Character Discussion - Suzaku

[CodeOrange]

Okay this is what happened. Tohdo and Genbu were talking about what to do with Nunnally and Lelouch since their father sent them there as hostages. Suzaku was going to give Tohdo the keys to the family dojo so he can get his stuff. Genbu said that the children were useless and that he was going to kill one of them. He was going to kill Nunnally himself. So Suzaku heard this and ran back to the annex where Nannully and Lelouch were staying. It was too late, Nannully was gone and Lelouch was drugged. Suzaku ran back to the dojo and grabbed Tohdo's sword and went to his father's office. He said "please don't hurt them." his father realized what he had meant. He decided to leave the room but Suzaku unsheathed the sword and stabbed his father with it.

Trust me I read the actual word novel "Code Geass Stage -0-"

[morbosfist]

Originally Posted by CodeOrange

Okay this is what happened. Tohdo and Genbu were talking about what to do with Nunnally and Lelouch since their father sent them there as hostages. Suzaku was going to give Tohdo the keys to the family dojo so he can get his stuff. Genbu said that the children were useless and that he was going to kill one of them. He was going to kill Nunnally himself. So Suzaku heard this and ran back to the annex where Nannully and Lelouch were staying. It was too late, Nannully was gone and Lelouch was drugged. Suzaku ran back to the dojo and grabbed Tohdo's sword and went to his father's office. He said "please don't hurt them." his father realized what he had meant. He decided to leave the room but Suzaku unsheathed the sword and stabbed his father with it.

Trust me I read the actual word novel "Code Geass Stage -0-"

That's all well and good, except it's not what happened in the anime.

He stabs Genbu with a dagger/short sword, for one thing, and they very clearly argue about the Japanese people dying, not Lelouch and Nunnally.

[azul120]

Originally Posted by Sol Falling

So are you gonna depose Charles, who has nothing to do with actually causing any of the suffering, or should you help (or at the very least cooperate with) him, because he's also trying to stop it, just the same as you?

Except that he pretty much did, or at least tacitly allowed it to happen, by making the Ragnarok Connection his primary main focus. If he wanted to stop the suffering, he would put an end to the Numbers system and return sovereignity to all captured nations.

Why do you call V.V.'s fears which lead him to kill Marianne paranoid delusions? Weren't Charles and Marianne themselves the ones who were telling Lelouch that story? It was clear enough that those two genuinely loved each other and were happy. Without the pain and despair over honesty that was driving him, what reason would Charles have for enacting the Ragnorok Connection?

If you ask me who in their right mind would desire Charles' 'peace', I'll answer that Charles to me seemed very much in the same kind of despair as Lelouch was, who himself came up with the unlikely Zero: Requiem. It should seem very much obvious that Charles might not have resorted to it had he been happy, his chance at which V.V. specifically destroyed.

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Code_Ge...B6k_Connection

I'm not sure if that's the whole thing, but only V. V. says anything about Charles and Marianne supposedly becoming too interested in each other to proceed with the plan, suggesting that he was too paranoid that Charles would abandon their contract. And again, Marianne was a Lady Macbeth to Charles, meaning that she was just as interested in the Ragnarok Connection. Not to mention the plan to create a duplicate body for Marianne in the Geass research labs, which means that if despair over Marianne's death was what got Charles so much, he could have quite possibly just waited until that was completed, and Marianne were to get her new body.

[CodeOrange]

Originally Posted by morbosfist

That's all well and good, except it's not what happened in the anime.

He stabs Genbu with a dagger/short sword, for one thing, and they very clearly argue about the Japanese people dying, not Lelouch and Nunnally.

Well the manga came out before the anime, the first word novel also came out before the anime so, yeah this is more accurate than the anime. Besides the do-or-die resistance was just a cover up in the anime. So technically the anime doesn't cover anything on Genbu's death by Suzaku

[bladeofdarkness]

Originally Posted by CodeOrange

Well the manga came out before the anime, the first word novel also came out before the anime so, yeah this is more accurate than the anime. Besides the do-or-die resistance was just a cover up in the anime. So technically the anime doesn't cover anything on Genbu's death by Suzaku

no its not
the novels AND the manga are NOT CANON
they can't BE more accurate, because as far as canon goes, they hold about as much significance as bonzo's comics do

the anime is what matters
the ONLY thing that matters

[Nogitsune]

Originally Posted by bladeofdarkness

no its not
the novels AND the manga are NOT CANON
they can't BE more accurate, because as far as canon goes, they hold about as much significance as bonzo's comics do

the anime is what matters
the ONLY thing that matters

Actually, I think I remember reading that the writer got some extra information from the original staff, at least for the first novel. But yeah, even if parts of Stage 0 were canon, we wouldn't know which parts, and everything that contradicts the anime or other official side material is obviously not canon. For example, there's a scene very similar to the Sound Drama "The Uninvited Prince" in Stage 0, but it plays out a bit differently - probably because the writer didn't have all the details.

[morbosfist]

Originally Posted by CodeOrange

Well the manga came out before the anime, the first word novel also came out before the anime so, yeah this is more accurate than the anime. Besides the do-or-die resistance was just a cover up in the anime. So technically the anime doesn't cover anything on Genbu's death by Suzaku

Neither manga came out before the anime. They were written after the anime started. The anime is the first source of canon. Everything else is secondary, and that includes the Stage 0 novel. The anime states very clearly why Suzaku killed his father, and the guy who tells us had no reason to lie about it, being a mind reader and hater of lies.

[CodeOrange]

Originally Posted by morbosfist

Neither manga came out before the anime. They were written after the anime started. The anime is the first source of canon. Everything else is secondary, and that includes the Stage 0 novel. The anime states very clearly why Suzaku killed his father, and the guy who tells us had no reason to lie about it, being a mind reader and hater of lies.

FYI the original author of CG gave permission to the person to write the Stage 0 and approved it fully as said in the commentaries at the end. So if the author approves it, it isn't a lie.

[Rising Dragon]

Furthermore, inconsistencies aside, the true reason why the novels and the like are non-canon is Sunrise's official stance on only animated features being canon--technically, the picture dramas and the sound dramas, all of them, are non-canon.

The fact is, most people do not give a shit about Sunrise's policy.

Therefore, its perfectly okay for us to accept supplemental works as canon if we so wish.

[morbosfist]

Originally Posted by CodeOrange

FYI the original author of CG gave permission to the person to write the Stage 0 and approved it fully as said in the commentaries at the end. So if the author approves it, it isn't a lie.

Just because the author approves it doesn't make it truth. They decided to go a different way with it. The anime is the source above all others. The novel, regardless of the source, is not in keeping with the events of the anime, and thus is not canon to it.

[Har0]

Originally Posted by morbosfist

Just because the author approves it doesn't make it truth. They decided to go a different way with it. The anime is the source above all others. The novel, regardless of the source, is not in keeping with the events of the anime, and thus is not canon to it.

I did read that novel, and I understand. The anime and the novel were a bit different. The anime, being the original is the most canon.
That novel seemed like a fanfiction to me, author approved or not.

[lunarpisces]

Who is Suzaku's lovers or haters?
I love Suzaku.I think he is a sensitive person.

[Sol Falling]

lol. What, are you making a poll? If you're a Suzaku fan, I don't know if it'd be such a great idea to call out all of the haters purposely...

Well, I'm a Suzaku fan myself. Incidentally, after writing something up over in the R2 episode 25 thread, something occurred to me. When it comes down to it, I think the major idealogical conflict in Code Geass can be summarized in this way--with regards to the question of the Japanese people's future, there were two paths: one, the path of Suzaku, who tried to erase the chains of hatred by destroying his country's hope; and two, the path of Kallen, who tried to reignite hope for her country by continuing the chains of hatred. As for the solution then, how Code Geass ended was by erasing the chains of hatred and giving the people hope--and the way in which this becoming possible was through the creation of a lie where a hero defeated a symbol of evil.

[azul120]

Originally Posted by Sol Falling

lol. What, are you making a poll? If you're a Suzaku fan, I don't know if it'd be such a great idea to call out all of the haters purposely...

Well, I'm a Suzaku fan myself. Incidentally, after writing something up over in the R2 episode 25 thread, something occurred to me. When it comes down to it, I think the major idealogical conflict in Code Geass can be summarized in this way--with regards to the question of the Japanese people's future, there were two paths: one, that path of Suzaku, who tried to erase the chains of hatred by destroying his country's hope; and two, the path of Kallen, who tried to reignite hope for her country by continuing the chains of hatred. As for the solution then, how Code Geass ended was by erasing the chains of hatred and giving the people hope--and the way in which this becoming possible was through the creation of a lie where a hero defeated a symbol of evil.

Whici is inaccurate, since Suzaku was a self-loather mostly looking for an excuse to die honorably through supposed self-sacrifice. Kallen only hated the iniquity represented by Britannia, not the people themselves.

[Sol Falling]

Whether or not Suzaku was also hoping to die does not change the fact that he genuinely intended to crush the remaining Japanese resistance activists, so that the Japanese people as a whole could begin to move towards integration with the Britannians. Kallen's goal, meanwhile, was not to destroy the inequality with the Britannians, but rather the Britannians themselves.

[Xander]

Absolutely. Suzaku arguably had multiple motivations for his actions (exactly like Lelouch himself did, for that matter), but one does not deny the other. We can choose to agree or disagree with either line of thought, of course, which just serves to show that Suzaku was a fairly complex character in his own right.

In this case, it's possible to speculate that Suzaku's death wouldn't necessarily go against his other objective. If he died as an Honorable Britannian in a manner that made him a hero and a martyr, perhaps he'd think that would benefit the Japanese people indirectly...though I'd personally think it's unlikely in practice.

[morbosfist]

It's also equally likely that, if he died under Britannian command, they would spin the situation and pretty much write him out of any credit.

Originally Posted by Sol Falling

Whether or not Suzaku was also hoping to die does not change the fact that he genuinely intended to crush the remaining Japanese resistance activists, so that the Japanese people as a whole could begin to move towards integration with the Britannians. Kallen's goal, meanwhile, was not to destroy the inequality with the Britannians, but rather the Britannians themselves.

For the former to even have a chance in the first place, you'd have to be in a situation where a) there were people on the opposing side sympathetic to the idea of equality and b) an almost complete absence of resistance to occupation. Even if Suzaku could somehow defeat every single terrorist, which is really freaking hypocritical given his mentality of "killing is bad" (not that he doesn't admit as much), there is virtually no one in a position of power that is sympathetic to his cause, at least not at first.

Suzaku had no plan and no idea how to achieve his goal, only the naive belief that the fighting would just stop eventually. Ineffectual as Kallen's initial efforts were, she at least saw the source of the problem, and the terrorists in general had a plan. Suzaku, in attempting to justify his own misdeeds, instead treated his own people like the problem without thinking of an actual solution.

[Sol Falling]

Originally Posted by morbosfist

It's also equally likely that, if he died under Britannian command, they would spin the situation and pretty much write him out of any credit.

For the former to even have a chance in the first place, you'd have to be in a situation where a) there were people on the opposing side sympathetic to the idea of equality and b) an almost complete absence of resistance to occupation. Even if Suzaku could somehow defeat every single terrorist, which is really freaking hypocritical given his mentality of "killing is bad" (not that he doesn't admit as much), there is virtually no one in a position of power that is sympathetic to his cause, at least not at first.

Suzaku had no plan and no idea how to achieve his goal, only the naive belief that the fighting would just stop eventually. Ineffectual as Kallen's initial efforts were, she at least saw the source of the problem, and the terrorists in general had a plan. Suzaku, in attempting to justify his own misdeeds, instead treated his own people like the problem without thinking of an actual solution.

:P lol, I'm not ragging on Kallen here. Like Xander said, we can choose to agree or disagree with either train of thought. My main point in bringing this up was actually because I found the parallels between Suzaku and Kallen's methods, and how they were resolved via Zero: Requiem, fairly interesting. As you say, for Suzaku's method to work, it requires the complete erasure of any Japanese resistance--which is to say, it requires stripping away any bare, remote scraps of hope which the Japanese held to the very last. Kallen, meanwhile, while pursuing hope for her people, would be furthering the chains of hatred by escalating the violence and creating victims among the Britannians. In the end, it is simply fact that neither is an ideal solution. Hope, and the chains of hatred--they are balanced against each other in this contradiction.

That is why I think it's pretty clever that Zero: Requiem managed to fulfill both these goals/requirements. I don't believe the show itself tries to portray Suzaku or Kallen as more right than the other--and the proof is in the ending itself. Frankly, in that light, I don't mind taking a more balanced view of things :P.

[morbosfist]

I wouldn't consider the ZR an ideal solution in that regard. Strictly speaking it does fulfill both objectives, but at the cost of horrible atrocities, far worse than either base plan would have gone.

Rebellion doesn't need to further the chains of hatred, certainly not indefinitely. Had the rebellion succeeded conventionally, it would have eventually forced a situation in which Britannia would either be forced to the table or stuck in a perpetual Cold War in the worst case scenario. Regardless, there would be peace, even if the two were separate. Suzaku's idea of peace could be easily likened to some rather unfortunate occurrences in American history, which I doubt I need to actually bring up.

All in all, ZR is an extreme, no-holds barred method of forcing peace on everyone. Rebellion can end any one of a number of ways, but successfully at least it can bring equality. Submission to an invading power, however, leaves little hope for a favorable outcome, not in the sense that the identity of those conquered gets to remain in any significant form.

[azul120]

Exactly. I spewed out several paragraphs on the subject of the Zero Requiem being worse than the rebellion in the Turn 25 thread. It's too bad bladeofdarkness isn't here right now.

And @Sol, you're ignoring what Kallen believed, at least after Lelouch as Zero showed her the way: that the problem wasn't the Britannians, but the policy of Britannia itself.