This is a glossary of terms from the anime and manga series Neon Genesis Evangelion.
The Evangelion are controlled mainly by linking with the cranial nerves of the pilot. Of these, the most important is this A^10 nerve. ... It is associated with higher order brain functions such as memory, cognizance and the execution of movement, and with emotions such as anxiety, fear, happiness and pleasure. In addition, it is also said to play an important role in affection between parent and child, and between lovers.
In Yoshiyuki Sadamoto's introduction to the bonus materials at the end of vol. 1 of the manga, he writes:
On the floor of the midbrain is the ventral tegmental system, that neurobiologists call region A10. Cells soaked in dopamine, certain emotions are processed here: such as the thoughts of two lovers - or a parent and a child. And it is the synchronization of the threads and bundles of A10 that splice pilot and Eva together; to become one entity, to fight. In other words, the power of love drives this weapon of mass destruction.Asuka near-constantly wears hers, during her daily life and at school.
At the beginning of the series, the AT Field is shown as a barrier that the Angels can erect, which is impervious to almost all conventional weapons. The N² bomb can penetrate the AT Fields of some Angels, causing moderate damage that can be regenerated in a matter of hours or days, depending on the Angel in question. Certain Angels are completely unaffected by N² bombs. The Evas can also generate their own AT Fields, and can use them to neutralize the Angels' AT Fields through destructive interference.
Toward the climax of the series, it is revealed that every being has an AT Field, and that it is the literal wall that separates one's identity from other egos and external reality, and which supports one's having a separate existence from others. Thus, it is also the cause of loneliness and pain, and can be related to the so-called "Hedgehog's dilemma" exhibited by main character Shinji Ikari — whereby a person feels (psychological) pain from loneliness, yet paradoxically, the closer he/she gets to someone else (emotionally), the more he/she is 'hurt'.
At the climax of The End of Evangelion, after the Third Impact, the re-awakened Lilith produces a massive Anti-AT Field that neutralizes the AT Fields of all human beings, thus returning them to an undifferentiated state — the "Sea of LCL", a primordial soup of sorts, containing the unseparated consciousness of the entire human race.
The concept of the AT Field could have been informed by the philosophical movement of existentialism as well as by the concept of angst. It also bears resemblance to the "morphogenetic field" of Rupert Sheldrake.
In episode 24 of the anime, Kaworu states that the AT Field is "the light of the soul" — possibly meaning a (physical and/or metaphysical) wall that surrounds a person's soul.
D-type equipment is a thick, heat-resistant armor used for sending Evas into extreme conditions. It resembles an old-fashioned diving suit and is fitted with coolant circulation systems. Unit 02 was equipped with the D-type equipment when it entered a volcano in episode 10. Asuka wears a modified plug suit with expandable thermal insulation in this episode, which may also be part of the D-type equipment.
Among the original Evas, Unit 01 is the only one incompatible with the DPS, which is methodically rejected at every activation attempt after the first one. Its main drive is stored behind the pilot's seat, marked by a large "DRIVE: A" plaque.
Control from within the entry plugs for activation of the Evas usually consists of voice-commands in conjunction with mental thought, although this is usually done remotely by Nerv personnel. The pilots must be able to "synchronize" with their Evas in order to control them. In practice, the connection is made through a combination of the A10 clips on the pilot's head and the plug suit, and signals are picked up from within the entry plug. Apparatuses found within the entry plug include two distinctly designed hand-triggers which are used for simple, but delicate, finger movements, such as using firearms. The screens that show the external environment surround the pilot and are picked up by cameras mounted on the Eva's head, and from the eyes of the Eva itself. They also display other information, and are apparently three-dimensional projections. Smaller images can be superimposed over the environmental views for communication between pilots and/or the command station in Central Dogma.
Introduced in episode 7, Jet Alone's creators insulted the Evas and Nerv, respectively. When Ritsuko publicly questions the creator of Jet Alone about the safety of Jet Alone using a nuclear reactor as a power source and of its overall combat effectiveness, the creator states "It's better than a machine that won't work for more than 5 minutes and forcing its pilot to undergo intense mental instability." He then went on to show top secret photos of Unit 01 going berserk, claiming that Jet Alone, being unmanned and armed with a supercomputer that rivals the Magi to calculate its combat decisions, would never do such a thing. He then reveals to the world the existence of the AT Field that Nerv had managed to emulate from the Angels, stating it would not take long to figure out themselves how to install it on future Jet Alone units (an impossibility given the biological source of an AT Field).
Ritsuko, obviously embarrassed, apparently sabotaged Jet Alone's program, and when it activates it does not stop walking and its cooling system fails, leaving it continuously running to a nearby city just minutes from a reactor meltdown. Misato decides to have Shinji carry her into it with Unit 01 so she can manually shut off its reactor. She fails to do so, but Ritsuko's sabotage program reactivated the coolant system and shut Jet Alone down automatically just short of detonation.
Due to the public embarrassment, the Jet Alone Project was ended.
Jet Alone's name comes from the robot Jet Jaguar, from the 1973 kaiju film Godzilla vs. Megalon. Jet Jaguar was a robot whose design was chosen from submissions from the public, and when it was initially announced, its name was Red Alone. Jet Alone is a combination of the two names.
In a brief shot of Jet Alone's programming it's revealed that the unit possess 640 + 2048 TB of memory.
The Lance was used in a "contact experiment" with Adam, which caused the Angel's awakening and the Second Impact. In episode 12, the Lance was recovered from the new "dead sea" (the remnants of Antarctica) to be used to control Lilith. The Lance was used as a last resort weapon to attack the fifteenth Angel, Arael, which was in orbit and outside the direct reach of the Evas or any other terrestrial weaponry. After being launched by Unit 00, it destroyed the Angel, but reached escape velocity and became lodged in lunar orbit, effectively lost from Nerv. It eventually planted itself into the moon's surface (specifically, in Walter crater); it returned in The End of Evangelion, moments before the Third Impact. The Lance is a key piece to the process of Instrumentality.
The Lance's origins in the anime are never fully explained, except that it was found within the earth: in a deleted scene from episode 21, it is stated that the Lance was transported from the Dead Sea to Antarctica for the Katsuragi Expedition's "contact experiment" with Adam.
According to the spin off Playstation 2 video game Neon Genesis Evangelion 2's Classified Information, the Angels Adam and Lilith originated from Seeds of Life created by a god-like ancient extraterrestrial species (known only as "First Ancestral Race"); Adam and Lilith were sent to Earth in the White Egg and Black Egg, respectively. A Lance of Longinus was sent along by the First Ancestral Race inside of both; this was meant to be means of controlling Adam and Lilith, a counter-measure in case a progenitor entity ever went against their goals. The Lance of Longinus appearing in the series is the one that was paired with Adam, and recovered from Antarctica. The Lance of Longinus paired with Lilith is presumed to have been lost or destroyed when Lilith's Black Moon collided with Earth during First Impact. (See "Terms from outside of the main series" for more details).
Artificial versions of the Lance are used as the primary weapon for the mass-production Evas, and also feature prominently in the Instrumentality.
The name "Lance of Longinus" originally refers to a Christian mythological object, also called the Spear of Destiny, which is supposedly the spear that a Roman soldier (Longinus) used to pierce Jesus Christ's side after he was crucified. In the original Japanese, the weapon was referred to as the "Spear of Longinus." The real name should be Lancea Longini, in the correct Latin form.
Note: There is some discrepancy as to whether the proper name is "Lance of Longinus" or "Spear of Longinus", as Japanese does not differentiate "spear" or "lance," instead using an all encompassing word (槍, yari). Also, in the manga of Evangelion it is called the "Spear of Longinus."
In The End of Evangelion, it is shown that all humans are composed of LCL, and only given form as separate entities by their own individual AT Fields. Hence, when an individual's AT Field collapses, the body formed by said AT Field dissolves back into LCL.
The bio-computer system designed by Dr. Naoko Akagi for Gehirn. It consists of three interconnected supercomputers, which are named for the traditional names of the Magi who visited Jesus at his birth and are imprinted with different aspects of Akagi's personality through a process she invented:
The MAGI supercomputers are used to run Nerv HQ, and in effect, actually "govern" Tokyo-3; the three supercomputers take a vote amongst themselves to decide on actions for the city, with unanimity required for certain actions like self-destruction (although if two Magi disagree and the third is undecided Nerv personnel will decide what to do). The original set of 3 Magi, which collectively make up the "Magi 01" system, are located at Nerv's First Branch in the Geo-Front. However the various other branches also have their own sets of Magi supercomputers (3 in each set) located in:
These other Magi appear in The End of Evangelion where as part of Seele's attack on Nerv they attempt to crack the original Magi, thereby controlling Nerv's security and forcing a surrender. Ritsuko Akagi thwarts the attempt, forcing Seele to dispatch the JSSDF special forces; she later attempts to activate Nerv headquarters' self-destruct mechanism, but Casper refuses the order and the self-destruct is not carried out. The Magi were previously targeted by Iruel in episode 13.
Production notes of the series refer to the N² bombs as the P-bomb, leading to speculation that it might be some sort of positron-based antimatter weapon. Another possibility is that it is a highly efficient pure fusion bomb, with no fission tamper, and thus very little to no radioactive material left over from the reaction, though the initial reaction would produce much radiation.
The devices are apparently deployed in a number of configurations; in the series, there are N² aerial mines, N² air charges, and otherwise N² bombs.
The translation by ADV Films uses the term "N² mine," a translation of . It is not quite correct because conventional mines are not used in the same manner they are used in the series (for example, being dropped from planes and being used in suicide missions). Japanese has no separate words for "bomb" and "mine" and just uses "heiki" for both, leading to the confusion.
The term is always spelled as "N²" bomb, using a superscript "2", when the name appears in print on screen. However it is not pronounced "N squared" but simply "N two".
In episode 10, Asuka wears a variant of her plug suit which is designed for pressure dissipation during the capture of Sandalphon. This suit expanded into a ball to provide additional thermal protection while Unit 02 was inside the volcano.
As shown in vol. 1 of the manga of Evangelion and episode 1 of the anime, the sleeves of Rei's plug suit can be removed; whether or not this is a deliberate design or a medical necessity (due to injuries to her arms) is not revealed.
Unit 02 has an advanced version, on which once the blade is broken, a button is pressed and another blade is extended from the handle. It resembles a utility knife with a multi-segmented, breakable blade, unlike Unit 01's giant Bowie knife.
See also Vibroblade.
An attempt was made to install an S² engine into Unit 04. When the S² engine test was initiated, "all the installations involved within a radius of 89km from the center vanished," resulting in the disappearance of Nerv-2 in the US. No official reason is given, but it is speculated by Nerv personnel that the S² engine created a Sea of Dirac similar to the one produced by the 12th angel, or that the engine went into overdrive and converted all matter within the area into energy. After the incident, Seele tried to keep the S² engine from being used in the original Evas, but these attempts failed when Unit 01 acquired one from the consumption of the body of Zeruel, the fourteenth Angel (in episode 19, "Introjection"). This resulted in Unit 01 being considered a "God" by Seele, something that the committee considered undesirable. However, when the Lance of Longinus is lost by Nerv and Lilith is no longer usable, Unit 01 becomes the viable alternative. The Mass Production Evas, however, all have S² engines because they were to be part of the Instrumentality Project. In Evangelion 1.0 it is explained that the S² engine is what allows the Angels to take physical form in the dimension of the humans.
Although Gehirn is consistently spelled using all-capital letters, it is not an acronym. Many times during the series English words are spelled in all-capital letters as a stylistic choice by the Japanese production team, including words that are obviously not acronyms such as "ADAM" or "SECOND IMPACT". This has unintentionally led to some confusion when words such as "Nerv", "Seele", and "Magi" are spelled with all-capitals, leading to the incorrect assumption that they are acronyms.
According to the Platinum DVD set's commentary track, the JSSDF was formed in 2003 when China and Vietnam went to war over the Nansha islands, as part of post-Second Impact global unrest.
The name for the institute is derived from the Babylonian god who is considered to be the head of the Babylonian pantheon.
The Nerv Logo is half a fig leaf covering its name, with the motto "God's In His Heaven... All's Right With The World" forming the quarter circle on the bottom. The motto comes from Robert Browning's poem "Pippa Passes."
In , Adam and Eve cover their "nakedness" with fig leaves. The fig leaf has covered nakedness in art and sculpture for hundreds of years, symbolically representing the guilt of original sin.
Although Nerv is usually spelled using all-capital letters, it is not an acronym. Many times during the series English words are spelled in all-capital letters as a stylistic choice by the Japanese production team, including words that are obviously not acronyms such as "ADAM" or "SECOND IMPACT". This has unintentionally led to some confusion when words such as "Nerv", "Seele", and "Magi" are spelled with all-capitals, leading to the incorrect assumption that they are acronyms. In particular, "Nerv" is actually spelled several times on-screen using lowercase letters.
In the new Rebuild of Evangelion movie series, Nerv has a new symbol, an apple turned upside-down, with the fig-leaf from the old logo superimposed and interrupted by a wave of motion around the apple in a broken, downwards spiral motion.
The original logo still appears in some scenes, however.
Seele is a secret organization, the real puppetmasters behind the United Nations. Its origins are shrouded in mystery; they would claim to have existed since ancient times, functioning as an Illuminati-like power cabal over most of the world's governments. This cannot be verified, but they have been operating since at least soon after World War II, when they acquired the secret sections of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The secret Dead Sea Scrolls predicted the arrival of the Angels and of Third Impact, and Seele began striving to develop means to defeat the Angels so that a human-centered Instrumentality process would proceed. Having decided that humanity as a whole had reached an evolutionary dead end, Seele seeks to bring about Instrumentality and unite all humans into one hyper-being, the next stage of existence.
In the series and The End of Evangelion, all meetings with Seele members are held by video conference. The Instrumentality Committee members are shown for their meetings, with each associated with a different color; however, for Seele meetings, images of large stone monoliths marked "Seele (member number) Sound Only" are projected instead of the images of the actual members. Seele's leader is Keel Lorenz, Seele 01. In the Director's Cut of episode 24 there is a scene in which 15 Seele monoliths are visible. This is the only instance where more than twelve are seen; it is unknown if this is an animation error.
Many times during the series English words are spelled in all-capital letters as a stylistic choice by the Japanese production team, including words that are obviously not acronyms such as "ADAM" or "SECOND IMPACT". This has unintentionally led to some confusion when words such as "Nerv", "Seele", and "Magi" are spelled with all-capitals, leading to the incorrect assumption that they are acronyms. The series also does not clarify the reason why all of these organizations have Germanic names.
The logo was changed for the movie series Rebuild of Evangelion. The new logo has a snake curled around an apple in-between the seven eyes. On the apple the organization Seele is written, and beneath it is "Überm Sternenzelt richtet Gott, wie wir gerichtet". The German quote is from the poem "Ode to Joy," which translates as "Above the starry-sky judges God, the way we judged".
Many traditional air force units are replaced with VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing) fighters and bombers. The naval power of the U.N. is primarily made up of a mix of many different types of ships from many navies. The U.N. Pacific Fleet operates Iowa class battleships (United States Navy), Arleigh Burke class destroyers (United States Navy), Udaloy class destroyers (Russian Navy), Ticonderoga class cruisers (United States Navy), Admiral Kuznetsov class aircraft carriers (Russian Navy), and several United States Navy aircraft carriers, specifically the flagship of the fleet, the Nimitz class carrier USS Harry S. Truman (renamed Over the Rainbow in the anime). The U.N. aircraft carriers, such as Over the Rainbow, also carry a mix of both Russian and American naval aircraft, such as Sukhoi Su-33 fighters, Yakovlev Yak-38 VTOL fighters, EA-6 Prowler electronic warfare craft, and E-2 Hawkeye airborne early warning craft. It is a strong possibility that the United Nations possesses N² bombs as well as traditional stealth planes. Much of the U.N. forces remain unknown, but it is clear that their military reforms are significant.
Unlike Nerv and Seele, the United Nations still relies on a traditional military with conventional weapons. As observed in The End of Evangelion, much of the U.N. forces, both air and land, are unable to defeat an Eva.
In the spin off Playstation 2 video game Neon Genesis Evangelion 2, the "meteor" in question was in fact the Black Moon, carrying Lilith. When the Black Moon collided with Earth, it bounced and became the Moon, satellite of the Earth, while in the crash, a small part of it, containing Lilith, detached itself and was buried in the Earth, becoming the actual Black Moon, known as the GeoFront millions of years later. (See #Terms from outside of the main series for more details).
The actual scientific theory of how Earth gained its moon, called the giant impact hypothesis, postulates that a planetoid called Theia, roughly the size of Mars, formed at one of Earth's Lagrangian points and then smashed into Earth I (the planet Earth before the First Impact), causing part of the smashed-together planets to separate and coalesce into the Moon.
The Second Impact is a cataclysm which followed the "contact experiment" conducted on Adam in the South Pole on September 13, 2000. The awakened and injured Angel created a strong anti-AT Field which caused an explosion that melted the Antarctic ice cap and caused a shift of Earth's axis; climate changes and gigantic floods followed. Two billion people in the southern hemisphere were directly killed by the ensuing tsunamis. As a result of the subsequent chaos, wars broke out due to scarce food and resources, such as a war between India and Pakistan which started two days after the explosion. These conflicts spread all over the world, and were ended on February 14, 2001 by signing what would be later called "The Valentine Ceasefire." By the end of these events, the human population of earth was halved.
Vast environmental damage and global climate changes resulted from Second Impact and the rise in global sea levels. These effects were worldwide, but during the series we are only shown the immediate changes observed in Japan, where the elevated sea levels have caused many old coastal cities to be submerged. Also, Japan has become a country of perpetual summer weather. A subtle hint of this throughout the series is that cicadas are frequently heard in outdoor scenes, even though they would normally only appear in Japan during summer months. Fuyutsuki alludes to this when he mentions first meeting Gendo Ikari when "this country still had seasons" (before Second Impact), and that the loss of the seasons was the worst that Japan had suffered.
Officially, there was no Adam and no "contact experiment." According to the cover-up, the Second Impact was caused by the impact of a meteorite that was too small (about 10 centimeters or 4 inches wide) and too fast (95% of the speed of light) to be detected. This relativistic speed resulted in a massive explosion when the meteorite collided with Earth (a remarkably detailed description is shown briefly in the series in a text book). Considering the ancient meteorite impact which created Earth's Moon to be the "First" Impact, the public at large officially dubbed this disaster the "Second" Impact in keeping with the cover-up story of a meteorite impact. Several Nerv personnel (Ritsuko Akagi, etc.) know the true cause of the explosion but still refer to it as "Second Impact" for convenience.
In actuality, the "White Moon" of Adam had been discovered near the coast of Antarctica under Mt. Markham, and a Nerv expedition was sent. The expedition then conducted activities to intentionally cause the Second Impact. Adam was fused with human DNA when he was pierced with the Spear of Longinus, causing Adam to generate an anti-AT Field. At this point, the Angel's Door of Guf (associated with Adam, as opposed to the human one associated with Lilith and the Black Moon) was opened, and any issuing Angels presumably destroyed. At this point, all life around him for some distance absorbed, Adam reverts to the Egg of Adam and a more manageable form from Nerv's perspective. There were only two survivors: Gendo, who departed the day before, and Misato Katsuragi, who was put into an entry plug-like survival pod by her father. (It should be noted that the explanation provided above is from an unofficial guide written by Fujie, and the book, unlike other official source such as the red cross book and the official cards, are not recognized by Gainax, and therefore should only be treated as one of many explanations or speculations.)
It is suggested that some individuals unassociated with Seele or its affiliate organizations became aware (or at least suspicious) of their cover-up, as demonstrated by Professor Kouzou Fuyutsuki. It is assumed that most of these people were silenced in one manner or another by Seele, although Fuyutsuki himself was recruited to Gehirn at the request of Gendo Ikari.
Third Impact is triggered by the union of Adam and Lilith, with the result being the creation of a supreme being that would succeed all existing life on Earth. The goal of Seele and Nerv is to prevent any of the Angels from instigating Third Impact so that humankind may do so instead, thus fulfilling the goal of the Human Instrumentality Project. For a human Third Impact, the Angels must be defeated, as they guard the Tree of Life. With the death of Kaworu, all Angels are dead, and the Tree of Life is accessible. (Again, this is a speculation from a unofficial guide and should be treated as one of the explanations or speculations.)
Third Impact occurs in both the television series and in The End of Evangelion; while the series only offers a few glimpses of Third Impact, focusing on the Complementation of Shinji Ikari, End offers a fuller and perhaps different account.
Before Third Impact Nerv and Seele turn on each other, and Gendo Ikari attempts to carry out his Third Impact, uniting Rei with Lilith, and his own self already possessing Adam. But after Gendo merges Adam with Rei, she rejects him. Instead of being reunited with Yui Ikari and gaining the godlike powers Gendo had been planning and seeking for so long, all humanity begins reverting to the egg of Lilith from which it came. The combination of Lilith (possessor of the Tree of Knowledge) & Adam (possessor of the Tree of Life) - in the guises of Rei Ayanami and Kaworu Nagisa - neutralizes the AT Fields of all human beings on Earth and absorbs their souls into her/himself. Shinji meanwhile has been placed at the head of the Kabbalah's Tree of Life, composed of himself in Unit-01 and 9 Mass-production Evas crucified with Lances of Longinus (each crucified Evangelion forming one of the Sefira). Control of the power is placed in the hands of Shinji as the sacrifice and initiator of Third Impact. With the unification of Angels and Humans, god-like power is unlocked: "The Fruit of Life borne by the Angels, and the Fruit of Knowledge borne by human beings. Eva-01 has acquired both of these gifts, and so has become something to rival the power of God.
However, Shinji Ikari makes the fateful decision to reject Instrumentality, thus ending Third Impact, and returning humankind to Earth in the form of the Sea of LCL. It is implied that all individuals with a strong sense of themselves and who choose to do so will, in time, be able to resurrect themselves.
Lilith is stored in Terminal Dogma, crucified upon a massive red cross (similar to the one Unit 03 is transported on). It is also pierced through the torso with the Lance of Longinus, much like Jesus. The wound from the Lance has not healed and LCL seems to bleed from it. This has caused a small lake of LCL to form around the cross which functions as the reservoir for Nerv's LCL needs.
The ruins of Old Tokyo were used as a testing site for the robot Jet Alone in episode 7.
Tokyo-3 was heavily damaged by the attack of the Angel Zeruel, though repairs on Nerv HQ and much of the city were worked on later. However, soon after this Rei was forced to self-destruct Unit 00 to destroy the Angel Armisael, destroying a large swath of the city. During the attack by JSSDF forces directed against Nerv by Seele in The End of Evangelion, the JSSDF dropped an N² bomb on Tokyo-3; what remained of the city was destroyed, and the GeoFront below was left open to the sky, though Nerv HQ (located deep beneath the area of the blast's effect) survived the explosion.
According to the Neon Genesis Evangelion 2, like the Black Moon containing Lilith, the White Moon was created as a vessel by the aliens known as the First Ancestral Race, one of many such vessels used to seed life on different planets (for what purpose is unknown). White Moons containing Adam-like creatures seeded some planets with Angel-like lifeforms, while Black Moons with Lilith-like creatures created human-like lifeforms on other planets. However, a White Moon and a Black Moon were never supposed to both seed life on the same planet, which ultimately put both humans and Angels in direct competition for control of Earth. (See "Terms from outside of the main series" for more details).
The ancient Hebrew manuscripts found in the caves around Qumran between 1947 and 1956. In the world of Evangelion, there exists one or more of these scrolls whose existence was never revealed to the public and are currently held by Seele. Seele states that their pursuit of the Human Instrumentality Project, and all events occurring therein, is in accordance with an ambiguously-described "scenario" laid out in the Dead Sea Scrolls, predicting the Second Impact, the coming of the Angels, and the eventual Third Impact.
Though the specifics of the project are largely mysterious and speculative, the Instrumentality Project is an operation initiated by Seele to instigate an artificial Third Impact in which all human physical life will end and the minds of all humans become united in a single soul. Nerv, the Evas, Adam, Lilith, and the Angels, along with Second Impact, all form part of Seele's skillful maneuvering to achieve this purpose. It could be said to be the project to turn humans into God, which is largely played out in The End of Evangelion, before Shinji decides to accept humans apart, and with different AT Fields. Metaphorically, this decision could be the "New Beginning" indicated by the series name, Neon Genesis Evangelion.
Evangelion Proposal is a 30 page basic outline of the plot of Neon Genesis Evangelion, including concept art, that was developed as a sort of pitch-package for the series while Gainax was still developing it. It was made about two years before the series even began airing (the premiere of the series was notorious for its repeated delays due to production and budget problems), after which it was shown around to TV stations that they wanted to pick up the series. Proposal confirms that Gainax did indeed have a basic outline of how the series would play out as they proceeded; however, it is also clear from this (and later statements by the creators) that the plot changed as work progressed; specifically the ending of the series outlined in Proposal, beyond the Eva-03 incident in episode 19, is widely divergent from what ultimately happened. However, Proposal does confirm that several aspects of the backstory, such as that the "First Ancestral Race" of aliens created the Angels, etc. were already established right when work on the series began, two years before it even premiered. Evangelion Proposal was released to the public as a subsection of the larger Evangelion Chronicle guide to the series.
Boosting Unit 01's power dramatically, it's the UN's primary hand-to-hand combat tool. On the plus side, it reinforces the strength of Unit 01, but on the minus side, the increased weight slightly reduces its mobility. By deflecting the A.T. Field the unit normally emits, the armor can be used for defense or even extra power for jumping and propulsion.
The new shoulder pylons each contains a 'Progressive Dagger,' an improved Progressive Knife which is even bigger and longer. Each shoulder is also equipped with an electrical beam like launcher named 'Volt Launcher' or 'Impact Bolt,' an antiphase weapon with, along with devastating power, the ability to temporarily paralyze an enemy.
In addition to these, the extra weapons included with F-Type equipment includes:
Note that these weapons are not only limited to Unit 01 for use. They can be switched to the other Eva Units for their use.
In the episode featuring Jet Alone in the TV series, Unit 01 was referenced as being deployed using the F-Type Equipment, although it looks no different from the standard armor in this appearance. Closer inspection would reveal that Unit 01 has larger than usual shoulder packs. It can be assumed that the F-Type Equipment, apart from other uses, offers the units the ability to operate without the need of being connected via cable for longer periods.
The JA that appeared in Episode 7 of TV series was the prototype model, and according to the setting, this unit with an onboard N² reactor was actually in development at the time.
Initially afraid of having an onboard fission reactor, but forced to meet the deadline for the public test, they fitted the prototype with a nuclear reactor taken from the "old system", which ends up running amok.
This model contained an onboard reactor was treated as experimental at the time. By coincidence, it slipped through the grasp of those who conspired to have it sabotaged, thus narrowly escaping disassembly.
The body of this robot, with its reactor, is slightly smaller than the original JA. But, it's still powerful and nimble, and in exchange for only having to equip a single cooling system, it consumes massive amounts of water, requiring the presence of a nearby water supply during periods of extended operation. Its weapons include a giant hammer and a ring attached to the wrist that emits an electrical discharge.
These blades are commonly seen as an accessory to Unit 01 models and action figures, but were never shown in the series. However, they do appear in several video games, like Super Robot Wars MX and Super Robot Wars Alpha 3.