✧ ooc ✧ characterization
Nia's one of my favorite characters ever, and I try to put a lot of thought into how I play her. This is just sort of a place where I can ramble about how I characterize her, as well as list any extraneous tidbits, such as non-anime canon that I've decided to include.
non-anime canon
interviews
interview with Gainax 10.16.07
✬ Nia and Adiane used to play beach volleyball together. Since Nia mentions in episode 13 that she's read about the ocean but never seen it, I'm interpreting this to mean that there's basically a giant sandbox in Teppelin where Nia played volleyball and built giant sand castles.
✬ Gainax is very coy about whether Simon and Nia had sex during the timeskip. I'm going with the interpretation that yes, they did, so no, Nia was not a virgin when she became the Antispiral Messenger. However, sex to Nia is just another thing people do, much like eating, breathing, sleeping, and going to the bathroom. As such, she doesn't understand why people fuss about it, but she doesn't bring it up in conversation unless there's something that prompts her to. The guys of the Dai Gurren Dan think of her as a little sister, though, so they probably scream at the idea of Nia having sex.
✬ Nia is Lord Genome's biological daughter. Her mother was one of the women from the village in episode 12 over which Guame intended for Nia to be headswoman. Because Nia never mentions her mother, and knowing how Lord Genome treats his ladies, I'd go so far as to say that Nia has no real memory of her mother.
✬ Simon and Nia spent the interim between their final victory and their wedding on an island together. However, I've read--and I have no source on this, but it's probably at csakuras's journal--that the lite novels have Nia going around apologizing in person to people for her actions as the Messenger, and it's very, very much in Nia's character to do so. I'm going to go with both the apologies and the pre-wedding honeymoon; Nia spent a few days traveling around apologizing and helping people, and the rest of the time with Simon.
✬ During the timeskip, Nia spent her time traveling around visiting various places, much like a real princess would. Therefore, she was probably a very popular and well-known figure in Kamina City, and not just because she's a member of the Dai Gurren Dan and dating the president. Even though she no longer considered herself a princess, the public probably took to calling her "Princess Nia" anyway. Also, since she didn't actually have a job, she would have been supported on Simon's very handsome presidential salary.
✬ Nia's self-identity, as well as her love of and promise to Simon, are what allowed her to hold on for that week until after the wedding. However, as the week wore on, her self-identity started to decay. Because Nia, as an Antispiral, is essentially a digital program, the destruction of the Antispiral system pretty much destroyed what would be considered the server maintaining her data. If Nia had tried to hold on longer, she would have slowly but surely started to decay and dissipate in pieces.
lite novels
novel 2
❀ Nia learned to cook from Old Coco.
❀ It took three days to bury all of the discarded princesses.
❀ Nia's DNA was used to unlock the Human Annihilation System. Also, Nia was personally responsible for summoning the Mugann to attack Earth.
novel 3
₪ Nia's favorite food is vegetable soup.
₪ Simon built the giant Kamina statue because Nia asked him to. ➛"When Nia saw the Kamina statues, she knew just how much Simon loved him and how important Kamina was to him. And seeing how he could feel so much for a person, Nia thought she could believe in him."
₪ Messenger Nia had a hell of a lot of power. ➛"When she appears in front of Simon, Rossiu orders for her to be captured, and the soldiers shoot her with electric rounds to paralyze her. But when the electric currents hit her body, she's able to bend them to her will, make them run up to the tip of her finger, then throw the electric currents back and mow down the soldiers."
novel 4
✧ Continuation of the above, about Nia holding onto herself before her disappearance. ➛"Apparently Nia used a method of "making her memories into a dummy and affixing them to her own body" to somehow avoid disappearing." If I'm understanding this right, this supports my theory that Nia's mind was being supported by some sort of Antispiral server or whatever. But it seems as if the difference between humans and Messengers is such that while humans are capable of maintaining their own identities, Messengers can't.
✧ One more thing Nia did during her last week was attend a private funeral for her fallen comrades.
movies
Lagann-hen
✾ Nia wrote letters to Kamina and kept up a written correspondence with Yoko. She was also there to see Yoko off when Yoko left Kamina City.
✾ Nia would attend government meetings and sit at Simon's side, despite not being part of the government, as if her being there was completely natural. She did this regularly.
✾ ➛ "Nia's dream is for the surface to be full of flowers. Not just as decoration, but for all the plants and insects and animals. She wants to make it a place where they could take root, drink water, bathe in sunlight, then bloom and bear fruit." She wants to do this without Simon's help, because he has his own things to accomplish and his own dreams to fulfill. But in her mind, their marriage is a bond that allows them to help each other make their dreams come true side by side.
✾ Nia kept a diary, which she entrusted to Yoko before her death. I may or may not be playing with this in the City (i.e., by having Nia keep a diary here).
✾ ➛ "He [Simon] understands everything about me."
weird ramblings
❃ On Nia's style of speech: In the original Japanese, Nia speaks keigo, or formal Japanese (not to be confused with polite Japanese). I've rendered this in English as formally as I possibly can. Nia addresses other people as [NAME]-san. -san is a standard Japanese honorific that expresses a very common and basic politeness. It's extremely common for everyday non-keigo speakers to address one another as [NAME]-san, so Nia doing so isn't particularly unique to her. Usually honorifics like that are just dropped in English, since we don't have much of an equivalent in everyday speech. However, because Nia speaks keigo, I've chosen to signify her use of honorifics by having her address men as "Sir" and "Miss".
❃ Nia's level of knowledge is a really big thing for me. Considering Lord Genome's attitude towards his children, it's highly unlikely he let her study science at any depth. Nia mentions having "read about the ocean in a book," so I'm sure she knows some very, very basic things--kindergarten-level science, basically. She's pretty good at math and probably has the times table memorized. What she studied most at the palace were sports and the arts; as noted above, Old Coco taught her how to cook.
Where it gets complicated is that this Nia comes from after her death, so of course she's post-timeskip. Nia's a very curious and intelligent woman with an incredible desire to learn. At the same time, though, I don't see her as really going out of her way to study subjects like physics and biology. She enjoys reading, but she's not avid about it, and while she's interested in all forms of knowledge, certain concepts and ideas rank higher in her interests than others. For instance, she'd read a cookbook or a book about caring for flowers, but she wouldn't go check out her world's equivalent of Grey's Anatomy just for some curious reading. If it came up in a conversation, she would ask about it, and gather the details from the person she's talking to--because if it comes up in conversation, it must be important to whomever she's talking to, and she wants to know a little about what they know so she can know the person better.
Basically, Nia's knowledge is very people-reliant, because she cares about these things in how they relate to the people around her.
❃ Nia dislikes the pain curses can cause, although she's had fun with some curses. She hasn't had much of a chance yet to be exposed to how nasty the deities can really be, though, and once she does she'll most definitely have something to say about it. She dislikes that the City traps people here when they don't want to be, but she can't hate it because being here has given her a chance to be Simon again, and further, to live with him as his wife. She also sees it as a chance to work to fulfill her dream with her own two hands, even if this isn't her own world. On the other hand, she's fully aware that her existence here isn't forever and neither is her time with Simon, and she doesn't want it to be forever. Nia is dead, and the dead can't come back to life. Sooner or later she's going to have to pass on for good, and even though she's scared and doubtful and her heart hurts at the knowledge that she can't always be by Simon's side, she's a very strong person; what will happen will happen because it has to happen, and for now she'll just take the happiness she can get each day.
❃ Another brief point on Nia's knowledge--the animals in the TTGL-verse are all hybrids, á la Avatar. So Nia is completely ignorant to the possibility of there being just dogs and cats. The would be liondogs, hippodogs, sharkcats, and ostrichcats.
non-anime canon
interviews
interview with Gainax 10.16.07
✬ Nia and Adiane used to play beach volleyball together. Since Nia mentions in episode 13 that she's read about the ocean but never seen it, I'm interpreting this to mean that there's basically a giant sandbox in Teppelin where Nia played volleyball and built giant sand castles.
✬ Gainax is very coy about whether Simon and Nia had sex during the timeskip. I'm going with the interpretation that yes, they did, so no, Nia was not a virgin when she became the Antispiral Messenger. However, sex to Nia is just another thing people do, much like eating, breathing, sleeping, and going to the bathroom. As such, she doesn't understand why people fuss about it, but she doesn't bring it up in conversation unless there's something that prompts her to. The guys of the Dai Gurren Dan think of her as a little sister, though, so they probably scream at the idea of Nia having sex.
✬ Nia is Lord Genome's biological daughter. Her mother was one of the women from the village in episode 12 over which Guame intended for Nia to be headswoman. Because Nia never mentions her mother, and knowing how Lord Genome treats his ladies, I'd go so far as to say that Nia has no real memory of her mother.
✬ Simon and Nia spent the interim between their final victory and their wedding on an island together. However, I've read--and I have no source on this, but it's probably at csakuras's journal--that the lite novels have Nia going around apologizing in person to people for her actions as the Messenger, and it's very, very much in Nia's character to do so. I'm going to go with both the apologies and the pre-wedding honeymoon; Nia spent a few days traveling around apologizing and helping people, and the rest of the time with Simon.
✬ During the timeskip, Nia spent her time traveling around visiting various places, much like a real princess would. Therefore, she was probably a very popular and well-known figure in Kamina City, and not just because she's a member of the Dai Gurren Dan and dating the president. Even though she no longer considered herself a princess, the public probably took to calling her "Princess Nia" anyway. Also, since she didn't actually have a job, she would have been supported on Simon's very handsome presidential salary.
✬ Nia's self-identity, as well as her love of and promise to Simon, are what allowed her to hold on for that week until after the wedding. However, as the week wore on, her self-identity started to decay. Because Nia, as an Antispiral, is essentially a digital program, the destruction of the Antispiral system pretty much destroyed what would be considered the server maintaining her data. If Nia had tried to hold on longer, she would have slowly but surely started to decay and dissipate in pieces.
lite novels
novel 2
❀ Nia learned to cook from Old Coco.
❀ It took three days to bury all of the discarded princesses.
❀ Nia's DNA was used to unlock the Human Annihilation System. Also, Nia was personally responsible for summoning the Mugann to attack Earth.
novel 3
₪ Nia's favorite food is vegetable soup.
₪ Simon built the giant Kamina statue because Nia asked him to. ➛"When Nia saw the Kamina statues, she knew just how much Simon loved him and how important Kamina was to him. And seeing how he could feel so much for a person, Nia thought she could believe in him."
₪ Messenger Nia had a hell of a lot of power. ➛"When she appears in front of Simon, Rossiu orders for her to be captured, and the soldiers shoot her with electric rounds to paralyze her. But when the electric currents hit her body, she's able to bend them to her will, make them run up to the tip of her finger, then throw the electric currents back and mow down the soldiers."
novel 4
✧ Continuation of the above, about Nia holding onto herself before her disappearance. ➛"Apparently Nia used a method of "making her memories into a dummy and affixing them to her own body" to somehow avoid disappearing." If I'm understanding this right, this supports my theory that Nia's mind was being supported by some sort of Antispiral server or whatever. But it seems as if the difference between humans and Messengers is such that while humans are capable of maintaining their own identities, Messengers can't.
✧ One more thing Nia did during her last week was attend a private funeral for her fallen comrades.
movies
Lagann-hen
✾ Nia wrote letters to Kamina and kept up a written correspondence with Yoko. She was also there to see Yoko off when Yoko left Kamina City.
✾ Nia would attend government meetings and sit at Simon's side, despite not being part of the government, as if her being there was completely natural. She did this regularly.
✾ ➛ "Nia's dream is for the surface to be full of flowers. Not just as decoration, but for all the plants and insects and animals. She wants to make it a place where they could take root, drink water, bathe in sunlight, then bloom and bear fruit." She wants to do this without Simon's help, because he has his own things to accomplish and his own dreams to fulfill. But in her mind, their marriage is a bond that allows them to help each other make their dreams come true side by side.
✾ Nia kept a diary, which she entrusted to Yoko before her death. I may or may not be playing with this in the City (i.e., by having Nia keep a diary here).
✾ ➛ "He [Simon] understands everything about me."
weird ramblings
❃ On Nia's style of speech: In the original Japanese, Nia speaks keigo, or formal Japanese (not to be confused with polite Japanese). I've rendered this in English as formally as I possibly can. Nia addresses other people as [NAME]-san. -san is a standard Japanese honorific that expresses a very common and basic politeness. It's extremely common for everyday non-keigo speakers to address one another as [NAME]-san, so Nia doing so isn't particularly unique to her. Usually honorifics like that are just dropped in English, since we don't have much of an equivalent in everyday speech. However, because Nia speaks keigo, I've chosen to signify her use of honorifics by having her address men as "Sir" and "Miss".
❃ Nia's level of knowledge is a really big thing for me. Considering Lord Genome's attitude towards his children, it's highly unlikely he let her study science at any depth. Nia mentions having "read about the ocean in a book," so I'm sure she knows some very, very basic things--kindergarten-level science, basically. She's pretty good at math and probably has the times table memorized. What she studied most at the palace were sports and the arts; as noted above, Old Coco taught her how to cook.
Where it gets complicated is that this Nia comes from after her death, so of course she's post-timeskip. Nia's a very curious and intelligent woman with an incredible desire to learn. At the same time, though, I don't see her as really going out of her way to study subjects like physics and biology. She enjoys reading, but she's not avid about it, and while she's interested in all forms of knowledge, certain concepts and ideas rank higher in her interests than others. For instance, she'd read a cookbook or a book about caring for flowers, but she wouldn't go check out her world's equivalent of Grey's Anatomy just for some curious reading. If it came up in a conversation, she would ask about it, and gather the details from the person she's talking to--because if it comes up in conversation, it must be important to whomever she's talking to, and she wants to know a little about what they know so she can know the person better.
Basically, Nia's knowledge is very people-reliant, because she cares about these things in how they relate to the people around her.
❃ Nia dislikes the pain curses can cause, although she's had fun with some curses. She hasn't had much of a chance yet to be exposed to how nasty the deities can really be, though, and once she does she'll most definitely have something to say about it. She dislikes that the City traps people here when they don't want to be, but she can't hate it because being here has given her a chance to be Simon again, and further, to live with him as his wife. She also sees it as a chance to work to fulfill her dream with her own two hands, even if this isn't her own world. On the other hand, she's fully aware that her existence here isn't forever and neither is her time with Simon, and she doesn't want it to be forever. Nia is dead, and the dead can't come back to life. Sooner or later she's going to have to pass on for good, and even though she's scared and doubtful and her heart hurts at the knowledge that she can't always be by Simon's side, she's a very strong person; what will happen will happen because it has to happen, and for now she'll just take the happiness she can get each day.
❃ Another brief point on Nia's knowledge--the animals in the TTGL-verse are all hybrids, á la Avatar. So Nia is completely ignorant to the possibility of there being just dogs and cats. The would be liondogs, hippodogs, sharkcats, and ostrichcats.