Characters / Code Geass: Paladins of Voltron, The Galra Empire

Code Geass: Paladins of Voltron Main Character Page
Voltron and Allies | The Galra Empire | The Holy Britannian Empire

The main antagonistic faction of the series.

In General

• Aliens Are Bastards: Seeing how the Galra have conquered most of the Universe and ruled for over ten thousand years in tyranny. Later subverted with the revelation that not every Galra is a part of the military or even a part of the empire.
• Always Chaotic Evil: Played Straight until the end of The Black Paladin, where Thace allows Voltron to escape from Zarkon's Fortress. Further subverted in Rai's Escape, where The Blade of Marmora is introduced.
• Eviler than Thou: On the giving end as the Galra are far more dangerous than Britannia, as well as more overtly villainous - while Britannia merely wants to rule the Earth, the Galra Empire is aiming to conquer the universe, and has already made significant headway in doing so. Additionally, while Britannia is willing to allow others to become 'Honorary Britannians' who have the potential to advance high enough to ultimately enact some form of change, the Galra tend to prefer enslaving all conquered peoples with no possibility of escape, and have totally wiped out the Alteans at the very least. It's made very clear that they are the ones with the real power in their alliance with Britannia.
• Mook Mobile: While the Galra don’t have any Knightmare frames, they do utilize sentry aircraft as their rank and file machines, most of which are piloted by sentry robots.
• Technologically Advanced Foe: Cornelia's forces find out very quickly that the Galra are on a totally different league compared to Britannia.

Leadership

Zarkon

Emperor Zarkon

"You cannot stop me. The Black Lion will finally be returned to its original Paladin."

The malevolent Emperor of the Galra Empire and the main antagonist of the series. Ruthless and without regard for life, he leads his people in a quest to extinguish all other living things and eliminates those of his own command who fail to meet his standard of strength.

---

• Adaptational Badass: Has a black Geass in addition to all of his other powers!
• Adaptation Expansion: Canon indicates the only reason he wants Voltron is because he wants to use it to expedite his conquest of the universe. Here, we learn that he has another reason for acquiring it - he wants to open a new rift to the universe where the transdimensional comet used to create Voltron came from.
• Always Someone Better: While they've yet to meet, Lelouch considers him one to Schneizel - Lelouch has never beaten his elder brother, but Zarkon's power, resources, and ambitions put him at a level head and shoulders beyond anything Schneizel could ever hope to accomplish on his own.
• Arch-Enemy: Manages to usurp Charles' role as this toward Lelouch — Zarkon embodies everything Lelouch hates about Britannia (social darwinism, abusive aristocracy, and general Lack of Empathy), but magnified due to ruling the Galra for several thousand years while they conquered the universe. What makes it worse is that Zarkon was the original Black Paladin, meaning that he genuinely was a hero in the past, but discard his virtues to become a tyrant (admittedly not without understandable reasons). Zarkon making a point of directly attacking and verbally eviscerating Lelouch into order to break the prince's connection with the Black Lion so that Zarkon can reclaim it as his own and just to add fuel to the fire, Zarkon cut off Cornelia's arm right in front of the young man
• Big Bad: The overall ruler of the Galra Empire and his obsessive ambition to obtain Voltron is the main source of conflict in the story.
• Crossover Villain-in-Chief: It is abundantly clear that Zarkon eclipses all other antagonists within the story in terms of power, skill, and threat level. Case in point, Charles and V.V. are terrified just from seeing a hologram of him.
• Fatal Flaw: Zarkon's obsession with the Black Lion is one that the Paladins actively exploit on their return to Earth.
• Foil: With Lelouch. Both are/were the Black Paladin, but Zarkon embodies everything (classism, racism, oppression, domination) that Lelouch opposes as Zero and the leader of Voltron.
• Horrifying the Horror: Even though he doesn’t appear in person when contacting Haggar, the mere holographic image of him is enough to make Charles and V.V. terrified of him.
• Implacable Man: Even more so than in canon. The man is capable of going up against an army of Humongous Mecha and casually winning. On foot.
• Non-Action Big Bad: Downplayed - Zarkon normally prefers to let his underlings do his dirty work, but he will get personally involved if the situation demands it. Haggar actually has to ask him to stay behind when she heads to Earth after finding that the planet is beyond her ability to locate via Zarkon's connection to the Black Lion.
• Not So Invincible After All:
  • As per canon, he's a One-Man Army capable of fighting against the Lions and Knightmare Frames and winning. On foot. Yet, in Battle for Home, Lelouch, of all people, managed to wound him with his Luxite Blade while Zarkon was distracted by Cornelia.
  • He loses the fight for the Black Lion on he astral plane, same as canon.
• Really 700 Years Old: Has been alive for 10,000 years. For a given value of 'alive'.
• Swiss-Army Weapon: He has the Black Bayard - and unlike the other Bayards, his can take multiple forms.
• Teleportation: This appears to be what his Black Geass does, as he repeatedly moves between several locations instantly during the final part of Battle for Home.

Haggar

High Priestess Haggar / Honerva

"You're only scratching the surface of the power that you possess."

Leader of the Druids and Zarkon's Right Hand.

---

• A Day in the Limelight: Get's a bit more focus during the Return to Earth arc, as she heads to the planet on her own to determine why she cannot find it with her quintessence powers.
• The Dreaded: C.C. is completely terrified of her, for good reason - Haggar can examine the latter's memories just by touching her.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Her request that Zarkon stay aboard his ship while she investigates Earth has undertones of this, even though she has pragmatic reasons, seeing how she is canonically Zarkon's wife.
• Evil Counterpart: To C.C., being a magic-affiliated character who provides the power of Geass to her allies. The Legend Begins reveals that she is Zarkon's wife, which only furthers the contrast, as C.C. ends up Lelouch's canonical wife in the movie timeline.
• Eviler than Thou: Easily manages to strong-arm V.V. and Charles into assisting her and Zarkon, in the process cementing the difference in threat levels between the Galra and the Britannians.
• Evil Sorcerer: Acts as one for Zarkon, and utterly outclasses Lelouch during their Wizard Duel in The Black Paladin.
• Foil:
  • To C.C. - both are magical, immortal women associated with a Black Paladin and have provided magical aid to said Paladins. Whereas C.C. mostly tries to maintain a professional relationship with Lelouch (and often annoys him for her own amusement), Haggar is truly loyal to Zarkon and treats him as a close friend. The two are actually husband and wife, making a dark mirror of Lelouch and C.C.'s situation at the end of Code Geass: Lelouch of the Re;surrection.
  • She's also one to Marianne. See her entry for more details.
• Foreshadowing: Changes her appearance to blend in better during her mission to Earth. Naturally being able to physically change appearances isn't a trait that Galra possess in Voltron: Legendary Defender, but it is a trait possessed by Alteans.
• Les Collaborateurs: She's The Dragon of Zarkon, but she herself is not a Galra. Justified because she's Zarkon's wife and, albeit unwittingly, the one who turned him evil in the first place.
• Squishy Wizard: Averted - Haggar primarily fights via magic, but is amazingly durable.
• Unholy Matrimony: The Legend Begins all but outright states that she is Zaekon's wife Honerva, who he loved dearly. The genuine concern the two have for each other is implied to be a remnant of this bond.

Lotor

Prince Lotor

Zarkon's estranged son.

---

• Adaptational Badass: As it is strongly implied that he was/is C.C.'s first contractor, he can be presumed to possess some kind of Geass.
• Adaptational Early Appearance: Makes a cameo during the end of Chapter 14, Rebirth, roughly a season and a half before he showed up in Legendary Defender.
• Foreshadowing: He shows up in one of C.C.'s visions, with the heavy implication that he's C.C.'s first contractor.
• The Cameo: He appears briefly when Suzaku and Lelouch accidentally pear through her memories in Crystal Venom, implying that he'd been to Earth in the past at least once.
• Foil: Is one to Lelouch, Suzaku, and Kallen.
  • He and Lelouch are both chessmasters and the sons of powerful emperors who exiled them. They also have... less than ideal relations with their birth parents. But while Lelouch has his sister Nunnally and has mostly good memories of his mother, Lotor is an only child and never knew his mother as she had turned into Haggar. Additionally, both are only part Galra, but while Lotor inherited the worst traits of the Galra from his father, Zarkon, Lelouch inherited the absolute best ones from his grandmother, who is implied to be Krolia.
  • Lotor and Suzaku are both Internal Reformists who wish to change their respective empires, but while Suzaku is an "Eleven" who willingly became an Honorary Britannian to do so, Lotor is a Galra/Altean hybrid and the crown prince of the Galra Empire.
  • Lotor and Kallen are both children of two worlds (half-Britannian, half-Japanese for Kallen, half Galra, half-Altean for Lotor) who despise their paternal homelands and people. But while Kallen can move past these issues and have friends with Britannians (who she accepts as not being Always Chaotic Evil), Lotor has a borderline Irrational Hatred of the Galra, and has had plans to exterminate them.
  • Interestingly enough, there is one trait that all of Lotor's Foils share that he lacks: while Kallen, Lelouch, and even Suzaku are willing to admit that they have occasionally made mistakes and change their plans to be more moral, Lotor will never stray from his course due to all of the sacrifices he has made and not recognizing just how bad some of his choices were/are. It doesn't help that Lotor never has anyone to open up to in canon except for Allura who he eventually drives away due to his own actions while Suzaku has Euphie and Lelouch and Kallen have eachother (and also Shirley, in Lelouch's case).
• "Not So Different" Remark: Tells Nina that he understands her hatred for the Galra, as he also has lost someone important to him because of them.
• Oh, Crap!: Does not take it well when he hears that Zarkon has conquered Earth in "Brawl on the Astral Plane".
  Lotor: "Cera..."
• Villain Takes an Interest: He's rather curious about Zero, to say the least.

Commanders

Sendak

Commander Sendak

"Victory or death is the way of the Galra."

A Galra officer who was tasked with destroying Voltron and Allura's castle after Allura was awakened from stasis.

---

• Artificial Limbs: Sendak sports an enlarged forearm connected to his shoulder by a stream of energy, allowing it to be used as a kind of Epic Flail.
• Foil: To Jeremiah - both possess Fantastic Racism and are fervently loyal to a member of their respective empire's royal families. Additionally, both view Lelouch as an enemy, though while Jeremiah has only fought Zero, Sendak has fought Lelouch beneath his mask. Sendak even has his own Geass Canceller in his synthetic eye.
• Ham-to-Ham Combat: Lelouch gives Sendak a modified version of the speech he told the Royal Guard in "The Day a New Demon Was Born" before attempting to Geass him into killing himself. Unlike the Royal Guard, Sendak throws everything Lelouch says right back at him. Including, thanks to his cybernetics, the Geass.
• No-Sell: His artificial eye can cancel Geass orders given to him.
• Shut Up, Kirk!: One thing that separates him from literally every other enemy Lelouch has ever faced is he is the only one to throw his belief that 'the only ones who should kill are the ones willing to be killed', admitting he agrees with it.
• Starter Villain: The first villain the Paladins face and one that plagues them still for several chapters. From him, the Paladins (and the audience) get the first hints that Geass isn't unique to Earth.
• Villain Respect: Unlike the villains in Code Geass, Sendak agrees with Lelouch's assessment that the only ones who should kill are the ones willing to be killed, viewing it as the way of the Galra.

Haxus

Lieutenant Haxus

"I'm a soldier of the Galra Empire! Nothing stops me but triumph or death!"

Sendak's underling.

---

• Dies Differently in Adaptation: In canon, he's knocked into the pit by Rover. In this story, he falls in after slitting his own throat, as per Lelouch's Geass instructions.

Prorok

Commander Prorok

"I'll capture Voltron on my own."

An ambitious Galra Officer who tends to take matters into his own hands.

---

• Dragon with an Agenda: He acts outside of the command structure and stages several plans against the Defenders without Zarkon's authorization.
• Fate Worse than Death: He gets turned into a Robeast by Haggar.
• Interservice Rivalry: He's distrustful of the Druids and bitter over Zarkon's favoritism towards them.
• Meaningful Name: In Polish his name means Prophet.
• You Have Failed Me: While at first he's sent off to Haggar for interrogation because he's suspected of treachery, it's clear that they're only really using him to try and forge a new Robeast. Zarkon was tired of his failures and Haggar felt he'd be more useful to them as a monster.

Thace

Lieutenant / Commander Thace

A Galra officer working directly under Prorok.

---

• Enigmatic Minion: When Prorok sets his Balmera gambit in motion, Thace offers to tell Zarkon as per procedure, but Prorok opts to do it himself. Aside from that brief moment, Thace only follows Prorok and Zarkon's orders, up until the end of The Black Paladin where he goes behind everyone's backs and frees the Paladins for his own reasons. He did so because he's a member of The Blade of Marmora.
• The Mole: He's part of the Galran resistance, The Blade of Marmora, whose job is to keep track of Zarkon.
• Number Two: He was Prorok's until Across the Universe.
• You Are in Command Now: At the end of Across the Universe Prorok is arrested for suspected treason and Thace is promoted from Lieutenant to Commander.

Corza

Commander Corza

"I may have orders but... As the saying goes, 'everyone makes mistakes' now, don't they?"

A Galra officer who leads the attack on Earth.

---

• Ax-Crazy: Is rather bloodthirsty, deciding to cow Bartley into submission by cutting off his ear, for starters.
• Bad Boss: Kills her own men for interfering in her fight with Tohdoh.
• Killed Off for Real: Is stabbed through the heart by Tohdoh during the Black Rebellion.
• More Deadly Than the Male: Her competence level clearly exceeds that of most of her fellow Galra officers, with only Sendak exceeding her. This is likely why Zarkon sent her to command his vanguard for conquering Earth.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: Corza has no obvious Fatal Flaws and does not exceed her command when fighting the Paladins. She immediately obeys Haggar's orders to retreat and does not use more than the necessary amount of force to cow Bartley into subservience.
• Original Character: She's the first major Galra OC for this story. She commands the fleet sent to Earth.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Corza may be Ax-Crazy, but she's not stupid. She never commits to actions that are pointlessly brutal or prioritize her personal successes over the Galra as a whole. She also uses only enough force to cow Schneizel and his companions into submission rather than executing one as a message to the others - valuable hostages are hard to come by, after all.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Kills her own men for interfering in her duel with Tohdoh.
• The Smurfette Principle: Among the main Galra chain of Command (which discounts Haggar as she commands the Druids), she is currently the sole female member of note.

Branko

Commander Branko

The commander of the Galra forces on Olkarion.

---

• Dies Differently in Adaptation: Canonically, he dies in his second appearance in Legendary Defender, which happens in Season 5, when he gets blasted by his own ion cannon. Here, he's fried by Sayoko using a Radiant Wave Surger before he can get off Olkarion.
• Named by the Adaptation: Downplayed due to format - while Branko is his name from canon, it's only given in his second appearance. Since he bites it on Olkarion, he's named by the narration in all scenes he appears in.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: States as much to King Lubos after the latter's people finish building a weaponized Olkari cube.

Gnov

Commander Gnov

---

• Adaptational Early Appearance: One of four Galra Commanders to appear at a strategy meeting on Earth, which takes place in the story's version of Season 2 of Legendary Defender. Canonically, none of them show up until at least Season 3.

Trugg

Commander Trugg

---

• Adaptational Early Appearance: One of four Galra Commanders to appear at a strategy meeting on Earth, which takes place in the story's version of Season 2 of Legendary Defender. Canonically, none of them show up until at least Season 3.

Throk

Commander Throk

---

• Adaptational Early Appearance: One of four Galra Commanders to appear at a strategy meeting on Earth, which takes place in the story's version of Season 2 of Legendary Defender. Canonically, none of them show up until at least Season 3.

Ladnok

Commander Ladnok

---

• Adaptational Early Appearance: One of four Galra Commanders to appear at a strategy meeting on Earth, which takes place in the story's version of Season 2 of Legendary Defender. Canonically, none of them show up until at least Season 3.

Lotor's Team

In General

Lotor's most trusted commanders.

---

• Amazon Brigade: All of them are female, kick tons of ass, and are fully loyal to Lotor. If it weren't for the fact that Lotor seems to only have interest in Cera, one could mistake them for his Battle Harem.
• Dark and Troubled Past: All of them had some pretty terrible lives before Lotor picked them up.
• Evil Counterpart: Currently a morally ambiguous example, but they are effectively Lotor's answer to the Paladins.
• I Owe You My Life: Implied to be why they follow Lotor — he took them in and helped them climb the ranks when others looked down upon them for being half-breeds.

Acxa

General Acxa

---

• Adaptation Expansion: Double Subverted. While she doesn't get one in A Place to Belong like Lotor's other generals, the author's note at the end of the chapter indicates that she will eventually.

Ezor

General Ezor

---

• Adaptation Expansion: Her backstory is significantly more detailed than we ever got in canon.
• Child by Rape: Her mother was raped by some lower-ranked Galra, leading to Ezor's birth.
• Defiled Forever: Not her, but her mom was considered this after being raped by a Galra soldier.

Zethrid

General Zethrid

---

• Adaptation Expansion: Here, we actually learn more about her and her backstory than we do in canon.
• Parental Abandonment: She was given to her father's niece shortly after she was born.

Narti

General Narti

---

• Adaptation Expansion: In canon, we knew little-to-nothing of her backstory. Not so much so here.
• Body Horror: Her blindness and muteness are actually birth defects, as the genetics of her other species heritage don't mix with Galra genes very well. And she's actually one of the lucky ones.
• Lizard Folk: Her non-Galra heritage comes from a race of humanoind reptiles.

The Fifth

Nina Einstein

A student of Britannia and friend of the Voltron Paladins. She's recruited by Lotor after he arrives on Earth.

Robeasts

Giant monsters created by Haggar and her Druids from a mixture of black magic and mad science, Robeasts are some of the Galra Empire's most powerful forces. They are only ever deployed to fight Voltron, but each of the creatures gives it a tough fight.

In General

• Robeast: Well, yes, obviously, since the original Voltron series was the trope namer for this in the west. As foes of a Super Robot made by a mixture of black magic and mad science, they tick all the boxes.
• Unwilling Robotization: Played with. Prorok, in particular, didn't want to go, but Myzax volunteered for the chance to get revenge on Rai.
• Was Once a Man: Robeasts each require a living organic mind to form the nucleus of the new creature, which is usually a Galra solider. Oddly averted in the case of Drazil, who was apparently a simple reptile before its transformation. Mao stands out as being the only one who really was human prior to becoming a Robeast.

Myzax

Myzax

Myzax as a Robeast

A former champion in the Galra Empire's brutal gladiatorial games, Myzax was beaten and humiliated by Rai. He willingly allowed himself to be made into a Robeast for a chance at revenge. He is heavily armored and armed with a strange weapon resembling a ball-and-cup, that he uses to smash anything around him.

---

• Cool, but Inefficient: His downfall, both times, comes from the simple fact that, as cool as his orb weapon is, it needs to recharge after every third shot.
• Gladiator Games: A former undefeated champion in them.
• Lizard Folk: While still fleshy, he was humanoid but covered in armored scales.
• Wake-Up Call Boss: Myzax gave the Voltron team a run for their money and forced them to learn to use some of their weapons systems.
• Warm-Up Boss: The only Robeast that Voltron defeated outright in its first encounter, without help and without coming back for a rematch.

Drazil

Drazil

^{Click here to see Drazil's original, innocent form:} 

Made from a simple reptile, Drazil is the second Robeast produced by Haggar. It is armed with countless eyes, each with a powerful offensive laser, granting it a nearly perfect offense with no blind spot.

---

• Beam Spam: It has a lot of eyes, and each one fires Eye Beams. These combine to fill the air with green lasers.
• Eyes Do Not Belong There: It has, in addition to the eyes on its head mounted on a swivel, eyes along the underside of both its long arms and more on its chest. Considering its primary means of offense...
• Lean and Mean: While Myzax was bulky, Drazil is clearly built for speed, with all its limbs pinched uptight.
• Long-Range Fighter: It has enough Extra Eyes to pull off a Beam Spam via Eye Beams, but it's never shown to possess any close-range attacks - it doesn't even try hitting the paladins with its arms.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: Has a big maw full of spiky teeth.
• Sdrawkcab Name: Its name is "lizard" spelled backwards.
• Sealed Evil in a Can: It's so powerful that the Paladins aren't able to destroy it — even after they beat it at the end of the chapter, it stood back up for another round. It was only defeated when the Balmera grew a massive crystal around it to seal it in and immobilize it, leaving it still intact but trapped. Nunnally can still sense an aura of menace coming from its crystalline prison, indicating that, like in canon, it is still alive.
• Wave-Motion Gun: Its chest blaster is the most powerful of its many beam weapons, and it can combine all its energy beams into a massive torrent of energy capable of overwhelming even the Orange Lion's Energy Bow.

Prorok

Prorok

Prorok as a Robeast

A Galra officer remade as a Robeast, who attacks the Castle while it's trying to rendezvous with the Blades of Marmora.

---

• Big Ol' Eyebrows: Amusingly, his Robeast form also has them.
• Cephalothorax: Uniquely among the Robeasts shown thus far.
• Made of Iron: Has the distinction of being the only entity in the story so far to survive being hit with a Radiant Wave Surger. Additionally, unlike the Lancelot (which can block the attack via the Blaze Luminous Shield), he outright tanks the attack, and only comes off with hull damage.
• Nonstandard Character Design: Compared to previous Robeasts, who were humanoid in some fashion. This thing pretty much consists of a large head with arms.
• Unwilling Robotization: Prorok didn't go willingly.
• Wave-Motion Gun: He fires one after absorbing enough crystals.
• Weapons That Suck: Uses one to deadly effect, as Voltron fights it next to a veritable minefield of highly explosive crystals.
• Your Head Asplode: Inverted, as he's ultimately killed by Ulaz opening a black hole inside his head, imploding him into nothing.

Spoiler Character

Mao

Haggar’s most recent test subject. See his folder under the main character page.

---