Shin Seiki Evangelion - 24:

Title:	Shin Seiki Evangelion
Episode:	24:
Synopsis
Misato is notified that the Second Division has taken the despondent Asuka into custody. She also learns that the Fifth Child/Children is due to arrive that very day, which strikes her as suspiciously convenient. Gendou asks Ritsuko why she destroyed the Dummy System. Shinji cannot face Rei (who he now knows is a clone), and feels he has run out of friends. While pondering his problems, he notices a strange boy who knows his name. It is Kaworu Nagisa, the Fifth Child...
Comments
"Ayanami Rei... There's a feeling about her--almost like my mother" --Shinji Because, to a certain extent, she is his mother, right? [Devil Doll: Yes, but Shinji still doesn't know why Rei actually exists.] "It wasn't the Dummy System that I destroyed. It was Rei" --Ritsuko Because without any spare bodies, Rei III will be the last of her kind? [Devil Doll: Yes, probably. The Dummy System is alive and kicking as you'll see in EOE when a series of new EVAs will be controlled by SEELE's dummy system, which makes me assume they cloned Kaworu for the same purpose as NERV did with Rei.] "I'm not happy anymore. Not even when you make love to me" --Ritsuko I see what you meant about Ritsuko and Gendou already being involved in an affair. "It will not be much longer. The Lance of Longinus that was hindering our wish is gone forever. The last Angel should appear soon and our wish will be attained upon destroying that Angel. Soon, very soon, Yui" --Gendou How was the Lance "hindering" Gendou's wish to be reunited with Yui? How will destroying the last Angel make their reunification possible? Does he need Yui's soul to remain within Unit 01 until that Eva defeats the final Angel, and then intends to transfer it to another body? [Devil Doll: According to EOE, the main difference between the scenarios for the Third Impact appears to be which catalyst will be used to form the Tree of Sephiroth and who will be in control to decide what happens during this event. SEELE needs the Lance for their scenario, and their goal is to eliminate individuality from the human race, so Gendou and Yui wouldn't be individuals any more and thus unable to "meet again". Thus removing the Lance prevented SEELE from starting their scenario immediately after Kaworu was defeated, thus they had to do what they did in EOE.] "He (Kaworu) is probably the last Angel" --Ritsuko How does she know? [Devil Doll: She does not, but it's an educated guess given her experience with synchronisation tests, being the leading designer of EVAs in the NERV group, and knowing so much about Rei (who has similar abilities - remember episode 1 when she appeared in front of Shinji, and episode 24 when she suddenly appeared in the Central Dogma even though EVA 00 was already destroyed).] "Unbelievable--SEELE itself sent an Angel to us!" --Fuyutsuki "The last Angel has invaded Central Dogma. It is currently descending. Just as we planned." --SEELE "Ikari, you were our good friend, our comrade and conspirator, but this is your last job. I expect that you will use Unit 01 to accomplish the mission". --Kiel/SEELE 01 It certainly sounds like SEELE was well aware that Kaworu is in fact an Angel. How did they get their hands on one? Do they have any idea what is stored within Central Dogma? What outcome are they hoping for--the final Angel destroyed, Unit 01 destroyed, both, or even the Third Impact initiated (why does everybody seem so eager to obliterate the human race?)? [Devil Doll: SEELE wants EVA-01 to defeat Kaworu, that's why they lied about Lilith being Adam. It's too early for the Third Impact yet (see below). It is never explained what Kaworu exactly is (he might be a clone of Kiel Lorenz and Adam, similar to Rei being a clone of Yui and Lilith) - but he definitely has Angel abilities. Episode 24 Director's Cut contains an additional conversation between SEELE and Kaworu - and this conversation provides one contradiction I cannot resolve: Kaworu is told that Adam is part of Gendou's body. But if so, why can he mistake Lilith for Adam in the Central Dogma (which still made sense in the original version of episode 24)? Seele does not want to obliterate the human race - the Human Complementation Project intends to dissolve the A.T. fields of all human beings so that their souls would unite to some god-like super-being, complementing each other - at the expense of individuality (all of this is explained during EOE, and even some aspects of how the ceremony for the Third Impact has to be performed). So my best bet is that SEELE actually betrayed Kaworu - it explains the standard episode 24 events. I just can't see why it still worked in the D.C. arc - maybe my translation of the crucial line there is flawed...] "But why did the Angel take Unit 02?" --Misato Does it matter? [Devil Doll: Not really, IMHO. EVA-02 is buying time for Kaworu by hindering EVA-01, then again had he flown down into the Central Dogma he would have been spotted much later.] "The Eva series was born from Adam. Humans must abhor their existence. Lilim try to survive even if it means using the thing they hate. I do not understand this" --Kaworu "Eva is created from the same tissue as I am. I am also born from Adam. So I can synchronize with it as easily as if it had no soul. Unit 02's soul is now shutting itself up" --Kaworu "Yes, that's what you Lilim call this. This is the light of the soul--sacred territory where no one should intrude. Don't you Lilim know? Everybody has an AT field" --Kaworu "Adam, our mother. One born of Adam must return to Adam. Although it could destroy all humanity? No! This is... Lilith?! I see. I understand Lilim now." --Kaworu "Thank you, Shinji. I wanted you to stop Unit 02. otherwise, it would have survived with her" --Kaworu "Now destroy me. Otherwise you will be destroyed. Only one life form can be chosen to evade the destruction and inherit the future. And you are not the existence that should die" --Kaworu "Thank you, my life was meaningful because of you" --Kaworu Kaworu seems to do an abrupt about-face when he realizes it is Lilith, not Adam, that he has found. He goes from I-will-kill-you-all to You-go-ahead-and-kill-me. What the hell..? Why would coming into contact with Adam annihilate the human race, while contact with Lilith presumably would not? Does Kaworu conclude that because they tricked him by performing a little switcheroo that humans have the will to live, and should be allowed to do so? And if he sacrifices himself to allow this to happen, his life will have "meaning"? [Devil Doll: Kaworu's motives are indeed hard to understand. The whole scenario of the Qumran scrolls (as interpreted by SEELE) looks somehow like this: "God created 18 races of beings, one of them named 'humankind', the others being the 17 angels. Only one of these races can survive in the end. The first Angel to touch Adam wins. If mankind defeats all Angels and then performs the ceremony to cause the 3rd impact, then they can become god-like." We never hear that explicitly (IIRC there's a line like "that's why we're the 18th Angel" in EOE) - but that's how SEELE acts. Gendou plays along as far as defeating the Angels, he just has a different scenario for who will decide about the events during the Third Impact: Gendou places the fate of humankind into the hands of Rei (as we see in the opening scene of EOE part 2), trusting her to be loyal to him (which she is not - "I'm not your doll!", she's hands the responsibility over to Shinji). Kaworu tries to contact Adam because that's his function in the scenario, not because he hates humankind. On the contrary, he likes Shinji a lot - and so he decides that his failure to locate Adam is his fate, and accepts his defeat. My problem with Kaworu is the aforementioned SEELE scene of the Director's Cut because in the original version it sounds as if SEELE betrayed him while in the Director's Cut the information about Adam's location looks unambiguous, which is why I don't understand Kaworu's actions in the Director's Cut version. One crucial element of this series is the conversation between Shinji and Misato about the events of episode 24. Misato states that Kaworu lacks the will to survive - thus he deserves to die. Shinji states that Kaworu acted in a "noble" way - thus he deserved to live. (What would have happened if Shinji and Kaworu agreed on a ceasefire? We'll never know...) Interestingly enough, Kaworu agrees with Misato in this aspect: He cannot understand why humans want to live so desperately (while for him life and death are the same) that they use EVAs made from the flesh of their enemy and betray him. Maybe Kaworu himself is aware that he lacks the will to survive... But remember: Adam and Eve were expelled from the paradise because they ate an apple from the Tree of Knowledge. From this moment on, they were denied the apples from the Tree of Life that would have granted them immortality. Kaworu, being an Angel, was able to eat fruit from the Tree of Life and as such is potentially immortal; after the decline of humankind he would have survived forever - alone in a universe without any intelligent life! What a horrible scenario for Kaworu who was so interested in understanding the Lilim... yet, Kaworu would have accepted this "fate" as well. But why are the Angels acting so humane, and why are the humans acting like monsters? Let's have a glimpse into the Kabbalah, maybe we can then understand better what's actually going on here. You remember the bible version about the Creation of the World? Well, the Kabbalah version runs slightly different: "God created the Earth, and he created two human beings by the names of Adam and Lilith. But Lilith refused to obey Adam, she insisted on being his equal, so Adam drove her away. God then created Eve from Adam's rib... Lilith was left alone, but on occasion she seduced men and gave birth to demons." Which explains, for example, why the EVAs have to be made from Adam's rib (i. e. his DNA), as Kaworu mentioned. But more importantly: Remember that Kaworu named the human beings "Lilim", i. e. descendants from Lilith! Which means: We are the demons. The Angels were the legit successors of Adam (because God granted Adam's wish for another, obedient wife! Evangelion isn't preaching equality of genders, being a Japanese story after all...). So Shinji was right - the Angels should have survived. But having eaten from the Tree of Life they seem to lack the will to live while humans ate from the Tree of Knowledge and use their science to obtain eternal life. Don't we always strive for what we don't have? The Angels may have been striving for Knowledge - that would explain why the last three Angels inspected Asuka's, Rei's and Shinji's mind instead of merely killing them.]

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