[EVA] Rei's Origins (repost)

[Greg Muir]

> >Yes, but they were intentionally developing S2 engines for the EVA's,
> >placed
> >on in Unit-04, and made use of them in the mass-production series EVA's.
> >While I do agree that safety measures are needed to prevent the crazed
> >behavior the EVA's are so famous for, I would think that this
> sort of thing
> >would be terribly crippling in combat.
>
> Considering that the combat area is basially always the same, the
> umbilical
> cables really aren't all that crippling, I don't think.

But consider how restrictive it is, even still. Once the cable is cut there
really isn't time for the EVA to secure another one.
>
> You would think that a more assured
> >method would be something akin to the range safety devices used in modern
> >launch vehicles. Rather than explode the entire EVA, though, you would
> >think
> >they could simply place pyrotechnic charges at key areas within
> the mecha,
> >cutting the connection between the internal batteries and the electrical
> >system.
>
> You'd think.  Of course, considering all the holes in NGE, you have to
> wonder how much planning REALLY went into it.  Certainly not

I think there was much initial planning but some of the holes and shifts of
focus are a result of Anno's mental breakdown. I think that as far as
telling the story of EVA goes, the mangas do a superior job. as good as the
anime is, the characters in the manga have more depth, are more human.

> enough to have
> it stand up well to the kind of critical analysis a lot of fans put it
> through.

Well, Anno should have thought of that before making the series the way he
did. When you do something serious like this you're begging people to
over-analyse. :)
>
> >But all logic aside, the majority of what they do visually in EVA is done
> >for drama, not for the practical end. Consider the launch
> sequence. Ain't
> >no
> >way in hell something that heavy is gonna move that quickly.
>
> I don't know, the space shuttle moves pretty rapidly, and that's probably
> heavier than an Eva.  Of course, you're right, the speed in the launch
> sequence is done for dramatic effect.

The space shuttle is riding a zillion pounds of rocket fuel, there's a
slight difference! From the looks of it the EVA's use an electromagnetic
launch catapult. We're still having trouble perfecting them to launch
aircraft from carriers in a horizontal mode. It would be really tough to do
so for giant EVA's striaght up. Again, dramatic effect. :)

I do like the way they portray the magnitude of an effort such as the E
project, though. You do not slap something like this together with a
scientist and a cute assistant. For something like E, it would resemble the
frickin' Apollo Program, which they borrowed from right down to mission
control. ;)
>
> Certain tactics
> >such as the one used against the underwater angel, that's completely
> >absurd.
> >There's no way in hell that battleships could perform in such a fashion
> >with
> >months of prep time, nobody could throw that together in 30 seconds.
>
> If you had some remote control of the battleships from the carrier, it's
> conceivable.

But such systems would not be installed in general since battleships have
crews, battleships are not designed to be controlled underwater, etc. Normal
radio control systems would not work due to the water, first off. Second
off, the battleships lack ballast tanks and control planes to properly
orient themselves in a descent such as that. Finally, their boilers would no
longer operate when submerged. In fact, if sea water reached them they would
explode like bombs.
>
>
> Of course.  In an early episode, Ritsuko actually says 1 minute,
> but GAINAX
> later abandonned that and used 5 minutes from then on.  Some people claim
> that maybe the batteries were upgraded in the series and we don't
> hear about
> it, but I think it was just a mistake and they fixed it partway through.

yeah. One minute is way too little.
>
>
> I've always wondered about that too.  We see in Shinji's fight
> with the 4th
> angel that his bullets do nothing but hide the angel in smoke.  Although
> that's another thing that doesn't make sense, Misato tells Shinji to
> neutralize the angel's ATF and then fire at it.  As far as I
> know, the Eva
> has to get pretty close to neutralize the angel's ATF, so at that
> range he
> wouldn't be able to fire at it, he would just have to grapple
> with it.  BTW,
> we do see the N2 mine penetrate the 3rd angel's ATF, it just doesn't kill
> it.  It only stops the angel momentarily while it regenerates.

Well, it all depends on the angel. We saw that rockets had no effect on the
one with the ribbons that dissected Unit-02 but the big spidery one was
defeated with a simple burst of automatic fire, as if it did not have an AT
field. The angels are highly variable in their power.