TV Series

Q:  How screwed up was/is Hideaki Anno?  After viewing the 26 TV episodes and the movies it appears that either this project greatly troubled him, or his life is not making any sense to himself yet alone to anybody else.
A:  Hideaki Anno's mind was very troubled. As an out of the closet "otaku" in the anime business, he strived to make his art known to the world and clearly defined to himself. His latest attempt to do so was also his most popular and widely received. It seems that it also helped him to find a little bit of peace of mind.

The following is an anti-suicide letter that Hideaki Anno wrote on July 10, 1995 (three months before his new series ShinSeiki Evangelion hit Japanese airwaves). It is self explanatory. This letter was originally published in Anime FX (c) Issue 10.

Ironically enough, ShinSeiki Evangelion first aired on Tokyo's Channel 12 at sundown, 6:30p.m., October 4, 1995 - the same time when Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonment came to an end, leaving behind the days of penitence. It was at 6:30p.m. that all of Heaven's fury in the form of Angels (or "Disciples") first brought their judgement upon man.

Men must face their angels, even as they face their demons, both of whom have the same creator.
(Do yourself a favor and try to find a copy of Anime FX issue 10. It has a huge six-page article on the beginning and middle [I doubt that there will ever be an end] of Studio Gainax.)

Q:  What are the First, Second and Third Impacts?
A:  The Impacts refer to the major events (earth shattering) that mankind and Angels alike faced on this planet. The First Impact was actually the splitting of a God-like being (formed again in EoE) into Adam and Lilith (and caused the Black Moon and White Moon to seperate and embed themselves under Tokyo-3's present location and Antarctica respectively) around 4 billion years ago. This "Impact" set everything in motion as eventually all the Angels came from the White Moon (and Adam) and mankind soon appeared thanks to the Egg of Lilith (the Black Moon).

The Second Impact occured when man succeeded in shrinking the Angel Adam to embryo size (after he was awakened by the testing of the artificial S2 unit by SEELE's people). The energy released was considerable enough to melt the Antarctic Ice Cap and cause a Great Flood that almost wiped out mankind (and supposedly destroyed the White Moon and separated/awakened the rest of the Angels from their slumber). Wars, famine and plagues spread across the Earth in the Flood's aftermath helping to expand the damage done.

The Third Impact took place when mankind initiated the final phase of evolution. By overcoming the Darwinian dead-end that he was faced with, man took it in his own hands to "evolve" into a single being and return to one whole single entity (as it was before the First Impact). When the Third Impact was complete, man as a species no longer existed and therefore had become totally extinct.

Q:  What is the difference between getting killed and evolving to the next and final stage of evolution? What happens if one gets killed before the Third Impact occurs (i.e. Misato and Ritsuko)?
A:  Supposedly (according to many religions) when humans die, their souls are judged on their thoughts and actions that they performed when they were alive (sometimes thought as a "self-judgement") and they either return to Heaven from hence they came, or they go to Hell if their existence on Earth was wasted and their evil thoughts and deeds outdid their good ones. The Third Impact (by Lilith) merges Mankind into one being (as it originally was long ago) devoid of any pain. Keel and SEELE seemed to believe that a return to God (the single-form being in which the Lilim would return to their egg [the Black Moon], and rejoin with Adam & Lilith) was a more satisfying existence in comparison to the distressful one we curretnly know. Apparently the Angels came to the same conclusion, but only one could achieve the goal, at the sacrifice of the other.

So the single form is the previous state, but that doesn't make it any more or less mature. Though as a side note, it would appear that Yui became a god (of equality to the Lilith & Adam combined being), and left with the Longinus Lance, having all the necessary tools to start the process over again elsewhere.

However, the "Judgement of Humanity" as individuals would still occur if the Third Impact was started by a Shito returning to Adam. Humanity would not evolve into one pure creature, but would die as individuals and each soul would be arbitrated on the deeds of each seperate individual.

Q:  What is "GeoFront"? What does if have to do with anything?
A:  GeoFront is a huge underground city that lies underneath Tokyo-3. It was built using a pre-existing valley that was originally at sea level (before the Second Impact) and made to house NERV HeadQuarters and to hide Adam and keep Lilith safe until the time of the Third Impact was at hand.

It is heavely guarded from Angel attacks with numerous armor plating and the "defense city" itself, Tokyo-3 (whose main purpose was to protect GeoFront). Its main problem in terms of defense was that it had no real security against actual humans (i.e. Kaworu or the entire Japanese Strategic Self Defense Force).

There is a large forest and lake in Geofront too.

When the Third Impact began, it was clear that GeoFront had another purpose to it. The giant hollowed out cavity was in reality the Black Moon (aka the Egg of Lilith) which is where all human life began and began to end (don't worry, there's no test on this).

Q:  If the Angels wanted Adam so badly, why didn't they attack NERV and Terminal Dogma in force? Surely this would have overcome the EVAs and toppled NERV in one strike.
A:  It definitely would have been more than enough to accomplish their goal if the Angel's goal was simply to return to Adam, but there was more to their existence than that.

The Dead Sea Scrolls foretold of the coming of the 17 trials that mankind must endure and overcome in order to gain eternal salvation as a whole. These trials were to be given one at a time and each more difficult than the previous. New ways of thinking and sacrifice would be necessary in order to triumph over the almost impossible odds of combat with the very Angels (or Apostles) from Heaven themselves. Man had to prove his worth, prove that he could think and act beyond his limited means in order to gain access to eternal and painless life. Angels had to prove that they deserved the reunification of their own being too, and their test must have been a one by one confrontation with mankind.

Q:  I've watched all 26 episodes of Evangelion and there is still one thing that I don't understand. In episode 24, Kaworu keeps mentioning the word "Lilim" as reference to a person. Who is "Lilim"? Is it just another way of saying "Lilith"?
A:  Wow! You've seen all 26 episodes and that's the only thing that you didn't get? You should feel very proud. I lived the entire series and I still don't know 100% what the #*~$ is going on.

But to get back to your question, when Kaworu says "Lilim", he is referring to man. "Lilim" refers to the demon-spawn of Lilith. Just as all Angels are from Adam, and to Adam they must return, all human beings are from Lilith, and to her we must return. The human-looking legs that protrude from Lilith's lower half (even after her legs grow back) prove this, as does the LCL that is her blood. It is also the liquid that allows pilots to communicate better with their EVA's and breathe while they're in the Entry Plug (it acts a lot like amniotic fluid). And besides, I like being thought of as "Demon-Spawn" too. It's cool!

It can also be in reference to a shortened form of "lilliputian", which means "small" or "little", or can be used to mean almost "insignificant". In comparison to Angels, this is exactly what humans are. It is also in reference to Gulliver's Travels in which the the tiny country that Gulliver comes across (in which he is a giant) is called "Lilliputian" or "Lilliputa" (meaning "Land of the Small People").

The term "Lilliputian" is also used in the 13th episode as the title Lilliputian Hitcher in which the 11th Angel, Ireul, attacked the Magi Super-Computers in the form of a computer virus. Also very tiny - but in this case, a very large threat.

Q:  Uh, I've got the ADVision subbed release of all the episodes and and don't remember seeing "Lilim" mentioned even once. Does Kaworu really say it? Is it just mistranslated? What gives? (Obviously this question is out of date since the DVDs have the correct terminology in their subs, but I left this up because it shows that fans can make a company change its mind, even if it doesn't want to, when they push hard enough)
A:  ADVision chose to translate "Lilim" as "humanity" in their subtitled release of episode 24 in their VHS release (along with misspelling both "Lance of Longinus" and Kaworu's name [but that's not important to NERV intelligence at this moment]), but curiously enough they chose to keep the term "Lilim" in their dubs.

For the full reason on this matter I sent one of NERV's best field agents into the fray to find out how and why something as important as Kaworu essentially telling us that we are children of Lilith could be omitted from the subtitled copy of the Genesis:12 release. She got this following reply from Brad Atwell of ADVision Films:

Although I would have preferred "Lilim" remain (especially and even moreso in the sub [and especially especially because it is part of the original script that Gainax wrote!]) I easily could have lived with his take of "Lilith's minions". That would have been just as descriptive (even more so). So our question still remains: Why was it translated as "Humanity" when that does not even allude to Lilith in the least?

We here at the EVA FAQs know that it isn't that big a deal, but we would prefer a better translation especially for our subs.

And just so we catch Manga Entertainment before it's too late, before you guys translate End of Evangelion please remember to translate "Lilith's Egg", "The Red Earth/Soil Ceremony", "the Tree of Life" and any other religious references correctly. Your patrons would truly appreciate it (and love ya for it). Keep up the good work, guys (and gals)!

Q:  What is up with the ProtoType Eva Unit 00? When Rei is testing it (episode 5) and also when Shinji tests it in a later episode, it goes psycho and does a lot of damage to itself and to its pilots. Ritsuko also made a comment that it was trying to kill her. Why does this happen?

A:  To start things off, every Eva unit seems to have the mind or soul of a female in it in one form or another. The EVA-01 has Ikari Yui trapped in it (which is how she disappeared in 2004), EVA-02 has Asuka's biological mother's mind in it (which is what caused her to go crazy and commit suicide), and it is Akagi Naoko's demented psyche that is trapped in EVA-00. Although Naoko suffered from no noticable breakdown from her initial synchro test back when NERV was Gehirn (unshown in the series), it is assumed that the "ghost" that her mind left in the Eva was seriously disturbed.

The fact that it went Berserker when Rei and Shinji were piloting it (both spawned from the hated Yui Ikari) and took swipes at Ritsuko (the daughter who tried to seperate herself as far as possible from her mother) goes a long way in proving this. It goes crazy because it does not want to have to synchro with its pilots, or it has an overwhelming urge to attack those that it sees in front of it.

E-mail me if you have any more questions at uber_rossman@yahoo.com