I've watched Code Geass: Akito of the Exiled

The decision to tell it as 5 hour long OVAs makes it effectively a 5 act play, which I find awesome.

Akito is the title character, but I feel like Leila is the real lead, in both the POV character sense and who the story's about sense.

I'm always intrigued by the Japanese interest in the French Revolution.  In this case it is the legacy of an alternate history version of the Revolution that lingers over much of the plot.

The story was good and I highly recommend it.

But it is much darker in tone then the Series.  Not as much of the fun scenes.  But doesn't feel like it's egregiously doing that for the pretentiousness of it the way Batman V Superman did.

I watched them Subbed because that's all we have right now.  The Code Geass series I've still only seen dubbed.  The first thing I notice in that regard is how kind of weird it is to see characters expressing racist attitudes towards the Japanese, when they're speaking Japanese.

I also find it amusing that the Eleven designation it used outside Britannia, by people at war with Britannia.  That doesn't seem logical to me.


Spoilers Ahead!!!!!!






I'm really unsure whether or not the story might have been better if they didn't shoehorn Suzaku and Lelouch into it.

They only contribute anything substantial to episode 3, and even there could have been done differently.  They never interact with the protagonists, just the villains, they are basically there for the Worf Effect, and to reference things potential new viewers wouldn't get.

Still the potential is there for their scenes to be really good for their fans.  From what I can gather in Japan they have the same voice actors they always did.  But for me I won't really be able to connect them to the characters I know and decide if they're in-character or not till I hear Johnny Yong Bosch and Lowenthal perform these scenes.

Thing is, C.C.'s scene is the ideal way to do a Cameo from the original main cast in an EU spin off, for something of this genre with this kind of lore.  But her Cameo may have felt more meaningful if they hadn't already dangled the other two stars in front of us.

Then Rollo shows up at the very end to help sell the idea that this bridges the gap between R1 and R2.  I never perceived there to be a gap, but whatever.