Rei.	OMF: Ominous shot here. He doesn't know why she's injured, but he glances back at the Eva anyway. Perhaps even at this early stage, Shinji suspects much more than he lets on, even to himself. Reichu: I always thought of the glance more as Shinji weighing his options, as it were. Considering what happens right after this, I think this is a more logical assessment. Keisuke-kun: And now for the creepiest addition to Renewal so far: As Shinji looks at EVA-01, the eyes light back up. (I don't know about Shinji, but that would creep me out.) This might indicate that EVA-01 now knows that Shinji will pilot. Reichu: The representation of the Evas' eyes as stylized white (or yellow,or red) slits has long been a pet peeve of mine. Realistically, you'd be able to see EVA-01's actual big, green eyes through the apertures in the helmet (unless shadow completely obscured them). Having the white slits = “eyes open”, darkness = “eyes closed” doesn't really make much sense. The actual eyes only glow when the Evas go into ‘overdrive’, not when they're just sitting around in their Cages.(The transformation of the Evangelion eye from an ordinary to bioluminescent state is actually depicted much later on.) felineki: I had thought that perhaps the "slits" were actually lenses that covered the eyes (somewhat like the eyes on a traditional mecha), and one scene in the next episode seems to support this — but many more go against it, so just forget I said anything. ::p Reichu: Yamashita's work pretty much derails this idea, as well — in particular, the painting of Shogouki's hand holding her helmet. While her design here is not the final one, it's damn close, and one can clearly see an opening for the eye. The eye slits are obviously a matter of stylization — they're not SUPPOSED to be a realistic representation. IMO, though,it would have been so much cooler to see this big green eye open up and stare at Shinji here. But either way, if I were Shinji I don't think I would have turned away so quickly.
	290	Rei suffering. Blood has adhered to Shinji's hand.	thewayneiac: And here is the first of many scenes where Shinji stares at his hand. I've never quite figured out what it all means, because, with one exception in EoE, the context never quite seems to be the same. For instance, here it's because Rei's blood is on his hand, whereas in episode #05… well, I'll save that for the relevant commentary.
	291	Shinji (MONO):“I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away, I mustn't run away…(repeats again and again)” He opens his eyes with resolve.	Someone: My personal favorite mantra. :) Reichu: Shinji's infamous line here is “Nigecha dame da!” Try saying that five times fast. HeWhoPostsStuff: Misato (OFF): “I really hope he doesn't make a habit of this, because I'd feel REALLY stupid about having given him that corny piece of advice earlier.”
	292	Shinji holding Rei in his arms. Shinji:“———I'll do it.”	Reichu: Hey, where did Rei's labored breathing go? HeWhoPostsStuff: In that position, EVA-01's hand almost looks like it's sneaking up behind Shinji and Rei to pick them up King Kong-style… “Mmm, Nerv Pilot Fruit Snacks™, my favorite!”
	293	Shinji:“I'll pilot it.”	Dream: And this is why I believe, ultimately, that Shinji is a good or even admirable person. The tone and way he says "I'll pilot it" is almost knightly or heroic. A badass in his own way. Sephizim: Of course, a pretty girl is the one thing that will motivate him. He needed this to put the situation in perspective. It's not about his grudge with his father (well, okay, it still sort of is), its about protecting innocent people. I fully believe Gendo knew that when he called Rei in. Bastard. thewayneiac: Of course you will, Shinji, or there wouldn't be a show. Keisuke-kun: He more says “I'll get in” — but that doesn't have as much dramatic effect. Reichu: Yeah, but if one translates noru or norimasu as “get in” every single time it's said, the dialogue sounds that much more awkward in English.

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