Ikari Shinji

Name: Ikari Shinji
Age: 14 years old (born 2001)
Parents: Ikari Gendo & Ikari Yui (died 2004)
Rank: 3rd child
Evangelion Unit: 01
Notes: raised by an uncle after his mother's death; little to no contact with his father; uncertain about his relationship with his father (or anyone else, for that matter); unable to trust after what he feels is his father's abandonment; jealous of Rei's relationship with his father; afraid of Asuka's temper and strength where he has none; submissive and passive until angered; high syncronicity ratings with Unit 01

"I hate myself. But I might be able to love myself. I might be allowed to stay here. Yes. I am nothing but I. I am I. I wish to be I. I want to stay here. I can stay here!"

Shinji was a shy and self-conscious boy just trying to make himself a place in the world. Bitter about the way his father abandoned him years ago, he is stunned to receive a call from Nerv, his father's company, asking him to come to Tokyo 3. Shinji, believing his father wants him at last, happily agrees.
Unfortunately, things don't go quite as he planned. He arrives in Tokyo 3 to find it abandoned. A sports car arrives and screeches to a halt beside him. "Get in!!!" a woman yells, then drives away at speeds he didn't even know existed. They spend a while dodging various chunks of buildings and asphalt, then finally arrive at Nerv. The woman, Misato, starts cursing about how her car was just repainted and now it's completely ruined. (Close up of various dents, missing pieces, and other forms of destruction).
Shinji has been chosen as a candidate to pilot Evangelion Unit 01, a top-of-the-line mech designed by his father's company. He passes the test, and is shipped off to Misato's apartment, which looks like a tank has decided to use it as target practice. Her fridge has only: "ice, snacks, and 50 gallons of beer?!". Moments later, a penguin leaves the second fridge and heads for the shower.

Neat and shy Shinji eventually learns to get along with the messy and seemingly carefree Misato (it's not as if he has a choice, after all!). Shinji has a habit of saying: "I will not run away, I will not run away, I will not run away..." whenever he gets into a difficult situation, and that's often. He often tries to get Rei to open up, but cannot seem to make her talk about herself.
As the series progresses, Shinji loses his innocence and trust in others. He becomes cynical and cold, and retreats further and further into himself as time goes by. He knows that he isn't exactly a normal teenager, and often wishes that he could just be a normal boy... Unfortunately, that isn't what he is, and he knows it. Shinji spends a lot of time in fantasies of his own making, and even more time trying to figure himself and everyone else out. It's as if his own mind and emotions confuse him, and he just can't seem to make them make any sense.
By the last few episodes, Shinji's personality -- which has been constantly changing and growing -- is pretty much established. Through all his trials, he learns bitterness and fear, and a great terror of being left alone and an even greater fear of opening up to anyone. He learns to trust Kaworu because he cannot see any evil in the totally innocent and unconfused Kaworu. Kaworu's betrayal wounds him greatly, but he does not retreat into himself as he usually does: instead, he fights and does what he has to do -- he kills his friend. Shinji starts seeing that Kaworu was a lot like he himself is, and a lot like Rei.
Our unwilling hero eventually realizes that, of all the people he's known and all the people who've betrayed him, only Asuka has ever been truly honest with him. With Asuka, there was never any deception, any strangeness, or anything to send him into deep turmoil. Despite her abrasive personality and obvious dislike for him, Shinji realizes that his relationship with Asuka is the most normal thing he's had. He begins to cling to her as his only lifeline to sanity and normalness. Unfortunately, she's gone insane at that point, and cannot help him help himself. Shinji's loneliness is the loneliness of growing up without a family or anyone to teach him to trust in himself and to be his own person.

Eva 01 is the test-type. It is slightly different from the other Evas: it is a sentient being with the power to react to Shinji's emotions. It goes berserk more than once, destroying everything around it. It is inhabited by the spirit of Shinji's mother Yui, who created the Evangelions and was absorbed into Unit 01 when he was only a little boy. Shinji too gets absorbed into Unit 01, but is eventually retrieved alive, unlike his mother.