Let me just say I didn't cry over Euphemia's death. I found it surprising, actually, since I cried when Shirley lost her memories. I guess I really don't like Euphemia. Huh.

 

Euphemia in a Knightmare.

 

So Euphemia was in some Knightmare when Kallen found her. Of course Kallen wanted to kill her, since she's supposed to be a traitor. Upon the destruction of her Knightmare, Euphemia, still under the control of the Geass, jumps off and arms herself with a gun she found lying around somewhere and fired at Kallen.

 

Lelouch from his own Knightmare, looking down at Euphemia.

Lelouch, having made up his mind, jumps down and decides to finish everything.

 

Zero firing at Euphemia.

Euphemia doesn't die just yet, because Suzaku arrives and actually saves her. I didn't like it, but I guess it had to be dramatic and all. Suzaku also wanted to kill Zero, but C.C. comes to Zero/Lelouch's rescue.

 

C.C. to Lelouch's rescue. Yay.

Anyway Suzaku backs off because he has to take Euphemia to the doctors. He manages to bring her there alive, and they somehow get to talk despite her weakness. He is confused when it appears like Euphemia doesn't remember anything.

 

Euphemia still under the Geass.

So, well, let's just cut to the chase. Euphemia dies, and Suzaku looks ridiculous.

 

Even if I liked Suzaku, I'd still say he looks ridiculous here. Because he does.

Meanwhile, Lelouch is fully aware that he has to say goodbye to everyone soon, since he can't control his power any longer. Oh, sigh. What's to be of Nunnally and his friends now? Only C.C. can stay with him, since the Geass doesn't work on her.

 

C.C. embracing Lelouch.

I'm all for this pair, but somehow C.C. words crept me out.  I remember Mao and how he had turned out, and I kind of realize that C.C.'s words aren't exactly to be trusted. She promised Mao, too, that she'd stay by his side, didn't she?

Anyway, it appears like she knew Lelouch's mother, the late Queen (?) Marianne. This is all so puzzling for me; isn't it episode 23 already? Two more and it's over! Why are they still posing a ton of questions and introducing new characters?

 

V.V. It seems he knows about the Geass, too.

V.V. tells Suzaku of the Geass, and Suzaku is furious upon knowing this. He then gets to talk to Lelouch, with a coldness fitting for the best friend who killed uh, his love interest. He asks Lelouch if he had ever been so furious at someone he could kill him. Lelouch says yes. (By which he is referring to his mother Marianne and her death.) It's obvious that Suzaku has an intent to kill his best friend, whom he now knows as Zero.

This just strengthens my argument: That Suzaku is a big hypocrite. Heck, I thought he said that changing the system through means like Zero does it leads nowhere? But now he himself wants to kill Lelouch for killing Euphemia? How does that make him any different from Zero? Unlike him, at least Zero has always been very straightforward about his intentions. Hah.

 

Lelouch is amused after he and Suzaku finish talking.

In the subbed that I watched, Lelouch said, "If you wish to fight me, then I shall entertain you. Because we're best friends." And then he laughed evilly, which was a fabulous ending to a good episode.

I swear, I will never side with anyone but Lelouch. ♥

I watched this twice; I think it didn’t sink in the first time. Because it was mad, and I had to pause and just breath. I'm still pretty speechless, so, uh. (Pictures in this post aren't mine, [except the last one] as I didn't really feel like taking screenshots myself. I found them here.)

It begins with Suzaku thanking Euphemia for what she's done.

They are holding a sort of ceremony to make the Special Administrative Zone of Japan official. Everyone is waiting for Zero to show up, since he and the Order of the Black Knights aim for this as well. He shows up in his Knightmare, together with C.C. who controls it for him.

 

"I won't. You will shoot me."

When he gets down he and Euphemia have a talk alone, where he tells her she's a big idiot for being so reckless. He initially plans to use the Geass on her and make him shoot her, so that when she does she will be deemed a traitor and therefore all the Japanese will once again turn against her and Britannia.

Outside, Suzaku sees C.C. and recognizes her. Walking up to her, he asks why she is with Zero. C.C. trails off while saying that, "Does this mean he is...?" (Gracious, he is what? What? The suspense is killing me.)

 

C.C. in the Knightmare, before Suzaku sees her.

In the course of this conversation, C.C. suffers from a sudden headache. Where he is, Lelouch also suffers from the same thing and he wards off Euphemia when she tries to help him.

 

Lelouch and Euphemia finally agree.

In the end Euphemia convinces Lelouch to cooperate with her anyway, and all is supposed to be well until Lelouch suddenly jokes about how she or anyone else won't be able to turn his command down if he's really serious about it. As if to prove his point, he tells her something along the lines of, "...Or I can even ask you to kill all the Japanese..."

And then all hell breaks loose.

His Geass has been activated without his knowing it, and Euphemia, acting upon the command, runs to the stage and asks all the Japanese to die - to commit suicide. But then she realizes it's impossible, so she tells all of the Britannian army close by to kill them. When they don't do as she orders, she shoots (with the ceramic gun that Lelouch was waving around while they were talking) at a random man in front of the audience and shows she means business.

 

Euphemia herself killing a Japanese.

(I found it creepy, actually.)

Of course the army at her command are very obedient, and they do as she says and kills every Japanese around.

Suzaku is incredulous that Euphemia could have ordered the murder of all the Japanese. Cornelia and Schneizer are equally shocked by the turned of events, and Cornelia decides to go to the battlefield herself.

Lelouch is horrified by what happened. He goes back to where C.C. is, and when she tells him he didn't expect for him to go so far, he tells her he didn't mean to do it. She seems surprised, carefully studying his expression and explanation.

 

C.C. looking at Lelouch.

Lelouch realizing the magnitude of holding the Geass at his command... 

or being held by the Geass at its command.

 

Lelouch giving the command to the Order of the Black Knights.

 

Back in the Knightmare, Lelouch once again assumes the role of Zero and orders the Order of the Black Knights to attact, as it turned out that Euphemia was an enemy.

I like the episode, despite the carnage in it. Although I knew something had to be done to turn everything to Lelouch's favor in the end, I didn't expect something like the Geass being permanent. I'm not too fond of the plot twist (Lelouch was just joking, c'mon), but I guess it worked, since they also showed a scene where Lelouch's father (where he exactly is, I have no idea) laughs as he watches the events unfold, commenting, "This kid has finally done it."

It seems like there's more to the Geass and C.C. than meets the eye. I wonder how everything will be wrapped up in three more episodes.

Good grief, I hate this episode. It mainly featured Suzaku, who isn’t even remotely interesting to begin with, and Euphemia, who just had to get all pooey and proclaimed her painfully evident love for him while he was in the battlefield and almost dying. Seriously, I want to throw up.

“I order you to love me!”

Aw, isn’t that just sickeningly sweet? Someone kill Euphemia and Suzaku already. The anime is mecha; not frikkin’ romance. Tell them to get a room or something. And please, tell Euphemia not to confess in the middle of a battle! What, she wants to get Suzaku killed? Not that I won’t like him dead, but it’s just wrong to proclaim one's, err, love like that and at such inappropriate moment!

I’m not even happy that she acknowledged her being deadweight to her siblings, since she doesn’t even try to do something about this. Honey, you’re a princess, and you’re supposed to have some spine. If you don’t get to work and fight, that same people whose smile you love to see will end up dying. This is war; not some stupid fairytale, you idiot.

And what is it with this Nina Einstein person? What is that girl on? I get that she’s dying over Euphie-sama and that her talk with the pretty spineless princess is supposed to develop Euphemia (or at least I think so), but so what? Is that really necessary? Does it have any pertinence to the plot? If anyone’s gonna argue that it’s for changing the system from inside and it’s all thanks to Suzaku that it's happening, well that’s just lame. It’s not as if Euphemia had some guts to begin with, and Suzaku underwent major trials before finally winning her over through his chivalry or something - because if that were the case then perhaps I'd give it more credit. But no, Euphemia is basically no more than a lovesick, idealistic idiot, and so this... thing, whatever it's called, is of absolutely no merit.

The only saving grace of this episode is that it showed Lelouch and C.C. in a Knightmare together. It made me smile more than I’m sincerely willing to admit, especially because Kallen wasn’t there (mwahahahaha!).

 

Lelouch and C.C. inside the Knightmare.

And I loved the faintest jealousy from Milly because Lloyd sent a sort of present to that creepy Nina girl.

The saddest part about this whole thing is that Lelouch saved Suzaku from his death. Seriously, Lelouch shouldn't have done that. It's wrong to interfere with people's death. Death is like, a serious business.

 

C.C. controlling the Knightmare.

Chawata’s moment of self-gratification was pure win as well. Haha, Lloyd sure as hell didn’t see that one coming. I love this sort of mind games between the two of them; it's pretty interesting when you challenge another person to... a battle of intelligence. Awesome.

There's too much Euphemia in this episode.

Lelouch wakes up finding himself in some unknown island, and unfortunately stumbles upon Euphemia. He points his gun at her and plans to shoot, but she asks him to, well, reveal himself to her first before doing so. 

 Euphemia sees Zero.

See I told you she's stupid. She isn't even the slightest scared of having a gun pointed at her; instead she stupidly smiles and does nothing. Either she's brave or she's stupid, and I'm really believing the latter argument.

 Lelouch looks adorable here. ♥

Lelouch and Euphemia spend time with each other and I have to say, it doesn't really seem like Clovis or Cornelia hate Lelouch or anything along that line. All that's to blame is their father, that greedy monarch who hardly seems to care about his children to begin with. Ah, hatred is indeed a powerful curse.

Lelouch tries to find food for both himself and Euphemia, and, well, failing at it. Poor bastard.

On the other side of the island Suzaku finds Kallen and well, captures her naked. Like, yeah. Suzaku you pervert. I learned Suzaku wishes to change the Empire from within, while Kallen wants to do so by force. For the record, I'm siding with Kallen, because Suzaku is just painfully annoying with his idealism.(Or is it me and my growing interest on Machiavelli's The Prince? Squee.

 Kallen upon being found by Suzaku.

The two pairs found each other and had to make a trade, since Lelouch, again assuming the persona of Zero, pretends to take Euphemia hostage.

 

C.C. talking to herself. I think.

Another point: I don't really know who C.C. talks to when she's alone. Who or what is that? It's strange and somewhat, well, puzzling.

Overall I didn't like it a lot, but I guess it somewhat pushed the plot forward.

Can I just say that I don’t like Suzaku too much either? His loyalty to the Britannian Empire somewhat annoys me. And besides, he’s an obstruction to Lelouch. I’m all for Lelouch Lamperouge; someone kill Suzaku already. (If you ask me, Kallen should have gone for the kill during the party.)

Rakshata Chawla is very interesting. Another evil genius in the series. Fabulous.

Rakshata Chawla, in charge of the Black Knight’s research and development.

Kallen looks very pleased to be in control of Unit Zero, Zero’s Honor Guard.

I actually like her when she supports Lelouch like this.

Suzaku Kururugi.

No position for C.C., but that doesn’t change the fact that she’s indispensable to Lelouch.

Suzaku being heralded as Euphemia’s knight.

The Brits don’t look too happy, and neither am I.

But of course Lloys puts his hands together for Suzaku.

LloydMilly moment. ♥

Milly doesn’t look very pleased about this, though.

Rakshata Chawla is a friggin’ genius. Apparently she used a sort of, err, Gefjun Disturber that would impede on the Sakuradite that the Lancelot uses as a source of its power. Great! So apparently someone can crack Lloyd’s unperturbed smile!

Kallen jumps out of her own Knightmare to save Zero.

Euphemia being heroic. Or simply put, an idiot.

The end of the episode left me hanging. Something called Float System ship arrived in the scene and even Rakshata had to say they were done for. Who is in there? A new character? Euphemia mutters something about her brother’s Avalon. So… what is an Avalon? And who is that person who looks like Clovis? Couldn’t they have drawn him differently?

I checked out some non-spoiling Code Geass forums and I’m not the only one who’s starting to dislike Suzaku immensely. ‘Told you he’s annoying.

Even Lelouch agrees with me: Suzaku should be with Nunnally. Yay.

Can I just say that Suzaku doesn’t look too hot in this shot? :P

That’s okay; I still like him with Nunnally.

Lelouch doesn’t look too hot in this either. Mwahahaha!

I don’t like Euphemia much, but she’s okay.

I think it’s the asymmetry of her hair that bothers me.

C.C. looks adorable here.

Lelouch and C.C.

Lelouch in a careful thought.

SuzakuNunnally.

Nunnally saying goodbye to Suzaku.

“I love Suzaku.”

(Oh-kay, she added, “But not as much as I love you, brother.” But she still said it!)

Lelouch surprised.

Euphemia declares Suzaku as her knight.

(Now I really don’t like you, Euphie. :P)

What now, best friends at draggers drawn? Hah.

I love Code Geass.

After watching this episode, I’ve come to a decision that I adore Lloyd Asplund (apparently, he's an Earl. How very surprising!). The guy (?) is absolutely interesting; he reminds me so much of Narumi from Gakuen Alice and Nathan Mahler from Blood+. And, his engagement to Milly Ashford amuses the hell out of me. What is it with that, really? I’m excited to find out more about it. Oohlala.

Lelouch looks innocent here. I can almost doubt here’s Zero.

Picking up from where the last episode ended, it turns out that Mao is still alive. He annoys me, really, although I have to admit he scared Lelouch by kidnapping Nunnally there. Oh, and the plan where he used the scales and the game of chess to settle things with Lelouch was genius.

Nunnally has been kidnapped, and Lelouch is furious.

Mao against Lelouch in chess.

Lelouch means business.

It must be hard for Lelouch to admit defeat.

But then again he doesn’t really lose, since he put himself under the Geass and commanded Suzaku to cut the wire for the explosives and rescue Nunnally. Awesome. Lelouch doesn’t cease to amaze me.

I just found out that Suzaku apparently killed his father at age ten. Hm. Now that’s something you don’t see everyday. Mao said Suzaku always put himself in peril so he would be able to atone for his sins and save his soul. Somehow, I believe in that. The conscience of a person can definitely prompt him to do a lot of crazy stuff… like putting his own life on the line.

C.C. kills Mao in the end. Well it’s about time; he’s taking up too many frames already. :P

Can I just say that I’m all for SuzakuNunnally? Like, yeah. Even from the very beginning, I saw potential in this one, and me thinks it’s developing nicely as the series progresses. SuzakuNunnally pwns SuzakuEuphemia.