Code Geass - Hangyaku no Lelouch R2 Episode 25 Discussion

Tengai said:
At least Lelouch died, that's one thing I like.

ttcchen said:
you hate him?
Fifteen characters

goodguygreg said:
Maybe I am too dumb, but I need answers to some questions. How was this Zero Requiem the best solution to the problem? He could have, you know, just liberated the Britannian colonies after becoming its emperor. The best explanation I could find is that More importantly, what exactly were Charles and Schneizel up to and why? And how did Zero sabotage Charles's plan so easily? It would be great if someone could explain this.

I also have some minor issues and questions regarding the explanation of Geass's origin, Charles's elder brother's looking so younger than him, how they built that Sword of Akasha, how CC came into contact with Charles & Marianne, and so on. But I guess that I'll get the answers to these from the movie.

ttcchen said:


Forgot about most of the stuff so i can answer ur other questions but the zero requiem is for the world to have a common enemy to centralize their hatred on. The enemy of the enemy is ur friend. That's the only way to unite everyone. And once the world's greatest enemy is defeated thats when people can achieve world peace. And Charles's older brother is younger is cause once u get a Code ur body stops growing. In other words, u become immortal.

goodguygreg said:
Maybe I am too dumb, but I need answers to some questions. How was this Zero Requiem the best solution to the problem? He could have, you know, just liberated the Britannian colonies after becoming its emperor. The best explanation I could find is that More importantly, what exactly were Charles and Schneizel up to and why? And how did Zero sabotage Charles's plan so easily? It would be great if someone could explain this.

I also have some minor issues and questions regarding the explanation of Geass's origin, Charles's elder brother's looking so younger than him, how they built that Sword of Akasha, how CC came into contact with Charles & Marianne, and so on. But I guess that I'll get the answers to these from the movie.

hamza121419 said:
about how the zero requiem is the best solution, the anime has from the start developed to converge to this solution: the problem is not only about britania or the monarchy, war has been since humains exist as c.c said in the last episode, people tend always to fight for what they think is right, but they never try to understand the other's pain nore they care about them, when charles died, shnizel came, and this would have continued endleslly, but the reason why the zero requiem is the best solution is that he centred all humanity's hatred toward one person, they were finnaly able to understand the other's pain cause they are all under the same treat, lelouch took over the whole world to unify people against him and to make them understand how peace is precious and that fighting is not the solution, so when lelouch died, they were freed from the burden of hatred and they could sit in round tables to discuss their problems. Code geass doenst say too much about these things, it only hint to them so that the viewer could make his own vision of the thing, and i find this to be brilliant. They hinted the ending from ep 5, lelouch said back then "when does war end? When some one wins" he also said in the first episode " the ones who should kill are those prepared to be killed" and he also said that he will destroy the world and make a new one and defeating evil by the means of greater evil.this is lelouch's phylosophy, he doesnt believe in mere words, like "i will change the system from inside" and the anime has shown that it's impossible this way cause the whole system is corrupted and susaku finnaly understood this and joined with lelouch. There is also the thing you said about them wanting to atone for their sins, it's absolutely true but it's only one part of the whole thing.
Now about what charles and shnizel were up to, charles is some one who is living in the past, he doesnt care about the present, he dedicated his all life to create a system that could unify all people's mind, the incarnation of this is the thought elevator, it's only a symbole you know, but for him to achieve this goal he needed two codes, he already have v.v's one and from the begining of the show he was after c.c who didnt agree with this plan, you remember the first episode when clovis captured c.c and was about to give it to the prince, but the japanese stole the capsule from him. The sword of akasha is a symbolisme in the japanese folklore, i dont have a clear idea about the myth but in code geass it incarnate how god will be slayed, god here is the collective consciousness that were gathered via the thought elevator. The purpose of all this is to to get rid of the lies in the world, by connecting every one's thoughts, so that every one will act as he is, without any mask. But the problem with this system is that it dosnt allow people to evolve, cause they will be no desires, no problems no future, life will loose its value cause even the dead people will be in that world. This is why lelouch rejected this world, he wanted a dynamic world where people long for the the loved ones, where they hope for the better, where they strugle to achieve their goals, even if they lie or commit mistakes, humaniyu should not stagnate. And to defeat charles, mariane and their system it was so easy to do and lelouch figured it so quicly, yes he couldnt use geass on charles who has the code, but he could use it on the collective consciousness as it's made from people's minds,( remember geass work on the mind of people not the corpse or the objet no matter the type of geass) but to geass the whole collective consciousness lelouch needed to have geass at its max cause it's as if he was about to geass a lot of people at the same time, so lelouch activated the other eye only by his extreme resolve and by his absolute despair, and then he ordred the collective consciousness to not stop the march of time, which means to destroy the system itself, and this also means that charles and mariane should no longer exist in the real world so they got absorbed by their own creation.
Shinzel in the other hand is the one who thinks only of the present, he doesnt care how the future will be, and this is why his methods are too extreme cause the consequences deosnt mean any thing to him. Lelouch relises the true nature of his brother and was then able to defeat him, he realised that shnizel doesnt have any desire as he doesnt care for the future, he doesnt enter a batlle to win but only not to loose, and because he misundrstood lelouch's ideology he thought that lelouch was willing to kill him, and that's wjat brought his loss, cause lelouch from tje start was planning to use him for the sake of the zero requiem.
"Charles values the past, you value the present, but i value the future, cause no matter how the future will be bright as people are longing for the best" said lelouch to shnizel in ep 24. And to link this the zero requiem, lelouch chose to die for the future to be bright,the geass in the end was the symbol of a wish that you need others to do for you, lelouch has all the way used the geass to make people do what he wanted, and in the end it was time for him to grant the whole world the wish they longed for, to grant them a world of peace, that world nunally and euphy hoped for. What a pefect ending with so much morality and emotions.

And about your minor questions, v.v loocked youger than charles while he is the elder brother is normal cause v.v has the code that make him immortal, this means that he is now growing any more, his body doesnt get older, look at c.c how she looked young while she lived i dont know how many decades or decenies. And how c.c met marian and charles, it wasnt showb in the anime but yoy can deduce it, she lived for so long in the only reason to find someone to pass the code to so that she could die, and the best way to do it is to search people who has power like charles and who can use the geass effectivly, the proof is that she has been chasing lelouch for so long and when they met in the first episode of the series she said " i found you" and she explained later that she saw potentiel in him and that he most likely will be able to realize her wish cause she already know who lelouch is and hwo much hatred he feels for the empror and britania. The question of the origine of geass was never the focus of the series cause it doesnt give anything to the story, on the contrary it would have dragged the series and finnaly they wount give a satisfying answer like no one has till now given a satisfying answer about the origin of the world we live in. And finnaly about susaku faking his death there is nothing weird about it cause he can simply eject before the explosion, they only showed us the explosion from the outside to fool us.

I know i've writen a lot, so i'm sorry i couldnt make it shorter, but the questions you rised are very important and neede a deep analysis. It's normal to miss a lot of details in the first watch cause code geass's pace is high and they give athis lot of information and they mix it with emotions, that's why rewatching code geass is a must for every one in order to understand the meaning of every thing. I've watched code geass multiple times and each time i knew something New. Just trsut me and rewatch the whole thing and you'll see that almost every thing makes sense and that the writing and the forshadowing is brilliant to say the least.

hamza121419 said:
about how the zero requiem is the best solution, the anime has from the start developed to converge to this solution: the problem is not only about britania or the monarchy, war has been since humains exist as c.c said in the last episode, people tend always to fight for what they think is right, but they never try to understand the other's pain nore they care about them, when charles died, shnizel came, and this would have continued endleslly, but the reason why the zero requiem is the best solution is that he centred all humanity's hatred toward one person, they were finnaly able to understand the other's pain cause they are all under the same treat, lelouch took over the whole world to unify people against him and to make them understand how peace is precious and that fighting is not the solution, so when lelouch died, they were freed from the burden of hatred and they could sit in round tables to discuss their problems. Code geass doenst say too much about these things, it only hint to them so that the viewer could make his own vision of the thing, and i find this to be brilliant. They hinted the ending from ep 5, lelouch said back then "when does war end? When some one wins" he also said in the first episode " the ones who should kill are those prepared to be killed" and he also said that he will destroy the world and make a new one and defeating evil by the means of greater evil.this is lelouch's phylosophy, he doesnt believe in mere words, like "i will change the system from inside" and the anime has shown that it's impossible this way cause the whole system is corrupted and susaku finnaly understood this and joined with lelouch. There is also the thing you said about them wanting to atone for their sins, it's absolutely true but it's only one part of the whole thing.
Now about what charles and shnizel were up to, charles is some one who is living in the past, he doesnt care about the present, he dedicated his all life to create a system that could unify all people's mind, the incarnation of this is the thought elevator, it's only a symbole you know, but for him to achieve this goal he needed two codes, he already have v.v's one and from the begining of the show he was after c.c who didnt agree with this plan, you remember the first episode when clovis captured c.c and was about to give it to the prince, but the japanese stole the capsule from him. The sword of akasha is a symbolisme in the japanese folklore, i dont have a clear idea about the myth but in code geass it incarnate how god will be slayed, god here is the collective consciousness that were gathered via the thought elevator. The purpose of all this is to to get rid of the lies in the world, by connecting every one's thoughts, so that every one will act as he is, without any mask. But the problem with this system is that it dosnt allow people to evolve, cause they will be no desires, no problems no future, life will loose its value cause even the dead people will be in that world. This is why lelouch rejected this world, he wanted a dynamic world where people long for the the loved ones, where they hope for the better, where they strugle to achieve their goals, even if they lie or commit mistakes, humaniyu should not stagnate. And to defeat charles, mariane and their system it was so easy to do and lelouch figured it so quicly, yes he couldnt use geass on charles who has the code, but he could use it on the collective consciousness as it's made from people's minds,( remember geass work on the mind of people not the corpse or the objet no matter the type of geass) but to geass the whole collective consciousness lelouch needed to have geass at its max cause it's as if he was about to geass a lot of people at the same time, so lelouch activated the other eye only by his extreme resolve and by his absolute despair, and then he ordred the collective consciousness to not stop the march of time, which means to destroy the system itself, and this also means that charles and mariane should no longer exist in the real world so they got absorbed by their own creation.
Shinzel in the other hand is the one who thinks only of the present, he doesnt care how the future will be, and this is why his methods are too extreme cause the consequences deosnt mean any thing to him. Lelouch relises the true nature of his brother and was then able to defeat him, he realised that shnizel doesnt have any desire as he doesnt care for the future, he doesnt enter a batlle to win but only not to loose, and because he misundrstood lelouch's ideology he thought that lelouch was willing to kill him, and that's wjat brought his loss, cause lelouch from tje start was planning to use him for the sake of the zero requiem.
"Charles values the past, you value the present, but i value the future, cause no matter how the future will be bright as people are longing for the best" said lelouch to shnizel in ep 24. And to link this the zero requiem, lelouch chose to die for the future to be bright,the geass in the end was the symbol of a wish that you need others to do for you, lelouch has all the way used the geass to make people do what he wanted, and in the end it was time for him to grant the whole world the wish they longed for, to grant them a world of peace, that world nunally and euphy hoped for. What a pefect ending with so much morality and emotions.

And about your minor questions, v.v loocked youger than charles while he is the elder brother is normal cause v.v has the code that make him immortal, this means that he is now growing any more, his body doesnt get older, look at c.c how she looked young while she lived i dont know how many decades or decenies. And how c.c met marian and charles, it wasnt showb in the anime but yoy can deduce it, she lived for so long in the only reason to find someone to pass the code to so that she could die, and the best way to do it is to search people who has power like charles and who can use the geass effectivly, the proof is that she has been chasing lelouch for so long and when they met in the first episode of the series she said " i found you" and she explained later that she saw potentiel in him and that he most likely will be able to realize her wish cause she already know who lelouch is and hwo much hatred he feels for the empror and britania. The question of the origine of geass was never the focus of the series cause it doesnt give anything to the story, on the contrary it would have dragged the series and finnaly they wount give a satisfying answer like no one has till now given a satisfying answer about the origin of the world we live in. And finnaly about susaku faking his death there is nothing weird about it cause he can simply eject before the explosion, they only showed us the explosion from the outside to fool us.

I know i've writen a lot, so i'm sorry i couldnt make it shorter, but the questions you rised are very important and neede a deep analysis. It's normal to miss a lot of details in the first watch cause code geass's pace is high and they give athis lot of information and they mix it with emotions, that's why rewatching code geass is a must for every one in order to understand the meaning of every thing. I've watched code geass multiple times and each time i knew something New. Just trsut me and rewatch the whole thing and you'll see that almost every thing makes sense and that the writing and the forshadowing is brilliant to say the least.

Manuchimso said:
You shouldn't trust anyone that says this ending isn't a 10/10 LMFAOO

Crazymallets said:
Most over rated ending in anime history, and it's what made me hate this anime so much.
The concept that Lelouch's plan would ever work is ludicrous. They really had to pull off some B.S. moments just to make it work, and pretty much make everyone an idiot so Lelouch could win.

The so called "peace" Lelouch made is a lie with Suzaku being a false hero.
It doesn't at all touch upon true political issues, corporate corruption, racism, and many other issues that need to be addressed to create world peace. (I'm actually happy the new movie points some of this out).

Lelouch himself had just told his father forcing kindness on people is an act of villainy. Yet what did Lelouch do? Just that. He was nothing by a hypocrite who placed himself above everyone else. He had the means to make the world a better place in a gentler manner once becoming emperor. Instead he created a war that costs millions of lives and ruined many more. Does that really honoring Euphi's, Nunnally's or anyone of the good people's desires? Personally I consider him mentally unstable and his so called grand scheme to bring about peace was nothing but a suicidal note.

Vaguelyweebish said:
Lelouch's death would have been earned if there had been a third season, but it is now known that the corporate offices of Sunrise were meddling with the second season to get it wrapped up as soon as possible. I thought season 1 was decent and was excited to see what happened next despite the overall experience only being a 6/10 for me. Maybe a 7 at best.

But then they reset everything that happened in episode one of the second season and didn't seem to know how to write proper development. Characters that could have been very fascinating (you know exactly who I am talking about) are not properly integrated into the story and are later killed for shock value or are just killed a few seconds after appearing because making Kallen even more unlikable makes the war more morally ambiguous, apparently. The Sunrise standard of beam spamming takes over any semblance of strategy the first season had, and the dialogue is bogged down by a plethora of pseudo-philosophical nonsense. (Except for Bismarck. He was truly wise despite believing too much in the emperor's plan. I don't know whether to be indifferent or upset by his death. But I think he could have been disillusioned along with Monica, Dorothea, Gino, Anya, and Nonette once he saw the empire fall apart. Either way, Suzaku is an Eleven at the very end of the story.)

Code Geass has a lot of good ideas that are compressed into a mishmash of nonsense that would have benefitted immensely by extending the series and taking more time to develop the plot and characters. The only reason viewers mourned Lelouch so much was because of his looks. He was completely unlikable by the end of the series and Zero Requiem was doomed to fail, anyway.

Monica is Best Girl. No debate.

ScottMerica said:


Well said, while I thought the scene where Nunnally was crying over Lelouch's body as the crowd chanted for Zero was very effective and the idea of the Zero Requiem on its own is about as satisfying a conclusion to this story and cast of characters as we could've gotten, the season's rushed nature and messy story telling prevented it from being "the best anime ending ever" IMO. It really feels like Sunrise screwed this story over by forcing the team to reset the story to appeal to the demographic that came with the new timeslot, while also wanting the story to be wrapped up that same season. Because of that it felt like they had a good beginning and ending, but had no idea how to tie the two together thanks to studio interference. Pacing was all over the place, characters and subplots just came and went, etc. Still don't really understand the whole deal with Charles's plan, as his goal of removing lies from the world with things like the Thought Elevator and Sword of Akasha were too vague and poorly explained.

Characters as well got shafted for the most part. Lelouch was resorted to an overemotional spaz who seemed to lack the same confidence and genius as before (and no his secret plan in the end, as good as it is, doesn't make up for all this). Shirley was rendered into a non-character halfway through Season 1 and just when it seemed like she would play a part in the story again, Rollo kills her. Suzaku became unlikeable and irritating as opposed to a sympathetic, complex character we can understand. Kallen turned into just another member of Lelouch's harem, speaking of which made his connection/reaction to Shirley's death all the more cheap since the series never gave their relationship more attention than with Kallen or CC. I've never felt more conflicted on a series before since there's a lot to like about it, but just as much if not more to groan at too. If nothing else it's shown the power an ending can have in determining a story's legacy, cause if it didn't miraculously end on a satisfying note like it did, it'd likely be remembered for all of its flaws instead of its pros.

Vaguelyweebish said:
A funny thing when you think about it: The "peace" Lelouch gave Britannia is a complete lie, and that is mirrored by Zero's identity. Beneath the mask is the selfish and petulant kid who murdered his own comrades in cold blood despite knowing they harbored no prejudices toward anyone and was THE primary tool for Lelouch's conquest during the civil war. What would happen if Zero's identity is revealed in public?

That fragile "peace" would shatter.

I'm hoping by some weird miracle that the writers recognize the strong cult following Monica and Dorothea have and bring them back in the new content so THEY can expose Zero for the sham he is. Who better to expose the hypocrisy of the new administration than two people who so dearly trusted Suzaku before he betrayed them in the worst way possible? That would make for a great arc, but I wonder if the fandom would reject it because it's showing how stupidly hypocritical Lelouch was. And Lelouch is NEVER wrong, obviously.

Yep, I hated so many of the main characters by the end that I only really like a few side characters who got almost no screen time because the writers had to pull a Snoke death. Now THAT is bad writing. -_-

And boy, I forgot how obnoxiously angsty Lelouch was throughout season 2. Shutting my brain off made me miss the important aspects that need to be critiqued.

ScottMerica said:


I also thought about how easy it'd be to destroy the peace Lelouch built by exposing Suzaku, like is he going to have to keep that costume on forever? He was famous during the war, if even one person discovered that Lelouch the demon's right hand man was posing as Zero the whole time it'd be over. Could be potentially interesting, but doubt it'll happen. Series is done, just leave it where it is and let fans be content with its ending. It was also disappointing that Schneizel, the guy who ultimately became the main antagonist, ended up being brain-washed for the remainder of this life.

But yeah, don't know what happened with Lelouch. Even in his battles against others he was constantly getting outmaneuvered and outsmarted. It's good to have him make mistakes and be flawed, but the way he handled these situations didn't feel like the same confident mastermind we saw in R1. The worst thing was the whole ordeal with Shirley and him attacking the Geass researchers. I'd understand him being upset over Shirley of course, but to go mental and forego any potential leads or info for the sake of "revenge" just felt shoe horned in. Him losing one of the girls in his harem isn't enough justification for him to order the murder of innocents. As I said, on paper the idea of the ending is great and fits nicely into the story, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired in some ways. It's why I'm hoping AOT pulls something similar (I'm anime only so I don't know about the manga ending) as it's a chance for this idea to be done better and so far AOT has remained engaging and thrilling with no signs of it tripping over itself in the same way as Code Geass.

phishe said:
instant 10/10 for both seasons. What a ride. I’m glad I decided to watch Code Geass

phishe said:
instant 10/10 for both seasons. What a ride. I’m glad I decided to watch Code Geass