Euphinator poll (Code Geass Spoilers)

Exactly. There would have been lots of interesting possiblities that could've happened had the Euphinator not occured. It was not needed for the story to move on.

edited 27th Oct '11 7:23:40 AM by ManwiththePlan

Hearing that idea does make it seem like Euphinator was done purely for the sake of causing more heartbreak, and ensuring that Lelouch couldn't find a peaceful solution to his problems.

What happens when the Wide-Eyed Idealist isn't so wide eyed, and their methods would actually work? Kill em off. 'Cause we can't have that.

It's like the fact that Euphemia's idea was plausible made the universe put extra effort into smashing it to bits.

Every time a story develops one way it closes off the possibility of it developing another way. That there were potentially interesting ways for the story to go without the Euphinator incident doesn't make the Euphinator incident bad.

They could have gone the Nightmare of Nunnally route and developed her into an interesting conflicted character who realizes absolute peace is an impossible goal but still Knight in Sour Armors the whole thing because she's a strong, independent woman and it's the right thing to do.

Instead they went the "lol let's kill her character off in the 'Idealistic Disney Princess' phase and squander all of her potential for easy shock value" route.

That's bad.

edited 27th Oct '11 11:29:16 AM by Dragonzordasaurus

The worst part is her idea is not even that plausible in the first place. Her idea was to make a huge ghetto in the center of Tokyo where everyone would be treated fairly and kindly and be happy. The problem is such 'solution' don't really solve much for all problems of Japan Area 11.

First of all, not all the elevens would be able to get in the special zone area. Only so much people fit there (it is just a region inside Tokyo, after all), and then there is all people who simple couldn't get in there for living far away. Every one outside it would face all the troubles they already face and oppression would run freely as always. Therefore, the armed rebellion is bound to continue, which or whichout Zero, even if with lower numbers, the different they wouldn't look as good anymore for "being ingrate after archiving 'so much'". This is why the Black Knight leadership actually wanted Zero to make one of his 'miracles' and end up the whole thing.

Furthermore, the new 'Japanese state' would still be a puppet state from Britannia. Their mere existence relies on Britannia good will, it is impossible to access it without passing by Brittania first and they can't have any kind of self sustenance, so they rely on Britannia for things like 'food' and daily products. Even the quality of live is regulated by the Britannia Empire. This is hardly the ideal situation for the Japanese. The solution may look good at a first glance, but all it does is to put Japan in a forced 'debt' with Britannia. It would be much harder for the Japanese people to rise against Britannia even if their lives become bad because they will 'feel' like Britannia is actually helping them, even though they were the ones who caused the situation in the first place.

So, yeah, there is way too much ground for Euphemia's idea to go wrong and many reasons for Zero to refuse, even if he abandoned his original intent of forcing her to attack him (thus outraging all Japanese). Regardless of Zero allying himself with her or not there was great potential for the series to grow from there. Either Zero would face all the hardships of this plan, while trying to keep it working (before abandoning it or not latter) or he would continue his rebellion, which would lose much of its popularity.

Instead they went for such cheap solution that avoid addressing the issue all together.

edited 27th Oct '11 6:19:40 PM by Heatth

In short, it's essentially a Japanese theme park with living exhibits.

Yep, a wonderfully sensitive, incisive, and well-thought-out way of addressing the Elevens' problems there.

edited 27th Oct '11 12:45:05 PM by Iaculus

Ouch.

I like to think that this whole thing was just a first step in a long term process. Even if that wasn't the case, with Lelouch and Suzaku on her side, maybe Euphemia could have come up with something better as time went on.

It sure is.

What?

edited 27th Oct '11 4:48:58 PM by HandsomeRob

Of course, this is a possibility, yeah. I don't really thing Euphemya planned that far ahead herself, specially since I don't remember her mentioning any concrete long term plan (though it have been some time since I watched it). I do like to think she would eventually realize her idea wasn't all that great (probably when one of more of the problems I mentioned stated to kick in) and would try to improve things a bit. Still, she is more the type of "go ahead with nothing but good intentions".

Of course, with Lelouch helping her, it might be possible to actually archive something from there on. I find unlikely, however. The obvious meta reason is that it would make a boring mecha show. More importantly, due to the nature of the imperialistic and oppressive Britannia, there would never be true freedom for the conquered territories. At most they could dream to be an "independent" puppet state. First there should be a massive change inside Britannia. Euphemia (and Lelouch?) would have to start an aggressive internal diplomatic campaign to completely change Brittania external policy. The problem is there is no much reason for them to change at all, since they are stronger then everyone else anyway. And all the power lies in a man who sees no problem in brutalizing the world.

Anyway, yeah, there might be a way to change the Empire internally. However, such ways aren't much easier then doing so aggressively, potentially even harder, since it would be more difficult to find support. Furthermore, it would take years and, in the meanwhile the oppressive population will still be oppressed.

I think that it would have been more interesting had Euphemia's plan continued a little bit further before the Euphinator Incident. See if it could have really worked and see how Euphemia reacts. Let the audience really see plan start to happen and then have Lelouch accidentally geass Euphemia into killing all the Japanese.

@Dragonzordasaurus: For once I completely agree with you on something. I hated that plot point. Even considering the ridiculousness of some of the events of R2, the Euphinator is the only thing which actually pissed me off. It pissed me off so much, in fact, that I actually ragequit the series for a while.

There is a fanfic written about this event in an AU manner. In fact, there are two or three. Take your pick.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3935205/1/For_the_bWant_b_of_ba_b_bNail_b

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5686087/1/LivingContradictory

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/4311899/1/Royalty_In_Rebellion

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6398573/1/bEuphemias_b_Bargain

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6602265/1/Code_Geass_The_Gossip_Princess

I was expecting that they would actually play out the SAZ, but instead they all either gave Euphemia a different Geass or blew Lelouch's cover wide open. Not interested. Although admittedly, the "Destroy Britannia" Geass in the third one makes a lot more sense for Lelouch to say (although it misses the irony of the original), and would be much more interesting to see in what way she would fulfill such a vague command.

edited 7th Nov '11 3:20:48 PM by shiro_okami