[Koshimizu]

Originally Posted by Dann of Thursday

Has Taniguchi expressed how he feels about some of the other characters like Nunnally, C.C., Kallen and the like or has he only expressed his feelings on Lelouch and Suzaku because it is their type that present the differing viewpoints on justice?

Yes. Only Lelouch and Suzaku, since "means and ends" is one of the themes of this series. He made a little comment on the Li sisters, but it's about their interaction with Lelouch as well. Can't recall any on other characters.

Originally Posted by Dann of Thursday

They actually determine some character's progression and what happens to certain mechs based on the model sales? That doesn't surprise me for some reason, but it seems wrong.

Gundam series weren't called the advertisement anime for Bandai figures for nothing.
Some other examples in Gundam Seed Destiny (sorry for kept bringing this up, but this is the most $$$-oriented Gundam series) : Meyrin and Lunamaria. Meyrin, a perfectly normal girl with no sad background or whatsoever, suddenly betrayed her sister and her country when Athrun bumped into her room while she's taking a shower. The real reason is her figure sales is the worst among all GSD girls. So they give her a new look, fan-service scene, and pair her with Athrun. As for Lunamaria, all of a sudden she started dating Shinn, right after he murdered her sister Meylin. The reason is Shinn's popularity is miserable and they want to pull it up by pairing him with a popular girl. But on the contrary, he dragged her popularity down.

Hence people were screaming when the spoiler of Code Geass Ep19 was released. "Noooo!! Not Shinn-Lunamaria pairing again!! Pairing Suzaku and Kallen won't save Suzaku!! He will only drag Kallen down!!" Luckily that didn't happen. Thnk goodness Code Geass isn't Gundam and doesn't have to be bound by figure sales.

Has Taniguchi showed the same attitude with his other works as Code Geass is the only one I have followed from start to finish when it was airing?
How does Kawaguchi seem to operate? Is it more along the same lines as Taniguchi? I've noticed that they each gave different views on the themes of Code Geass and I preferred Taniguchi's myself. Though I suppose that depends on how active he really his with everything since I am not entirely familiar with the job of a producer.
Also, what does Okouchi seem to do with the series he is involved in? I remember it being noted in the S and S thread how he seemed to write episodes that could fit a whole lot in without things appearing to rush, while episodes done by Yoshino seemed much slower paced and prone to sometimes unexplained events.

Code Geass is the first series that got me enthusiastic enough to follow all the interviews and radios. So I'm not familiar with Taniguchi's attitude in previous works. *sweatdrop* Same with Ōkouchi's work. But there's pretty high reputation in his previous works.

In the Animedia interview last May, Taniguchi said, "although I will try to make the audiance happy, there are things I can't give way."
So I won't worry about him being pushed around by fan opinions.

About producers, I think ashlay gave explainations a few pages ago. Producers (Kawaguchi and several others) give main direction and advices. Director Taniguchi, series composition Ōkouchi, and vice series composition Yoshino decide the story. And Taniguchi has the final say. For the themes, there are many things they're trying to express so maybe all of them are right. But I agree I like Taniguchi's better. And since he has the final say I'd go with his.
BTW, Kawaguchi has a track record of misleading fans. The most recent being "who's inside the Zero suit is still a secret" in Newtype January. And a further one being "it will be strange to end at an unstable state and keep the audiance hanging for 6 months, right?" ...Um, riiiight!

Yoshino is known for putting warp, amnesia, lesbian (coughNinacough) in his show, and oftentimes not giving explainations for events. But his script is fun. So people enjoy it anyway without taking it seriously. Yoshino knows how to make interesting background settings. It's up to Taniguchi and Ōkouchi to make things more reasonable.
It's also known that his pacing is awful and oftentimes has to rush in the end. It doesn't matter if he waste time on girls smooching in MaiHime, but not for Code Geass. Please! Just do the background setting and leave the script to Ōkouchi! >_<

Did Taniguchi ever state how he felt about Colors by FLOW? I always felt that the opening was very well sychronized with that song.

It's perfect. Though I can't remember where, he did talk about Colors.
Colors is the image song of Code Geass. (That's why Code Geass started with Colors, and ends with Colors.) Its lyrics was written just for Lelouch.
Especially this part:
Light shines into my room that was completely empty.
I look up at the sky, which is blue and perfectly clear,
So I decided to open the window that was locked.
The moment that seem like both myself and even the world could be changed is always right here with me.
They describe Lelouch's feelings very well.

Regarding Jeremiah again, is his cyborg form in any way a homage to Kazuma from s-CRY-ed? I noticed that the cyborg aspects of him looked quite similar to Kazuma's second alter form in many ways.

Many people suspected so. But no official words on this.