#final fantasy vii rant

[roeyliteratiforever]

"My impression of Cloud and Tifa relationship is that is based on guilt trip, projection and childish infatuation, mostly coming from Tifa."

I'm sorry when has Tifa ever guilt tripped Cloud?? She's been nothing but supportive to him. She's the sweetest girl she's never guilt tripped him at all. She has been worried about him because she knows his mental state is not well, but she has held his hand and helped him through it along the way.

What is Tifa projecting on to Cloud anyways?? She hasn't projected anything onto Cloud.

Childish infatuation?? Tifa has loved Cloud since she was a little girl, but grew up and still loved him and stood by his side despite all the obstacles and trauma her and Cloud both went through!

"This is why I don't like Tifa, because of how she treats Cloud and her jealousy issues when in reality...Cloud never was hers to begin with, so I don't see why she has this mindset that 'he promised to save me so he must still like me' which is false Tifa, in my opinion, needs to grow up and realize that Cloud isn't the only option."

Tifa treats Cloud wonderfully I don't know what game You've been playing, but she definitely does not treat him bad. It's normal for people to get jealous sometimes! Aerith gets jealous all the time and it's cute but when Tifa gets jealous it's not?? Cloud made a promise to her and she held that close to her heart as did Cloud! They both valued that promise because that was the moment they realized the both had deep feelings for each other.

I'm so over the Tifa hate! I love Tifa and Aerith both, and it's perfectly fine if you ship Clerith, but Tifa is an amazing character and y'all are just making stuff up at this point!

[withgreatpowercomesmyfuckingdick]

Imagine what it’s like being Lazard. Your top three employees according to fate are a 1) silver haired cat-man with three cycles of NPC dialogue he cycles through before he’s socially useless, who carries a sword longer than his body and is scarily proficient at his job and apparently nothing else 2) a fucking ginger (derogatory) obsessed with an old poem he recites regularly that’s our contextual equivalent of quoting Homer in day to day conversation, and is always cat fighting with the cat man because he can’t stand not being the center of attention, whose only redeeming quality is that he’s more conscious of keeping up public appearances and that’s only on the days he isn’t feeling Pyromaniacal and then 3) one singular semi-functional man that’s perpetually tired from mentoring others and babysitting his coworkers, who has such a rigid sense of honor that you could hit it with the Buster and it wouldn’t give. And that guy is probably depressed

Honestly it’s a miracle he didn’t snap before Crisis Core. Being the manager for that group would’ve put me in a fucking coma

[justyouraveragerpgfan]

Ok, what in the AI is this????

If you look closely, Masamune looks off, the belts look wrong, there are buckles in places there shouldn't be, Sephiroth's sleeves are too loose, etc.

Dear MTG and Square, if you want to make money off of artwork, please use artwork drawn by PEOPLE, not an amalgamation of STOLEN artwork generated by a COMPUTER PROGRAM. And especially don't credit an artist (name in the bottom left corner) for something a computer program made. And why the fuck would y'all, these huge, multi-million dollar companies, feel the need to use AI instead of HIRING ARTISTS. It's beyond me.

I am VERY pissed off, how do you screw up one of the most FAMOUS SCENES IN GAMING???

I'll just stick to collecting Pokémon cards, they never use AI for those.

[aleeeeeeeeeeeeeeee]

I fucking HATE post-cc Sephiroth, I DESPISE him, I need him DEAD. I WOULD FIGHT THAT MF HAND TO HAND IF I HAD THE OPPORTUNITY I WON'T STOP UNTIL THAT PANTENE AD HAIR HE HAS DISAPPEARS AND LEAVES HIM WITH A HEAD AS SMOOTH AS THE ROCK'S

The only thing that's stopping me are his big gagazongas. Like. What was the need to have them all out like that. Why am I suddenly seeing this man in ways I never thought I would.

Am I a homosexual?

[ilminnestrone]

Can we stop using any excuse to ruin other people's fandom experience because they dared to joke (and I repeat, joke) about a theory (and I repeat, theory) that we don't like?

Can we stop using a purism and orthodoxy worthy of a theocracy to be unapproachable fucking gatekeepers, convinced that we are the bearers of the one and only true way and that everyone else is a bunch of idiots who clearly have absolutely no understanding of the media they are fans of?

Can we stop treating our interests as museum pieces to be kept under glass, and setting off alarms every time someone tries to interact with them in a light, spontaneous, fun way?

What the fuck is the point of engaging with fan communities if you are so comfortable all by yourselves, locked up in your bedrooms wanking, in the perfect belief that the characters you love are your exclusive property?

And yes (yes, YES), I am referring especially to Vincent's fans, who are so toxic that they made me walk away from one of my favourite characters. When they were handing out kindness and a sense of humour, you were standing in line for self-entitlement.

[eschercaine]

Seeing young Sephiroth in Ever Crisis and young Aerith in Remake got my brain working up.

What if, you know, the two of them met when they were young? They are close with each other before Aerith and her mother flee Shinra. (Thanks for this wonderful fanart. Love this! ❤️) But she and Sephiroth promised that they would see each other again.

Sephiroth and Aerith met again during the events of Crisis Core. And instead of Zack (Sorry, man.), Sephiroth became her lover. Maybe in this scenario, he didn’t go mad after learning the truth of his existence but he was struggling with himself.

The only bad guys here are probably Shinra corporation for experimenting on people and draining the planet.

...Ah, what a good fanfic it would be. 🥲

[buffaloborgine]

Before reading, I want to emphasize, I don't hate Sephiroth as a character, I hate how some people dismiss all of his heinous acts and cling to "He is a victim" and shove the tragedy he caused onto other characters. About that one post about Sephiroth and someone replying to it, let me be clear: I don't deny Sephiroth was a victim. Like many, he was the victim of Shinra and Hojo, that's undeniable. But to write like he is a good person and all the bad things he did were influenced by his upbringing? NO. Sephiroth is selfish, and no matter what you try to bend the narrative to fit your imagination, it is a fact. When the theme of FFVII is about "imagination/illusion", if we use the structure of protagonist vs antagonist, Cloud is the one that was affected by the illusion but he accepted help from others and got over it. Sephiroth would simply be the reversed version of that, he wasn't even illusioned, he knew for sure what he is but deciding that it was better for him if everyone else, and even himself stayed in that illusion forever. Sephiroth wasn't the only character to be affected by Shinra's evilness, but then let's take a look at those who also were affected: - Zack once learned and accepted that Shinra is evil had started running away with Cloud. - Angeal and Genesis don't share the same reaction but eventually once accepted the truth, they both rebelled against Shinra (also Lazard). - The Turks and Rufus are easy to see, I don't need to explain. - The massacred 1st SOLDIER unit mentioned in Dirge of Cerberus, fighting against the creation of inhuman Deepground facility. - Deepground themselves, they know what they are and they fought against Shinra, knowing they would even die if they do. So many would say, but Sephiroth does disobey Shinra and that he wanted to leave Shinra. Vetoing orders onto co-workers' heads doesn't seem to be a good way to protest, rather that's just push the responsibility onto others. And about "wanting to leave Shinra", as far as I remember, Sephiroth just said he would consider the idea, not that he would ever leave, and even till the event of Nibelheim, he didn't leave Shinra, not at all. So let's put this together, should we just see Sephiroth as a victim and say he isn't accounted for other tragedy happened in FFVII? Personally? Of course not. There are other victims and they fought back their abuser in different ways, maybe causing mayhem on the route but they still fought for their freedom. Sephiroth has never once given a single thought for others, and he was comfortable staying in Shinra, after all, he got the privilege for 1st Class, can veto orders and get admired by other SOLDIERs. To debunk people who claim that Sephiroth was thoughtful about Genesis' injury: Who was the one causing that mess in the first place? And even when you look at the cutscene, it was less of caring thought but more of "Why I am inadequate for this?" If he was sincere, he would have gone to check on Genesis later, but nope, he assumed Genesis was fine, like really, what kind of friend is that? No fucking friend would just assume friend is fine knowing they are hurt, no fucking friend would just condemn friends as traitor while not knowing the reason why they leave, and no fucking friend would keep their friends in the dark while knowing they are being tricked, abused. In conclusion, please stop saying Sephiroth is a good friend to anyone. If he cannot earn Zack's forgiveness, he is a prick, but if even Weiss stood against him (in DFFOO), consider he surely won't get any redemption.

[tifa-simp]

Why does every word speak for Tifa?

Tifa's signs of trauma are scattered throughout the game, some are obvious, some are subtle, but they all realistic reactions to all the things that have happened to her. Tifa is strong, yes, but she's also scared and confused. There are so much she still needs to learn and grow. And hopefully part 3 will do her character journey justice.

[hooty09]

One-Winged Angel Analysis

Okay so Sephiroth’s theme..! I was looking at the English translations and found some interesting stuff. The first set of lyrics, which are usually “Estuans Interius, Ira Vehementi,” translate to “Burning inside, with violent anger.” This translates to Sephiroth’s true feelings towards humanity itself, despite many people’s mischaracterization of him being a teasing and “hopeless romantic” for Cloud. Really, the way he behaves towards Cloud comes from a spot of hatred and anger in his heart for just how easily Cloud was able to sneak up on him and impale his torso with the buster sword. Depending on the version of FF7, Sephiroth was either thrown into the life stream below the Mt. Nibel reactor, or he jump in himself. Sephiroth’s consciousness was only able to survive in the life stream without being absorbed because of the Jenova cells flowing inside him, and his status as an “unnatural life form” due to the super human abilities of the mako (mixed with Jenova cells. Normal SOLDIERS, who are also infused with Mako, are able to be absorbed by the life stream). The many times you actually see Sephiroth in game are actually just clones of him using parts of Jenova’s body, while his true body is in the North Crater. This all ties to the “Ne me mori facias” lyric, which translates to “do not let me die.” Sephiroth cheated death and was able to rise to the strength of a god, and his desperate hold on immortality is shown in this lyric. The next new words, “Gloriosa” and “Generosa” mean Glorious and Noble. This ties to Sephiroth’s belief that his actions are “good,” due to what humanity did to Jenova. Tying everything together is his main goal in FF7, which is to summon meteor and make a rift in the life stream, where the essence will clot up. Sephiroth will be in the center of the wound, absorbing the lifestream essence and becoming a god. With this, Sephiroth would be the last (known) living being in existence, which is the empty fate he refers to. All in all, while Sephiroth’s true theme would actually be “Those Chosen by the Planet,” his battle theme “One-Winged Angel” puts so much more depth into his character to study. One-Winged Angel focuses on Sephiroth’s fall from grace, and his idea of fate. In the new FF7 remake trilogy, fate is emphasized as the main idea of the games, and this ties in with Sephiroth’s character (as well as other characters) so much more. I made the gif below myself btw. THE END!!!

[protemporescitor]

"But she ded tho" (a.k.a. the dumbest argument against Clerith) - A rant

To expand on my previous post, in which I posited the crazy, far-fetched theory that in a fantasy setting mayhap death is not the relationship brick wall that it would be in a more grounded, realistic one*, I just want to bring up a few points to further buttress this off-the-wall notion.

"Cloud can't be with Aerith. She's dead!"

We've all heard it a thousand times. It is the argument most commonly levelled against Clerith. It is also the worst (and laziest) one.

It's often delivered in a declamatory and glib fashion, as though it were some sort of obvious conversation ender. Q.E.D. End of debate. The ultimate gotcha. "Checkmate, Clerith fans!" the haters think to themselves, chortling and patting themselves on their backs for this profound insight. (Insert tasteless and juvenile comments about Aerith being "shish kebab-ed" by Sephiroth as desired.)

And all I can think is "That's it? That's your best argument? That's some weak tea, man."

Despite its myriad flaws, this idea continues to radiate throughout the fandom a good quarter century after the original title's release, as though it had never once been challenged. It is a feeble and untenable position, a house built on sand, and one that deserves to be thoroughly demolished. With Rebirth on the horizon, and all the shipping wars nonsense rising from the grave once more as a result, it is high time, if you'll forgive the expression, that we laid this cliché to rest once and for all.

(*Note: Even in a more "realistic" setting lacking any kind of fictional afterlife, this would still be a gross oversimplification of the story's themes of loss, regret, and yearning, as well as entirely ignoring the idea of love transcending death, but we'll set those concerns aside for the time being.)

Lastly, before we begin: This is not an anti-Zerith / CloTi screed. Those pairings both have an undeniable canonical basis. My aim here is simply to demonstrate that the notion that Cloud and Aerith are forever separated by death is rendered invalid by virtue of the type of setting that their story takes place in. (Something that, frankly, one would reasonably assume to be perfectly obvious. Alas, such is not the case. And so I find myself yet again pointing out the glaringly obvious.)

Now, without further ado, let's begin:

Part 1. Before (the Compilation) Crisis

In the beginning, there was the year 1997, and Squaresoft had just released their latest title. And lo, it was good. We spent days and weeks following our favorite polygon people around their embattled little globe. We fought, laughed, cried, and struggled up until the Meteor Crisis reached its crescendo, and the credits rolled. Gosh, what an ending! But what did it all mean? How did things REALLY turn out? Did we get a happy ending at all?

According to some, Cloud lived happily ever after with his childhood sweetheart, Tifa. According to others, he continued to roam the earth in search of his Promised Land to be reunited with his tragic lost love, Aerith. Yuffie swiped everyone's materia (again). Cid finally went to the moon. Red XIII opened a haberdashery in Costa del Sol, or something. No-one really knows for sure.

And so, the fandom began to spread to every corner of the internet in search of answers. Thus began the age of dissension. Opinions clashed across fanzines, blogs, and fanfic country alike. Wild fan theories abounded pertaining to special codes, methods, and blood rituals capable of bringing back our erstwhile flower girl. The fan-made media bubble surrounding the game turned into a lawless land of misinformation and vicious disagreement. None were spared.

A brief digression on why said rumours persisted for as long as they did (CAUTION: Massive spoilers for Chrono Trigger).

One side proposed a simple solution. A way to cut the proverbial Gordian Knot of our fandom. It was quite obvious, really. Just staring everyone in the face. The flower girl was dead, and that was that. Thus, there was only one possible conclusion to our narrative. Cloud's feelings on the matter were, of course, irrelevant. With Aerith out of the picture, the only logical choice left to him was to settle down with Tifa, and that was that. Never mind the themes of doomed, tragic love and the possibility, strongly hinted at throughout the game and outright confirmed during its ending, of existence after death.

Overall, direct evidence for said afterlife was scant, but not entirely absent from the story. As an example, at one point during her childhood, Aerith speaks to Elmyra, trying to comfort her, saying that the spirit of her husband wanted to come visit her, confirming that an afterlife presence did indeed exist. But for some, this simply wasn't evidence enough. And so the war raged on. Which brings us to…

Part 2. Advent Children: The smoking gun

Remember back when a certain portion of the fan base insisted that Gaia erased all the humans at the end of the story, on the flimsy basis that we don't see any during the game's brief post-credit scene? Well, that little theory was neatly undone by subsequent releases in the Compilation, showing regular ol' humans still roaming around Gaia in all their everyday human-ness. Hence, it is rarely brought up these days. Would that the pernicious notion of "but she ded tho" could follow in its footsteps, given that the same film roundly contradicts it in every way possible.

For starters, the film inexplicably bring two characters, Rufus and Tseng, hitherto assumed to be dead, back to life, probably in an effort by Square to shoehorn as many recognizable members of the cast into their animated feature as they could. But that's not all. Next we have three characters that everyone agreed were deader than doornails ALSO making appearances, first in flashbacks, and then directly influencing the world of the living. Zack speaks to and encourages Cloud during his struggle. Aerith reaches out to him (quite literally) from beyond the grave and assists him in defeating Bahamut. And of course Sephiroth pops back into existence just in time for his contractually-obligated boss fight near the end of the film. All three demonstrate quite clearly and definitively that death is not the impenetrable barrier to continuing interactions between the living and the dead in the world of Final Fantasy VII, as a certain segment of the fan base would have everyone believe it is.

To be blunt, I don't know what level of dense you'd have to be to keep up this so-called "argument" in light of this information. Advent Children reiterates what most of us already knew, that our story takes place in a fantasy setting* with a confirmed afterlife existence.

(*You'd think that the name of the series would clue people in.)

The notion that death represents, within the context of said setting, the ultimate end was already softly contradicted by the original game's narrative, and then (because that was apparently too subtle for some people) flat-out annihilated by the existence and events of Advent Children. It should have long since ended this nonsense. But somehow, it didn't. These revelations, obvious though they are, remain ignored for some reason. And so, the cycle of willful ignorance continues.

But we're not done yet. We now move on to more tangential, but still relevant arguments against this line of "reasoning".

Part 3. Stop Hitting Yourself: Why "but she ded tho" is insulting to everyone

And I do mean everyone. Let's examine this, shall we?

It's insulting to Cloud.

To suggest that he loses interest in Aerith the moment she sinks beneath the waters, or that he is obligated to move on simply because she is no longer among the living, with no mourning period, no time to work through his guilt and grief, is to portray him as shallow and uncaring, something that goes against virtually all the characterization that he's been given throughout the story. The line of thinking apparently goes "Well, she's gone. That sucks. She was cute, too. Better move on to the next available piece of meat."

Sounds pretty gross when you write the quiet part out loud, doesn't it?

It's insulting to Aerith.

"Didn't even toss the b@#h a Phoenix Down, just dumped'er in the water LAWL"

I'm sure you've all come across comments like that at some point, usually originating from some errant redditor or blogger. Thinking themselves fine fellows and enlightened, above-it-all gadflies, they provide us at length with this and other prime specimens of 14 year-old internet edgelord "humour" that carries about as much edge as a perfect sphere. Remarks like these serve little purpose beyond confirming my suspicion that our fandom is indeed plagued with illiterates who can't tell the difference between the terms "revive" and "resurrect", and insist on conflating game mechanics with storytelling. And you wonder why some people are confounded by words like "flammable" and "inflammable".

(All right, I'll put the salt down. For now.)

"The party's designated white mage dies, oh no, that's so sad, boo-hoo, life goes on," I hear you say.

But boiling Aerith's role down to one of merely that of a temporary party member who kicks the bucket halfway through the story, never to be heard from again, both cheapens her purpose within the larger narrative and denies the clear effect that she continues to exert, directly and indirectly, on it and the other characters after her passing.

Though Aerith may have departed the world of the living, the story makes it abundantly clear that her influence on it has not ended. There are hints here and there that she still tries to assist her friends from the afterlife. As an example, when the party rediscovers Cloud in Mideel after assuming that he might be lost for good, a villager sums it up best with the following remark: "That boy must have one hell of a guardian angel."

It's only mentioned as a vague hint in the original story, but it is clear that some beneficent force is acting on Cloud and Tifa's behalf, aiding them in their survival and uniting them in the Lifestream in order to help Cloud recover his memories. Later supplemental material confirms that to have been Aerith's doing. If that's not enough to convince you, though, the original game's ending leaves little room for ambiguity as to Aerith's continuing influence. When Holy sputters and fails, she coaxes the Lifestream itself to intervene, burning away the calamitous meteorite, helping her friends put an end to the planetary crisis long after her own demise. I suppose the lesson here for silver-haired godhead wannabe villains is this: Strike her down, and she shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine.

So the idea that Aerith's participation in the story immediately comes grinding to a halt upon her death is both puerile and easily demonstrated to be false. But even if that were the case, downplaying her lingering influence on Cloud and the other characters in this manner would still be ignoring the creators' intent. Whether one interprets Cloud and Aerith's relationship as romantic or merely platonic, it is clear that her death, the loss of one of his closest allies, is something that wounds him deeply, and scars him forever. Two years on, he still pines for her company and desires her forgiveness for his perceived failures. She clearly occupies a special place in his heart, and her memory and legacy live on within him, spurring him on as he wanders the planet, searching for some way to meet her again, defying the impossible. (Which, as we all know, isn't going to happen. This is, after all, Final Gritty Reality we're talking about here.)

Ah, but all of this is a moot point, you say? Even if he did wish to be with her, preferring the company of the last Cetra over that of his childhood friend… well, too bad. That's no longer an option. We can spout all of this verbiage about "soul pain" this and "star-crossed lovers" that, but at the end of the day, Aerith is still dead, and that's that. At least, that's what ardent CloTi fans will insist, no matter what. So, what is Tifa to Cloud, then, by their own logic?

Which brings us to perhaps our most salient, and most overlooked point, at least as far as CloTi shippers are concerned. If all that wasn't enough for you, you may want to consider that it's deeply insulting to Tifa, as well. Grievously so, in fact. Quite possibly more so than any other character in this whole equation. And the reason why should be plain as day if you stop to think about it for a fraction of a second.

Here's the thing… if you can't articulate why you think Cloud would prefer to be with Tifa in spite of Aerith being alive, then you are essentially declaring her the "winner" by default on no other merits than the fact that she's still sucking down air. Stating "but she ded bro" means relegating Tifa to the role of a consolation prize. I don't think I could ever hurl such a staggering insult towards her as her biggest fans keep doing, without even realizing they're doing it.

Ask yourselves, is that really what you want for your supposed favourite character? To frame her as being doomed to eternally play second fiddle to her fallen friend? Cloud's "plan B"? The "side piece"? Someone who only stands a chance if her rival in love is literally six feet under? I'm sure she'd be thrilled by the high regard in which her own fans seem to hold her. (Hey, you said it, not me. It's not my fault if you don't take the time to actually consider the ramifications of what rolls off your keyboard. But by all means, keep insulting your own favorite character just to put down a ship you don't like.)

In closing, if we unearth the subtext and reframe it to highlight what people are, in essence, saying, it's this: "It's a good thing that she-who-shall-not-be-named bit the dust, because otherwise our beloved Best Girl Tifa (tm) wouldn't stand a chance."

It's a simple enough question: Why do you think that Cloud and Tifa belong together? What, in your mind, makes them a good fit for each other?

"Well, the competish is dead." ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Not exactly a ringing endorsement for your best girl, now is it?

Part 4. "Heads, I Win. Tails, You Lose": A brief word on hypocrisy

In fandom, it's often the loudest and most obnoxious voices who tend to drown out the more reasonable ones, those of fans who are just minding their own business and grooving on the thing that they like. Which, unfortunately, renders this next part a necessary component of the greater argument that I'm trying to make. Multishippers and sane, reasonable CloTi and Zerith fans may consider themselves exempted from the following harangue.

The rest of y'all, buckle up.

The too-oft repeated refrain of "but she ded tho" entails a twofold hypocrisy. The first part is:

Case of Tifa: Fan hypocrisy regarding death.

Strident anti-Clerith fans, with their usual level of maturity, will often bring up Aerith's demise in a gleeful, mocking tone that can best be summed up as "ding dong, the witch is dead!" And if the shoe were on the other foot? If their Best Girl Tifa (tm) were the one pushing up daisies instead of Miz Gainsborough? Would they be quite so cavalier in their attitudes?

Who wants to bet that these fans wouldn't be making this "argument" so loudly if it was their ship that was in question? Consider this scenario: Suppose that the remake trilogy does the unthinkable and has Tifa die in Aerith's place. What then? Would they accept that "but she ded tho" is, at best, a double-edged sword, one that applies equally to their own favourite ship were their fortunes to be reversed?

Something tells me that's not the case.

But if you think that's hypocritical, you ain't seen nothing yet. This first point pales in comparison to…

The Zerith Exemption: Fan hypocrisy regarding the afterlife.

You know what my favourite thing about this whole debacle is? When people inform me that because they are separated by death, Cloud and Aerith have no hope of ever being together again. They will then unironically pivot to shipping Zack and Aerith, two characters who are together in the MOTHERFUCKING AFTERLIFE.

It's wild. How do you even compress that much cognitive dissonance into one skull? We're talking about mind-melting, Olympic medal-worthy levels of mental gymnastics here.

Now, before someone accuses me of being morose, I'm not suggesting that Cloud hop off the nearest cliff just to be with his beloved (Aerith would not approve of him throwing his life away, for one), just that when he reaches the end of his natural life (which may not be too long, given the cells eating away at his body), he can finally be reunited with her in the afterlife.

Many ardent CloTi shippers see themselves as bound by law to uphold Zerith as a shield against the dreaded Clerith plague. But to proclaim, implicitly or explicitly, that the afterlife encompasses one but not the other is not an idea that can be taken seriously. It remains an utterly bizarre blind spot, one that beggars belief.

On a related note, there is the infamous misconception that is…

Part 5. The ZaCloud Fallacy

While this is not directly related to my main point, I nonetheless find myself compelled to address this issue. There is a long-standing confusion that bedevils our fandom, one that has its roots in the Shipping Wars (tm). I am, of course, referring to the ZaCloud Fallacy.

We owe this particular misapprehension to Crisis Core, a prequel/gaiden game that was released ten years after the original FFVII. Already, its existence can mess up the timeline, so to speak, as, strangely, people tend to treat it as a sequel rather than a prequel, and as though it were adding new and vital building blocks to the world of FFVII instead of merely distorting the original story while retreading it with a far less interesting cast of characters. It also retcons major elements of the original story that it shouldn't have (such as the events taking place in Nibelheim five years prior to the main narrative), lazily steals Clerith scenes only to rehash them with Zack and Aerith, and forces players to endure, at length, crimes against literature, courtesy of Genesis.

It's an odd prequel, to say the least, given how heavily it relies on the original story for context. Sequentially, it may take place before FFVII, but it can only be fully appreciated with the original in mind; it cannot be treated as a stand-alone story. The worst thing about Crisis Core existing is that playing it first can outright ruin people's perception of the original narrative by spoiling several major plot elements and even lessening them in the process. Crisis Core's writers are especially guilty of cheapening dramatic moments like Zack's last stand by transforming it from a quiet, tragic, harrowing scene about sacrifice to an utterly over-the-top and emotionally overwrought trainwreck. It all merely serves to add to the confusion, especially for gamers who started with this title instead of the original.

But if that were not enough, Crisis Core's reckless meddling with the story combined with the acrimonious and all-consuming nature of the shipping wars has resulted in one of the most nonsensical misconceptions in the entire fandom. During Crisis Core's ending, Zack implores Cloud to carry on his legacy, thus giving rise to the erroneous assumption that Cloud's behaviour in disc 1 is merely that of him "being Zack". Clerith-hating fans, in particular, pounced on this idea as a way to put a safe distance between him and Aerith, characterizing their interactions, whether platonic or romantic, as merely a case of Cloud utilizing Zack's memories and personality around her (Never mind that Zack and Cloud's personalities are as different as night and day).

It is a fundamental and willful misreading of the story, a gross oversimplification of a more complex and granular truth in service of a fan-originated meta-narrative, one that has been assembled in order to reach the conclusion that Cloud and Aerith's relationship is null and void, and that therefore the romance between him and Tifa remains unchallenged. (Never mind that the story is intended as more than just some playground tug-of-war romance). To maintain this lie is to do violence to the story by destroying Cloud's character arc and reducing him to a virtual non-entity until the very end of the game.

Having already been rebuked in regards to this pervasive delusion, certain fans have tried to hedge their bets by suggesting a second, more advanced version of this idea. ZaCloud Fallacy 2.0, if you will, which states that Cloud is only in Zack Mode (tm) when he's around Aerith. I don't even know what to say about that sort of nonsense. To paraphrase Charles Babbage, I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such an assertion.

I'd go into this in more detail, but YouTube creator LinkOnTheBrink has already covered this topic extensively in their superlative video essay "How Shipping Can Ruin a Narrative".

It may seem like I'm trashing Zack or Zerith here, but I'm really not. That was never my intent. So let me be clear about this: I like Zack. I just hate Crisis Core and what it's done to this fandom. If you prefer CloTi and Zerith to everything else, I don't much mind. Ultimately, this isn't about shipping wars nonsense, but protecting the narrative from such nonsense.

And that leads us to…

Part 6. I Against I: Where the fandom went wrong

We all know that the infamous FFVII Shipping Wars (tm) are as stupid as they are inescapable. Anyone who's spent any time at all within this fandom has inevitably run afoul of them and their detritus at some point, whether they've chosen to participate in them or abstain from the whole debacle. But there's a reason why this acrimonious dispute has raged on for as long as it has. Much like Blade Runner fans would argue until they were blue in the face about whether or not Deckard was a replicant, fans of this story have been squabbling about CloTi versus Clerith for ages for similar reasons. (Zerith got roped in as a "political wedge", I would argue, as much as a pairing in its own right.)

It's more than just a war over shipping, it's a war over canonization, over character motivation and psychology. Of how we ultimately interpret the story and its characters. Given the vagueness of the story's ending, one can't help but wonder and speculate as to how everyone ended up afterwards. (Advent Children and Dirge of Cerberus may have offered some answers, but they still largely sidestep these questions in a noncommittal, to-be-continued manner.)

The problem is that, for many fans, it isn't possible to simply say "It's my preference" and be done with the matter. Unlike most rarepairs and bananas pairings like Cait x Jenova, CloTi and Clerith remain hotly contested because they go beyond mere shipping, or even aesthetic preference, or which characters one most identifies with; they lie at the core of how we perceive the story and its inhabitants. In that sense, I don't consider it to be an entirely frivolous debate, just an unsolvable one.

So, what's the answer?

There's this long-standing piece of received wisdom about JRPGs vs. WRPGs, where the latter involves more freedom at the expense of focused storytelling, and vice versa. This idea might hold true to some extent, but it is not some iron law that must be obeyed without question. For a game like FFVII, choices that radically affect the narrative structure would be considered an aberration and not the norm. And yet, it might represent the only way out of this quagmire that doesn't involve throwing half the fandom under the bus in the process.

For me, Mass Effect and similar titles (e.g., Quest for Glory) have already presented an obvious solution: Let the players choose. (There is already some precedent in the form of the Gold Saucer scene, although it ultimately doesn't change the outcome of the story all that much.) It may not be a perfect solution, but I'd argue that it's far better than leaving one side out in the cold. At least this way, everyone gets something.

"Ah, but this is not feasible," I hear you respond. "Not for an Eastern-style RPG, at least. Only one of these pairings can be correct, and one must, above all, respect the creator's vision."

Yeah, look where that got us.

Part 7. As You Like It: Ship whatever you please (just stop this nonsense)

I realize that this little essay of mine has been digressive, rudimentary, rambling, extemporaneous, and scattershot. So let me try to reach some kind of meaningful conclusion here.

Much of this anti-Clerith rhetoric we've seen over the years seems to stem from a place of insecurity, whether it's murmuring "but she ded tho", claiming that Cloud was only ever Zack in disc 1, inventing a fictional sex scene underneath the Highwind from whole cloth, and so on… The thing is, there is no need for it. Clerith and CloTi both exist canonically. Even the game manual says as much, describing Cloud, Tifa, and Aerith's relationship as a love triangle. In other words, the love triangle is what's canon, and the rest is by and large up for interpretation. (Zerith also canonically exists, and we've known this since the OG.)

The true reason why this whole disagreement has gone on for eternity, I suspect, has less to do with any debate over canonicity alone than it does the sheer enmity and pettiness that it has continued to spark for so long. It has metastasized over the years, going from being a mere squabble over which pair is canon to an exercise in holding the other side in contempt. That endless cycle of disrespect and reprisals is undoubtedly where it all went wrong in the first place. (If I had a nickel for every time someone commented "but she ded tho" or "wHy iS zAcK bLoNd iN tHiS pIc?" when someone posts a piece of Clerith fan art, I'd have a pretty nice collection of coins by now.)

Obviously, we should all try to just click off when we encounter content that we dislike, but it's not always easy, especially when something we harbour a strong aversion to is so deeply enmeshed within something that we do enjoy. And so, our fight-or-flight instinct kicks in. Before you ask, yes, I'm as guilty of that as anyone else.

Still, I firmly believe that the occasional olive branch can go a long way. So let me simply say that I have the utmost respect for Tifa and Zack. They are worthy characters in their own right. So create and share all the CloTi/Zerith fan works your little hearts desire. Hire a fleet of skywriters to declare Zerith your favourite couple. Throw a giant CloTi parade through the middle of Times Square. We don't mind. Honestly.

As stated above, whether it's CloTi, Clerith, or Zerith, you can stop fretting over which one is canon; they all are. The other three permutations (Zakkura, Zifa, AerTi) don't get much in the way of canon acknowledgement, but they probably should at this point.

In the end, this is about saving the narrative from the shipping wars, as much as anything else. To say that you prefer CloTi or something else to Clerith is fine. To assert that Clerith doesn't exist in any form, however, is where I begin to take exception.

Ultimately, I say ship what you like. All I ask is that you retire this sort of narrative-wasting nonsense. It's time we threw it into the garbage can of gaming history where it belongs. As for questions of motives, character interpretation, canonization, and so forth… if we cannot reach an accord, then let us at least try for a more amicable disagreement.

As for my fellow Clerith supporters, the next time you see the withered old canard that is "but she ded tho" being bandied about in the wild, feel free to laugh and treat it with the derision and contempt that it so richly deserves.

[divan-daikon]

there is a certain sense of calm i get when i block out all the ff7 stuff that came after the og game like

the way sephiroth is so majorly hyped up in every single release after the og is a bit interesting after returning to the og game for a while. bro doesn't even have the singular wing that people now mostly know him with

that also makes me think that the name of his theme is supposed to be symbolic rather than a little more literal with the wing reveal in advent children (im not sure if that was the first reveal of it but still)

"one-winged angel" without the added on literal wing on him is such an interesting train of thought to me. like it tells of someone who used to be good natured and kind (or maybe pretended to be) and then was cast out like lucifer for example. his other wing, the one that let him fly and reach heaven, was forcibly ripped out of his back or something. but then again i can never explain my thoughts well so this might read as stupid drabble and maybe not even sound like sephiroth at all

still, i value just looking at the og material for what it is, especially now with the remake series n stuff

its also funny to me that most people forget that mr angel man is literally dead for the entirety of the of game. like, he's snoozing in his crystal

he barely even says anything when you finally go fight him. says a few sentences at the start then, wham, he shuts tf up and fucking dies

og sephiroth almost seems underwhelming compared to all his other counterparts in later titles and appearances, and i find that i maybe like that a bit more

ofc this is just my opinion that i may or may not have worded in a readable manner, and i might also have not taken certain details into account bc i forgor do feel free to correct me on anything

[roeyliteratiforever]

(Rebirth Spoilers) I am so tired of shippers in the fandom trying to cheapen Cloud and Tifa's kiss, and say "Cloud only kissed Tifa because he was rebounding." Rebounding from what?! Cloud has known Tifa almost his whole life and has had feelings for her for such a long time at this point! He knew Aerith for what a couple of weeks?! I'm not saying that Cloud and Aerith don't have a cute bond, but I'm tired of people trying to to cheapen Cloud's feelings for Tifa or acting like she is some rebound. If she was such a rebound for him why didn't he kiss Aerith?? Someone was trying to tell me that the almost kiss between Cloud and Tifa in Gongaga was also him rebounding "because he was so hurt because he though Aerith still has feelings for Zack" (which yes she does she will always love Zack but that's not the point) Cloud and Tifa had a moment in Gongaga after he thought he nearly lost her and stayed up all night watching over her to make sure she was okay and then they have a heart to heart where Cloud opens up to her and gets vulnerable for the first time ever with anyone! Cloud has never opened up his feelings to anyone else, and in that moment he wanted to kiss Tifa because that's how he felt not because he was rebounding! Look it's fine if you ship Clerith that's valid, but it's so annoying when shippers try to gaslight us into thinking Cloud doesn't really have feelings for Tifa or she is just a rebound when clearly that is not true! Cloud kissed Tifa because he loves her and always has! If you really think Cloud is the type of person to use someone that has always loved him like that then I really don't understand why you would want him with Aerith anyways.

[withgreatpowercomesmyfuckingdick]

something that’s always going to take me out about the ff7 fandom is that you WILL tag sephiroth on the post. doesn’t matter what the post is about. sephiroth is tagged. is he even in the room with us? no, but he’s in the tags, and it’s absolutely hilarious

[ff7-has-taken-me-over]

I never talk about it but I fucking adore Cloud’s name. Like, I love how easily you can turn his name into this whole array of stupid little mushy nicknames/pet names.

It’s probably one of my favourite tropes within the Zakkura ship (cause I have no idea if it’s the same with any of his other ships and out of the AGSZC ship, Zack’s still the only one that does it)

I just love seeing all the stupid, lovely little nicknames that Zack gives Cloud and the way he sometimes gets so wildly embarrassed while other times he can’t help but grudgingly accept them.

[professional-sephiroth-scrungler]

Seriously not a fan of Sephiroth’s new costume. I just saw it and it’s such a huge yuck for me. Like, yeah fictional character blah blah but this character is still 12-15. It looks like a “fan service” costume but that’s not okay because you are giving “fan service” of a 12-15 year old character. What “fans” are you “servicing” with this costume? Hopefully I don’t even have to say it. Ugh. I don’t care if it’s like “oh, lore and shinra implications.”

I’m not trying to be toxic or have discourse or anything. Think what you will about it, but it’s pretty gross to me.

[ilminnestrone]

This was originally meant as a reply to @rottenpumpkin13, but I didn't want to drown her in an endless rant, so I'll continue here.

A lot of fanwork that depicts homosexuality has its roots in mysogyny. I said what I said. That doesn't mean I don't enjoy it myself, I wasn't brought up in a magical bubble and everyone is entitled to their kinks, including me. I'm an AFAB masochist sub with a humiliation kink, so believe me when I say it's perfectly fine to enjoy things that could be considered mysoginistic in the safety of our bedrooms.

Let's start with the obvious here: the seme/uke stereotype has obvious homophobic roots, especially when it is culturally appropriated and taken out of its original context (a context in which it is mainly aimed at young women who want to identify with the uke character). The sterotype being:

the top is always the dominant one, he's tough and strong, sometimes even sadistic and brutal and quite abusive;

the bottom is always submissive and breedable, feminine, frail and small, and he looks like he's not really enjoying himself.

Let me stress the homophobia in case it's not clear: you have to be feminine to enjoy dick. And let me stress the mysogyny: you have to be frail and not really into sex to be feminine.

So here we are: bottom-shaming (yes, it's a real thing!) was a thing even in ancient Greece and Rome. "To be fucked in the ass" still means "to have it bad" in Italian. The point is that being penetrated is humiliating because it's something women do, and being a woman is inherently bad. And if it's humiliating it must be painful too. Both the giver and the receiver orgasms are always depicted as some sort of debasing punishment.

There is no such thing as top and bottom stereotypes we portray in our fanwork in real homosexual relationships. Bulky hairy men can be submissive bottoms. Small twinks can be relentless tops. Most gay people switch. The younger partner can top the older. People with the same body type have sex (and it's actually easier that way, this comes from someone who's 5' and can't do certain things because of size difference!).

You know how much I love @birdblacksocialclub. One of the reasons being the fact she depicts achillean men in a realistic way: her Genesis and Sephiroth are both slender and muscular, roughly the same size and they want to have sex with each other because they're both young and hot. Who's the top? Probably Sephiroth, but it's actually unclear most of the time. Who's the dominant one? Ah, it depends, it's a battle of wits. Who's mainly? Both, because they're fucking men in their twenties. Who enjoy himself most? BOTH. They're smug and hedonistic about it. They're having sex for God's sake, it's one of the most pleasurable things in life alongside with pizza and punching a nazi.

This isn't really going anywhere. It's just my desire to see more variety and realness in gay fiction. I want to be able to find a Bottom!Sephiroth fic and not be overwhelmed because it's the first one I've ever read. I want people not to see a soft-spoken and queer coded character and immediately assume he wants to be pegged. I don't want people depict oral sex as submissive (it could be but it realy depends on how you do it). I don't want people to portray a character as small and feminine just to get him fucked.

And fucking please, let bottoms enjoy sex. We do. A lot. I swear to God, we're not suffering (even if we whine).

(And yeah, this is basically why I can't really stomach Omegaverse stuff).