Aerith Thoughts

Aerith thoughts

I like to imagine that Aerith slowly got over Zack after going on her adventure saving the world with friends.

For those who have been in relationships or at least had a boyfriend or girlfriend in highschool, it can be really hard to get over heartbreak if your environment and the people around it don’t change.

For Aerith, her first boyfriend by all accounts ghosts her one day after months to years of causally dating and she is still in contact with his co workers, saying they can deliver letters to him if she wants. It’s natural for her to assume that he just found another girl or died during one of his missions.

Crisis core (a terrible game btw) adds context to their relationship and honestly as someone who was a little interested in their relationship dynamic, I wasn’t expecting the few scenes they have together to be hanging out for a little bit but then Zack gets a call from work so he’s gotta go.

It does add context to the player that hey dude maybe Zack did ghost Aerith. He seems like an amazing person but the game chose to show that he was always too busy and he had other relationships to tend to.

On Aerith’s end, it seems she really enjoyed being with Zack but her time with him was always cut short. That must of really sucked for her because I bet she always wished he stayed longer. To me (the player), it felt like Zack didn’t or couldn’t prioritize Aerith in their relationship and Aerith knew and wished something would change.

Rebirth adds new context with two things: Zack WAS OBSESSED with Aerith. Couldn’t wait to tell his buddies about her. That’s sweet but not really the vibe I got from him in Crisis Core and def not in the OG when he was barely a character.

Another thing is that Aerith rather quickly gets over Zack (whether or not she knows it) after meeting Cloud, Tifa and gang. Having a new boy to mess with was def a fun change in her life but also having a bestie like Tifa must have made her feel comfortable talking about her experiences with Zack as shown in Rebirth. When she met the two, her relationship with Zack still defined her to some degree or at least was one of her biggest hang ups she wanted to inform people about because it was on her mind.

What’s interesting is that before meeting Cloud, Aerith is stuck in this cycle that I’m sure many people who experience heartbreak know well but being stuck in the same environment but without someone you hold dear. For me, it felt like I could never get out of feeling like I was ever going it to get over it. However for me, I got so much better and later got over that person when I got out of that environment I associated the heartbreak with and reconnected with some friends of mine. I believe the timeline of Aerith meeting Cloud and gang to her death, it was around one to two months. I think Aerith legitimately got over Zack (maybe 80%) by nibelheim or if you get her date it’s like 100% by return to gold saucer.

All Aerith had to do was create new memories with new people who gave her a new purpose in life. Not only that but she was travelling 24/7 saving the world with her bestie and new boy toy and a gang of new friends. She left her home and adventured off to actually live life and stop Sephiroth. I’m sure this fulfills her fantasies of creating memories with people and just being a normal young woman. I mean she was kinda living the typical boyfriend girlfriend dynamic but she wanted more out of it. I think Aerith really fell in love with Cloud because he prioritized her more than Zack regardless of infinity levels just from Cloud saving Aerith from Shinra and other smaller things that happened in Rebirth. She def said life got better during her cosmo canyon speech. I will say that in the OG, her relationship with Zack was not as important to her character as it is in the remake series. In the OG, I felt like the story was telling to tell me that she doesn’t want to talk about it because she wants to still look available to Cloud/the player but still have different characteristics (past boyfriend, been in a relationship, experience older girl option, missing boyfriend, etc) when compared to the other girls.

To summarize, I like how they showed Aerith getting over one of her biggest personally obstacles which was her missing boyfriend from her teenage years. She let it be one of her defining aspects of her character and now she’s so much more than a past heartbreak. She could actually enjoy life until her end 🥹