I just finished watching the best anime I've ever seen!

[S.M.O.G.]

Granted, I think it's actually the first anime I've watched all the way through, but it was still freaking amazing. Anyways, I didn't see a thread for Code Geass, so I'm making one.

I saw a random thread on another forum discussing it, so I wached the first episode and thought it was preety good, but didn't think much about it until I found it in the middle of the series on demand. Then a couple months ago I started watching it online.

I had a ton of eye-buldge moments, but the end of the final episode was the first time I actually had a jaw-drop. Earlier today, somone asked me what my favorate anime was. I said I didn't know, but now I can easily say Code Geass. [/rant]

[Yamamaya]

Yep Code Geass is pretty amazing. I'm not going to discuss the ending since I've talked about it so much on forums, I'm sick of hearing about it.

[Fish and Chips]

...This thread isn't about Baccano!...

This thread isn't about Baccano! at all.

:|

[Roy Mustang]

Awwww, I thought this thread was going to be about Baccano! or Cowboy Bebop and now I'm disappointed.

Anyway, carry on.


[font="Book Antiqua"][color="Red"]Col. Roy Mustang[/color][/font]

[Yamamaya]

Two posts complaining that this thread isn't about Baccano. XD.

Code Geass holds a special place in my heart since it's one of my first animes that I watched in full.

[goldenspines]

Code Geass was okay.

Firstly, I congratulate you on finishing a whole anime series. You have no idea how hard that is to do sometimes. Secondly, before you announce the first anime you finish as the "best anime", you need more stuff to compare it with. Stuff like Baccano!, Samurai Champloo, Cowboy Bebop, Ouran High School Host Club, Fullmetal Alchemist and many more.

That said, if you want to discuss Code Geass, I can change the thread's title for you. In fact, I would reccomend it. ^_^

[Yamamaya]

Good grief guys, back off a little on smog. He's just announcing that he loves CG, nothing wrong with that.

CC is still the best anime girl, no exceptions.

[Fish and Chips]

CC is still the best anime girl, no exceptions.

Abject.

Failure.

[blkmage]

In an attempt to actually talk about the show, I found it entertaining, but disappointing. One of the more noticeable flaws was that it couldn't decide what kind of show it wanted to be, a problem which became a lot more evident after the season break. A lot of people compared the first portion of Code Geass to Death Note, in the meticulous plans and strategery going on.

Not too long after, we have terrible high school shenanigans. Further along, the show just suddenly breaks and moves at breakneck speed while piling on insane development after insane development. Note that this was not the same as, say, Gurren Lagann's AWESOME moments or some amazing reveal. This was just pulling stuff out of a hat at random.

And in the end, while it contained mecha, it didn't particularly feel like a mecha show. This is probably because Lelouch isn't the ace pilot and so the show doesn't revolve around a particular mecha, like the Nirvash or the RX-78-2. After all, after the first Lancelot or Guren, did you bother to remember their upgraded versions, or whatever that thing that Lelouch magically flew with fast typing was? I didn't.

CC is still the best anime girl, no exceptions.

[Yamamaya]

Abject.

Failure.

Preferences my friend, preferences.

[Fish and Chips]

Preferences my friend, preferences.

CC is still the best anime girl, no exceptions.

preferences.

no exceptions.

Man, Yamamaya, you are hilarious tonight.

[Yamamaya]

Sanity? I never had the bothersome thing to begin with.-Kenpachi.

[LadyRushia]

Also in an attempt to actually talk about Code Geass instead of horribly derailing this thread (and I suggest further posts should do the same), I really like what I've seen of it so far (the first season). I thought the characters were evenly developed; I can't really think of one who doesn't have some other side that's later presented to us. No one's cut and dry, and neither are their relationships to each other.

[minakichan]

Code Geass is the best awful anime I've ever seen in my life.

To quote myself:
"Oh Code Geass. The grandest coalescence of spectacle, melodrama, and inanity; a performance both soap and opera; the supremest work of war, politics, and philosophy ever conceived by a group of people who know nothing of any of these things. It kicks reason to the curb more than any testosterone-fueled GAINAX mecha show ever could, and it demonstrates once and forevermore that awful and awesome are not mutually exclusive."

[MasterDias]

I liked Code Geass, but it did show its flaws as it went on.

The first season seemed pretty balanced to me for the most part. R2 was really where it seemed to get increasingly over-the-top and try to shoehorn in some random plot twist each episode. I don't think it actually made effective use of a lot of its cast either (The Knights of the Round as an example.)
I would sort of have liked to see the staff's original plan for a second season, before executive meddling and the time change forced them to alter things.

Ah, well, it's not the type of show one should really get too critical about. Sunrise was trying to make a hit original show that wasn't Gundam, and they largely succeeded at this.

[blkmage]

[quote="minakichan (post: 1353354)"]Code Geass is the best awful anime I've ever seen in my life.

To quote myself:
"Oh Code Geass. The grandest coalescence of spectacle, melodrama, and inanity]

I don't think I've ever seen Code Geass so accurately and eloquently described.

[S.M.O.G.]

Just to point out, I never said the best anime ever, I said best I've ever seen, I haven't seen the anime you guys mentioned, but thanks for the suggestions. I was wondering what I'll watch now that I finished CG.

Now to actually discuss it so I don't contribute to getting my own thread closed:

Nothing is perfect. The only major complaint I had was around epsode 46 it got preety confusing. ENDING SPOILERS:[spoiler]First revealing the emporor's plan but not explaining how it worked or Lelouch stopped it. Then Suzaku forgiving Lelouch and siding with him, and finally Lelouch's intentions when he found out he'd be fighting against Nunnally and actually seemed willing to kill her if he needed to.[/spoiler] If somone could make a bit more sense out of this than I did than please help explain it to me.

In an attempt to actually talk about the show, I found it entertaining, but disappointing. One of the more noticeable flaws was that it couldn't decide what kind of show it wanted to be, a problem which became a lot more evident after the season break.

But I does it really matter what kind of show it was, if you enjoy watching it?

Not too long after, we have terrible high school shenanigans.

I didn't mind. There was some charecter development and comic relif (read: cupid day) you couldn't really get from a more action packed episode.

Further along, the show just suddenly breaks and moves at breakneck speed while piling on insane development after insane development. Note that this was not the same as, say, Gurren Lagann's AWESOME moments or some amazing reveal. This was just pulling stuff out of a hat at random.

Yes, but I thought making the big reveals so random made them more unpredictable and thus shocking.

And in the end, while it contained mecha, it didn't particularly feel like a mecha show. This is probably because Lelouch isn't the ace pilot and so the show doesn't revolve around a particular mecha, like the Nirvash or the RX-78-2. After all, after the first Lancelot or Guren, did you bother to remember their upgraded versions, or whatever that thing that Lelouch magically flew with fast typing was? I didn't.

Again, it didn't feel like a Mecha show, but was it supposed to? If I enloy an anime as much as I did CG, I couldn't care less what genre it fits under. And the whole fast typing thing looked cool, IMO.

As to not sound like a biased fanboy, so I just want to point out that I'm not saying you are wrong or that I'm even right on any of these points, and it was completly (biased) opinion. Might be obvious, but I just felt I should point that out.

[blkmage]

But I does it really matter what kind of show it was, if you enjoy watching it?

No, it doesn't matter to whether you enjoy something, but it does matter when you try to talk about how good or bad something is and what something did right and something did wrong. There are things that I like (Shakugan no Shana, Saki, etc.) that I'd never be able to convince myself that they're good in any way.

In this case, my problem isn't that it's not a single solitary genre. It's mostly because other problems stem from this one. If the show could decide what it wanted to be, the writing could have been more focused and it would have been better at the one thing it wanted to do rather than spend time flailing around in inconsequential stuff.

Yes, but I thought making the big reveals so random made them more unpredictable and thus shocking.

When you do a reveal, no matter how shocking or unpredictable it is, people have to be able to see where it came from in hindsight. The reveals in Code Geass were only shock with no reasoning behind it. This is bad, because it breaks suspension of disbelief and instead of feeling shock, people are left going lolwut.

Of course, my impressions of Geass are coloured by a lot of the shows that I've watched. The big one was comparison to other mecha shows of the year: Macross Frontier and Gundam 00. It's pretty clear that Macross Frontier did what it wanted to do while Gundam 00 suffered from some of the same problems that Geass had near the end (THE DIALOGUES TO COME), although not to the same degree.

And of course, the producers themselves bring up the comparison to Gundam, when they said one of the motivations of the show was what it would be like to have Amuro and Char switch roles, with Char being the main character and Amuro being the primary antagonist. That would have been really entertaining if they were able to keep the style of the show consistent. In this case, my disappointment in the show comes from the wasted potential, much like, say, Soul Eater or Xam'd.

Again, that's not to say Geass wasn't entertaining. I thought it ended up being unintentionally hilarious. But since this is a thread and we want to talk about Geass, I thought we should talk about Geass. That to me means talking about what it did right and what it did poorly.

[rocklobster]

Yeah, I enjoyed Code Geass. It was one of the rare times I actually rooted for a villain. (In my eyes, Lelouch is a villain)

[LadyRushia]

And in the end, while it contained mecha, it didn't particularly feel like a mecha show. This is probably because Lelouch isn't the ace pilot and so the show doesn't revolve around a particular mecha, like the Nirvash or the RX-78-2.

I don't think Geass even attempted to feel like a typical mecha show in the first place, so to be dissatisfied with that aspect of it doesn't make sense to me if it was never going for that.

In this case, my problem isn't that it's not a single solitary genre. It's mostly because other problems stem from this one. If the show could decide what it wanted to be, the writing could have been more focused and it would have been better at the one thing it wanted to do rather than spend time flailing around in inconsequential stuff.

I'm curious about this, but I'd rather see it for myself. I didn't get this impression from the first season, and I've only seen the first two episodes of the second season, so I don't have the whole context of the show to work with. When I think about it, I can see a little bit of what you mean here, but when it comes to the first season I think it works well.

[blkmage]

I'm curious about this, but I'd rather see it for myself. I didn't get this impression from the first season, and I've only seen the first two episodes of the second season, so I don't have the whole context of the show to work with. When I think about it, I can see a little bit of what you mean here, but when it comes to the first season I think it works well.

Yeah, the first season was a lot more coherent, both in terms of plot and style. Most of the problems are with the second season, which had a very different direction from the first season.

For a brief history lesson, the first season of Code Geass aired during the Fall 2006 and Winter 2007 seasons (Oct. 2006 - Mar. 2007) up to episode 23. After four months, the final two episodes of the first season aired in July 2007. Then, there was an eight or nine month wait before R2 aired in the Spring and Summer 2008 seasons (Apr. 2008 - Sept. 2008). In that waiting time, it's believed that the second season was completely rewritten.

[Yamamaya]

The second season was a bit of a trainwreck especially when they tried to throw in so many elements.

[SPOILER]They also tried to copy Evangelion with that whole World of C/World of tommorrow/world of today crap[/SPOILER] Yet, it was still an enjoyable anime with an antihero akin to Kira of Death Note, except that Lelouch was a bit more sane than Kira.

[minakichan]

Yet, it was still an enjoyable anime with an antihero akin to Kira of Death Note, except that Lelouch was a bit more sane than Kira.

NOT TO MENTION HOTTER, AM I RIGHT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!











*cricketchirp*

[Etoh*the*Greato]

Code Geass was okay.

Firstly, I congratulate you on finishing a whole anime series. You have no idea how hard that is to do sometimes. Secondly, before you announce the first anime you finish as the "best anime", you need more stuff to compare it with. Stuff like Baccano!, Samurai Champloo, Cowboy Bebop, Ouran High School Host Club, Fullmetal Panic and many more.

That said, if you want to discuss Code Geass, I can change the thread's title for you. In fact, I would reccomend it. ^_^

Fixed that for ya, Goldy!

[Yamamaya]

NOT TO MENTION HOTTER, AM I RIGHT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!











*cricketchirp*

CC pwned Misa Amane by far.

[Fish and Chips]

I'll admit, at least part of my dissatisfaction with Code Geass (yes, actually talking about it now) is my inherent dislike of the High School Hijinx Meets Giant Robots genre. I'm not genre nazi, but I can't get that one. They undermine each other, and I find it difficult to care about any End of the World Evil Darwinist Government Conspiracy in the first half of an episode when we're stripping characters and drawing cat faces on them in animal costumes after the commercial break. Code Geass was presented to me as a show about political intrigue, the empire vs. the rebellion, "It's a show about terrorism." Whether or not they succeeded, on purpose or completely by accident, what was supposed to hook me was the whole Empire Britannia Conquers Japan angle. With robots!



I'm aware that this is just one example from one scene in one episode. If some poor man's mathematician were to add up all the high school segments they'd come up short to the allegedly political machinations in terms of screen time, but that's not the problem. The problem is it's there, laughing as it draws those stripes on LeLouch's face, running because someone decided we didn't have enough Pizza Hut references so let's have a giant robot make a pizza, having an entire bonus episode in the girl's baths because most viewers are male. Oh yeah, and the emperor is voiced by Norio Wakamoto you guys, come back, honest.

I just can't take it seriously. In whatever dosage, it kills the mood completely for me.

There are other things I could rampantly complain about, particularly the female cast, but I'll refrain since we've been talking chiefly about genre.

[blkmage]

Something that I was reminded of was the talk of difference in the mecha battles between seasons. I've heard a lot of people express disappointment in R2's mecha fights because they were going the way of the AU Gundams: special mecha taking down waves and waves of grunts and eventually focusing on the fight between the few special mecha that can stand up to each other.

Something that I hadn't thought of before it was brought up was the fact that forcing mecha battles to stay on the ground (as in the first season) instead of up in the air (like in R2) change the dynamics of the fight. Fights early on in the first season had a far more tactical feel to them.

[LadyRushia]

I found those segments amusing and welcome as comic relief. High school moments in the midst of much more serious events have never bothered me in anime.

There are other things I could rampantly complain about, particularly the female cast.

What are your problems with them? Personally, I don't like Mina or Nina or whatever her name is. Her little scene in whatever episode that was when Nunally walked in on her creeped me out. The other thing I don't like is how much fanservice happens to Kallen and C.C., and probably a few others. As far as characters go (both male and female), I didn't feel that any of them were underdeveloped, even the minor ones.

[Roy Mustang]

Fish and Chips put in better words that I could have. I have the same view on why I didn't like CG. When I first saw it, I was thinking this was going to be a good war story, but then to my dissatisfaction it turn into High School Hijinx and getting females nude at anytime kind of show.

I knew that this wasn't going to be a true mech series, but I had hope that would have been a good war story with very good tactical mecha anime, which it work for the first half of the series and then R2 came and it just made me hate it.

[font="Book Antiqua"]
[color="Red"]Col. Roy Mustang[/color][/font]

[Fish and Chips]

I found those segments amusing and welcome as comic relief. High school moments in the midst of much more serious events have never bothered me in anime.

It's not the comic relief that bugs me, necessarily, it's the mood whiplash. Obviously if the show was nothing but softly distilled DOOM AND GLOOM with noodley appendages, it wouldn't be any fun to watch either. It's just that there's a good chemistry for these kind of scenes and failed attempts, and the juxtaposition of them in Code Geass was jarring to say the least. Jumping from whatever weekly atrocities the god emperor of Britannia has on his schedule to inflict because he feels like it to a preppy high school festival just doesn't sit well with me.

There had to be a better way to incorporate some lighter aspects into the show.

What are your problems with them? Personally, I don't like Mina or Nina or whatever her name is. Her little scene in whatever episode that was when Nunally walked in on her creeped me out. The other thing I don't like is how much fanservice happens to Kallen and C.C., and probably a few others. As far as characters go (both male and female), I didn't feel that any of them were underdeveloped, even the minor ones.

If anything, it might be the oversexualization. Let's start with Kallen. Code Geass obviously wants to present her as a strong-willed female pilot in a difficult situation, half-Japanese, half-Britiannian, posing as sickly to allay suspicion, fighting the injustice of a cruel system, and getting interrupted in the bath a lot.

Much like the High Schoolers by Day Mech Pilots by Night setup, this sort of thing destroys some of what Kallen had going for her. The characterization wants me to think she's someone of strong character, but the marketing department apparently wants me to think of her as a sex object, and with the number of times the show in series obliges them makes me raise an eyebrow. Probably the most gratuitous example is the island episode where Suzaku discovers her by the waterfall. I mean, really? Really? I can only assume to get the voice actors to deliver their lines as seriously as possible they didn't tell them what the scene would entail.

No matter how beautifully a house of cards is prepared, one misplacement causes the entire thing to tumble. For me Kallen's character was a lot like that. There could be a really solid character in here, someone I could root for, but we keep getting blind-sighted.

C.C. is another, though in her case it might be more the promotional artwork, since there seems to be an awful lot of it produced in studio of her being unable to accomplish simple tasks like standing next to people, eating pizza, testing out capes, etc., without standing in an incredibly provocative position or manner.

Ultimately my biggest complaint with Code Geass is that there's a show worth watching in here somewhere, but I can't see it for all the static.