History YMMV / CodeGeass

* TrueArtIsAngsty: The story's cripplingly depressing at times but it's still one of the most popular anime in Japan and/or the world.

** You can also easily see it as [[DieHardOnAnX Death Note with Giant Robots]]. You have a seemingly ordinary but extremely intelligent high school student VillainProtaganist (Light/Lelouch) who gains a unique super natural item/ability (Death Note/Geass) and begins to use said ability in unexpected and creative ways to further his goal of changing the world, while taking on an alternate identity to the public (Kira/Zero). The item/ability has hard and fast rules that the protagonist must learn about and manipulate to his own advantage, they have a quirky aloof sidekick connected to the item (Ryuuk/C.C.) and are opposed by a HeroAntagonist (L/Suzaku) who is philosophically opposed to the values of the protagonist, but who interacts with him in daily life in a more friendly manner. There is also a signifigant MemoryGambit used in both series.

* SpiritualAdaptation: This has a premise of an imperial entity colonizing another land for extracting special resources, the secret society of people with speical ability, and the noble's son fighting back with the indigenous rebels. It could easily pass as an adaptation of Frank Herbert's ''{{Literature/Dune}}'' saga...with robots and spinning kicks!
** as mentioned a few times elsewhere, it's also basically a perspective flipped adaption of Mobile Suit Gundam.

** Rolo in R2. He doesn't start off sympathetic at first since he had a hand in Lelouch being watched and faked being his brother, but through Lelouch's interactions with him, and the fact that Lelouch begins to use him as a tool, it pushes him into being seen as a character your supposed to sympathize with and find Lelouch wrong for manipulating him. However, many people didn't feel sorry for him when he [[spoiler:died]] because of the fact he killed [[spoiler:Shirley]] for simply saying the wrong thing to him, and that he wanted to kill Nunnally so he could be Lelouch's only sibling.

* UnintentionallySympathetic: While the Black Knights gained a reputation as UnintentionallyUnsympathetic [[spoiler:after their betrayal]], because of the complex morality of the series, just as many are quick to think the Black Knights did warrant some sympathy for the situation. [[spoiler:Namely, while they were performing a back room deal with Schneizel to get Japan back, the majority of them were still reeling from the Tokyo Settlement being destroyed by the Fleija, and that because Zero had made numerous questionable decisions during R2, they were more willing to believe Zero ''was'' just using them and just wanted their home back. Not helping matters being their lack of knowledge on Geass allowing Schneizel to color their perceptions of it, along with Asahina trying to warn Tohdoh not to trust Zero before he was caught in the Fleija blast, and doctored evidence by Schneizel making it look like Lelouch willingly caused the SAZ massacre via Euphemia.]] To many, the Black Knights were ultimately just scared, hurt, and confused, making their reactions more understandable, and by time Lelouch had become Emperor, he was deadset on his ZeroApprovalGambit, making them think their fears were justified. The {{compilation movie}}s seemed to agree, since it [[spoiler:alters events so that the Black Knights aren't trying to ''execute'' Lelouch, but just want ''answers'' and are willing to give him a chance to explain himself, only for Schneizel's forces to open fire anyway, the events of Anime/CodeGeassLelouchOfTheResurrection demonstrating several members regret their part in Lelouch's seeming mental decline, with Ohgi in particular initially DrivenToSuicide.]]

** Nina Einstein. She is meant to be seen as someone mentally ill in desperate need of actual help[[labelnote:*]]She was nearly raped by Japanese citizens in the Ghetto when she was younger, leading to her xenophobic tendencies, and Euphemia's kindness being her LivingEmotionalCrutch up until her death causing SanitySlippage[[/labelnote]], whose fragile mental state was taken advantage of by Schneizel and caused her to suffer further SanitySlippage, before returning to her senses after witnessing the effects her FLEIJA bomb had and travelling the [[TheAtoner path of redemption]] by helping Lelouch construct a counter measure to it and [[spoiler:aiding in the Zero Requiem]], giving her a good deal of CharacterDevelopment in the process and furthering the homage to her namesake, UsefulNotes/AlbertEinstein. However, her original xenophobic tendencies, StalkerWithACrush behavior towards Euphemia, and the fact she is responsible for creating a nuclear warhead more destructive than the infamous [[UsefulNotes/AtomicBombingsOfHiroshimaAndNagasaki atom bombs]] lead many fans to turn their back on her as their most [[TheScrappy hated]] character, refusing to see her change despite the contrary.

** The "Euphinator incident" is despised by many, mainly because they feel that having Euphie's plan actually go into action and horribly collapse would have been a lot more interesting than [[spoiler:having an absurd DiabolusExMachina crush it before it starts and cause Euphie to be killed, as having it happen and fail with Euphie still alive would give her some interesting CharacterDevelopment to go through, potentially pushing her to becoming someone who, while not dark and cynical, would be a lot less cheerful and optimistic, and forced to look at things more realistically.]]

** Cornelia is treated as a sympathetic character due to her desire to avenge [[spoiler: Euphemia's death]] [[KarmaHoudini and gets a happy ending]] despite having been shown to be especially racist towards the Japanese and committing several war crimes, such as staging a massacre early on just to lure out Zero. Her racism is also implied to have been prompted by Lelouch and Nunnally's disappearance in Japan (and the belief they were lynched by the Japanese at some point during Britannia's invasion), but even if that were true, it would still be wrong to generalize the entire population of Japan based on that, much less murder and oppress countless men, women and children for it.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: The infamous ''Table-kun'' scene. In Episode 12 of the first season, Nina is shown in silhouette [[ADateWithRosiePalms masturbating]] against the edge of the table in the Student Council room while looking at pictures of Euphemia, only for Nunnally to roll in (since she lives in the clubhouse) thinking Nina sounds sick, with Nina quickly cleaning herself up reassuring Nunnally everything is fine. The scene is less than 30 seconds long, and is never referenced again. [[NeverLiveItDown It's still one of the first things most people associate Nina with.]]

** Nina's [[ADateWithRosiePalms Table-kun]] incident, of course.

** You can also easily see it as [["DieHard"OnAnX Death Note with Giant Robots]]. You have a seemingly ordinary but extremely intelligent high school student VillainProtaganist (Light/Lelouch) who gains a unique super natural item/ability (Death Note/Geass) and begins to use said ability in unexpected and creative ways to further his goal of changing the world, while taking on an alternate identity to the public (Kira/Zero). The item/ability has hard and fast rules that the protagonist must learn about and manipulate to his own advantage, they have a quirky aloof sidekick connected to the item (Ryuuk/C.C.) and are opposed by a HeroAntagonist (L/Suzaku) who is philosophically opposed to the values of the protagonist, but who interacts with him in daily life in a more friendly manner. There is also a signifigant MemoryGambit used in both series.

** as mentioned a few times elsewhere, it's also basically a perspective flipped adaption of Mobile Suit Gundam

** Marianne [[spoiler:having been alive the whole time and actually completely evil, in spite of the whole show being driven by Lelouch wanting to avenge his sweet mother. While her survival could've gone in any direction, having survived by essentially jumping her soul into another body and the fact that nothing was known about Marianne besides that she had a HundredPercentAdorationRating comes off as this]].

** After [[spoiler: Euphemia's death]], Cornelia is treated as a sympathetic character [[KarmaHoudini and gets a happy ending]] despite having been shown to be especially racist towards the Japanese, even staging a massacre early on just to lure out Zero. Her racism is also implied to have been prompted by Lelouch and Nunnally's disappearance in Japan (and the belief they were lynched by the Japanese at some point during Britannia's invasion), but even if that were true, it would still be wrong to generalize the entire population of Japan based on that, much less murder and oppress countless men, women and children for it.

** Britannians like Cornelia and [[spoiler:Jeremiah]] who are shown to be especially racist towards the Japanese are implied to have had their racism prompted by Lelouch and Nunnally's disappearance in Japan (and the belief they were lynched by the Japanese at some point during Britannia's invasion), and are made out to be somewhat sympathetic because of it. The issue here being that, even if Lelouch and Nunnally were actually killed by Japanese people, it would still be wrong to generalize the entire population of Japan based on that, much less murder and oppress countless men, women and children for it.

* TooBleakStoppedCaring: The endgame of R2 slips into this for some. [[spoiler:The Black Knights betray Lelouch for stupid reasons and end up helping Schneizel with his plan to nuke a bunch of people. Lelouch gets thrown over the DespairEventHorizon and carries out a plan with Suzaku and C.C. that, while not as destructive as Schneizel's plan, still involved deceiving everyone else he knew and oppressing and presumably murdering hundreds of millions of people, and was likely motivated far more by psychological issues and self loathing than any sense of rationality. Afterwards, several characters who should be punished, including war criminals like Cornelia who mass murdered innocent civilians out of racism, are instead let completely off the hook.]]

* CreatorsPet: Ohgi was well-liked at first, but went from a VoiceOfReason to an ever-increasing liability, with his [[LoveMakesYouDumb relationship with Villetta causing numerous problems and getting too much focus]], and his controversial actions towards the end of the second season didn't help at all, with [[spoiler:his betrayal of Lelouch and selling him out to [[TheDragon his evil brother of all people]]]]. Unlike Rolo, [[HeelRealization the now more clearsighted Suzaku]], and the [[ItsAllMyFault remorseful]], [[DeathSeeker suicidal]] Lelouch, who was [[spoiler:largely led to this point because of said betrayal]], Ohgi changed for the worse and received a happy ending with the equally if not more culpable [[TheStoolPigeon Villetta]] that many fans felt was neither earned nor justified.

* CreatorsPet: Ohgi and, to a lesser extent, Villetta. For those who despise him, Rolo counts too. He was very well liked among female staff members on the show and [[spoiler:he ended up dying easier than he deserved to because of it]].

* CharacterPerceptionEvolution: In R1, Cornelia was for the most part well liked by fans for being an antagonist who [[ANaziByAnyOtherName embodied some of the worst aspects of Britannia]]'s brutality, but was also intelligent, competent, [[EvilIsSexy beautiful]] and made for an imposing foe for Lelouch. Come R2 however, where [[spoiler:she's presented sympathetically and gets off scot free for her war crimes even though she never even shows an ounce of remorse for the horrific massacres she committed, she's now one of the most controversial {{Karma Houdini}}s in the show.]]

* CreatorsPet: Ohgi and, to a lesser extent, Villetta. For those who despise him, Rolo counts too. He was very well liked among female staff members on the show and [[spoiler:he ended up dying easier than he probably deserved to because of it]].

*** As for Villetta, like Jeremiah she was a member of the purist faction. Whereas Jeremiah's racist tendencies are more understandable due to blaming the Japanese for the alleged death of Lelouch and Nunnally, Villetta has no reason for her FantasticRacism. Only focused on power for the most part, once she recovers from her amnesia she attempts to kill the man who saved her, then goes after Lelouch for the chance to rise in nobility. While Lelouch does turn her into an unwilling accomplice, she gets [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic no sympathy]] after she had been leading the operation of trying to bait C.C. with him. She betrays Lelouch to Jeremiah in the hopes he'll kill Lelouch, then tries to kill Ohgi ''again'' just so she won't be associated with a Number, only hesitating once he confesses his love to her. So while she lets up on him, she still convinces Ohgi to lead the betrayal, setting into motion the cluster [[PrecisionFStrike fuck]] that is [[spoiler:the Zero Requiem]].
* DesignatedMonkey: Lelouch, courtesy of the DiabolusExMachina and DeusExMachina.

** ''Suzaku''. He is not much worse morally than Lelouch but he is always scapegoated for any conflict between the two, even after Lelouch's carelessness causes Euphemia's death. Although he ''is'' a hypocrite, he is far from the only one in the show and Lelouch himself shows a very bad case of NeverMyFault.

* DesignatedHero:
** Ohgi and Villetta, among other characters responsible for the betrayal of and later fighting Lelouch as Emperor. They demonize Lelouch for his use of Geass and wholeheartedly consider their betrayal of him to be a good thing, and they are presented among the heroes in the final episodes, even getting unearned happy endings. The problem is, neither have any moral high ground to stand on.
*** Ohgi had already betrayed Zero multiple times prior to learning his identity, starting with his rescue of Villetta, who was then the amnesiac "Chigusa". Even after being shot by her during the Black Rebellion, he remained devoted to her beyond rationality, putting himself in the line of fire to protect her after she attempted to kill him ''again''. And despite being aware she was a Britannian Noble, he openly believed the circumstantial evidence she gave him regarding Geass, and sided with her and Schneizel over the man who gave them a leg to stand on against Britannia. Making issues even worse is that he adds a caveat to the Black Knights betraying Zero, that Schneizel return Japan to its people. This in itself is tantamount to treason due to willingly going behind the backs of the UFN, who at that point were technically the bosses of the Black Knights, and negotiating a deal with an enemy nation, setting aside the fact Schneizel doesn't even have the power to give them Japan. He goes even further by proceeding to lie to Jeremiah, Xingke, and Kaguya by saying Zero perished in battle, and would have let them believe it had it not been for Lelouch staging an attack on Kamine Island.
*** As for Villetta, like Jeremiah she was a member of the purist faction. Whereas Jeremiah's racist tendencies are more understandable due to blaming the Japanese for the alleged death of Lelouch and Nunnally, Villetta has no reason for her FantasticRacism. Only focused on power for the most part, once she recovers from her amnesia she attempts to kill the man who saved her, then goes after Lelouch for the chance to rise in nobility. While Lelouch does turn her into an unwilling accomplice, she gets [[UnintentionallyUnsympathetic no sympathy]] after she had been leading the operation of trying to bait C.C. with him. She betrays Lelouch to Jeremiah in the hopes he'll kill Lelouch, then tries to kill Ohgi ''again'' just so she won't be associated with a Number, only hesitating once he confesses his love to her. So while she lets up on him, she still convinces Ohgi to lead the betrayal, setting into motion the cluster [[PrecisionFStrike fuck]] that is [[spoiler:the Zero Requiem]].

** [[spoiler: To an extent Suzaku is this, especially in regard to his actions during season 1s finale. While he is a hypocrite and extremely self-righteous, his hatred for Lelouch after Euphie's death is pretty understandable considering he had no idea that Euphie's death wasn't caused by Lelouch's malice but instead a freak accident just as Lelouch was going to begin working with Euphie. From Suzaku's point of view, Lelouch used Euphie as a tool to slaughter the Japanese so that Zero's cause would be furthered and that any attempts of reconciliation between the black knights and Britannia were squashed. This is because V.V. only told Suzaku that Lelouch brainwashed Euphie into slaughtering the Japanese instead of providing the actual context and Lelouch doesn't help matters by brushing off Suzaku's questions about it. This doesn't stop a large part of the fanbase from portraying him as an evil and petty traitor who betrayed his best friend for no reason though.]]

** Holy ''crap'', Britannia. They are presented as morally ambiguous (at ''worst'') and the Black Knights and Lelouch are portrayed as selfish and vengeful for fighting against them. However their hypocricy, MasterRace ideology, the willingness(and sometimes eagerness) of the soldiers to commit atrocities and the fact that their 'good' members come across as {{Token Good Teammate}}s at most it falls flat. Quite a few people have outright said that they wouldn't care if Britannia was razed to the ground.
** Britannians like Cornelia and [[spoiler:Jeremiah]] who are shown to be especially racist towards the Japanese (to the point of bordering on [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Nazi levels]]) are implied to have had their racism prompted by Lelouch and Nunnally's disappearance in Japan (and the belief they were lynched by the Japanese at some point during Britannia's invasion), and are made out to be somewhat sympathetic because of it. The issue here being that, even if Lelouch and Nunnally were actually killed by people who were Japanese, it would still be wrong to generalize the entire population of Japan based on that, much less murder and oppress countless men, women and children for it.
** Cornelia in general gets no sympathy from a lot of fans, who find her few PetTheDog moments and redeeming factors like her care for Euphie to be too scarce and middling compared to the brutality and atrocities she sanctions and even directly oversees.

** The belief that Lelouch is a [[pragmatistPragmaticHero]] who is fighting in a BlackandGreyMorality conflict against the evil Empire of Britannia. He is actually the NominalHero fighting for revenge against his father and his (misguided) goal of creating a better world to live in (without actually understanding the consequenses of his actions and what that 'better world' entails) and Britannia is never portayed as evil; just morally ambiguous, dark grey at worst.

** Holy crap. Britannia. They are presented as morally ambiguous (at ''worst'') and the Black Knights and Lelouch are portrayed as selfish and vengeful for fighting against them. However their hypocricy, MasterRace ideology, the willingness(and sometimes eagerness) of the soldiers to commit atrocities and the fact that their 'good' members come across as {{Token Good Teammate}}s at most it falls flat. Quite a few people have outright said that they wouldn't care if Britannia was razed to the ground.

** Holy crap. Britannia. They are presented as morally ambiguous (at ''worst'') and the Black Knights and Lelouch are portrayed as selfish and vengeful for fighting against them. However their hypocricy, MasterRace ideology, the willingness(and sometimes eagerness) of the soldiers to commit atrocities and the fact that their 'good' members come across as TokenGoodTeammates at most it falls flat. Quite a few people have outright said that they wouldn't care if Britannia was razed to the ground.

** To an extent Suzaku is this, especially in regard to his actions during season 1s finale. While he is a hypocrite and extremely self-righteous, his hatred for Lelouch after Euphie's death is pretty understandable considering he had no idea that Euphie's death wasn't caused by Lelouch's malice but instead a freak accident just as Lelouch was going to begin working with Euphie. From Suzaku's point of view, Lelouch used Euphie as a tool to slaughter the Japanese so that Zero's cause would be furthered and that any attempts of reconciliation between the black knights and Britannia were squashed. This is because V.V. only told Suzaku that Lelouch brainwashed Euphie into slaughtering the Japanese instead of providing the actual context and Lelouch doesn't help matters by brushing off Suzaku's questions about it. This doesn't stop a large part of the fanbase from portraying him as an evil and petty traitor who betrayed his best friend for no reason though.

* HilariousInHindsight:
** Creator/YuriLowenthal and Creator/JohnnyYongBosch voicing friends who eventually become enemies only to become allies again towards the end? [[Anime/TengenToppaGurrenLagann That sounds familiar...]][[note]]For extra {{Irony}}, their roles are reversed. Both cases have Bosch play the WellIntentionedExtremist and Lowenthal TheIdealist. In Gurren Lagann, Bosch's character Rossiu temporarily serves an antagonistic role and and is proven to be wrong by Lowenthal's character Simon due to their world running on RuleOfCool, nearly driving Rossiu to kill himself as atonement only to be stopped by Simon. Here, Bosch's character Lelouch is the protagonist in a CrapsackWorld and his methods prove more practical than Lowenthal's character Suzaku, Lelouch going through with killing himself to complete his plans with Suzaku assisting him.[[/note]]
*** Also present in ''VideoGame/{{Ace Combat Zero|TheBelkanWar}}''. [[spoiler:During the last level (which is coincidentally named "Zero"), Pixy (Lowenthal) shoots down P.J. (Bosch). It seems as if Yuri is destined to kill Johnny. Also, that level involves a nuclear MIRV missile called "V2," which is how V.V. is pronounced.]]
** During the Guren's first taste of battle, Jeremiah says it's impossible for Elevens to have created such a powerful war machine, dismissing the notion that the ''Japanese'' are capable of creating hi-tech weapons.
** "Zero, you son of a bitch!"
** Dub instance: In ''R2'' Episode 13, the one where [[spoiler:[[KillTheCutie Shirley dies]]]], Lelouch was casually chatting about going to Ikebukuro. Cue a few years later where Bosch is [[{{LightNovel/Durarara}} voicing a person who causes chaos and discord in said city]].
** This wasn't [[VideoGame/MegaManZero the first series]] to feature a character named Zero who fights in a rebellion. Bosch even goes on to play that Zero [[VideoGame/MarvelVsCapcom3 some time afterward]]. Not to mention the fact that [[Creator/TakahiroSakurai Suzaku’s voice actor]] is also X’s actual voice actor. And [[Creator/TakahiroMizushima Rolo’s]] voiced X during VideoGame/MegaManZero.
** Anyone watching ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamIronBloodedOrphans'' know that Creator/TakahiroSakurai (Suzaku's Japanese voice actor) voiced resident CharClone, [=McGillis=] Fareed. The last episode of R2 has Suzaku, [[spoiler:dressing up as Zero, the CharClone of the show]].
*** Also, Creator/KikukoInoue (Cecile's Japanese voice actress) voices Carta Issue in that show, meaning Suzaku and Cecile are working together again. [[spoiler:Crosses into HarsherInHindsight when Carta dies following [=McGillis=]' orders. In other words, Suzaku sent Cecile to her death]]].
** Some memes on the internet link the story of the series about an inefficient European Union on the brink of collapse and a modern British empire, and the fight of some people against a corrupt British establishment, to the Brexit Referendum.
** Between the way C.C.'s name is meant to be spelled (which looks like it'd be said C-C rather than C-2) and her love of pizza, it can be very amusing for viewers to find there is a pizza buffet chain known as [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicis CiCi's]].
** Because of the Myth/{{Arthurian|Legend}} themes in the show, Suzaku has a pet cat named Arthur and pilots the Knightmare Frame, Lancelot. It becomes hilarious that his Japanese voice actor, Creator/TakahiroSakurai, ends up voicing with two actual Arthurian Servants in the ''Franchise/{{Fate|Series}}'' franchise: the original King Arthur of ''Anime/FatePrototype'' and Merlin of ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder''.
*** In relation to ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'', Lelouch's Japanese voice actor, Creator/JunFukuyama, voices the ruler of the third Lostbelt, Emperor UsefulNotes/QinShiHuangdi, who reaches immortality and can be summoned as a Ruler-class Servant. Because of the old but [[https://www.reddit.com/user/GeassedbyLelouch/comments/8hklfr/evaluating_code_theory_main_body_index/ now fully debunked (contradicted by the anime itself and Word Of God) theories]] about Lelouch becoming immortal after ''R2'', this spawn a lot of jokes about him going to China after the Zero Requiem. It doesn't help that Fukuyama uses the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfKXVx9yn-c same type of voice]] that Lelouch had when voicing as Emperor Qin.
*** Lelouch pilots the Knightmare Frame, Gawain, in the first season. Creator/TakahiroMizushima, the Japanese voice actor of his "brother" Rolo, voices the Saber-class Servant, Gawain, in ''VideoGame/FateExtra''.
** The entire premise of the show, especially at the very end, is this if you know [[spoiler:Creator/JunFukuyama (Lelouch)]] is the Japanese dub voice of [[spoiler:[[Series/GameOfThrones Bran Stark]]]] and how CG ends compared how the latter ends too: [[spoiler:Lelouch became the emperor of Britannia and plans to conquer the world, just like Daenerys Targaryen planned to do in the last season, with the help of a WeaponOfMassDestruction (In ''Code Geass'' with the Sword of Damocles and the F.L.E.I.J.A. warhead and in ''Game of Thrones'' with a dragon) and both Lelouch and Daenerys ended being killed by their closest allies (Suzaku Kururugi and Jon Snow respectively) in similar ways (being stabbed)]]. The main difference here is [[spoiler:while there's two cities destroyed by the F.L.E.I.J.A. in the series, mainly Tokyo and Pendragon, the capital city of Britannia, Lelouch wasn't involved in their destruction, as the former was destroyed accidentally by Suzaku and the latter was nuked by his brother Schneizel el Britannia in an attempt to assure his authority, compared with King's Landing, when Daenerys orders its destruction without guilt. Also, unlike Lelouch, Bran survives the whole thing and became the ruler of Westeros]]. To make the irony even sweeter, [[spoiler:Bran's role is very similar to Lelouch's sister Nunnally, who, just like Bran, she is also crippled and she became the empress of Britannia after her brother was killed]].
** Following the passing of Queen Elizabeth II Great Britain now has a monarch titled King '''Charles''' III.