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At the very beginning of the Evangelion anime, when Shinji is waiting for
Misato, he notices Rei standing across the street. She then disappears after
he turns away and looks at the spot again.

![Rei on street](https://i.stack.imgur.com/kvJEo.png)

What's with her appearance here? Surely this can't be the "real" Rei, given
that later, I think we see Rei in bandages when Gendo Ikari goads Shinji into
piloting the EVA? I'm assuming that this could be some sort of foreshadowing
(?), but even so it doesn't make sense for Rei to literally appear before
Shinji, unless this is some sort of illusion.


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2015-04-30T01:25:20.940
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question
neon-genesis-evangelion
What's with Rei's appearance at the very beginning?


There is a mind boggling theory for this. If you are an avid reader of EVA
Geeks you would enjoy it very much. So here is my small take on it.

Rei appears with the same uniform in the _End of Evangelion_ standing on a sea
of LCL. Here is the scene:

![Rei on LCL](https://i.stack.imgur.com/FueOl.jpg)

Shinji, when he first sees Rei at Nerv, recognizes her and makes a connection
to the girl in the school uniform. So he is **not hallucinating** when he sees
the image of Rei.

At this point there are a few theories:

  1. The Rei which is seen could be **Eva Unit 01** which is trying to contact his mind.

  2. Another theory is that Shinji has mental visions of Rei in episodes 16 and 20 which could be Rei herself contacting Shinji telepathically.

  3. A nice theory would be that Rei has the DNA of **Yui Ikari and Lilith**. So essentially, it's **two mothers** watching over their sons: namely, Yui looking after her son Shinji in the first episode and Lilith, who is the mother of Lilin, or all mankind, looking after her sons / daughters (let's not go on that path) in the End of Evangelion (picture above).

**Mind blowing theory:** I swear this is one of the mind blowing theories I
have read about Evangelion. But it gives reason to your question.

In episode 23 Ritsuko shows Rei's room. If you notice the wall it has the
words "Top, Bottom, Strangeness". This presumably is put there to show Rei's
powers or nature. In quantum physics these three represent a sub atomic
particle called the quark. The six types of quarks are: up, down, charm,
strange, top, and bottom. As you can see, three of the quarks are listed in
Rei's room. The way it is related is that quarks defy classical physics. They
can be at two places at once. In End of Evangelion, Rei is seen everywhere. At
the sub-atomic level the particles do not follow the laws of physics, so much
that they can create effect without cause, or they can reach their destination
before starting their journey. So this could give you reason why she could be
at two places at once or show up as an image at the beginning and at the end.

P.S.: I did not come up with connecting the quark theory, but I did realise
the writing on the wall meant that Rei had a connection to quarks or just that
she likes quantum mechanics a lot (like me :D). But EVA Geeks had this
connection posted and credits to them for this mind boggling theory.

Source at EVA Geeks: [Theory and Analysis: Rei's Ghostly Appearances and
Quantum
Mechanics](http://wiki.evageeks.org/Theory_and_Analysis:Rei%27s_Ghostly_Appearances_and_Quantum_Mechanics).


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answer