Characters: Code Geass part 1

Characters: Code Geass Main Characters

This the character sheet concerning the main characters of Code Geass.

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    Lelouch/Zero 

Lelouch Lamperouge/Lelouch vi Britannia

"I am Zero! The man who destroys worlds — and the man who creates them!"

"Obey me, world!"

The central character of Code Geass, Lelouch Lamperouge is a Magnificent Chess Master who was given the power of an Evil Eye called a Geass that allows him to compel anyone to obey him to do anything he demands — although It Only Works Once on any given person. Few even of his closest friends know that he is actually a fallenWhite Prince of the Britannian Empire. He plans to rebel against his estranged father, the darwinist EmperorCharles zi Britannia, who, he thinks, was unforgivably apathetic about his mother's death — and may even have had a hand in it. Lelouch demands vengeance, and he'll settle for nothing less than the complete destruction of the Britannian royal line.
Well, not the entire Britannian royal line: Lelouch wants to protect his paralyzed and blind little sister Nunnally — and not just to protect her, but to make a better world for her. He'll do just about anything to accomplish his goals, and he doesn't mind if he has to be labeled "evil" in the process. Especially if he gets to make being evil look damngood as he announces his new anti-Britannian movement.
As the series evolves, Lelouch finds a worthy opponent, his buddy Suzaku Kururugi, who eventually becomes the biggest obstacle to his plans.
He also finds an unexpected ally, a beautiful and mysterious waif who usually goes by the "name" C.C. She isn't what she seems to be. But then, neither is Lelouch.

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• Abusive Parents: His father the Emperor. Turns out his mother wasn't a saint either.
• Achilles In His Tent: During most of Turn 19. Schneizel uses it to maximum effect.
• Alliterative Name: If he's using his mother's surname.
• Aloof Big Brother: As part of his Jerkass Facade near the end.
• Alternate Character Interpretation: Range from a Jerk With A Heart Of Gold and Anti Hero to even an egomaniac Villain Protagonist who manipulates everyone around him and covers it up with a thin veneer of self-deluded ideals, whose karmic backlash was not even half of what he deserved.
• A Man Is Not A Virgin: Subverted so ridiculously hard that it's hilarious.
• Ambiguously Gay: Almost every fan has to agree Lelouch gives this kind of vibe with his FABULOUS Ham. And let's not get started about the whole thing between Suzaku and Lelouch. Please.
• Anti Hero: [[Sliding Scale Of Anti Heroes Lelouch started the series as a type III, but later in the season became a type IV, with moments of III and V].
  • Byronic Hero: In the Second season
  • Heroic Sociopath: Paying evil unto evil with a smile, particularly against his worst enemies.
• Antihero Antagonist: In the "Suzaku of the Counterattack" manga.
• The Atoner: In the Grand Finale, the Zero Requiem is revealed to be an elaborate public performance intended to personally atone for his own sins by making the world hate him in death, even though his chosen method and leading circumstances make it appear he has another hidden motive at that point.
• Attractive Bent Gender: The Picture Dramas and games are surely very fond of having him go around◊ in◊ drag. Stupid Sexy Luluko!
• Awesome Moment Of Crowning / Crowning Moment Of Awesome: "ALL HAIL LELOUCH, 99th EMPEROR OF BRITANNIA!!"
• Awesomeness By Analysis: He is about the only one smart enough to use Shinkiro's full combat potential.
• Badass: And HOW! To the extent one fan's dubbed him a walking Crowning Moment Of Awesome!
  • Before you say ''huh?'', remember in the second episode where Viletta threatened him by blowing the walls around him? He. Didn't. Even. Flinch. 2:50
• Badass Bookworm
• Badass Cape
• Base Breaker: Doesn't just break it, but smashes it to atoms. See also Draco In Leather Pants and Ron The Death Eater, below.
• Bastard Bastard Or Heroic Bastard: Lelouch is the child of one of the the Emperor's recognized wives, who was killed before the series bagan. Lelouch was disowned and ultimately rises up in rebellion against his father. Lelouch certainly gets around in the Bastard tropes.
• Batman Gambit: He loves playing these. He's the victim of a few of them, too, but he usually prevails.
• Becoming The Mask: Several times, on several different levels. Luckily for him, it's a very becoming mask.
• The Beautiful People
• Be Careful What You Wish For: His Geass. And his plans in general.
• Big Bad or Big Good
• Big Brother Instinct: He only, you know, started a war for her.
  • A World War. Against the greatest superpower on the planet. Pretty much by himself.
• Big Screwed Up Family: Where the whole mess starts.
• Book Dumb: More precisely, Brilliant But Lazy — but the effect is that Shirley is always complaining that his grades should be much higher.
  • Justified by him deliberately not trying so he can get average scores; as a Fallen Prince, he's trying not to garner too much attention.
• Born Unlucky: Oh so very much. See also Butt Monkey and Cosmic Plaything.
• Brilliant But Lazy: His school persona. Of course, he's anything but lazy.
• Brother Sister Incest: Toward Euphemia (of whom he says, "You may have been the first girl I ever loved"), and even more toward Nunnally (his "reason for living"). His love for them is not sexual — or at least not explicitly sexual — but it's certainly unhealthy.
• But Now I Must Go At the end of "Nightmare of Nunnally," he says goodbye to his friends and loved ones before leaving to be Demon King.
• Butt Monkey: Regardless of his karma meter — or maybe because of it — he just can't catch a break.
• Calling The Old Man Out: Aside from his desire to make Nunnally's dream of a kind world come true, Lelouch's main reason for basically starting a world war was to do this to the Emperor. (Let it never be said that he does anything by half-measures.) When he finally gets his chance, it officially becomes a Crowning Moment Of Awesome.
• Cannot Spit It Out: Lelouch has a habit of dodging questions even when he'd be better off answering them.
• Cartwright CurseHe falsely confirms that he did]], but Suzaku catches him on the lie.
• Celibate Hero: If only out of necessity thanks to his chosen profession. Strangely, the second season focuses heavily on Lelouch's love life — especially the tragic ending of episode 13.
• Character Alignment: Chaotic Good —-> Chaotic Selfish / Selfish Good, YMMV if can be considered Neutral Evil by the end of the series
• Character Development: Lelouch becomes more and more extreme among the series progressed.
• Char Clone: In fact, if you take this perspective, Code Geass literally becomes Mobile Suit Gundam with the perspectives skewed, instead of following Amuro (Suzaku), you're following Char.
  • He's an estranged son of an important political figure, he has a grudge towards a whole family of nobility, he has a fake name, he wears a mask, he has a younger sister, he's handsome, he's charismatic, he has no loyalty to anyone except himself, he has no qualms about killing people who were nice to him in the past. Definitely a Char.
    • The last part is debatable, though, as those he has killed without restraint he tends not to have any real connection to.
• Chess Master: Literally and figuratively. (Although as a literal chess master, it's more of an Informed Ability, as no one in-universe really seems to know how the game works.)
• Chess Motifs: He's the king on the chess board; his Zero costume even resembles one. Although his physical combat skills are less than impressive, he's the one who commands the whole board. He's always on the battlefield with his troops, because, as he puts it, if the king won't lead, his subjects won't follow. Mind you, that doesn't usually work in actual chess, and certainly not as Lelouch applies it, but it is just a metaphor.
• Chick Magnet: An extreme example.
• Clark Kenting: ...Sort of. Lelouch does wear a mask that conceals his whole head and does tricks with voice recording to throw people off the trail. But the fact that his sister Nunnally—who is blind and therefore relies primarily on hearing—never recognizes him as Zero is a bit much. Not to mention the other people who are extremely close to him.
• Clasp Your Hands If You Deceive: As a common trait of the quintessential Magnificent Bastard, Lelouch is fond of doing this.
• Conspicuously Public Assassination: It's a Call Back to when he rescued Suzaku in season 1 episode 4.
• Cosmic Plaything: See Born Unlucky and Butt Monkey.
• Counterpart Comparison: He is this of V, the chaotic rebel Byronic Hero, Magnificent Bastard and sociopath utilizing morally dubious plans to bring down an oppressive dictatorship.
  • Or even fellow angsty orphan chessmaster Seto Kaiba. He's Lelouch's and Light's secret lovechild!
  • Char Aznable is another.
• Crucified Hero Shot: He dies at the bottom of a trail of his blood leading from the middle of the Britannian flag, the resulting visage being reminiscent of the Christian cross.
• Cursed With Awesome: Aside from some Diabolus Ex Machina, his Geass has virtually no drawbacks, and he can get around the ones that do.
• The Dandy
• Dark Is Not Evil: Perhaps it's unintentional, but Lelouch tends to invoke this trope. He seems to be a dark figure overall: he has black hair, purple eyes, wears dark-colored clothing, leads a double life, consorts with a witch, and gets compared to a demon on several separate occasions. And yet, he wants to make the world a better place and manages to remain a good person for quite some time, until all the terrible, horrible things he goes through start catching up to him. Meanwhile, Mao andSchneizel, his two Evil Counterparts are albino and blond, respectively; and both play white against him in chess.
  • That, and he only starts wearing white after he's established his evil persona.
• Dark Messiah: To the core.
• Death Seeker: Becomes this following both Nunnally's apparent death and the Black Knights' betrayal.
• Deceased Fall Guy Gambit: For the first time, see Xanatos Speed Chess. For the second, see Xanatos Gambit.
• Defeat Means Friendship: Subverted After Lelouch finally beats him in the second-to-last episode, he uses a Geass to force Schneizel to serve him. Or, more precisely, to serve Zero — a distinction soon to become important.
• Defector From Decadence: His response to Charles' cold indifference to Marianne's murder and Nunnally's crippling and declaration that the Britannia is defined by the strong ruling over the weak. He gets sent to Japan along with Nunnally for his troubles. The takeover of Japan by Britannia is what drives him to revenge.
• Despair Event Horizon: Goes over the edge following Nunnally's apparent death and finally the Black Knights' betrayal, leading him to plan on isolating himself inside the Sword of Akasha with Charles, and later, the Zero Requiem. See also: Death Seeker.
• The Determinator
• Diabolus Ex Machina: Sometimes, you'd be forgiven for thinking Lelouch's main opponent was called Murphy.
  • Episode 22 of the first season in particular is the poster child for this trope.
• Did Not Get The Girl: The amount of Ship Sinking in R2 was epic.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu: Lelouch's Geasses God itself to stop Instrumentality and kill his parents. In all fairness, however, he asked politely and didn't even include the second part, so it's more like Did You Just Ask Cthulhu For A Favor?
• Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead: The reaction to his death. It causes his entire army (giant robots, tanks, and armed soldiers) to collapse and run away from an angry mob. Makes sense actually, since he has Zero Percent Approval Rating and the only member of his army who isn't brainwashed to be his slave is in on the plan.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Sort of. To avenge the death of his mother, he wishes to bring about the destruction of the entire Britannian royal line — with the notable exceptions of his beloved sister Nunnally, Euphemia, and himself. However, he has plenty of legitimate gripes against the Empire which do not involve those two things, mainly the Social Darwinism that drives the country to conquer the entire world and oppress everyone who isn't Briannitan, and the aforementioned members of the royal family are the only ones known to oppose said policies.
• Doom Magnet
• Dont Tell Mama: He tries to keep his sister ignorant of his alter ego.
• Draco In Leather Pants: To avoid wank-age here, just check the main entry. See also Base Breaker, above, and Ron The Death Eater, below.
• Dude Looks Like A Lady: Oh yes. In one picture drama he was made to look prettier than the girls simply by putting on a wig and an Elegant Gothic Lolita dress.
• The Emperor: The 99th Emperor of Britannia, to be precise.
• Establishing Character Moment: Lelouch smiled after he ordered a whole army regiment to kill themselves in the 1st episode.
• Estrogen Brigade Bait: To a degree. He gets his shower and shirtless scenes.
• Et Tu Brute: Happens twice, and with him getting sold out to the two baddest of the Big Bads in the show (obviously barring V. V. who gets offed in R2 14)). I do not envy this man.
• Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: Though whether Lelouch is really a "bad man" is best left to the viewer. Then flipped around in R2 episode 21: not only does he come to hate her within one episode, after Marianne shows him her true colors, he also erased her from existence along with Charles.
• Evil Costume Switch: When he became Emperor.
• Evil Tropes: For a given definition of "evil".
  • Affably Evil: Gives off this, as he is remarkably polite, when he isn't killing his enemies.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Despite being a Magnificent Bastard, he really seems to regret the deaths of innocents.
  • Evil Is Sexy: He is a Magnificent Bastard and is Sexy.
• Even The Guys Want Him: Of course Milly, Shirley, Kallen and Kaguya are head-over-heels in love with him. (As well as 108 other girls. And C.C. Possibly.) But there'salso Rolo, and maybe even Suzaku.
• Evil Gloating: Lelouch is fond of this. It's very lucky that all of his Geass victims are polite enough to listen to his monologues before he orders them to commit suicide, or whatever else they would really rather not ever do.
• Evil Eye: The Geass. It allows him to give direct commands to anyone he makes eye contact with (which they must obey, even if the command is explicitly suicidal or goes against every moral fiber of their being), but It Only Works Once per person.
• Evil Laugh: Frequently, as Zero. Borders on self-parody.
• Evil Overlord: Setting himself up as one is a requisite for his Zero Requiem Batman Gambit.
• Expy: Lelouch has been considered at least a partial Expy of any number of fictional and even historical figures, especially the Byronic heroes V For Vendetta and The Count Of Montecristo.
• FABULOUS Ham: Mostly in his Zero costume. Although he's possibly even more of a ham without it on, as seen in R2 episode twenty. Also rather scary. Which might be the point of the mask. Then he made himself the Emperor of Britannia and was as bad as his father.
• Facing The Bullets One Liner / Final Speech: When faced with a firing squad made up of his own men, he takes off his mask, laughs in their faces and tells them they are all fools who he was using like pawns. Subverted a second later when its revealed that he's only doing this to trick Kallen into leaving his side, rather then staying to die with him.
• Fake Complete Monster: During the Zero Requiem.
• Fake Memories
• Fallen Hero: In some parts of the second season, he is reasonably well meaning for a while, but ultimately the results of his old sins catch up with him in a seriouslydisproportionate way and he falls back to his more tragically flawed ways.
• Fallen Prince
• Fan Nickname: "LeDouche" (Adult Swim even gives him this name), "Leaplouche", "Baby Lulu" (derisive one), "Failouche", "FABULOUCH", Christlouch, and "Cart Driver" (for those who buy that interpretation).
• Fashion Victim Villain: His Emperor outfit is awesome, but his Nice Hat just pulls it over into Narm territory, leading to much snickering from the fanbase.
• Fatal Attractor: Very bad things tend to happen to those he loves.
• Freudian Excuse
• Geek Physique
• Generation Xerox: Not only having inherited the Manipulative Bastard gene from Chuck, his life story is playing out much like his father's, with the characters around him playing out similar roles to Chuck's earlier years.
• Gory Discretion Shot: Used when Lelouch kills his half-brother Clovis and whenever he employs his Geass to order mass suicides.
• Good Eyes Evil Eyes: His eyes are ambiguous until he gets his Geass. Thereafter, they're fairly obviously evil.
• Go Out With A Smile: He's smiling as he warns Suzaku (now Zero) about his Fate Worse Than Death, then manages to spare a last smile for the crying, shaken Nunnally.
• Guile Hero: He prefers to play politics to sideline his opponents most of the time. For instance, at one point after losing his most important fighter and being attacked by the two most powerful armies in that universe - the Chinese and the Brittanian - he manages to manipulate the Eunuch Generals into announcing their evil plans to their entire country, enciting riots and getting them to lose their Brittanian support. This plan went very smoothly because he managed to steal it from a third bad guy without that third opponent ever telling something about it, who had no choice but to support Lelouch after this fight. Using politics he managed to sideline one bad empire, destroy a second one and get the support of the third one. The only reason he might not deserve to be on this list is your interpretation of his actions, as by the end of series he might have gone of the slippery slope, but in the ending he is redeemed.
• Hes Just Hiding: C.C.'s enigmatic final line left much speculation that Lelouch had found a way to fake his death. Jossed later on by Word Of God stating that Lelouch really is dead.
• He Who Fights Monsters: He quickly starts demonstrating almost the same lack of concern for human life that he despises in Britannia.
• Heroic Sacrifice: He dies for HIS SINS, and the sins of his family. In doing so, he also turns himself into the most hated person in the world, so that Britannians and Japanese will no longer hate each other.
• Hidden Depths: Well, in-universe anyway, since only a few people know he's actually an exiled Prince of Britannia, or that he's Zero, etc.
• High Collar Of Doom: Zero, which is an early sign this isn't the hero Lelouch is making out this persona to be.
• How Do I Shot Web: When he first gains his Geass power, he automatically understands the basics, namely that it allows him to give commands that cannot be refused. However, he discovers the hard way that his power has limitations, like requiring direct eye contact, and only working once on a particular person. After the first time this causes a problem for him, he uses a logical and scientific method to test his powers and determine obscure details like maximum range and duration of effect. However,he also finds out the hard way when his Geass become permanently active. Which sucks.
• I Cannot Self Terminate / Suicide By Cop : He asks Suzaku to kill him to conclude the "Zero Requiem", dying in Nunnally's arms, but justified in that just killing himself wouldn't have helped anyone.
• I Did What I Had To Do: Lelouch whilst squaring off with his father. Followed up by "Everybody lies to survive! No one is blameless!" Silly Lelouch.
• I Was Just Joking: Lelouch's denial of C.C.'s antics when Nunnally asks if C.C. is Lelouch's girlfriend.
  • Also when Lelouch is cooking in episode 3 of R2
    Rivalz: He's even got a housekeeping book.
    Lelouch: How do you know!?
    Rivalz: Crap, you really do?
• Idiot Ball: Has put Nunnally in danger several times due to temporary stupidity.
• I Have The High Ground: First season opening. Actually, he likes the high ground a lot.
• Impossibly Cool Clothes: As a civilian, and also as Zero.
• Improbable Age: How many seventeen-year-old paramilitary masterminds do you know? While Code Geass has many examples of this trope, Lelouch is among its most extreme.
• Informed Ability: His skill at the actual game of chess (but not his skill as The Chessmaster). We see him win chess games, but the actual moves he plays tend to beweird. Rule Of Cool and all, but in Real Life, weird moves don't win chess games against skilled opponents.
• In The Blood: Lelouch has shown himself to be very prone to manipulating people (and letting them die) in order to get what he wants. Just like the old man he despises so much and the mother he used to love and idealize. The major difference is that Lelouch is is aware of the nature of his acts and his self-destructiveness.
• It Only Works Once: His Geass.
• Its Not You Its My Enemies: Works with Kallen, but fails with Shirley.
• I Will Protect Her: Goes to varying extremities to protect his loved ones, be they his little sister Nunnally, his unrequited love interest Shirley, and his bodyguard Kallen.
• Jerkass Dissonance, Jerkass Facade and Jerk With A Heart Of Gold: Would have more friends if he didn't act like a complete dick at the most inappropriate times. Though some characters do like that about him, these people are insane and/or immortal, generally. Justified in most cases, though, as he's doing it on purpose for this exact reason.
• Johnny Yong FREAKIN' BOSCH!: His voice actor in the English-language dub.
• Jumped At The Call: His declaration of the Order of the Black Knights.
• Jumping Off The Slippery Slope: He takes a flying leap off it in episode fourteen of R2. Several viewers consider it his Moral Event Horizon. Your Mileage May Vary on some of the other things he did.
  • To be fair, his mind was also more or less broken and he was directly ignoring his plans.
  • What about the time in which the abandonment to his subordinates.
• Jun Fukuyama: His seiyuu.
• The Kirk
• Knight Templar Big Brother: Virtually the Trope Maker.
  • To elaborate, someone among the Brittanian royal court was responsible for the death of his mother and the crippling and blinding of his sister. Rather than attempt to discover who exactly it was, Lelouch decides to declare war on Brittania itself and kill off the rest of his family, bar one or two of his other siblings, in order to be thorough.
• La Resistance: Initally irked by it, he soon decides he might as well lead it, as long as he gets a chance to avenge his mother.
• Laser Guided Karma: See Butt Monkey entry.
• Laughing Mad: Lelouch does this as well at the end of episode 17 in the first season.
• Legacy Character - Zero
• Living With The Villain: Lelouch and Suzaku attend the same school, and for a while, neither of them realizes that the other is their regular opponent. Inverted in R2, where both of them know who the other really is, but have to pretend to have no idea.
• Love Makes You Evil: When Lelouch's resolve fails and he betrays his ideals and the Black Knights, he does it (twice) because his sister Nunnally is held hostage.
• Magnificent Bastard/ Manipulative Bastard: He even DIES happily in a fabulous way. As an example, Cornelia calls him a coward for attacking her from behind. He makes no attempt to deny it, but calls her one, too. Cornelia, the goddess of war who is always charging into battle in front of her knights and has just made the decision to fight to the last. As is pointed out in the commentary, he says this in such a way that we believe him anyway.
• Manchurian Agent: Lelouch does this several times with the Geass. Once with Syako, to make her play prerecorded messages over the phone. Again with Jeremiah Gottwald, so he will let Zero and his gaggle escape with Suzaku while destroying his career without realizing it. As well as to the Britannian special forces assigned to moniter him incase he regains his memories, which he does. Even Gilford gets this done to him, making him think Lelouch is Cornelia. Justified since it's Mind Control.
• Mary Tzu: An unfortunate side effect of him being an avid user of Hollywood Tactics despite his supposed military genius.
• Meaningful Name: "Lelouch" is the French word for "suspicious", but that's probably just a coincidence.
• Memory Gambit: How Lelouch defeats Mao when Mao is planning to blow up Ashford Academy.
• Michelle Ruff: The English-dub VA for ten-year-old Lelouch in the flashback sequences.
• Milking The Giant Cow: Takes this to memetically Fabulous levels.
• Millionaire Playboy: Possibly.
• Misaimed Fandom: "Lelouch brainwashing and killing innocent people is awesome! Wait? Why did he order his own death?" And on the opposing team, (even after the intention and results of the Zero Requiem were revealed): "Hooray! Lelouch the tyrant is dead!"
• Mode Lock: At exactly the worst possible second.
• Mole In Charge: As emperor.
• Moral Dissonance: But at least Lelouch is capable of realizing that his actions are morally questionable.
• My antihero zero
  • He could have went with a non self-sacrificing and less bloody method than the Zero Requiem, but he had lost the will to continue living. Plays the hero card straight when he averts a second SAZ disaster and helps liberate the Chinese Federation.
• Necessarily Evil/ Evil Versus Evil: Invoked during a discussion with Gilford
  • His final plan, and the actions he takes to carry it out, is the definition of what it means to be Necessarily Evil.
• Nice Hat: Nice enough to have its own fan club.
• Noble Fugitive
• Non Action Guy: This trope is played with in sundry ways. Physically, Lelouch is at-best-mediocre compared to his comrades. Even Euphie can outrun him on foot. But he can more than hold his own on the battlefield, especially against mooks. For more details, see the trope example.
• No Place For Me There: He dies to finish Zero Requiem and bring about world peace.
• Nothing Can Stop Us Now: Whenever he says, "All tasks at hand have been cleared," something's bound to go terribly wrong in a way that the poor guy couldn't have possibly expected. Borders on Cosmic Plaything at times.
• Not What It Looks Like: Usually with Kallen. Usually witnessed by a fretful Shirley. Similarly — as Zero — with C.C., witnessed by a fretful Kallen.
• Ominous Opera Cape
• Ordinary High School Student: The preferred mask Lelouch wears when not wearing his preferred mask.
• Pale Skinned Brunette
• Pay Evil Unto Evil
• Paranoia Fuel: You or the guy next to you is under Lelouch's control. All he has to do is "ask for a favor".
• Parental Issues: While almost everyone on the show has these, his prove more lethal than most.
• Personality Powers
• Playing Against Type: Lelouch's seiyuu Fukuyama Jun usually plays as straightforward, naive heroes (such as Watanuki from XxxHoLic). The English dub follows suit by picking Johnny Yong Bosch (you might remember him as Idiot Hero Ichigo Kurosaki, soft-spoken philosopher Itsuki Koizumi or goofy Crouching Moron Hidden BadassVash the Stampede... or, if you want to go even further back, the Green Zeo/Turbo Ranger and the second Black Ranger).
• Powered Armor: In Nightmare Of Nunnally, sort of (it's complicated). Zero can fight Knightmares hand to hand.
• Power Incontinence
• Psychic Assisted Suicide: Lelouch uses his Geass to do this at least four times. The first of which is at the end of the very first episode.
• Psychotic Smirk: Borders on Slasher Smile sometimes, but whenever he's just wiped out an enemy taskforce or thwarted one of their plans, Lelouch's typical alternating scowl/smug expression goes off into an awesomely evil smile. Often preceded or followed by an equally entertaining EvilLaugh.
• Purple Eyes: They become red when he uses his Geass.
• Really Dead Montage: Receives one of the longest death scenes in anime history, and yet a large part of the fandom still insists that Hes Just Hiding.
• Rebel Prince
• Red Eyes Take Warning: When he uses his Geass. Otherwise he has Purple Eyes.
• Redemption Equals Death: It is kind of ironic that this applies straight to Lelouch but it is subverted with Suzaku.
  • Or not, considering that he could have come up with a more moral solution that wouldn't necessitate his death. Lelouch, having lost practically everything as far as he knew at the time he started the Zero Requiem, did so largely because he wanted to die.
• Red Oni Blue Oni: Evoked a few times, with a few different characters:
  • Mao (red) and Lelouch (blue)
  • Lelouch (red) and C.C. (blue)
  • Suzaku (red) and Lelouch (blue)
  • Lelouch (red) and Schneizel (blue)
• Rhetorical Request Blunder: The moment where It Got Worse in season 1.
• Rich Idiot With No Day Job: His non-Zero persona. Then again it was all a front because he was in hiding, and therefore did things that did not call attention to himself.
• Rhetorical Request Blunder: The moment where It Got Worse in season 1.
• Ron The Death Eater: Lelouch has as many utter detractors as he does fan girls, dragging other characters allied with him down in the undertow, while opposing characters, not to mention Britannia itself, score points by virtue of being against him. See also Base Breaker and Draco In Leather Pants, above.
• Royal Blood
• Sarcastic Confession: To Suzaku in R2 17. Schneizel uses this against Lelouch in the worst possible way.
• Savvy Guy Energetic Girl: Lelouch with nearly any girl he can be paired with, due to his Squishy Wizard nature. Only Nunnally, C.C. not under amnesia, and maybe Sayoko don't fall under this.
• Self Made Orphan: After finding out what both of his parents truly believed in. Yes, after spending 90% of the series trying to find out who killed his mother, he winds up doing it himself.
• Sensitive Guy And Manly Man: A deconstruction, through his and Suzaku's interactions.
  • In more ways than one. When they first met during their childhood, Lelouch really was the sensitive one, while Suzaku was the ruffian. It was the subsequent occupation of Japan by Britannia that supposedly inverted things, with Lelouch becoming more vengeful and embittered, and Suzaku, who was responsible for killing Genbu but never being punished for it, becoming neurotic and attempting to be even more mild-mannered and chivalrous. Though of course, cracks in their respective facades would show throughout the series.
• Shield Surf: During his duel with Guilford.
• Shoot The Shaggy Dog: One of the reasons Lelouch started Zero Requiem was his loss of hope due to Nunnally's apparent demise. Nunnally turns up and declares herself his enemy when he's beyond the point of no return. D'oh!
• Shrouded In Myth: People thought Zero was a woman, Prince Clovis or a prince of another country.
• Shut Up Hannibal: Twice. First, in season one, after Mao most unpleasantly discloses that Suzaku was responsible for the death of his father, Prime Minister Genbu Kururugi, in order to put an end to the war between Japan and Britannia and then precedes to berate Lelouch's thoroughly traumatized friend, Lelouch has clearly had enough, and commands him via Geass to never speak again. The second time is in R2, when confronted with Charles' and Marianne's plan for Instrumentality with the Ragnarok Junction and the revelation that their abandonment of Lelouch and Nunnally in Japan was all a Xanatos Gambit meant to protect them, Lelouch rebuts and banishes Charles along with Marianne to C's World with the assistance of the collective unconsciousness.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: unspoilable is the reason why they are popular among girls, although technically he is a Heroic Sociopath, women really love his heroic part, but not part sociopath.
• Silent Scapegoat: Zero Requiem.
• Slave Mooks: Gets an entire army of them in the final arc.
• Slouch Of Villainy: He does these in the cockpit of whatever Knightmare he's riding in.
• The Smart Guy: While Code Geass has almost as many TV Geniuses as it has idiots, Lelouch still stands out as among the very smartest.
• Smart People Play Chess: Lelouch is introduced by having him win an unwinnable chess game. He's the second smartest person in the entire world of the series. Never mind that no one in this series actually knows the rules of chess, just go with it.
• Spanner In The Works: Lelouch's affection for his friends has scuttled his plans almost as many times as Suzaku has.
• Spared By The Adaptation: Suzaku of the Counterattack
• Squishy Wizard: This trope is played with in sundry ways. In physical strength, speed, endurance, and coordination, he's not remotely in the league with Kallen, Cornelia, or most of his other allies and adversaries — much less Suzaku, whose Charles Atlas Superpower allows him to dodge machine-gun bullets. Even Euphie can outrun him on foot. He manages to power through when it counts, though.
• Star Crossed Lovers: With Shirley and Kallen. Your Milage May Vary.
• Stop Or I Shoot Myself: Does this in response to C. C. pointing her gun at him to prevent him from going anywhere.
• Straw Hypocrite: At first. He starts out using and manipulating the Japanese liberation cause as a cover for his own personal revenge. Only to later on embrace it for real.
• Student Council President: Well, Vice President.
• Superheroes Wear Capes: As part of his hero identity.
• Taking The Bullet: He did this to save Rolo. It was his ploy to get Rolo to come over to his side.
• Taking You With Me: Following the betrayal, he attempts to do this to his father by having them both sealed inside the Sword of Akasha.
• Tall, Dark, Handsome and Snarky
• Tempting Fate: Constantly. See also Nothing Can Stop Us Now, above.
• Ten Minute Retirement: After learning about Nunnally's plan to restore the Special Administrative Zone of Japan in Turn 7, then again after supposed death in episode 19 of R2.
• Thanatos Gambit: Dies for world peace.
• Trauma Conga Line: The writers of Code Geass R2 traumatize Lelouch every two episodes like clockwork from episode thirteen on — so much so that by his fourth trauma he could not even cry when he was told that he had just inadvertently gotten Nunnally killed.
• Troubled But Cute
• Tsundere: Type A. He loves mocking his enemies and rivals, but god is he dere to those he loves.
• Ubermensch
• The UnFavourites: Lelouch and Nunnally, apparently, as a side-effect of the rest of the court's disdain for their mother Marianne. his is subverted when we find about the truth in episode 21 of R2.
• The Unfettered: Initially he did have a few fetters, but one by one they disapeared
• Utopia Justifies The Means: Lelouch is willing to go to almost any lengths to create a perfect world for Nunnally. By the end of R2, this includes brainwashing numerous people, slaughtering noncombatants, deception, betrayal, self-inflicted public demonization, and assisted suicide. Though one can blame this on the events of the betrayal that led him over the Despair Event Horizon.
• Villain Protagonist: See Alternate Character Interpretation.
• Villain With Good Publicity:
• Visionary Villain: Just wants to remake the world, is all.
• Wake Up Go To School Save The World: Part of his non-Zero persona.
• Well Intentioned Extremist: Towards the end of R2 he seems to be more Necessarily Evil.
  • Not to mention that said plan is a consequence of his despair and isolation that resulted from Nunnally's apparent death and the betrayal from the Black Knights, making him a Woobie Destroyer Of Worlds at worst.
• What An Idiot: He has his moments.
  • When he accidentally Geassed Euphemia to commit genocide. It's not so much the fact that he did it as the primary reason it happened. Worst Rhetorical Request Blunder ever! Admittedly, naming an action that would be entirely contrary to nature of the victim in conversation as an example of what Geass can compel is a reasonable way of impressing how powerful it is, so it's reasonable that Lelouch would use such an example.
    • Possible subversion, as he didn't realise that he'd just lost control of his Geass a moment earlier.
  • Worse than the above is sending Rolo to secure Nunnally, while knowing that he is Ax Crazy Yandere who already killed one girl for being too close to Lelouch. That was inexcusably stupid.
• What Could Have Been: For an example, see White Haired Pretty Boy, below.
• What The Hell, Hero?: Happens to him a few times — perhaps most ironically, by Mao. The most significant probably come from Nunnally, in the final arc.
• White Haired Pretty Boy: The Other Wiki tells us this was originally in his character design. Along with a mask. Blond Anti Hero rival with great plans. Does this remind you of anyone?
• White Prince: A fallen one.
• The Woobie: Possibly a Jerk Ass Woobie. His mother was killed when he was 8, he was sent to Japan as a political hostage with his crippled sister (then left for dead when Britannia invaded). In R2, Lelouch is traumatized every couple of episodes. After he regains his composure, he will react in a reckless and overly radical way to prevent such trauma to happen again. In a fit of irony, this new-found recklessness and radicalism is usually to blame for the next trauma.
• Woobie Destroyer Of Worlds: Can be considered this when he enacts the Zero Requiem, which he does as a Death Seeker, a plan that ends up causing quite possibly more bloodshed than what he would have otherwise taken towards world peace.
  • What? Zero's version of world peace involved the destruction of Britannia, and Emperor Lelouch's regime was established on mass Mind Control and bloody purges. Compared to this the world of Zero Requiem is a lesser evil.
    • Incorrect. Lelouch as Zero only planned to overthrow the Britannian government, not completely destroy the nation and its people. The latter would have been nothing more than pure terrorism, which he himself claimed was nothing more than a nuisance.
• Xanatos Gambit and Xanatos Roulette: Everything he does.
• Xanatos Planned This Character
• Yandere: A possible interpretation of his character.
• You Killed My Father: Or mother, as the case may be.
• You Wouldnt Shoot Me: Lelouch pulls this a few times. The first, when C. C. threatens to shoot him in episode 7 to prevent him from going off and putting himself in danger, which he counters by pointing a gun at himself. A few episodes later, a few the Black Knights threaten to shoot him after he strands them, along with himself, on top of Narita, prior to the incursion of Cornelia's forces, and he defies them to find anyone else cunning enough to lead them. Finally, at the start of season 2, including walking up to her and pressing the gun to his chest before finally taking it away. At the same time, this is also a subversion of the trope on several levels. Kallen is his bodyguard and thus far from "helpless", and is confronting him to find out whether or not he used his geass on her to make her love him. She's also killed many times before before, and could Easily kill Lelouch with or without the gun. Lelouch also doesn't intimidate her into giving him the gun; rather, he simply tells her the truth and asks whether or not she believes him.
• Zero Approval Gambit: Zero Requiem, quite literally.
• Zero Percent Approval Rating. After Schneizel reveals Zero's true identity, the Black Knights turn on him and try to kill him. After he escapes and saves the world from the Emperor's plans, he claims the throne by force and strives for a literal Zero Percent Approval Rating, hoping to unite the world against him as part of his master plan for world peace. It works.

---

     Suzaku 

Suzaku Kururugi

"A victory gained through dishonest means is worthless."

The rival and "best friend" of Lelouch. Suzaku is a rather controversial character. Instead of following Lelouch's ideals to crush Britannia to save Japan, Suzaku opted to "change Britannia from the inside, to help Japan," and he is willing to crush Japanese freedom fighters and terrorists in order to achieve this (even those that share his ultimate goals, such as the Kyoto Group). Speaking of that, he got chosen to pilot the Humongous Mecha Lancelot, which enables him to do lots of otherwise-impossible physical feats. He often tells people that "results obtained using the wrong means are meaningless," which means he opposes Zero for using terrorism to achieve his ends, but this is actually a result of the fact that he killed his father, former Japanese Prime Minister Genbu Kururugi, to end Japanese resistance to the Britannian invasion, which has made him hate himself greatly and try to atone by attempting to get himself killed in battle.
Later, he finds love in Princess Euphemia li Britannia, and got picked as her Knight, nonetheless. But after a certain incident that made him lose her very cruelly and messily, he blamed Zero for it and became more "honest", showing more brutality and less restraint. Even after the revelation that Zero is Lelouch, Suzaku did not falter and turned against his best friend.
In the second season, Suzaku becomes a Knight of the Round and hopes to advance to the rank of Knight the First, since it will grant him honorary rule of any area. He plans to take control of Area 11 (Japan) and use his position to help the Japanese people.
Not to be mistaken for The Phoenix.

---

Suzaku embodies these tropes:

• Ace Pilot: The most obvious example in all of Code Geass.
• Almighty Janitor: For the first half of the first season, Suzaku is treated like dirt because of his race, even though he's one of the best pilots in the series and pilots a nigh unstoppable Super Prototype.
• Animals Hate Him: Well, cats do, anyway. Although eventually he seems to make his peace with Team Pet Arthur.
• Anti Hero: Type IV.
• Anti Villain: Suzaku is one for most of the series.
• Arranged Marriage: He was engaged to his cousin Kaguya when they were children, but that was broken once Genbu died. Later, Lelouch toys with the idea of asking him to marry Nunnally so he could protect her.
• The Atoner
• Badass Cape: As Knight of Seven.
• Base Breaker
• The Beautiful People
• Becoming The Mask: By becoming Zero and killing Lelouch for Zero Requiem. Even involves a literal mask.
• Beta Couple: With Princess Euphemia. She champions him (a risky thing for her to do, since he's an Eleven), and he becomes her official knight, both literally and figuratively. Suzaku / Euphemia sets up a nice contrast with Lelouch (for whom Suzaku is a foil) / Shirley (who is in many ways similar to Euphemia, or how Euphemia might have been if she had not grown up as royalty.)
• Beware The Honest Ones: Part of the reason for his Chronic Backstabbing Disorder. Verges on Hypocritical Humor since he lies almost as much as Lelouch in spite of it.
• Big Brother Is Employing You
• Big Damn Heroes: Suzaku just loves having these, but not just for the glory. (See Death Seeker.)
• Big Eyes Little Eyes: He has big eyes, to indicate his seeming innocence — but not truly enormous eyes like Euphemia or Shirley.
• Bishounen
• Blue Blood: In a sense. His father was the Prime Minister of Japan, and there are those who want the family to retain power.
• Bodyguard Crush: Towards Euphemia. Reciprocated.
• Break The Cutie or Break The Haughty: While Your Mileage May Vary on which is a better description for how Suzaku starts out, over the course of the series he gets fairly definitively broken.
• Broken Ace
• Calling The Old Man Out: Like Lelouch, he tried doing that to his father. When that didn't work, he killed him, resulting in a failure even worse than Lelouch.
• Character Derailment or Character Development: Trying to figure out where to place his actions from Turn 14 onward is a chore to say the least. His hypocritical behavior during that span may fall under the former, or it can be justified as the latter as Suzaku struggles to come to terms with his own actions until FLEIJA, his Heel Realization, and finally teaming up with Lelouch again. Or course, this is somewhat undermined by Lelouch starting to act like a Complete Monster from that point on with Suzaku supporting him all the way. Usually, a Heel Realization isn't suppose to make you act worse then you did before it, even if it was part of the plan.
  • The licensed novels pull a bit of derailment in regards to Suzaku's past: Officially, he killed his father in a childish fit of rage, which became a source of Survivor Guiltand made him seek Redemption Via Death. In the novels, Genbu was a Complete Monster who was planning on selling Japan out to the Emperor, and even planned on killing Lelouch and Nunnally, and possibly even raping Nunnally; here, Suzaku's killing him actually comes off as heroic, but completely undermines a fundamental element of his personality.
• Cats Are Mean: Cats are mean to Suzaku. Arthur seems to hold no ill will toward any other members of the cast.
• Charles Atlas Superpower: For reasons pointed out but not fully explained in the anime, Suzaku is capable of performing athletic feats far beyond what normal humans are able to (like running along a wall and kicking off a machine gun with a 0.05 seconds time delay).
  • In a presumably non-canon Cd extra , Cecile remembers a time when she accidentally drops a chip under the Lancelot's foot. Much to her shock, Suzaku is able to lift the mecha's foot with his bare hands to allow her to grab the chip.
• Chess Motifs: The knight piece: Suzaku is the white knight and his strange movements let him take Lelouch by surprise.
• Chick Magnet: Very much so. Perhaps less so than Lelouch. Certainly less oblivious about it.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: So much so that other characters draw attention to it repeatedly. Before the series starts, he betrayed Japan to Britannia by killing his father and joining up with the Britannia army. In the first season, he betrays Lelouch at the end of the season to the Emperor in order to become a Knight of the Round. (This is arguably a case of Its Personal, since Lelouch had just killed Suzaku's girlfriend and never explained why). In season 2, he first betrayed Nunnally's trust by using her to bait Lelouch (she found out and called him on it), then inadvertantly betrays Lelouch to the Brtiannians again (though it's not his fault this time, he was followed because they suspected him of having ties to Zero), then betrayed the Emperor himself and sided with Schneizel to quickly rise in rank. (Knight of One Bismark Waldsteinlampshades this very well in their first battle against each other.) In episode 21, he betrayed Schneizel by becoming Emperor Lelouch's Knight of Zero (this can be considered his Heel Face Turn). In the end, he finally completed this by becoming Zero to kill his Emperor, making him a hero in the eyes of the world and the UFN. This is a subversion, though, as it was all part of his and Lelouch's plans.
• Conflicting Loyalty: A big reason for the above. During the course of the show, Suzaku tries to balance his loyalties to Japan and its people, the Britannian military he has sworn to serve, the people he cares about and wants to protect, and his personal moral code. At almost any given time in the series, at least two of these will be in conflict with each other. Lampshaded by Lloyd, who points out that it will get him killed someday. That might have been the point.
• Cool Shades: He only wears them on his days off.
• Counterpart Comparison: As you can see he gets a lot of it from Gundam SEED fans because he's similiar to Kira.
• Crash Into Hello: How he meets Princess Euphemia. An unusual example, in that it's vertical rather than horizonal: Euphie falls (or possibly jumps) on top of him while climbing out her window. This begins a pseudo-Rescue Romance that blossoms into a Bodyguard Crush that might — in a world without Geass — have led to a real relationship and possibly even marriage.
• Cursed With Awesome: He uses Lelouch's "Live On!" command to his advantage.
• Death Seeker and Redemption Equals Death: Subverted BIG time because for years he wants to die to atone for his murder of his dad, but not only do these suicidal acts become Big Damn Heroes moments, but then Lelouch geasses him into living, so every subsequent attempt ends in failure, at one point horribly so for many people. Finally, in the Grand Finale he kinda gets his wish. Everyone thinks he perished in battle and his "tombstone" regards him as the greatest hero in the war - but Suzaku not only is alive, he has become * Zero* now that Lelouch is dead. Both tropes are revealed and lampshaded by Mao.
• The Determinator: Although he's outmatched by Lelouch.
• Deuteragonist
• Disappeared Dad: The aforementioned Genbu Kururugi, ex-Prime Minister of Japan who was heavily opposed to Britannia. Suzaku killed him at the tender age of ten, after completely losing his shit because his old man was willing to sacrifice himself and Japan to resist Britannia until the bitter end. When Premier Kururugi was out of the picture, Japan promptly surrendered.
• Draco In Leather Pants: To a lesser extent than Lelouch, but still.
• The Dragon: As Emperor Lelouch's Knight of Zero.
• Dual Wielding: Suzaku's Humongous Mecha Lancelot would frequently use two swords, but when it was upgraded into its Albion form, it started carrying around a rifle in each hand.
• Dynamic Entry: He does his Spinzaku Kick on his first appearance.
• Estrogen Brigade Bait: His Knightmare Frame-piloting uniform is really tight. He's pretty muscular, and he's got a really cute butt!
• Even The Guys Want Him: His Ho Yay / Foe Yay with Lelouch and Gino.
• Everythings Better With Spinning: His "Spinzaku" Fan Nickname says it all.
• Expy: Of Kira Yamato with Euphie serving as an Expy of Lacus to round the pair up. Made even more clear later on when he even gets a SEED-mode.
  • If you ask people who don't like SEED, they will tell you he is a Deconstruction of Kira.
  • He also resembles Syaoran from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle a little bit. Considering the designs were done by CLAMP, this shouldn't come as a surprise.
• Failure Knight (Even when he does become Euphie's knight, since she dies horribly. By the time his friend Nunnally is believed to be dead due to a nuke that Suzaku fired under influence of Geass, the guy hits rock bottom.
• Fan Nickname: Several of them: "Uzaku" ('cuz some people don't like him), "Hax" (for pulling gravity-defying fighting moves), and "Spinzaku" (which is spreading throughMemetic Mutation). Read on for the episode-specific variations.
  • There are also all the fan-ideated rewritings of his first name: "Drugzaku" (after episode 14), "Doomzaku" & "Nukezaku" (episode 18), "Lolzaku" and "Crazyzaku"(episode 19), "Runzaku" (episode 20), "Roofzaku" and "Winzaku" (episode 21), and "Deathzaku" (episode 22). Concluding with "Zerozaku" (episode 25, when he takes Lelouch's place as Zero).
• Fashion Victim Villain: The actual outfits are actually pretty snazzy. They're just... really detailed. With eyes all over them. Suzaku's outfit has skin-tight bare shoulders, for instance.
• Fate Worse Than Death: Suzaku's fate, which he voluntarily takes upon himself, can certainly be viewed this way. While his tombstone praises him as a loyal defender of Emperor Lelouch, given that Lelouch will be remembered as the worst dictator ever, it is likely that Suzaku will go down in history as The Quisling where Japanese people (except for Kallen, and maybe Tohdoh) are concerned, and as The Dragon to a deeply evil ruler for everyone else. Also, throughtout the series, he always argues for change within the system rather than through revolution - while he gets to change the system from within, it is through becoming Zero who will be celebrated as a hero for working outside of the system. And to make matters worse, he will never be able to be anything but Zero for the rest of his life, as only a small handful of people know who's under the mask, and they aren't stupid enough to spill the beans and ruin the plan.
  • Then again, getting to spend the rest of his life as The most beloved and admired person in history, kinda helps to take the edge off.
• The Fettered
• Foe Yay: With Kallen, Lelouch, and others.
• The Fool: A bit of a subversion. He tends to have incredible Plot Armor, which he would rather not have for particular reasons. Which also becomes a bit of a liability forLelouch.
• Forgotten Childhood Friend
• Freak Out: After nuking Tokyo under the effect of Geass, Suzaku snaps and goes through one, Evil Laugh included. It radically changes his character throughout the rest of the anime.
  • Also has one about one season earlier when Mao exposes his deepest, darkest secret.
• Freudian Excuse: More Freudian than most examples.
• Green Eyes
• Heroes Want Redheads: Well, pinkheads, in the case of Princess Euphemia.
• Heroic BSOD: After Mao reveals that Suzaku was the one to kill Genbu Kururugi. And an even bigger one after he fires the FLEIJA.
• He Who Fights Monsters
• Hey Its That Voice: Yuri Lowenthal, who is also known as Sasuke Uchiha or Ben Tennyson
• Honor Before Reason
• Horrible Judge Of Character: Hates violence and discrimination. So why does he trust the very people who occupied his country?
• Ho Yay: With Lelouch and Gino.
• Humongous Mecha: See Ace Pilot, above.
• Hurricane Kick: The origin of "Spinzaku".
• Hypocrite / Moral Dissonance: Preaches non-violence and working within the system, yet supports one that invaded and colonized his country, downgrading him along with all other natives to second-class status, and has no problems with violently oppressing them. Cranked up to 11 in R2 when he becomes a Knight of the Round, and becomes part of Schneizel's anti-EU campaign among other things, including the opposition to UFN's legitimate fight of liberation for Japan itself. All of this of course is in hopes of Japan's well-being, but it turns out to me more self-contradictory and counterproductive than anything. Also qualifies as What An Idiot.
• I Cannot Self Terminate Unfortunate for him being a Death Seeker, this happens to Suzaku when Lelouch geasses him to "Live!"
• Idiot Hero: Played for drama (if not deconstructed) as he painfully pays the consequences for his questionable decisions.
• Inspector Javert
• Interrupted Suicide: Or Bungled Suicide, depending on the situation. Happens quite a bit throughout the series.
• Ironic Hell: The whole situation with Lelouch and his dad.
• I Will Protect Her: He becomes knight and love interest to Euphie.
• Jade Colored Glasses: What he acquires thorugh the series.
• Jerkass Woobie
• Karma Houdini: A case where the character thinks he is, and is arguably right. He gets away with killing his father, defies royal orders several times, yet is never really punished for it except for self-imposed ones. For much of the series, Suzaku's compulsion to atone for being a Karma Houdini — along with his consequent self-hated — is his driving motivation. All this is Lampshaded very Melodramatically by Mao in episode 16.
• Kids Are Cruel: Think he was a nice boy? Think again.◊ He's just more passive-aggressive these days.
  • Well, while he does have a nasty streak, he does also get over it and becomes a genuinely good friend to Lelouch and Nunnally.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: He is said to love cats upon his first meeting with Euphie (whom is playing with a cat he later takes in, named Arthur), but this also said to be aone-sided love which becomes something of a Running Gag for the show. Arthur is shown later watching over his "gravestone", though
  • Or possibly Arthur does like Suzaku and bites him to show affection. Arthur even saves Suzaku's life by biting a Black Knight who's about to kill him when they take over Ashford. Heck, even the cats are Tsundere in this series.
• Kissing Cousins: With Kaguya. See Arranged Marriage, above.
• Knight In Shining Armor: In the beginning. Later, he became a Knight Templar.
• Knight Templar: His intentions are noble in theory, but in practice they require ruthlessness to carry out. It also doesn't pan out so well for any country that isn't Japan or Britannia.
  • It doesn't pan out well for Japan either.
• Lawful Neutral: While he aims to be Lawful Good, he ends up as this as he unquestioningly follows the orders of his Brittanian superiors, no matter how hypocritical they are, and even if he does disagree.
  • Lawful Stupid: He pays dearly for this on a number of occasions.
• Laughing Mad: at the end of R2 episode 19 (doubles as his Heel Realization).
• Laura Bailey: Plays little Suzaku in the English dub.
• Legacy Character - When he takes over the role of Zero at the end of the series.
• Love Makes You Evil: His descends into Knight Templar status after the death of Princess Euphemia.
• Meaningful Name: Suzaku and his late father, Genbu. His Knightmare's name qualifies, too.
  • A bit of Fridge Brilliance. The Phoenix rises from its ashes (or lays egg before it burns), so it's, kind of, immortal. Lelouch geassed Suzaku to live on, with the same 'rise from the ashes' effect. Not literally, of course.
• Meet Cute: With Princess Euphemia. Not just their vertical Crash Into Hello (when she falls on top of him while "escaping" imaginary villains), but the whole sequence that follows, which is arguably the happiest and most unambiguously romantic sequence in the series. So you just know things are going to go well from then on.
• Memento Mac Guffin: His Disappeared Dad's old pocket watch, which once saves him from death, as he's shot at very close range but the watch stops the bullet. When he leaves it with Euphie's body, it's a symbol of him finally letting go of the past and his Wide Eyed Idealism.
• Memetic Badass: Courtesy of his "Spinzaku kick".
• Meta Guy: Becomes this in the Picture and Audio Dramas, especially those from the R2 timeframe.
• The Mc Coy
• Mike Nelson Destroyer Of Worlds: Accidentally triggers the destruction of the area he had sworn to protect. Whoops.
• Moral Myopia: Toward the second season (really, anytime after Euphemia's death), he ultimately committed many of the same violent acts he decried earlier on. Arguably even before that, where he really has no problem with the massacre of every citizen in the Shinjuku ghetto, and even aids in it by removing the only thing keeping it at bay (the terrorists). In general, Suzaku seems to hold the belief that it's ok for Britannia to act this way because they're in charge, but no one else can no matter how justified it may be.
• My God What Have I Done: He has three of these. First, when C.C accidentally undoes his Trauma Induced Amnesia and he remembers that he murdered his father. Second, when he attempts to drug Kallen to get information out of her but stops himself from doing so at the last moment, realizing it's the kind of underhanded tactic he despises Zero for using. Third, when he fires the FLEIJA nuke while under the effect of his "Live" Geass, kills thirty million people (mostly on his side) and spends anentire episode brooding at the epicenter of the disaster.
• My Hero Zero: After Lelouch becomes The Emperor, he became the Knight of Zero. Later in the story, as part of the Zero Requiem, he's required to drop "Knight of" from his title and wear a mask.
• Playing Against Type: Suzaku's seiyuu, Takahiro Sakurai, is often typecast as an anti-hero, or an angsty loner (such as Cloud Strife in Advent Children). The English dub follows suit by picking Yuri Lowenthal (who happens to play Sasuke Uchiha and Alvis of Naruto and MAR respectively). Obviously this only counts for the first season.
  • Except that Yuri had played other straight heroes, most notably Superman in Legion Of Super-Heroes.
• Put Into The Cockpit: In the beginning, he became the pilot of the Lancelot because he was the only soldier around. Everyone else was kicking lots of puppies in the Japanese Ghetto, so Lloyd and Cecile make him go out in the mecha.
• Prophetic Name: His name can mean "phoenix". Guess who "dies" at the end of the series and is "reborn" as an entirely new person.
• The Quisling: Ingratiates himself quite thouroughly into Britannian culture, particularly after he becomes the Knight of Seven.
• Red Baron: "The White Grim Reaper".
• Ron The Death Eater: For reasons similar to Lelouch. And especially, coming from the most rabid Lelouch fans.
• Ryu And Ken To Kallen
• Screw The Rules, I'm Doing What's Right: Up for debate. Suzaku, the pilot of a Humongous Mecha, punched the mech's designer in the face when he didn't let him go out and fight, as they weren't given orders to delpoy. This is a big shift for pro-rules Suzaku. Now whether you consider his actions following this justice-driven or revenge-driven decides whether this belongs here.
• Self Made Orphan: At the age of nine, he stabbed his own father to death, the prime minister of Japan, in order to put an end to the war. See also Disappeared Dad, above.
• Sensitive Guy And Manly Man: He seems like this for part of the series, but it's a facade.
• Shut Up Hannibal:
  Lelouch (still in Zero persona): Euphemia randomly murdered throngs of innocent Japanese people. You fight for a woman like —
  Suzaku: (interrupts) Your Geass power is quite convenient, isn't it? You get to hide in the shadows while others take all the blame for doing your dirty work. You're just an arrogant coward. That's your true nature, the real you.
• Spanner In The Works: Aside from the fact that he is usually the one to spoil Lelouch's Xanatos Gambit (including his "Live" Geass), Suzaku wouldn't have appeared inside the Sword of Akasha if it weren't for the Batman Gambit of Marianne, who was probably counting on either his love for her stepdaughter Euphie or his friendship with her Soul Jar Anya... which backfired when Suzaku sided with Lelouch regardless. If he hadn't been there, Charles and Marianne could have had a better chance of succeeding.
• Tall Dark And Handsome: He's 5'9" (175 cms) which is just above average, but the rest checks out.
• To Be Lawful Or Good
• Took A Level In Jerkass: Quite a few levels in fact in R2. Though given everything that happens to him over the course of the series, it's sort of Justified.
• The Unfettered: Later in the series.
• Unwitting Pawn: Suzaku is an earnest, well meaning lad with a healthy respect for authority stuck in a show filled to the brim with Magnificent Bastards and Chess Masters. As a result, he ends up being everyone's pawn... and often ends up derailing as many gambits as he helps build.
• Wake Up Go To School Save The World
• Well Intentioned Extremist: He is. This, in turn, subverts the trope where mandatorily one and only one of the two arch-rivals is the Well Intentioned Extremist, since BOTH of them fit the trope.
• White Prince: A deconstruction.
• Wide Eyed Idealist: Initially, though this brutally changes over the course of the series.
• The Woobie: Killed his own father in hopes of bringing peace to Japan as a child and being stuck with the guilt all of his life, gets put down for being an Honorary Britannian on both fronts almost constantly by all but the likes of Euphemia, Darlton, Cecile, Lloyd and his Student Council friends throughout the first season, loses his girlfriend in one of the worst ways EVER, and accidentally causes the destruction of Tokyo Settlement in season 2 and loses the last vestiges of his sanity in the process.
• Would Not Shoot A Civilian: To the core. At least at first. He fights the Japanese resistance — or any attempt (legitimate or otherwise) to free Japan — precisely because it endangers civilians. Even in the heat of battle, Suzaku goes out of his way not to harm civilians, even if it means disobeying direct orders. (For example, in the very first episode, he refuses to shoot Lelouch — although in that instance he also has personal reasons, as he and Lelouch are long-time friends.) Of course, the tragic irony is that Britannia is just as likely to harm Japanese civilians as the terrorists are, sometimes more so, and Suzaku participates (albeit very indirectly) in the first episode's massacre. At any rate, his previously iron-clad Would Not Shoot A Civilian position starts to crack after the first season, and it dissolves completely after the F.L.E.I.J.A. incident.
  • But to put a little context on it, Geass has pretty much stripped his free will at the critical aversions of this trope. It's a bit harsh to call him a hypocrite when Supernatural Phlebotinum makes the decision for him.
    • Actually, he still had responsibility for the F.L.E.I.J.A. incident, because chose to carry said weapon into battle, and chose to remain and be killed by Kallen rather than retreat when he knew about said command and how it kept him from getting himself killed. At best, he had a monentary lapse of reason. All of that aside, the incident made him realize that no matter how hard he tried doing things the way he wanted to, he was continuously responsible for the deaths of many people, and the F.L.E.I.J.A. explosion made this brutally evident, leading him to abandon his pacifistic intentions, none of which had any potential for success in his position.
• You Are Number Six: Is by definition, as a Japanese native, a Number. Ironically enough in R2, he refers to Kallen by her prisoner number when he requests Nunnally, who is conversing with her, to allow him to interrogate her. A signal of his further descent, especially in that he, the nation and the fellow countrymen he fights for are Numbers.
• Yuri Lowenthal: Suzaku's English VA