#AND NOW THEY MADE THE CHARACTER ILLUSTRATIONS FOR FLYAWAY

[valkyrietookmoved]

WAIT THAT'S WHY THE ART IS FANILIAR OH MY GOD I'VE BEEN FOLLOWING THIS PERSON ALMOST SINCE SEKAI CANE OUT WJAT THE FUCK WHATE THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUXK

[huayno]

from neon genesis evangelion, vol. 12

The Mysterious Stranger

The Anime, the Manga, and the Mark Twain Novella

"God will provide for this kitten." "What makes you think so?" Ursula's eyes snapped with anger. "Because I know it!" she said. "Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His seeing it." "But it falls, just the same. What good is seeing it fall?"

—from The Mysterious Stranger

There is a short novel by Mark Twain, written near the end of his life and published posthumously, entitled The Mysterious Stranger. The tale is set in a small village in 16th century Austria, where three boys one day meet a young man different from themselves: "he had new and good clothes on, and was handsome and had a winning face and a pleasant voice, and was easy and graceful and unembarrassed, not slouchy and awkward and diffident, like other boys."

The mysterious stranger starts to do small but amazing tricks for them—causing water to turn to ice; conjuring grapes and bread out of air; even making birds that can fly out of clay. At last one boy, the story's narrator, works up the courage to ask the stranger who he is:

"'An angel,' he said, quite simply, and set another bird free and clapped his hands and made it flyaway."

The angel then proceeds to really impress them by making an entire toy castle, complete with five hundred miniature soldiers and workmen that move around by themselves. Naturally the boys get involved with this ultimate playset, making their own knights and cannon and cavalry, and although they get rather nervous again when the angel reveals his name is Satan, he assures them he is not that Satan, but only named after the fallen one.

"We others are still ignorant of sin; we are not able to commit it; we are without blemish, and we shall abide in that estate always." Distracted by two of the miniature workmen, "Satan reached out his hand and crushed the life out of them with his fingers... and went on talking where he had left off: 'We cannot do wrong; neither have we any disposition to do it, for we do not know what it is." Horrified as the other boys are, "he made us drunk with the joy of being with him and of looking into the heaven of his eyes, and of feeling the ecstasy that thrilled along our veins from the touch of his hand.'"

Yes, Kaworu Nagisa made quite an impression on the fans of Neon Genesis Evange/ion, despite the fact that, in the original broadcast version of the TV show (before it got all director's-cutted, box-setted, special-editioned, and platinum-lined) he shows up for only slightly less than thirteen minutes of total screen time, the climax of which being an entire minute where nothing happens at all.

That's what being a beautiful angel will do for you, especially when you make the most of your thirteen minutes on Earth by having a Whirlwind romance with the main character that ends in a lover's quarrel with Prog Knives and finally a voluntary martyrdom at the hand of your boy here. Relationships don't come any more tragic than that of Kaworu Nagisa and Shinji Ikari, and when fans (including this one) first saw it on TV, the affair was so brief and shocking the story logic of it didn't click in until much later.

In the anime, Kaworu is acknowledged as the Final Messenger, and, of all the Angels Shinji has to fight, this is the most ruthless battle, won at the highest possible cost to himself. It took even longer for me to realize that the showdown in episode 24 had also taken us full circle from Shinji's first fight in episodes 1 and 2, which emphasized his personal helplessness against the looming Angel Sachiel. Against Kaworu, it is the Angel who becomes the small, helpless figure, while Shinji is represented only by the gargantuan, frightful helm and arm of his Eva Unit-O1. We never see Shinji's human face once throughout the whole final minute of decision.

So as Col. Trautman would have said instead of Major Katsuragi, "It's over, Shinji! IT'S OVER!" Kaworu v. Shinji (or Kaworu x Shinji, in the doujinshi) was the big final showdown between humanity and the Angels. And with the outcome leaving Shinji at his most wretched ever, wouldn't it be nice if everyone just died—your wish being Eva's command, as it turns out that fortunately humanity hardly ever needed the Angels to slaughter itself.

"I am perishing already—I am failing—I am passing away. In a little while you will be alone in shoreless space, to wander its limitless solitudes without friend or comrade forever...But I, your poor servant, have revealed you to yourself and set you free. Dream other dreams, and better!"

—from The Mysterious Stranger

Satan's words near the end of Mark Twain's story also uncannily prefigure the end of the world and the Instrumentality project, both of which follow his death in the TV show in such quick order you picture Anno as a hairnetted fry cook dinging the counter bell. By now you see Sadamoto's handling of Kaworu, and perhaps nothing illustrates the different experiences of the manga and the anime better than his handling of this critical character.

No longer the last Angel to be fought, Kaworu actually becomes an active Eva pilot and fights an Angel—the dude even has the nerve to observe the fight is fixed, based on his knowledge of SEELE's prophecies. Sadamoto of course introduces him at an earlier point in the narrative—at the equivalent of episode 19's end—and then sends him to NERV near the equivalent of episode 22's beginning—before certain important events, to put it mildly, can occur. When one notes this kind of thing, of course, it's important to restate that the Evangelion manga has always been a separate but equal "official" version of Eva, with no particular obligation to align itself with the anime, and indeed it was with Book Five, the first released after The End of Evangelion, that Sadamoto began to truly seem free to go in his own direction.

Nevertheless, as the "other" official version of the Eva story, it is reasonable for fans to view it as an "alternate history" relative to the anime, and the way Kaworu has been introduced makes us realize the manga may end very differently indeed. Despite the fact we know here that Kaworu is an Angel from the very beginning, he appears destined to at least hang around long enough to pick up a few paychecks. It's not clear when your health benefits kick in at NERV, although if Ritsuko is your primary caregiver it might be best to forego them.

Sadamoto's remarks upon visiting the U.S. in 2003 indicated that the Eva manga might (might) be planned as a twelve-volume series in all. There is still plenty of room for speculation, as the slow working pace to which the artist himself often refers has of late become almost relativistic—as of this writing, it has been eight months since Sadamoto has drawn a new installment of Eva in Japan, and hence a Volume Ten is nowhere in sight. It may be small comfort, but those of you reading this are pretty much in the same drifting boat as the Japanese fans.

"An angel's love is sublime, adorable, divine, beyond the imagination of man—infinitely beyond it! But it is limited to his own august order. If it fell upon one of your race for only an instant, it would consume its object to ashes. No, we cannot love men but we can be harmlessly indifferent to them; we can also like them, sometimes."

—from The Mysterious Stranger

And with Book Nine we see the most staggering difference thus far between the manga and the anime; Sadamoto's Shinji doesn't even like Kaworu, much less love him. Of course, you could say the less-ethereal Kaworu of the manga is harder to love. I can't believe Sadamoto had him tell Rei he thought she'd be "heftier." And yet he did.

I don't think any A.T. Fields actually got penetrated in the anime; while I do think Shinji felt sexually attracted to Kaworu, and that you the audience are supposed to feel that he felt it, what Kaworu himself thought was a very different matter. Like Rei, I believe Kaworu to be innocent—coyly, he appears not to be so, because while Rei needed to be reached out to, Kaworu has come to reach out; whereas Rei has spent her existence being observed; Kaworu has come to observe.

Indeed, in the manga, Shinji's irritation about Kaworu's invasion of his personal space seems almost a parody of his attitude in the anime. In the TV show, when Kaworu put his hand on Shinji's, he flinched but did not pull away; whereas in the manga it's easy to imagine Shinji slugging him. Instead he goes to run after Rei, hoping to get closer to her again.

I hardly think the change reflects any phobia on Sadamoto's part (after all, we even get to see Shinji's "Unit One" in the manga), but the fact the manga Shinji is less emotionally bleak and empty, and hence less vulnerable. Shinji's just as negative in the manga, of course, but it's an active variety, rather than the passive negative creep (in the best Nirvana song sense) we know from the anime. We don't have to imagine him slugging Gendo; from the look of surprise on Dad's face in Book Seven he would have smacked the beard off his face if Kaji hadn't stopped him.

Neither is Shinji in a positive emotional situation where we leave him here, either; indeed at this point in the manga there's arguably no one he can turn to—the more brutal fate that befell Toji has cut him off from his school friends, Rei has become hesitant, Kaji is dead, and his perennial self-esteem booster Asuka is going to need to rebuild her internal supply before she can even get back to calling him a loser and idiot.

So, like Misato trying to put her own hand on Shinji's, all I can do for now while we wait for Sadamoto-sensei is to recommend for your winter vacation reading list The Mysterious Stranger, which I can almost guarantee will give you new angles to think about Kaworu, and may even earn you class credit besides. A quick look at the novel's comments on Amazon list a teacher who says fundamentalist students walked out of his class when he taught it; another compares it to The Matrix; those who dislike it call it "sick," "bitter," and "twisted." Sounds like good old Evangelion to me!

—Carl Gustav Horn

[a drawing of Kaworu holding a kitten]

Although The Mysterious Stranger can also be found in a number of print editions, including The Portable Mark Twain from Penguin (haw haw), the story, being from the days when mp3s came on shellacked cylinders, is legally available online at http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/TwaMyst.html. The same site has a book called The Holy Bible, King James Version, which fans of Evangelion might also enjoy, although it's technically "Editor's Choice."

[yv-sketches]

Hello! I was wondering if you could describe 'The Wizards of Once' characters physical appearances with details.

Eyyyy another question! 😱 These make me so happy 

This question is kind of hard though. Cressida is sparse with physical descriptions, most of them say something about the nature of the character. Her illustrations do most of the work. The httyd books often had half accurate colours, (Shadow is nor red!) so I’ll believe the text and illustrations over the cover art.

I reread both books and collected the following mentions:

Sit down, because this will be a LOOOONG answer.

~

Unironically, most comments about Xar’s physical appearance are about his hair. When Xar is sad or in distress, his hair droops.

“He was a cheerful scruff of a boy, with a tremendous quiff of hair shooting upward from his forehead as if it had accidentally come into contact with some invisible vertical hurricane.” (Once, Ch. 1)

Xar is five foot tall, or 152,4 cm.

“Xar had been caught because there was no such thing as a five-foot-tall Bigfoot with a bright blue beard.” (Twice, Ch. 1)

A green X shaped witchstain on his right palm.

“There, right in the middle of the palm, was the bright green stain. He tried to wipe it off on his cloak, but it did not move.” (Once, Ch. 11)

In book 2, it becomes worse, and Xar wears a black glove to conceal it.

“The green of the Witch-stain had moved beyond Xar’s hand and up his wrist, and looked as if it was spreading farther, like a creeping bruise, or ivy slowly growing around and strangling a tender young tree.” (Twice, Ch. 1)

Xar also wears a cloak. Most illustrations show him with his long fur coat only, but Cressida doesn’t draw EVERY detail in EVERY illustration. (Unless it’s an important detail.)

Xar is heavier than Wish. (Once, Ch. 8)

Xar wears a waistcoat with pockets and he has at least one breast pocket. (Once, Ch. 13)

Bodkin is described as skinny, but Xar is small too.

“But you’re just one small boy!” (Twice, Ch. 7)

~

Wish’s descriptions are mostly about how she is not a great warrior. She wears an eyepatch, a red cloak and armour. Her hair, like Xar’s, is a mess.

“A skinny little Warrior princess and her Assistant Bodyguard, Bodkin. They were wearing red cloaks over their armor, which made them shine out like stars in the dark green forest.” (Once, Ch. 2)

“Warrior princesses, of course, ought to be impressively tall and absolutely terrifying, like Wish’s mother, Queen Sychorax. Wish was neither scary nor large. She had a curious little face that was rather too interested in the world around her and hair that stuck out too wispily, as if she’d accidentally hit some unnoticed bit of static electricity. A black patch covered her left eye.” (Once, Ch. 2)

“Wish was small and sweet-natured and determined, with an eyepatch over one eye, and hair so disobediently flyaway that it looked as if it were being blown about by some personal independent wind.” (Twice, Ch. 3)

“She didn’t look remotely special, a small, skinny little child with an eyepatch and hair sticking out in all directions.” (Twice, Ch. 14)

She also has a limp.

“The queen had hoped to have a daughter who was tall and golden like herself, not someone small and scruffy and weird with hair that wouldn’t lie flat and an eyepatch and a limp.” (Once, Ch. 14)

Xar wonders:

“How could this tiny matchstick of a girl be scary Queen Sychorax’s daughter?” (Once, Ch. 5)

~

There are very little descriptions of Bodkin, but he wears a helmet on every single illustration. At the beginning if book 2, Bodkin wears a lot of armour.

“Bodkin was the taller one, and Wish was the little one with the sword.” (Once, Ch. 4)

“Bodkin was an anxious, skinny boy about the same age as Wish.” (Twice, Ch. 3)

“CLANG! That was the sound of Bodkin’s helmeted head hitting the floor.” (Twice, Ch. 6)

Bodkin is taller than Wish, and he’s described as skinny multiple times. (Maybe because he is a servant. In book 1 he mentioned that royalty ate fancy food.)

“Two Warriors, one tall, skinny one and one little, limpy one.” (Once, Ch. 15)

~

Queen Sychorax might be the character with the most physical descriptions available. A lot of times, she is described as beautiful, but in a scary, chilling way.

“Queen Sychorax was a legend in the forest, known for her cruelty and height and her pitiless Warrior strength. (Once, Ch. 5)

She is six feet tall, or 189 cm, slim and muscular and has long golden hair.

“Sychorax was scary. She was lovely, all right—if by “lovely” you mean pretty. Hair like a golden waterfall, slim as a candle, six feet tall and most of it muscle. She was dressed in white, with a single black pearl hanging from one ear.” (Once, Ch. 13)

She wears a long white dress, one black and one white earring and a belt to keep keys. She also has a sword with a rather grumpy face on it.

“And just as Queen Sychorax was sailing off, in a rustle of long, gracious white skirts, a certain knot that attached a little iron key to the belt she wore around her waist undid itself.” (Once, Ch. 14)

As queen, Sychorax has very fancy armour. She is described as ‘golden’ a few times. Her shoes are gold too.

“She was dressed in elaborately regal armor, with one black earring and one white.” (Twice, Ch. 3)

“The queen had hoped to have a daughter who was tall and golden like herself.” (Once, Ch. 14)

“She glided out of her throne in a graceful golden flash,” (Twice, Ch. 5)

“Queen Sychorax was not in a good mood as she stepped disdainfully across the broken rubble in her golden slippers.” (Twice, Ch.13)

She wears a royal ermine cloak.

“Queen Sychorax handed him her keys to all the cells and her very distinctive bright red cloak, lined snugly with royal black-and-white fur.” (Once, Ch. 16)

She has a large nose. Both Encanzo and Xar comment on it. There were even more nose comments in book 1, but they did not make it to the final version.

“Queen Sychorax did have, as it happened, a rather large nose. It was a splendidly, royally, beautifully large nose, but a trifle on the enormous side of medium nonetheless.” (Twice, Ch. 13.)

As a great warrior, Sychorax probably has a neat haircut, manicure and very pointy weapons.

“And a Warrior should always be well put together,” said Queen Sychorax. “Every hair in place. Every weapon sharpened. Every fingernail shining.” (Once, Ch. 25)

This one is a bit less obvious:

“Inconceivable,” echoed Encanzo bitterly, in a voice hard as a diamond. “A queen like Sychorax was always going to marry some idiot Warrior with a thick neck and a big sword, so she could enjoy all these knickknacks, these golden plates, this Warrior jewelry trash around her neck…” (Twice, Ch. 18)

Encanzo is mad at her, but it says a lot about what warriors look like. They wear neck rings on most illustrations, and apparently they use gold for their jewelry and maybe even for their plate armour.

It also shows that wizards are not very fond of jewelry.

~

Encanzo is a bit difficult, because his shape changes due to his magic. He has one black fingernail, and since it’s visible on all his illustrations, it must be important.

“The King Enchanter was a tall man, and Magic had made him taller still. It was curiously difficult to look at him, for he always seemed to be very slightly changing shape, blurring in and out at the edges. He had one black fingernail on his right hand, and there was a story of how the fingernail had turned that color, but no one dared ask the Enchanter what the story was.” (Once, Ch. 9)

He is described as tall, but we do not know his exact height. People in the iron age were shorter than they are now, so he is probably not httyd-viking-tall.

“Encanzo, was a tall, immensely powerful Wizard, of such Magic strength that it was curiously difficult to look at him. His outline was blurred by Magic, shifting, moving, and great steaming clouds of enchantment drifted off his head as he spoke.” (Twice, Ch. 1)

Magic clouds drift from his head, depending on his mood.

“And Encanzo was prowling in the shadows, his face bleak as a midwinter cliff, great storm clouds billowing from his head” (Twice, Ch.17)

Encanzo can shapeshift. Both times he turns into a bird.

“Encanzo had been up all night, in the form of a peregrine falcon.” (Once, Ch. 26)

“Xar’s father was looking for him, searching the countryside in the form of a great golden eagle.” (Twice, Ch. 8)

He wears a cloak as well.

“And off the Enchanter swept, with a rather unnerving thunderclap sweep of his cloak, to join in the merrymaking.” (Once, Ch. 26)

Encanzo has a bronze sword. Droods use bronze swords as well as wizard staffs, so it’s likely that Encanzo owns Bronze weapons. Sychorax comments:

“Your bronze sword is no match for my iron.” (Twice, Ch. 14)

When he was a young man, he was kind if handsome.

“The Wizard, now that she could see his face up close in the moonlight, was a very silly, tricky young man, but undeniably a little bit handsome…” (Twice, Ch. 10)

~

Encanzo’s eyes are grey, Sychorax’s are blue. Both parents are aging, and their skin starts to wrinkle.

“Fine lines had traced their way across their faces. But their eyes were the same eyes that had gazed out on the world a couple of decades before. One pair a fierce blue. The other a wild gray.” (Twice, Ch. 19)

~

Now for the less-certain parts.

Cressida does not draw pupils, so Wish, Xar and Bodkin’s eye colours are a mystery.

Xar’s hair is very dark. When I compare him to Caliburn the raven, it is black or near black.

Encanzo is bald so we can skip him. (Looter has the same hair colour as Xar, so if he ever had hair, it was probably dark too.)

We can also skip Bodkin, because we have never seen him without helmet.

Sychorax is blonde and pale and ripped (look at that biceps)

(Cressida’s illustrations vary A LOT, so this is just speculation, but Encanzo’s skin is often shaded while everyone else’s is not. Either he has a bit if a tan, it’s the magic coming out of his head, or everyone else is pale. Not unlikely, considering it’s Britain.)

The most difficult case is definitely Wish.

In most of her illustrations, her hair is obviously darker than her mother’s, but not as dark as Xar’s. On every coloured cover art, she is blonde. She might be blonde, and the dark lines are meant to show the dirt and mess? Her hair might be dark blonde? Or blonde-brown-ish?

We’ll have to wait for further books to tell us the details. ♥️