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Euphinator poll (Code Geass Spoilers)

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shiro_okami ...can still bite Since: Apr, 2010 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
...can still bite
#1: Oct 17th 2010 at 5:57:01 PM

What's your opinion on the Euphinator incident in Code Geass? Do you think it's a natural progression of events? Do you think it's a natural consequence of Lelouch losing control of his geass but should have been handled more realistically? Or do you think the SAZ should have progressed and how would the story have progressed if it had?

On a side note, do you consider Marianne's shift from Yamato Nadeshiko to Evil Matriarch to be a good twist or Character Derailment?

silver2195 Since: Jan, 2001
#2: Oct 17th 2010 at 5:59:07 PM

See my entry on the Fridge Brilliance page. Basically, subconsiously, Lelouch wanted Euphie's plan to fail.

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Sporkaganza I'm glasses. Since: May, 2009
I'm glasses.
#3: Oct 17th 2010 at 5:59:16 PM

The Marianne thing isn't a character shift, though; it's a shift in perception of the character, since before that we have no information on what she is like except for secondhand info. Therefore it can't be Character Derailment.

edited 17th Oct '10 5:59:39 PM by Sporkaganza

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silver2195 Since: Jan, 2001
#4: Oct 17th 2010 at 6:51:13 PM

Yeah, I never got what people were projecting onto Marianne. I think it's partly the difference between watching it in several-episode chunks (as I did) and watching it as it comes out; you might develop Epileptic Trees and become confused when canon contradicts them.

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Anarchy just a medicine seller from Perak, Malaysia Since: Jun, 2010
just a medicine seller
#5: Oct 17th 2010 at 7:01:00 PM

It was a total wallbanger for me. I mean, I think it's a great concept, I just wish they pulled it off better. Instead of the entire freaking event being based on one single slip of the tongue. Accidents like that work for comedy, but if you're going for tragedy, stuff like that just seems contrived and fake. Screw the Lelouch unconsciously wanting the plan to fail Fridge Brilliance. The story just doesn't work in terms of narrative.

Kayeka from Amsterdam Since: Dec, 2009
#6: Oct 17th 2010 at 7:04:25 PM

To me, it was a big Diabolus ex Machina. I actually said out loud 'Oh, come on!' at the screen when it happened.

Sporkaganza I'm glasses. Since: May, 2009
I'm glasses.
#7: Oct 17th 2010 at 7:05:16 PM

I agree. I thought it was a totally BS move. A lot of people had problems with R2, but personally Euphinator was the only Wall Banger I ever had in the series. It made me stop watching it for a good two or three months.

Always, somewhere, someone is fighting for you. As long as you remember them, you are not alone.
Nyktos (srahc 84) eltit Since: Jan, 2001
(srahc 84) eltit
#8: Oct 17th 2010 at 7:12:47 PM

I agree. I thought it was a totally BS move. A lot of people had problems with R2, but personally Euphinator was the only Wall Banger I ever had in the series.
This.

I guess it is.
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#9: Oct 17th 2010 at 8:06:06 PM

I liked it. It was grotesquely funny and seemed rather logical considering Mao, if not poorly timed.

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ManwiththePlan Since: Dec, 2009
#10: Oct 17th 2010 at 8:47:48 PM

Basically, subconsiously, Lelouch wanted Euphie's plan to fail.

Yeah, he even said "I shall stain your hands with blood, Euphemia!" at some point before it happened. As a whole it was a mistake, but Lelouch was still ultimately responsible for it happening. Why do people make this guy a Draco in Leather Pants again?

And on the incident itself; it was handled horribly. Absolutely horribly. The only really stupid moment of the first season. Like everyone's said, the setup was ridiculous. Her actually massacering the elevens was over the top. And worst of all was that it ended in her death. It's not just that she died that sucks, its that:

1. Despite what he might've thought, Lelouch did NOT have to kill her. It wasn't the only way out, it wasn't the first resort he should've taken. it just plain wasn't nessecary. He could've just had Euphie captured so that he could try to find a way to restore her.

2. She actually dies while Lelouch is out there villifying her to the Japanese public and pretty much making her entire life's work meaningless. She died in vain and without any purpose other than to give Suzaku (and Nina) angst over her death. Which is cruel and something she did not deserve at all.

Some fans (particularly die-hard Lelouch fans) found the Zero Requiem to be a Wall Banger but after this, it was pretty much the only way for Lelouch to go out...with him being villified to the world. Poetic justice.

But nothing was wrong with the Marianne twist. It wasn't a stretch that Lelouch's perception of her he had as a child could be wrong and she was actually in on her husband's sick plan.

edited 17th Oct '10 8:49:14 PM by ManwiththePlan

Gilphon Untrustworthy from The Third Sound Since: Oct, 2009 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Untrustworthy
#11: Oct 17th 2010 at 8:53:31 PM

I always thought it was a nice tragic twist, executed in the classic 'oh god, if things had even gone the slightest bit differently everything would've worked out of everyone, but now it's a huge disaster' tragic fashion; just like the stuff at the end of Romeo And Juliet. I was surprised and disappointed when I found out it was given this kind of hate.

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Drakyndra Her with the hat from Somewhere Since: Jan, 2001
Her with the hat
#12: Oct 17th 2010 at 8:57:52 PM

I agree on the Marianne stuff here: It's not derailment it's a reveal because until this point Marianne never actually had any characterisation. She just had people's opinions of her, and since we only heard from people who liked her, most of whom were children...

(Incidentally, it kind of surprised me that in a show that is so based on lies and deception and subjective opinions of events, people were so annoyed that what Lelouch assumed about his mother wasn't actually the truth. It was hardly the first time a Geass character turned out to different to what they seemed.)

As for the Euphinator thing, while I agree that the execution had issues, but maybe it's a result of me reading too many Monkey's Paw stories as a kid that I had been expecting Lelouch's Geass to screw him over horribly from pretty much the second episode. Getting what you want, in the worst possible way is the way these deals for power always seem to go. And it wasn't even subconscious that Lelouch wanted Euphie's plan to fail, he went to meet her specifically so he could screw it up. It struck me as being in the good old tragic tradition that if you set out with bad intentions, no matter when you change your mind, it will always be too late.

...Which is a very convoluted way of saying that I understand what the writers were trying to achieve there, even if the execution might have needed some cleaning up.

ETA: Basically, I agree with Gilphon and Manwiththe_Plan here. Including the Zero Requiem bit - that was the moment I knew Lelouch wasn't getting out alive. Okay, I had already been spoiled for the end, but that's the moment I could feel the death flags dropping into place.

Incidentally: I wonder if some of the hate for that moment is in part because that's when people realised Code Geass wasn't a story about a (anti)-Heroic Rebel defeating an evil Empire, but a lot closer to a tragedy.

edited 17th Oct '10 9:04:11 PM by Drakyndra

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Sackett Since: Jan, 2001
#13: Oct 17th 2010 at 8:58:45 PM

The moment it happened I was stunned for a few seconds. Then I stopped the episode, and dropped the series.

There was no point in continuing to watch it. I knew what was going to happen after that. (See my rant over in the unpopular opinions thread).

That's how bad it was for me.

I mean... maybe if they had foreshadowed it better, or handled it differently, maybe, maybe I could have swallowed it.

But still I think it went completely wrong. A better move would have been to have the Britannia side undercut Euphie while trying to use her as a figurehead, making it impossible for her plan to work, and leading to the reappearance of Zero and the black knights and the reigniting of the civil war.

Then if the writers really wanted to be all dark and cold have Euphie get killed in the crossfire and have both sides claim her as a martyr for their side.

Sporkaganza I'm glasses. Since: May, 2009
I'm glasses.
#14: Oct 17th 2010 at 9:03:24 PM

On the plus side (in terms of my enjoyment of the show anyway), the Euphinator thing did end up giving us the first emotional death in the series. And I ate that shit up. I cried at every single one of them: Euphiemia, Shirley, Lelouch himself, and hell, even Rolo. This is because I'm a sap. =D

Always, somewhere, someone is fighting for you. As long as you remember them, you are not alone.
Anarchy just a medicine seller from Perak, Malaysia Since: Jun, 2010
just a medicine seller
#15: Oct 17th 2010 at 10:05:17 PM

The thing is, I love emotional deaths but I was too busy being bashing my head into the wall about how utterly STUPID that plot twist was to be able to savor the emotions. I like my tragedies to make narrative sense.

Chubert highly secure from California Since: Jan, 2010
highly secure
#16: Oct 17th 2010 at 10:08:15 PM

This was one of the...three really moments in the series. It ranks as the least stupid.

Honestly, it was rather comedic watching Euphemia murder everyone. I knew pretty much most of the plot of Code Geass by the time I had watched it, but it was still hilarious. There were so many things the writers could have done with the situation. They had to make Murphy rape Lelouch. Not only did it do away with an awesome character, the actual relevance to character development- Lelouch's massive guilt issues and Suzaku swearing revenge against Zero- could have been accomplished through other means. It...well, it made sense, so it wasn't exactly a Deus ex Machina, as it was forshadowed, but it was still stupid.

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Nyktos (srahc 84) eltit Since: Jan, 2001
(srahc 84) eltit
#17: Oct 17th 2010 at 11:21:50 PM

My problem with it isn't that it went badly for Lelouch but that it didn't make any fucking sense. There was absolutely no good reason for him to say that line. He could've said pretty much anything and — under any other circumstance — there would've been absolutely no difference. Now, in a way, this is actually rather realistic, but it's a very good demonstration of how realism and good writing are very different things.

Now, some people made the argument that his Geass had to bite him in the ass eventually, and that it going out of control made sense and blah blah blah. I could accept that...if it actually went anywhere. Instead, it fucks up the one time and then he gets a contact lens so he can control it and it's never brought up again. If, instead, they'd devoted an arc in R2 to him finding a way to avoid a similar incident, I'd at least be able to accept that that part of it made sense.

At the very least, they could've had him make her kill herself instead. For one thing, that's something he'd actually done before, so it would make sense that he'd use it as an example, plus it's the probably the most obvious example of making someone do something they wouldn't want out there. Even that would've left a bad taste in my mouth, but it would've been far better than what we got.

I guess it is.
EternalSeptember Since: Sep, 2010
#18: Oct 18th 2010 at 12:20:41 AM

I can take the supposed "randomness", unfortunate things happen, but I can't forgive Lelouch for not trying harder about capturing her, or even killing her, in-between the geassing and the incident.

Using the tragedy to his best advantage is one thing, but allowing it to happen is an entirely different thing.

edited 18th Oct '10 12:21:53 AM by EternalSeptember

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Clarste One Winged Egret Since: Jun, 2009 Relationship Status: Non-Canon
One Winged Egret
#20: Oct 18th 2010 at 3:15:00 AM

I liked it too. I liked the randomness of it in a "plans won't always go your way" sense. I liked that the writers were willing to kill off a character who had previously considered an Expy of a Canon Sue. I liked the effects it had on the characters thereafter. While there were some narmy bits in it, I think that's forgivable and the dissonance was really the entire point of the scene. I especially liked the way they played to the differences between Lelouch's and Suzaku's reactions. The juxtaposition of Suzaku crying over her body and Lelouch rallying the crowd outside strikes me as the powerful scene in the series. In fact, I wrote a paper about it for a film class.

I won't say it was a perfect execution, notably the ease with which he dealt with the eye being permanently on afterward as well as the awkward way the line was written into his dialog, but I think it did its job quite well.

Drakyndra Her with the hat from Somewhere Since: Jan, 2001
Her with the hat
#21: Oct 18th 2010 at 3:57:03 AM

^On the subject of that juxtaposition, I kind of love the way that they paralleled Euphie's death with Lelouch's. Seriously, it's like "count the identical elements", from the cheering crowd/crying contrast to Zero in tears behind the mask.

FWIW, I'd like to thank this thread for finally clarifying to me why a whole lot of R2 FixFics completely fail to work for me: I think the Euphinator was a lot bigger game-changer than R2 (What I said back there about it being the push into tragedy). But a lot of those fics seem to ignore that fact, excluding Suzaku being all It's Personal about Zero, which comes off as tonally very wonky to me. To me they feel a bit like trying to turn Romeo and Juliet into a Happily Ever After.

Speaking of which: Euphinator FixFics. Do any decent ones exist?

edited 18th Oct '10 3:57:29 AM by Drakyndra

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shiro_okami ...can still bite Since: Apr, 2010 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
...can still bite
#22: Oct 18th 2010 at 7:14:48 AM

I had always thought that while Lelouch losing control of his geass was realistic, it made ABSOLUTELY NO SENSE to say that line.

Anyway, here are the tallies for the 17 votes so far (including mine above). Opinion #1: You liked it. Opinion #2: Needed better execution. Opinion #3: Total Wall Banger.

  • Opinion #1: 4
  • Opinion #2: 7
  • Opinion #3: 6

edited 18th Oct '10 7:15:44 AM by shiro_okami

EternalSeptember Since: Sep, 2010
#23: Oct 18th 2010 at 8:24:46 AM

For the record, I liked it's execution too. I hate Lelouch for it, but not the writers.

Drakyndra Her with the hat from Somewhere Since: Jan, 2001
Her with the hat
#24: Oct 18th 2010 at 8:34:01 AM

Am I listed in liked it or needed better execution?

Because while I said it could have been done better - which is true - if it was an either/or I'd go with liked it. It has enough dramatic power for me to gloss over the issues.

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ManwiththePlan Since: Dec, 2009
#25: Oct 18th 2010 at 10:05:08 AM

Speaking of which: Euphinator Fix Fics. Do any decent ones exist?

Nightmare Of Nunnally pretty much gives Euphie a happy ending in order to make up for it, and I heard there was a japanese game where you play as a Gary Stu protagonist who could avert the crisis if the right choices are made. Not sure if they're "decent" though.

I personally would've liked it if the incident's cause were executed better, Zero would merely stun Euphie before capturing her and it just looked like he killed her to Suzaku, and then the still-crazed Euphie would break out of her prison somewhere in the season finale only to be captured by Schneizel. Just think of the second season possibilities that could've ensued from there. evil grin

edited 18th Oct '10 11:42:56 AM by ManwiththePlan


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