New Headcanon Unlocked

Sephiroth:

Mass murderer

Child soldier

Lab experiment

Demigod

Enemy of humanity

Actual child

Monopoly host

High school student

Uninvited Smash attendee

Udon salesman

Impossible to take seriously anymore

Ahhh yes! That ending scene with Zack was fantastic, what a range of emotions the first time I watched it. Confused, worried I’d see a sad ending again, confused again, dawning comprehension, then a ton of exciting and wtf combined. I think I’m still stuck in that last one, haha.

Thank you for putting in words what I was too sleepy to express last night! Yes, when I saw the last stand I feared I would have finished the game in tears like I did when I played CC, but I ended up in tears anyway when I saw him alive. This ending is so full of hope, expectations and misteries. I can't understand people who disliked it.

That hug hitted home so hard! Such a big load of emotions: need of comfort, trust, that "inexplicable something" buried inside Cloud that lead him to hug her... I really hope the devs will spend a scene in the future to show how he will re-evaluate this moment after regaining his true-self.

Barret is absolutely the cherry on top of this game and his English VA can't be prized enough for his amazing job. I don't know how he sounds in JP but the English one made a great job in conveying the essence of the character even in the perspective of non-native English players. I found him so grotesque in the OG but now I can't help but love him. His interactions with other characters are great but, yes, his bond with Marlene is priceless.

My very second favourite part of the game is Aerith rescuing Marlene (rescuing Betty, encouraging Wedge to save the Sector 7 citizens, all the scene), but your moments are close ones. There are so many beautiful well-developed and emotional scenes and so much attention to details that it's even difficult to establish a ranking. Otherwise we wouldn't be here after a year still noticing&analyzing new details :)

What are your expectations for the Intergrade? Since the devs had complete freedom about the setting of this episode I hope we could see the Sector 7 fall from the upper plate perspective and I'm really looking forward for any reference to Denzel.

happy ffviir 1 year anniversary! 🎉🎊🎈 do you have a moment or detail from the remake that's still your favorite even a year later?

Hi Hartofhearts!

Happy first year anniversary to you too!

Well there are MANY moments I really love about this first part of the Remake, but if I have to choose just one, I definitely take this scene, and all that follows it until the end. 

This is by far the most unexpected and most welcomed change of the Remake and it still gives me goose bumps! I can’t wait to see where this will lead, I really hope he could be reunited with Aerith this time…!

What about you??

Parallel #4

The first succesful high five

And of all the objects, scraps and debris that could be part of the environment...

[Previous]

Talk about a coincidence!

(Previous post here)

Midgar Blues

It has been said and repeated to death: there's a song dedicated to the "promise" in the Remake, and this should be enough to claim the "coincidence" post and end it here with a good link to enjoy the song.

But this song received some criticisms, so I'd like to talk a bit more about it.

1. "There is no evidence that this song is about Cloud and Tifa" and "It's just a random song in Wall Market without specifical meaning".

I saw some people trying to debate about this matter so, here we are.

The text perfectly describes the scene of the promise and Cloud leaving Nibelheim to join SOLDIER. It talks about a man/boy who left his hometown for Midgar, leaving behind a girl. There's a reference to the Lifestream and to the starry night with falling stars. The lyrics - both English and Japanese - are posted below.

This song has old-time/banjo&harmonica sounds that fit the "old west" atmosphere of Nibelheim.

The "author" of the song says he had started his career 7 years ago, when Cloud and Tifa shared the promise, and he's wondering if "Midgar Blues" will be his greatest success. Get the metaphor.

From a storytelling perspective this is NOT a coincidence: no reasonable company invests money and resources to create this sort of content without a reason (and no reasonable company invests money and resources in a song submissively sang in a hidden location of the game, probably this piece will have more focus and importance in the next parts of Remake when the promise will be brought up again - who knows, maybe at Gold Saucer?).

2. The original Japanese lyrics are different from the English translation (hence: it's not about love)

(Source)

The English version is undoubtly romantic and includes the words "True love", while the Japanese version doesn't. I'd like to point out a couple of considerations:

Whether you take the English version or the Japanese one, they're both romantic. It really doesn't seem to me that the original version sounds like a man singing for his sister or his mother. The romantic subtext is in both songs, and it's no wonder: the fact that Cloud was in love with Tifa at the time of the promise is history, more likely the addition of the "True love" part could be made in order to convince the most relunctant part of the western fandom about this subject.

This is a "Enka" song, a popular Japanese music genre that bears some resemblance with blues (for this reason, "Midgar Blues"). This genre is a form of sentimental ballad: enka songs usually express strong emotions, especially love.

This is more a personal opinion about localization from the perspective of someone who's not a native english speaker. I've read many harsh comments about the English localization of the Remake. Especially when it comes to LTD I've seen people from both sides of the fence complaining the translators to be biased CA or CT fans. Fact is that if the complain comes from both sides probably they're not the first nor the second, they're just...translators. I'm not a translator but I speak many languages and it happenes to me to watch and rewatch movies both in English and in my native language. You'll never find a literal word-by-word translation, ESPECIALLY when it comes to songs. Because it wouldn't work. A good localization has to follow the pace of the lip-sync, has to create rhythm, rhymes and lyricism when it comes to poems and songs, it has to convey the right feeling before the right word, it has to take into account the cultural differences from the country of origin of the movie/song and the receiving audience (in this case Japanese people tend to be more descreet and less explicit than western people when talking about love), and much more. With this I'm not saying everyting in the localization is perfect, I don't speak a word of Japanese so I can't make a comparison myself, but just remember that the devs DO speak English. They speak it well enough to notice the difference between the two texts of the song and if they authorized it (I doubt nobody bothered to double check the international scripts of one of the most important products of this company)...it just means that they agree.

In conclusion, yes, it's a love song about the promise and no, it's NOT a coincidence.

Only a blind person would deny the writers' intention here ❤️

In the August 20th, 2021 interview for Trace of Two pasts, Nojima comments on how Aerith handles her sadness.

Both of the stories shine light on the protagonists who steadfastly live on despite the unfortunate circumstances surrounding them. Can you tell us what kind of story device you used to get these ideas?

Nojima: I thought about those who were able to overcome various sadness in their lives. Aerith tries to get used to the environment by maintaining a very upbeat personality and believing that she isn’t sad.

(Source)

So Aerith pretends to be an upbeat, happy person to mask her sadness?

Sure enough:

“Gotta look forward, not back.”

Ahhh my poor heartbroken girl 💔

you know-

no

Im not gonna shut up about it actually - you season 5 spoilers so if you're not insane and didn't consume that season at the speed of delirium scroll now

But season 1 and the way the story was told was truly a testament to the way Joe saw the world and the way he stole Beck's voice the entire time and THAT is why she came across as bland and boring and irresponsible and messy in the first season and why she was so unsympathetic to so many (not me but some of y'all know who you are) because she WAS Joe's trope and she only existed because he SAW her in season one - her light was only applicable when we saw it shine on him and he was so fucking good at making it seem like he was the only thing that drew out her radiance and creativity and fucking brilliance and everything else in her life diminished her, Joe diminished her and capitalized off her insecurities to do so. He championed breaking women down so he could try to be the one to "build them back up"

And the above being inherently untrue is why she haunts him so much because the reality is - Joe was the one who was absolutely nothing special without someone's light shining on him and Beck shone SO fucking bright

But then!!!!! Season fucking five!!!!!! We finally, FINALLY, see Beck through the light of someone who looked up to her!!! Who ACTUALLY saw her!!!! For her brilliance, for her kindness, for her light. We saw the fact that Guinevere Beck touched so many lives and she drew people in to the point where her impact stayed even when she wasn't aware of it.

Guinevere Beck is the perfect showcasing of a character who's light draws good people in to bask and bad people in to corrupt and/or diminish and capture. Joe wanted to capture her light and steal her intelligence - he never would've written in the first place if not for Beck and her creativity - he had to steal her voice to give himself one. Joe was a pro at playing feminist and him claiming to be Zelda to Beck's Fitzgerald is a PERFECT example because in THAT lies the most insane metaphor that Joe sees himself as the visionary and Beck as the one capitalizing off him - the way he accredits himself for Beck's essays about Peach, accredits himself for Beck's novel, accredits himself for all of Beck's success and beauty. Painting himself as the victim at every turn when in reality, Beck was always Zelda and Joe was always stealing from her the same way Fitzgerald stole from his wife.

And in the end, he's the one who lost anything interesting about him. Louise gave Beck back the most important thing, her voice, her writings, and she took away from Joe what never should've been his in the first place. No one will ever read his legacy because he doesn't deserve to have one, but EVERYONE will read Beck's and know the truth and THAT is the most glorious ending i could've hoped for

Season 4 was such a clusterfuck horror show of what happens when misogynistic men are so good at undermining women by convincing them they are feminist and season 5 was all about the power of women finally seeing the light and coming together to save each other and take back their voices

Joe stole from every single woman he came across AND the show being so starkly in his head even stole sense from the audience so to have the wrap up be a collective wake up and criticism of societies willingness to forgive and romanticize bad men made me shed several tears.

He lost his voice because nothing about it was his in the first place - he was NOTHING without all of those women

Having a comfort character is great and I think it’s fine to have one but if you can’t handle someone politely saying that they don’t like that character or giving criticism of them that’s probably something to bring up in your next therapy session.