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Splitting this from DoctorWTH's post in the "Do you think Shinji and Asuka look good together" thread, since it was highly irrelevant, but still very good questions. And I will contribute to each answer one by one. If anybody else disagrees or has something else to add, I highly endorse it; this is a forum after all.


Yes it did. As with most stories, the plot is forced to take a more serious tone in the latter half. In NGE's case it can be explained as things getting worse for all the characters. After all, what good is a story with static characters? Evangelion would be the most boring show ever if everything was like the first 16 episodes. After that, Shinji's depression got worse; Asuka's ego was slipping, which became suicidal; Kaji reveals the dark secrets of Nerv and Seele to Misato and is killed; Misato dedicates herself to finding out the same truth Kaji was looking for; the Angels were certainly getting tougher.


Could you elaborate on that please? When exactly? If you mean that scene in EoE when Rei betrays Gendo by taking his hand (with Adam on it) and merging with Lilith then that is simple: Rei III was a more complete Rei than Rei I (the child) and Rei II (the Rei we see for most of the series until episode 23); Rei II theoretically contained only a fraction of Lilith's soul, which inhibited her emotions; the rest of Lilith's soul is believed to have been the soul in Evangelion Unit-02. In episode 23 when both are destroyed, the soul is released and settles in the new Rei, Rei III. Rei III has her full soul and is therefore more complete and has more emotion, and unlike Rei II, who had been saved by Gendo and gained a connection with him, Rei III initially came into contact with Shinji and gained a connection with him. In EoE, Rei hears Shinji call out for her and betrays Gendo, knowing that he was only using her, and she goes to help Shinji.


Well, everybody in existence was converted to LCL in Third Impact, and when it rained down it became the red ocean we see at the end. Shinji pulled himself out of the LCL Sea when he rejected instrumentality, and Asuka eventually did too. Essentially, anybody, if they wanted to, could pull themselves from the LCL Sea and live life as an individual entity instead of being one with everybody else.


This has been a major topic of discussion. And I believe the final consensus was that, like Shinji, Asuka too went through a very similar mind ******** during Third Impact. As you can recall, Shinji went through a lot during pre-instrumentality. Presumably, everybody went through their own unique experience, including Asuka. Asuka had been through so much s**t toward the end of the series, only to be forced to go through instrumentality. Her words "I'd rather die than be with you" to Shinji stuck with Shinji after Third Impact. When he was choking her on the beach, he may have been fulfilling her request by killing her instead of making her be with him, but he doesn't go through with it. Asuka's "You disgust me" could express her disappointment that he didn't do it. But it could be a number of reasons, and this is just one theory.