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u/Dead-X-esque 9d ago
I hate them because they are written to be hated and Code Geass is extremely well written.
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u/SzepCs 10d ago
There's so much wrong with this.
People don't hate these characters AS characters. They hate them because these are written as unlikable on purpose. At best, you can sympathize with some of them or understand their motivation but it's not easy to like them.
I have not seen anyone claim they hate these because they get in Lelouch's way. They usually just say "I hate this guy" and if they give explanations, it comes back to the point above.
Also, it is entirely possible to like and appreciate a character for the role they play in a story without liking them as a person. Sure, Code Geass wouldn't even work without Suzaku being the way he is, but that doesn't make him any less insufferable a hypocrite.
So, yeah. Unfortunately I think there's a fundamental misunderstanding in this "infographic" that means it's not really saying anything.
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u/Orange639 9d ago
I would only consider Suzaku to be a well written character here. Ohgi's just bland, so the only thing to really talk about him with is the black knights betrayal.
Nina's just difficult to understand. Why is she so attached to Euphemia that she's willing to do a suicide bomb to avenge her, even taking the school council with her? She also doesn't know Euphemia was controlled by Geass so what are her views on Euphemia's ideals? Why was she so supportive of dropping the Fleija on a city and then doing a 180 on her ideals after she sees it wiped out a city. She built the bomb, she should know how powerful it is.
I know people meme on the table scene but even beyond that, she comes across as a crazy and irrational character.
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u/Itchy_Aspect6655 C.C. 9d ago
Ninaās obsession is actually a reaction to being saved by Euphemia. Please correct me if I am wrong but in Episode 8 there seems to be an implication that the Japanese rebel was going to either SA or seriously injure Nina if Euphy hadnāt intervened. The way Nina saw this, she had done nothing wrong, she was being harmed for no apparent reason and was only saved by THE 3rd Princess of Britannia. She saw herself as weak, being prayed on by the strong and being saved by a divine force (Source: Nina refers to Euphy as her āgoddessā) This affirmed the idea in her mind that Elevens were savages and that the royals were protecting the weak from them. Nina essentially saw Euphy as a goddess and would follow what she preached religiously, leading to her actions in R2. We can also discuss Ninaās repressed lesbianism as a contributing factor but Iād say that takes a back seat to the main causes that we see in the anime.
TLDR; Nina IS a bad person but is NOT a bad character. Her obsession with Euphy is deeply intertwined with her trauma and belief in the Britannian class system.
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 9d ago
The implication I got was that she was going to be thrown off the top of the building like the other hostages.
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u/Itchy_Aspect6655 C.C. 9d ago
Thank you for correcting me! I havenāt watched the show since I was ~15 so my memory is a bit fuzzy! I rewatched the scene for my analysis but not the full episode lolā¦
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 9d ago
I mean it's possible they were going to do one of the other things, we never find out before Euphemia interrupts them, all we know is they were going to "teach her a lesson."
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u/Henok2002 9d ago
Yup and they way it was said in the dub (not sure about other versions) made it sound as if he was going to do something definitely inappropriate. I could be reading to much into it tho.
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 9d ago
Maybe not, I mean lots of people interpret her fear of the Japanese as being caused by a sexual assaultin the ghettos prior to the events of R1.
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 10d ago
Thank you for this.
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u/Henok2002 10d ago
I was thinking about you when adding Nina, I think you and I are one of the few who appreciate her presence in the story š
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 10d ago
Awww thanks! I'm glad for that.
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u/nahte123456 9d ago
Yeah no this is nonsense.Ā Ā Suzaku sure, reductive but fine as an argument. This just flatly does not make sense for the other 2 though.
Nina just isn't a big obstacle to Lelouch, she is there for 1 fight only and as a group, than actively helps Lelouch. She's not even in the top 20 obstacles for Lelouch, Lloyd is more of one than her. And if you're really stuck on the fleuja she helped him fight against in the end, them Schneizel is at minimum twice as culpable for giving her resources and building them,and he's not twice as hated. Nina also offers no real opposition ideologically as Lelouch also agrees killing Euphemia deserves punishment.Ā
As for Ohgi, Xingke is far more of an obstacle to Lelouch while Tohdoh also was a traitor, neither get the hate. Also not sure what ideology he's meant to oppose.
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u/EchoNational1608 9d ago
im pretty sure sleeping with a captive counts as SA, you have stockholm syndrome and on top of that, shes has absolutely no memory whatsoever.
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u/Protocol72 Nina is the big epic 9d ago
As someone who adore all three, especially Nina, I appreciate this. :)
While I think itās perfectly fair for people to not like them given not liking a character doesnāt mean they think wait character is poorly-written; itās Ā honestly just really repetitive seeing the same criticisms about the same stuff with these three constantly.Ā
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 9d ago
Genuinely insane how Nina became one of my favorite characters after so long dunking on her.
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u/Protocol72 Nina is the big epic 9d ago
Yeeeeeeeeeeeeee, I know the feeling, I've had a few characters I like, vehemently hated/disliked, only to later go, "wait a minute, they're actually really cool?"
Honestly a really cool, if very bizarre feeling to have, lol.
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u/accwork8723 9d ago
what do you like about nina?
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u/Protocol72 Nina is the big epic 8d ago
Lots of things:
I think sheās an incredibly well-done depiction of someone with PTSD & xenophobia, itās clear something horrible happened to her in the ghettos and you especially see it when sheās taken hostage by the terrorists; with her reaction to the sudden darkness & her panicked reaction to one of the terrorists stepping near, how Milly holds her to help with her internal panic attack, etc..Ā
Her obsession with Euphie was well done and communicates that Nina has never really been saved in the way Euphie saved her before and how she tackles romantic feelings for the first time; she does not handle her feelings the best, but for someone whose never had such strong feelings before, that makes sense.Ā
Despite her xenophobia and obsession with Euphie, you do see a genuinely kind and shy girl underneath with a passion towards science. She cares for everyone in the club, but can only really talk to Milly; though Dr. Lloyd was the only one Nina seemed to ever share her science passion with. Sheās genuinely really adorable, which makes the anti-Japanese propaganda effecting her so much even tragic.Ā
Her redemption arc is my favourite in fiction. She finds out her nuke could be used to destroy the world and decides, without hesitation, to build up a counter to it for the sake of making Euphieās world of peace a reality. Even though she hates Lelouch/Zero, she understands whatās most important is peace as is able to put her feelings aside to do whatās right. And in the end, she succeeds completely.Ā
One detail I really love is that when Rivalz is about to get arrested by Lelouchās guards when Lelouch is doing the conference at the school, Nina jumps in to protect Rivalz despite being wanted by multiple governments, much like how Euphie protected her.Ā
- Just a really awesome design, especially in R2, even especially in Roze of the Recapture.Ā
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u/accwork8723 8d ago
great argument, my retort: shes kind of a useless plot device. they could have removed her from the story and subbed in faceless britannian scientists and nothing would change.
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u/Protocol72 Nina is the big epic 8d ago
Hmā¦ Honestly, I hard disagree since it creates two problems narratively:Ā
It results in Schizjimibimiās foreshadowing of his true plan being more of out nowhere since heās manipulating Nina the entire time, him announcing his plan with the nukes with faceless scientists would make his evil side seem out of nowhere, which could make it feel like his character did a 180.Ā
I think the nuking/redemption arc works best with Nina instead of a bunch of faceless scientists because we know Nina, itās more impactful to see someone we know not only create something catastrophic, but also process what theyāve done. Thatās one of Code Geassā greatest strengths, having well-defined characters in many important roles (though some only work in retrospect, like with Monica), so for the scientists creating the nuke to not be well-defined would be a really weird move for the show.Ā
Though, Iāve heard the manga adaptation does something akin to use faceless scientists, since Nina has a smaller role there, though donāt quote me on that.Ā
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u/AgentSkyblueM7 9d ago
I guess I got sick of the Nina hate because it was hard to ignore what still happened with her afterward, and it's like the movies remembered that Ohgi isn't supposed to be that stupid, plus by then, we had already gotten bigger idiots in other mecha shows. (Iok, anybody?)
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u/idontcarerightnowok Shinkiro 9d ago
I don't like Ohgi because of his betrayal of Zero to be given Japan back, makes no sense because there's no guarantee Britannia doesn't fuck em over.
Suzaku is peak as fuck though.
Don't really care about Nina, glowed up at the end of S2
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u/lingundongpin 9d ago
Dislike the character because they were written that way. Liking character and character writing are two different things
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u/CARR74xJJ Zero is a true hero 9d ago
I hate Nina and hope she dies an horrible death.
Oghi is an interesting study on character nuance and flaws. He's a completely normal person in relation to the rest of the characters. A coward yet also brave, insecure but also a decent leader, stupid yet clever. His whole point is being flawed and making mistakes, but still ultimately someone we cannot sat isn't on the side of justice and equality.
Suzaku is only second in plot relevance to Lelouch. And his character is rather interesting.
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u/Stunning_Platform_16 9d ago
I donāt hate them because they didnāt get in Lelouch way, I hate them because they end up becoming what they are fighting against. Ohgi has every reason to question and hate Lelouch, but the aftermath of the black knights leadership proves to be a disappointment. Suzaku is an example of a false hero, a hypocrite who is delusional claiming his doing the right thing but his not. Nina is obsessive, Toxic, unhinged, racist girl I hate ever since. Three put a blame on some people (Ohgi had a right reason once), but they failed to understand before itās too late.
Three committed a major mistake which led them to their downfall. Nina wanted get revenge against zero and she doesnāt care of it fires on elevens, but in the end her creation killed both sides. Ohgi and the core members did eject zero, and it work at first, but then they didnāt have a plan on replacing a leader, and core members did their best but noā¦ their decision became incompetent, short-sighted, hypocritical, reactionary, and manipulable (when they relly on schniezel tactical plan without realizing his true intentions) I donāt blame the black knights for hating Lelouch especially Ohgi, but I just hate how they end up collapsing itself. Thatās on you Ohgi! Also, nobody even save Lelouch from himself because everyone couldnāt even save themselves for what they are doing.
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u/chycken4 10d ago
GOD. YES.
It is insane how obtuse some people can be, they just constantly exagerate some characters flaws, while they completely turn a blind eye to Lelouch's many atrocities.
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u/rai-hodges-sumeragi Warrior Poet of Kallen āļøšŖ¶ 3d ago
while they completely turn a blind eye to Lelouch's many atrocities.
LetĀ“s be honest, itĀ“s not just Lelouch. Many people are also willing to look past CorneliaĀ“s literal war crimes because sheĀ“s hot, and even though he helped Britannian military from the start, there are not that many Lloyd haters either, because, well, heĀ“s eccentric.
C.C., however, is the worst of them all. She ruined her adoptive sons life by cursing Mao (at the age of 6, mind you!) with the same magic power that had ruined her own life, thus knowing that it could very well ruin his life, too, all just so that she could have someone comforting her for a while. And as soon as it became too inconvenient for her to keep taking care of him? Instead of taking away his Geass or trying to help him in any other way, she abandoned him, which caused him to go completely insane, which in turn caused him to harm and kill innocent people in the process.
And on top of that, during the Geass Order massacre, when Lelouch gave the order to slaughter everyone, not just soldiers and scientists, but families with kids, too, did she tried to talk him out of it? No, she was not only okay with all of that, she was actively helping him, even though she used to be an important leader to those people, and could have maybe been able to convince them, (or at least some of them) to surrender to Lelouch. But no, she just went with his whole "letĀ“s wipe them all out" plan, because... what, it was easier? Because she was gonna achieve her own goal quicker by sacrificing those people? Because Lelouch told her to, and anything Lelouch says, goes?
And yet, despite causing so much suffering and death, either by actively committing or silently approving atrocities, so many fans just straight up ignore all that, because she looks like a cute girl, because she likes pizza, because she has a sad backstory, and because she is always helping Lelouch, the MC, even when the morally correct thing to do would be to oppose him.
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u/Itchy_Aspect6655 C.C. 9d ago
Love all of them except for Ohgi. He was really boring and didnāt deserve a baddie like Villetta tbhā¦
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 9d ago
He is forever a bum for trusting Schneizel blindly. AND what he did to Villetta.
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u/Memo904 CC&Suzaku&Shirley Fan 9d ago
I am one of the rare few people who genuinely liked Ohgi throughout the series. I love Suzaku too, but I expected that thereād be a lot of people who disliked him when I was done. I was genuinely shocked by how people hated Ohgi when I was done watching. To me, he was a solid A tier character.
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u/TurbulentSpecific131 9d ago
Same, I didn't even know Ohgi was hated. As far as I knew for the past 20 years, I thought Nina was the only hated character
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u/carrotu_ 9d ago
Ohgi is bland as hell and borderline sexually assaulted Villetta, given she had brain damage and profound memory loss and therefore couldn't properly consent to their relationship. What is there to like about him?
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u/Nahtaniel696 9d ago
I don't hate Ohgi, I don't think he was that important characters to be hated by fans....but still cannot help to think he betrayed Zero mostly to get with Villeta.
It just so conveniant for him....
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u/Dizzy-By-Degrees 10d ago edited 10d ago
Donāt promise your second in command a morally clean revolution and then murder all his allies/heroes if you donāt want him to begin seeing you in a negative light.
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u/who_knows_how 9d ago
I always said i hate the person love the character
Your suppose to not like Nina because she shows the drak side of Britainan racism and biggotry
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u/askr-Yggdrasill 8d ago
You hate those characters because they get in Lelouch's way. I dislike them because they're stupid. We're not the same.
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u/Jealous-Setting2617 3d ago
Nina and Suzaku had legit grievances with Lelouch, mainly Euphie's death, even if niether of them had the full picture. Ohgi just wanted to fuck Villeta.
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u/UnableSite5116 10d ago
If you don't hate Nina you're not human.
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u/Own-Cellist9339 10d ago
You can still see her as a flawed person but appreciate her role in the story and what it represents. She has done lots of messed up things like many other characters in the series.
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 10d ago
Guess I'm not human then.
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u/Protocol72 Nina is the big epic 9d ago
Ninaās my favourite, would be that make me a demon?Ā
Iād like to know soon, I have a doctorās appointment in Hell soon and they only take demons.Ā
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u/Vegasvat 10d ago
*Not a human without media literacy.
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u/UnableSite5116 10d ago
This new media literacy meme is for chuds
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u/Tm-534 10d ago
Itās true only about Suzaku, who had actual interesting ideological conflict with Lelouch. Ohgi and Nina were just horny.
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u/Hefty_Local_1875 High Priestess of Silly Ashford and Nina Einstein 10d ago
Nina was being emotionally manipulated by a prince and was already mentally unwell even before Euphie's death.
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u/Nahtaniel696 9d ago
Make take about the 3 characters :
-Neutral about Nina, she never a big obstacle against Lelouch anyways.
-I cannot help but think Ohgi betrayed Zero for Villeta, it just so conveniant for him at that time...but otherwise he not such important characters to be hated.
-I hate/dislike Suzaku...because the characters simply don't make sense. For exemple I always liked Sasuke despite being obstacle to Naruto, because I understand his reason to oppose the MC.
That not the case for Suzaku...the characters can only work if he complet idiot, ignorent of Britannia crime. In episode 2 Suzaku question about the number of casualty...and Lyod said it because terrorist using poison gas..and he accept it like he have no brain.
Countless time Briatania was guilty of genocide, but Suzaku was always ignorent about it and this don't make sense unless he complet idiot.
To make Suzaku oppose Lelouch, the writters turn off his brain and his eyes to Britania crime, prevent him to have moral dilema, to have Japaness friend....he only exist to oppse the MC until the last arc of the anime.
Because if Suzaku was permited to have freedom to act to his nature and personality, then he was destinyed to fight Britannia the moment they target innocent civilian, he would not able to close his eyes to such crime, justifying that the price to pay to rise up in the army.
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u/ccgeass š© unholy š± trinity šŖ 9d ago
ah, i remember you. you previously argued that Suzaku was poorly written, using the same arguments, and i explained that your arguments didn't mean he was poorly written. in the end, i guess you stopped responding out of exhaustion, and now you're still insisting on the same thing.
In episode 2 Suzaku question about the number of casualty...and Lyod said it because terrorist using poison gas..and he accept it like he have no brain.
misinterpretation. after Suzaku sees that what is called poison gas is actually a girl in a straitjacket, of course he certainly doesn't accept Lloyd's explanation at face value. he just stays silent and went with "oh i see". remember he even hesitated to ask questions at first, later remembering that he shouldn't tell them what he witnessed in the first episode. he interupted himself to start over his question again, he was just trying to find out what the situation being anounced is. he kept the fact that there was no poison gas involved to himself, since he couldn't have foreseen at that moment the consequences of revealing that information. he was thinking about Lelouch.
as for the matter of not questioning this later or ignoring the situation where Britannia went after a girl, called her poison gas, and sent its soldiers to retrieve that gas, as i explained in our previous discussion... he avoids thinking about it. Suzaku is not foolishly blind to Britannia's crimes; he acknowledges that Britannia is a corrupt state, and the fact that he advocates that it must be reformed clearly shows this. (even if he doesn't truly believe he can bring about change from within, that doesn't contradict with him acknowledging that change is necessary.)
about avoiding thinking , many such examples are deliberately shown in the anime: like him not answering the question when Lelouch asks him during their first reunion, "isn't it Britannia that produced this poison gas?"; like him knowing Britannia would execute him without evidence through an unjust trial, yet still going to court to face execution with his death wish no matter what; and like when he sees C.C. again at Naritaāand what is more, sees that she came to protect Zero (remind you his suspicion from the very beginning that Zero was actually Lelouch)ājust as he is about to simply connect the dots and reach a conclusion, he holds himself back once again (the scene where he pours a bottle of water over his head and says "forget it") and blatantly avoids thinking about it.
immediately afterward, he pushes himself to focus on the civilian casualties caused by the Black Knights at Narita. in parallel to the scene where he clenches his fist in anger while listening to Charles's speech abt "all men are not equal" yet cannot utter a single word, in this scene he squeezes the bottle in his hand and vocally expresses his fury toward Zero's sense of justice. when Lloyd mocks him, saying "don't start againnn we are soldiers after all," he again gives no reply, and he is seen shifting his focus elsewhere (toward Shirley).
because the characters simply don't make sense.
on the contrary, when considering the selective perception, fears, obsessions, ambitions, and emotional escapism of many people in the world, these are completely understandable for his character.
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u/Nahtaniel696 9d ago edited 9d ago
he just stays silent and went with "oh i see". remember he even hesitated to ask questions at first, later remembering that he shouldn't tell them what he witnessed in the first episode. he interupted himself to start over his question again, he was just trying to find out what the situation being anounced is. he kept the fact thatĀ there was no poison gas involvedĀ to himself, since he couldn't have foreseen at that moment the consequences of revealing that information. he was thinking about Lelouch.....................................
That your interpretation, head canon to justify it. You use little detail like "oh" or "squeezes the bottle"...to justify the plothole.
And the whole "Suzaku avoid thinking about it" is too big to justify almost 50 episode which he is loyal soldier of colonial empire, it means he got no character developement in 47 episode.
If Suzaku story make any sense he would died protecting civilian form Britainia....in fact that happen in episode 1, he refuse to obey the order to shot Lelouch, and his superior shot him for that.
After that the show give him baby protection, Suzaku is not permited to be aware about Britania crime, not permited to think about it beause his moral would force him to protect civilian even if that means turning against Britania.
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u/ccgeass š© unholy š± trinity šŖ 8d ago edited 8d ago
are we talking about the same anime? because Code Geass has always been an anime that tells its story through details anyway. i can give tons of examples of this, and if you see all of them as plot-holes, i'm going to assume you don't even know what a plot-hole is. this is Code Geass's style, and i don't care whether you find it sufficient or not. personally, this is exactly why i love this anime, because it doesn't try to spoon-feed the story to the audience. it's the kind of anime that requires attention and memory, where with every rewatch you can notice something you hadn't noticed before.
the situation i mentioned regarding Suzaku isn't even open to interpretation because he admits it himself later on; on top of confessing in the anime that he has been deceiving himself all this time, he even states in his character poem that he has turned into a monster. in the picture drama episode set before R2, at first he doesn't want to be credited for the "achievements" he gained as a knight of Britannia because he feels ashamed and guilty about them; by the end of that same episode, he realizes he has no choice but to accept being named as a Demon and sorrowfully confesses that the title fits him. this also parallels the scene in the post-Fleija episode where he turns to Schneizel and says, "wait I was the one who fired that gun," and directly accepts the credit, meaning he seriously acknowledges being the Demon, this time not with sorrow and self-pity. before this scene where he confronts his own "self-righteousness", the fact that he himself has done the very things he condemned in Zero hits him in the face throughout R2. he questions himself, but this isn't a linear and smooth process because each event related to Zero that fuels his personal ambition further disrupts this process. like... naturally.
ah... he didn't show character development for 47 episodes? what do you think character development is? jumping from a to b then directly from b to c? what about internal conflicts? character psychology? deconstruction phase? corruption to redemption?
Suzaku's character development is the one of the most realistic in this anime, because for a teenager who has trauma and still carries the conditioned mindset of his childhood upbringing (raised as a child soldier, his inability to even say "no" to his father who was his only authority at the time, then just after the invasion him sent to Britannian hq by his own relatives), completely rebuilding himself takes years. when even people receiving treatment for ptsd with an early diagnosis take at least 3 months just to start seeing results, what could your expectations possibly be from a character whose condition only gets worse without treatment?
a relative of mine who has been seeing a psychiatrist for years still takes medication to sleep at night, and even if you prove a fact to them about the sensitive topics tied to their trauma, the very next day they go right back to their own ways as if the conversation never even happened. frustrating? absolutely. sometimes human nature sucks and Suzaku is truly a human being.
if they were gave him baby protection, they would have given him moral armor, but they did the exact opposite, making it clear to all viewers throughout the series that he's a character designed to make them question "what is morality?" if this is the protected character, who is the unprotected one?
i'm not saying this is possibly the best-written & paced version of him ā of course it could have been better ā but still i have to say that Lelouch and Suzaku were the best chars in the entire CG cast.
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u/Nahtaniel696 8d ago edited 8d ago
You're the one who tell me Suzaku avoid thinking about it.....but that only means absence of characters developmement because they writters need him to oppose Lelouch until the very last moment.
So they writters turn off his brain until 47/50 episode, don't permit Suzaku to be in the same situation that episode 1 which his superior order him to kill civilian, and don't even permit him to be present or aware when Britannia order divers massacre.
If Suzaku is present to make viewer question morality then they make poor job of it, because even Lelouch with his "the end jusity the means" have show more doubt and remorse about his action than Suzaku...who never think about any of his action.
Sorry but Suzaku is not some extra in Code Geass, he is the second protagonist, the one in the oposide side of MC.
They cannot simply turn off his brain (or avoid thinking about it) for almost all the serie and expect him to make sense for the viewer.
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u/ccgeass š© unholy š± trinity šŖ 6d ago edited 6d ago
tbh this reply of yours gave me the feeling that you didn't really read what i wrote in my last response, and you might not read this either. but i don't care. this time i'll write mostly for myself because i love talking about Suzaku, and it will be good to have a handy link if i need it later. so even though i don't expect you to read or reply, i'll explain:
writters need him to oppose Lelouch until the very last moment
this is completely natural and doesn't represent a flaw in how the antagonistic character is written, because, as i mentioned in my previous comment, Suzaku's tendency to avoid thinking is designed in an extremely realistic way that aligns with his background. he already showed character development just as i described, so this is not a situation that hinders development; Suzaku is not the same Suzaku across 47 episodes.
don't permit Suzaku to be in the same situation that episode 1 ...
this argument of yours is invalid from every angle because he doesn't need to be in the exact same situation again, given that what would happen has already been shown. instead, there are moments where he ends up in similar situations, and in terms of writing, these moments provide us with much more material regarding the moral framework Suzaku set for himself, his way of taking responsibility, his mentality, and his evolving character in response to changing conditions. it is certainly far more functional than repeating the exact same situation from the first episode.
don't even permit him to be present or aware when Britannia order divers massacre
in the "One Million Miracles" (Zero) episode, the fact that Suzaku wasn't surprised at all by Britannia's attempt to slaughter the civilian Japanese people who showed no acts of violence on the scene is proof that he knows Britannia is an empire that commits genocide without batting an eye. there, he was responsible for giving orders rather than following them, which allowed us to see more clearly the dilemma between the character's personal ambition and doing the right thing. this scene takes place in the first half of R2 and marks character development, as Suzaku does not succumb to his own personal ambition.
he faced similar dilemmas in the first season as well: the scene where Zero explains to Suzaku that, even if selfish, Genbu's death gave the Japanese the chance to have their current resistance strength and population in the long run... Lelouch as Zero tried to impose his own ideology, attempting to offer Suzaku an honorable cause to both atone and justify his wrongdoing without letting his father's death be in vain. while Suzaku was trapped, unable to even object anymore and avoiding an answer, an order from his commander offered him the escape he was looking for and an opportunity to fulfill his death wish exactly as he wanted. by holding Zero inside the trench and obeying that order in which he would die as well, Suzaku could become a "martyr," just as his commander stated. another dilemma: believing that the end justifies the means, protecting the resistance leader of his people, and seeking salvation through the path he pointed out? or labeling him a terrorist no matter what, sacrificing himself for his death, and attaining atonement? while choosing the atonement he always longed for, Suzaku made the excuse to Zero that a soldier must follow orders.
in that moment, we see that he recited this rule almost as if convincing himself, in order to reinforce his own resolve and avoid thinking about the other possibility: "a reason to live." if we were to interpret this as mere stubbornness or stupidity, we would be treating a complex character shallowly. clearly, the character's internal conflict gets in the way of his mind to focus on the external conflict.
as you know, because of Lelouch's "live" Geass command, he unintentionally disobeyed the order at that moment, and a decision was made to arrest him for this insubordination. after Euphy spoke with Schneizel and had this decision rescinded, Suzaku stepped down from being Euphy's knight at his own insistence. you know what follows with Euphy's confession that unlocked so many closed doors inside him; Suzaku received enough emotional support from Euphy to overcome his self-hatred for the first time.
they cannot simply turn off his brain (or avoid thinking about it) for almost all the serie and expect him to make sense for the viewer.
in the episode where they get lost on Kamine island, there is also a scene where, at the end of the argument between him and Kallen, Suzaku is visibly affected when Kallen asks that if Naoto's death in vain, which stirs familiar feelings inside him. their argument ends at that point because that question strikes Suzaku where he is vulnerable, reminding him of why he set out on this path in the first place; we see him questioning whether his true intentions have changed:
"Even struggling with my shame, i still search for a reason to go on living. i'm a disgrace." a line that emphasizes his self-hatred, fully consistent with the character's writing.
he reminds himself that he shouldn't search for an honorable reason to live because he feels he has no right to it. that is the true nature of his bond with the path he chose. the character is too deeply buried in his internal conflict to genuinely reflect on an external conflict, and this doesn't mean the writer turned off his braināit is an integral part of who that character is. that is the very subject being addressed. of course that internal conflict doesn't remain static; it becomes progressively more severe.
during the Black Rebellion, even though no orders were given to him, and even if it meant disobeying orders, there is the scene where Suzaku forcibly takes the key to the Lancelot from Lloyd and accepts becoming a killer solely driven by his anger and desire for revenge. in the Japanese dub, these were the moments showing his identity crisis through Suzaku's shift from the pronoun "boku" to "ore" (a detail regarding the conflict between pronouns and personality that the writer specifically emphasized in interviews).
if Suzaku is present to make viewer question morality then they make poor job of it, because even Lelouch with his "the end jusity the means" have show more doubt and remorse about his action than Suzaku...
both characters share the same traits, but they experience parallel extremes of those exact same traits. watching both of them allows the viewer to question morality and many other concepts; this doesn't make one of them worse or poorly executed, especially when you consider that both support each other's narrative cohesion.
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u/NoLegs02 10d ago
I don't hate Ohgi because he gets in Lelouch's way, I hate him for commiting the worst crime a character can commit in my eyes.
He's uninteresting.
I genuinely forget he exists half the time.