Rei Ayanami

Overview

A central female character in the Evangelion franchise. Designated as the First Child, this 14-year-old girl is the exclusive pilot of Evangelion Unit-00 under NERV. Possessing an erased personal background, she exhibits an exceptionally reserved and emotionless demeanor. Throughout the narrative, she serves as a pivotal figure intimately tied to the core mysteries of the story and the Human Complementarity Project.

Appearance

She has fair skin, shaggy light blue short hair, and red eyes. She has a slender, petite build and first appears covered in heavy bandages due to an activation experiment accident. When piloting, she wears a white-based plugsuit—though her clone counterpart in the Rebuild films wears a black variant. Outside of combat, she is seen in her school uniform. In the final Rebuild film, a version of her appears with significantly longer hair inside Unit-01.

Personality

She exhibits an extremely quiet and detached personality with minimal expression of emotion. Possessing little regard for her own survival, she carries out assigned tasks mechanically. While initially opening her heart only to Commander Gendo Ikari, her interactions with Shinji Ikari gradually awaken subtle emotional responses, empathy, and social warmth. She is also a vegetarian.

Abilities

She possesses high compatibility as the pilot of Evangelion Unit-00, engaging Angels using A.T. Fields for defense alongside heavy arms like N2 weapons and scythes. Certain iterations are also shown interfering with vessel systems like the AAA Wunder. Furthermore, her consciousness can be transferred into fresh physical clones stored as backups, and her existence serves as the core for NERV's Dummy System.

Background

She is an artificial human created by combining a body derived from Yui Ikari—who was absorbed into Unit-01—with the soul of the Second Angel, Lilith. Multiple clone bodies are kept in reserve underground, allowing her soul to be transferred into a replacement body upon death. Over the course of the story, distinct iterations take her place following tragic fatalities. The Rebuild film series similarly introduces clone variants such as Rei Ayanami (Tentative Name).

Relationships

She initially holds unwavering loyalty toward Commander Gendo Ikari, though she eventually moves past total submission to follow her own resolve. Through shared combat and quiet personal moments with Shinji Ikari, she develops a profound bond and acts to protect him even at the cost of her life. Her dynamic with Asuka is marked by friction yet mutual recognition as fellow pilots. Her connection to Ritsuko Akagi and her mother Naoko is burdened by the dark history of NERV's synthetic human research.

Trivia

Her surname 'Ayanami' stems from the Imperial Japanese Navy Fubuki-class destroyer Ayanami. Her given name 'Rei' incorporates the dual concept of the numeral zero and a homage to Rei Hino from Sailor Moon. Her memorable early appearance clad in heavy bandaging was inspired by lyrics from the Japanese rock band Muscle Girl Coalition (Kinniku Shojo Tai).