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Bardiel is a major antagonist of the Neon Genesis Evangelion franchise. It is designated as the Thirteenth Angel in original TV series while both the manga and film series designated it as the Ninth Angel.
Biography
Stealthy sneaking into NERV's HQ at Matsushiro, Bardiel managed to infect and take control of Unit-03, the newest Evangelion model, with its pilot Toji Suzuhara trapped inside of it. Afterwards, the Angel proceeded to destroy any of its surroundings, triggering a massive explosion that destroyed the base.
Marching towards Tokyo-3 in order to trigger Third Impact with Lilith's body at Terminal Dogma, Bardiel soon found himself observed by other Evangelion Units. The first to challenge it was Unit-02, whom Bardiel effortlessly defeated and incapacitated. The Angel spared the life of its pilot before resuming its advance into city.
Later, Unit-00 took shooting position behind Bardiel's back. However, its pilot Rei Ayanami hesitated to finish off the Angel, knowing well it could result death of her classmate. Becoming aware of her presence, Bardiel suddenly stopped and performed a backflip, pinning Unit-00 to the ground. The mutated Unit-03 easily overpowered its opponent before beginning an attempt to infect the Eva with its spores. Acting quickly, Gendo gave the command to sever the Evangelion's arm off through explosives. This caused much pain to its pilot as synchronization was not cut off, but the Angel apparently lost its interest in Unit-00 and moved on.
The Thirteenth Angel's final opponent was Evangelion Unit-01, piloted by Shinji Ikari. Unleashing a howl from its jaws, Bardiel took a leap into air and floored Unit-01 before wrapping its arms around its neck. Despite this, Unit-01's pilot refused to hurt the Angel, believing Toji could still be saved. However, Gendo did not share his beliefs and instead commanded to activate the Dummy Plug System, cutting off the pilot from control over the Eva.
Massively growing in strength and endurance, Unit-01 broke out of Bardiel's grip and snapped its neck, paralyzing the Angel's body. Refusing to stop its assault, Unit-01 continued to thrown around Unit-03's lifeless body and tear out of the insides of its abdomen, before finally crushing its skull. To make sure the Angel will not return, Unit-01 grabbed the Entry Plug (where the human pilots are located) and smashed it. In the manga series, Toji ends up dead, whereas in the anime, he loses his left leg.
Personality
Bardiel is one of the most aggressive, savage and unpredictable Angels in the entire series.
Bardiel was shown to be a rather peaceful Angel while unprovoked, slowly heading towards the Tokyo-III in a slightly hunched over pose. It seems to not take any interest in its surroundings, ignoring anything that's not an Evangelion Unit.
However, when confronting another Evangelion, Bardiel becomes highly violent and unpredictable, quickly defeating them while also trying to contaminate them with its own parasite. It's seen behaving in a savage and animalistic manner, roaring, standing on all fours and choking its victims.
Appearance
As Evangelion Unit-03, Bardiel is a tall, slender humanoid Evangelion of average size. Its head is rounded and small compared to rest of the body, with a ghostly white (glowing red in Rebuild) pair of eyes and opened jaws, filled with square teeth. Its arms are extremely long and skinny, reaching beyond to its knees, while its hands have five fingers with functional thumb. Its legs are also long and skinny, being slightly shorter than the arms. Its entire body is covered with full-body armor plates of black-white color scheme, with shoulder pylons, knee and elbow guards.
Powers and Abilities
Angel/Evangelion Unit Physiology: While Bardiel seems to lack many standard powers like that most of the Angels have like an AT field, it instead possesses those typically assigned to Evangelion Units, although greatly enhanced.
- Parasitic Possession: Being fungus-like parasite in nature, Bardiel is able to take control over biological beings' bodies, such as those of humans or Evangelion Units. It seems to require a human pilot in order to properly control a Unit, as it prevented the injection of the Entry Plug, although it might simply take the pilot hostage.
- Apocalypse Inducement: Like all Angels, Bardiel will trigger an apocalyptic event known as Third Impact as soon as it makes a physical contact with the Seed of Life known as Lilith. Said event will erase all organic life originating from Lilith, leaving the Angel's species as the only survivors, as well as render the climate on Earth uninhabitable for anything aside from Angels, allowing their species to flourish.
- Absolute Stamina: Unlike the regular Evangelion Units, Bardiel does not require any Umbilical Cord or internal batteries to function, as it might have S² Engine to create infinite amounts of energy from nothing. It should be noted that in Rebuild of Evangelion, the inside of Unit-03 was stated to have been converted into an Angel's core.
- Advanced Jumping: This Angel's signature power is leaping distances and heights of hundreds of kilometres, if not miles into the air. This proves useful when fighting against Evangelion Units from enormous distance, allowing Bardiel to close the distance between it and its opponent within seconds. As demonstrated during the fight with Unit-00, Bardiel can also perform backflips, and does not need a running start.
- Advanced Strength: As Unit-03, Bardiel is abnormally strong for an Evangelion Unit, being able to effortlessly overpower all three Eva Units in both manga and anime series one after another. For comparison, said Evangelion Units are able to lift and throw an battleship, as well as temporally support Sahaquiel's body individually.
- Advanced Speed: Mutated Unit-03 can move at astonishing speeds, even by Evangelion Units' standards, which are able to break the sound barrier while running. Its blitzing speed allows it to overpower other Evangelion Unit's before they can even react, although the Angel itself is blitzed by berserk Evangelion Unit-01's speed.
- Advanced Durability: Although not as impressive as most of other Angels, Bardiel displays a fair level of durability; landing on other Evangelion Units, Bardiel dazes them by its impact while it stays completely unfazed and unharmed. The Thirteenth Angel was also able to survive a brutal beatdown from a berserk Unit-01 for brief moments before ultimately dying from having its Entry Plug crushed.
- Mutation Inducement: Due to Evangelion Units being biological in biology, Bardiel can freely mutate taken over bodies to better fight with its opponents.
- Multiple Arms: Similar to Evangelion Unit-13, Bardiel possesses additional set of arms, although those seem to be a result of Angel's mutative capabilities rather than biological trait. It is seen using them against Unit-01, after it initially breaks free of its grip to hold its arms and neck at once.
Trivia
- The color of the armor covering Bardiel's body bears a heavy resemblance to Toji Suzuhara's typical clothing.
 Villains
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SEELE NERV Angels Transformers x Evangelion Godzilla vs. Evangelion | ||