Hardcore FFVII fan sharing theories & fanart, sometimes silly stuff ⋆ AuDHD ⋆ She/her ⋆ INTP ⋆ Atheist ⋆ Non-native English speaker, be merciful with my odd way of writing ⋆ Twitter @TerraFatalis
234 posts
Ever Crisis Academy
And they made relationship chart. Thanks, Square. Now when's the next chapter for the first SOLDIER?
Different Stories Resonate with Different People
Study i got carried away with
Full image, baby soldiers having a snooze. For the friends who don't use X ^^
New headcanon unlocked
Sephiroth is constantly like nonstop scattering feathers in remake/rebirth even when his wing isn't out so either some other part of him is also feathered or he like collects all the ones he molts and tosses them like confetti whenever he wants to make an entrance
Aerith's day
Oh those glasses ❤️❤️❤️
FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH (2024) ↳ Aerith x Sweet Gangster (⌐■ˬ■)❀°。
i hauve a cold
˗ˏˋ 2月7日 HAPPY BIRTHDAY AERITH! ˎˊ˗
I… I could make that mug
I - 30something yo mom - never looked "adult" once in my life. Draw fanart, play videogames, rant about fictional stories and lores, cosplay, read manga and basically do whatever makes me feel good and I regret nothing.
Bc once your age hits a 'serious' number, you start to think - "damn, I should probably stop geeking and get more serious." But then you scroll and see a 34y/o woman writing fics after driving her kids to school, a 40y/o dude making fanart of his fav super heroes and you realize - "nah, I'm actually good"
I've been thinking about Sephiroth's having a tendency in Ever Crisis First Soldier to put his hand on his chest and that it seems to have made it into Rebirth as something he does.
The revelation that he used to wear a locket with his mothers picture there really does change the gesture meaning. I think he's reaching for for that. The idea he's still reaching for her roughly a decade after losing the locket really breaks my heart.
I have written and rewritten the Gast Post wayyy too many times and put more time thinking about it then it's worth so now here it is, just so it will begone from my drafts, here's my beef with Gast Faremis and the two big narrative issues that make thinking about him fill me with rage
Also I'm gonna put a TW for grooming here actually because Gast's lack of a canon age makes it seem like he might have met Ifalna when she was very young and they have a weird power imbalance thing going that I kind of talk about
It is basically impossible to make a sound judgement on Gast's ethics because we have no idea when he left the Jenova project or really why beyond that he knew he misidentified Jenova. I know one of the ultimanias said he felt guilt/remorse. But to be quite frank, until they show this remorse in-game it means nothing to me. It's one thing to reveal details like ages in the ultimanias, but Gast is a far too critical player in the plot for his characterization to be getting done secondhand in supplemental materials. Do not get me started on how he never shows up in Dirge. They just... ignore him a lot of the time, which is really weird since his discovery of Jenova is the plot catalyst for the entire series.
Also, I've noticed people tend to passively talk about him like he's *the good one* on the team or that he would have saved Sephiroth from Hojo. I'm not really sure where this comes from? Sephiroth speaks highly of him, but i don't trust Seph to be an accurate judge of character when it comes to Gast. Sephiroth would have been, at the very vert latest, probably around 4 when Gast left the company. If he even remembers Gast at all, his memories are not gonna be a full picture of what the man was like. Besides that, I think it's incredibly likely Sephiroth has a mystical, idealized version of Gast in his head, because Gast is someone who could, in theory, give him the answers about his origins Hojo refuses to. Hojo also probably shit talks Gast if be ever comes up, which would only make him more appealing to Sephiroth. Gast is not Hojo. He has cleared the bar past literally the worst person Sephiroth has ever met. It is akin to praising a candle for being able to burn compared to a crumpled, broken, wet match. Gast being less abhorrent then Hojo doesn't mean he was a good person.
I think people also tend to automatically assume Gast was a good person bc he's Aerith's dad, but being a good person isn't genetic. He didn't have the opportunity to be a father to her for more then about 3 weeks. That's not his fault, obviously, but it means he had no hand in raising her, so him being her father really isn't indicative of anything outside of him being involved with Ifalna, which we will get to in a second.
Honestly, it seems to me like Gast was ambivalent to Sephiroth at best. Remember that a perfect weapon was not what they were designing Sephiroth to be; they wanted him to be an Ancient. Of course, Jenova is not one, meaning that in terms of achieving its original goal, Gast's goal, Project S was a failure from the outset. I can't help but wonder if Gast saw Sephiroth that way, or else as a horrible mistake, especially considering that after leaving the company and abandoning Sephiroth (and maybe Lucrecia depending on who left first) to Hojo, Gast on his own time achieves his original goal of making an Ancient, by fathering Aerith. Speaking of...
We know from the guides that Ifalna was 29 when she died. Aerith was 7, meaning Ifalna had her at around 22. If Gast was around Hojo' age, he would've been in his early 30s when Sephiroth was born. Sephiroth is 5-6 years older then Aerith, which would put him at around his mid thirties when he had a child with Ifalna. If Gast left the project shortly after Sephiroth was born or during Lucrecia's pregnancy, he might have met Ifalna as early as her being 18. I sincerely do not believe the devs want to imply their relationship was predatory. I honestly don't think all that much thought has been put into it at all, and while it's reasonable to sideline it since it's not the most urgent bit of lore, this sidelining makes trying to figure out what their dynamic was a nightmare.
Apparently the ultimanias are contradictory about whether the two of them met at Shinra or outside of it. The only time we've ever seen the two of them together was the Icicle Inn tapes, wherein their interactions seem mostly professional until the last tape. In this last tape, the dev's clumsy way of showing that these two are in a relationship was to have Ifalna start to address him as Professor, then correct herself and call him 'honey' instead, which is a hell of a Freudian slip for her to make, given that this tape takes place almost a month after the birth of their daughter.
Again, I think this was just a very awkward blinking neon sign hung up in order to quickly convey THESE TWO WERE IN LOVE, but if you take it at face value, it is strange at best and downright chilling at worst. Gast was the leader of the Make An Ancient Baby project, and when he realized he didn't actually make an Ancient, he left the project and went and had a baby *old school style* with the last Ancient while she was undergrad age. It is fully possible he and Ifalna did have real feelings for each other, but that context with the age gap just makes it... eugh. And it's not like they had a professional friendship and he just served as a sperm donor for Ifalna because she wanted to start repopulating her species or smth. She calls him by a pet name, they are in some kind of romantic entanglement.
At this point I don't think the devs have put nearly as much thought towards this as I have, we're probably just supposed to assume they were happy together because it makes Gast dying more tragic. But them neglecting this relationship leaves it uncomfortably unclear. For example, because they don't think about this relationship a lot, Aerith never mentions her mom telling her about her dad, which is very easily read as Ifalna not wanting to tell her daughter about Gast. That would just be because it hurts Ifalna to talk about his death, but... she also told Aerith stories about the Ancients, which must have also been painful since they were the last two, stuck in a lab away from nature. We know Ifalna gets emotional when talking about the Cetra, she gets worked up seemingly to the point of crying while talking about Jenova in the interviews. The only explanation I can see for why she wouldn't want to talk about Gast if they were happy toghether was that Hojo might punish her if she did. (Worth noting i have traces of two pasts but haven't gotten to reading it yet, she might mention him in there but again supplemental materials, Aerith has never knce mentioned a dad in the actual games)
If the goal is that we are supposed to see Gast as a bad or even morally compromised person who went straight after leaving the company, that's perfectly fine, but everything about him is so muddy that I genuinely can't tell what to make of him. Hojo and Hollander we're clearly supposed to hate, and Lucrecia has settled herself pretty comfortably in the "did fucked up things but has since paid for it" niche, but Gast is just... here. Floating around in the back of the narrative, not even really haunting it because his main contribution as the guy who discovered Jenova gets usurped by Hojo being the one to spread its cells. His other main contribution is being Aerith's bio dad, and she has never once seemed to give it any thought. The only person in the modern era who seems to give a rat's ass about his role in everything is Sephiroth, for like 2 seconds during his meltdown at Nibelheim before he's back to huffing the mommy issue fumes. He is just... such a bizarre, frustrating nothingburger, and I desperately hope they rectify it in remake 3.
i kinda love him
Family gathering
Aerith inspired by the works of Mucha
This might be the cutest FF VII lore fanart I've ever seen
oopsie, sketched some quick ff7 stamps bc i thought the idea of shinra making Stamp stamps was silly, and then i just had a great time playing crisis core reunion so here we are!!
so annoyed i couldnt remember if there is any unique identifiable flora to nibelheim, so i just decided cloudberries would be a good substitute since they are a) pretty damn hardy, b) punny and c) very tasty. these are based on stamps i vaguely remember from childhood, very cool!! :)
responsible adults
Conservative politics are an incubator for the worst people to manipulate the dullest of minds.
Conspiracy theories give the D-student oxygen.
IT CLICKED
I GOT IT
Rufus sees the Whispers in Shinra HQ because he’s in the process of exterminating greater Avalanche.
This is why Rufus’s reaction to and relationship with the Whispers seems so odd. They’re helping him. And he doesn’t realize it. Rufus is the only character whose reaction to seeing the Whispers for the first time isn’t to try to fight them or run away – rather, he actually moves towards them and is so entranced by them that he’s still staring out the window long after they’re gone.
Let’s back up.
In Before Crisis (which appears to be canon-ish for the Remake, considering the reference to the assassination attempt on President Shinra and the greater organization of Avalanche as a whole), Rufus was Avalanche’s inside contact. He provided them with information on Shinra and funded their terrorist campaign.
In the Remake, Mayor Domino refers to himself as being Avalanche’s man on the inside, which initially made a bunch of Rufus fans (myself included) scratch their heads a bit. But when looking closer, it becomes pretty clear that Domino is working with Rufus to fund/assist Avalanche and undermine Papa Shinra’s administration.
However, also established in Before Crisis is the detail that Rufus never cared about Avalanche as an organization nor the fate of the planet itself. He was simply using them as pawns to murder and usurp his father.
As we can see from Rufus’s introduction, once Papa Shinra is dead, Rufus doesn’t need Avalanche anymore. He shoots down the Avalanche extraction chopper and steps onto the scene in order to personally declare face-to-face that the alliance is off.
So, the order of events is:
1. Rufus puts the call out to Avalanche HQ to storm Shinra HQ and flush out the president.
2. Rufus calls Domino and tells him to assist Avalanche once they get to the building so that they can remain unseen in their journey to the top floors.
3. Cloud, Barret, and Tifa coincidentally happen to show up first, unaware of the larger plot about to take place. Domino assists them on their ascent, assuming that they’re the ones to carry out the mission at hand.
4. Rufus calls Tseng and mobilizes the Turks. Reno and Rude go to pick up Rufus, who is likely planning on pulling the trigger on his father himself while Avalanche causes chaos and creates an opening to do so.
5. Aeris is rescued.
6. Larger Avalanche (along with Wedge) arrive on scene to carry out the assassination attempt.
7. Rufus arrives on scene and very smugly makes it a point to personally give the order to arrest who he believes to be Avalanche operatives who are only there in the first place by his orders. Boss fight occurs.
8. Meanwhile, Tseng is searching for President Shinra, unaware that he’s already dead at this time.
9. Cloud, Barret, Tifa, Aeris, and Red XIII make their escape from Shinra HQ.
10. The Whispers surround the Shinra tower.
11. Rufus enters the Executive Suite and sees the Whispers for the first time.
12. Tseng gets a call from someone (presumably Reno) and is pleased by what he hears. He tells Rufus that “The men are on standby.” To which Rufus responds, “Bring them in.”
13. Rufus gives Reno and Rude the order to exterminate every Avalanche operative still on site.
Now, I realize that 12 and 13 are a little bit vague, and you might be wondering how I arrived at number 13 at all.
The important thing to understand that the main narrative tool that FF7R utilizes is misdirection. Rufus’s line of “bring them in” is just one example of many. After he says this, the scene cuts back to Cloud & co. on the highway as Shinra soldiers are deployed after them, so the immediate assumption is that Rufus just gave the order to dispatch soldiers to detain the party.
However, if this line was truly in reference to the pursuit of Cloud & co, then Tseng’s phone conversation no longer makes sense. We hear him say, “I see. Very good.” This reaction isn’t internally consistent with the idea that someone has just told him that the party has escaped.
More likely, Tseng was getting an update from Reno that the chopper has been parked and they’ve returned to HQ. “The men are on standby” – Reno and Rude are back and awaiting orders. Rufus then gives Tseng the order to have Reno and Rude come into the office. There, the order is given to take out Avalanche. This also explains why Reno and Rude are missing from the final sequence in which Rufus takes the throne – they’re still likely out and about in the aftermath of the mass murder they just performed.
The Whispers are non-hostile to Rufus, and he seems completely distracted and mesmerized by them. He can see them, but they’re not impeding his progress in any way.
Avalanche HQ are not supposed to be at Shinra HQ. This is not how the original script/”destiny” plays out. So, by giving the order to hunt down and kill every Avalanche operative, he’s actually doing the bidding of destiny/The Whispers, even if he doesn’t realize it. He’s basically doing the Whispers’ job for them.
So when the order comes, the Whispers decide to help out and encircle the Shinra building in order to ensure that none of them escape.
Knowingly or not, the Whispers serve to establish the bounds of Rufus’s villainy and mercilessness. His inaugural speech about ruling the world through fear is no longer necessary, as he’s just turned Shinra HQ into a locked-down prison for the “heroic” team, in which he orders and orchestrates a bloodbath.
Sephiroth has fascinated me as a villain for a long time, but I’ve also struggled to “figure him out” for just as long. For all the simplicity of his villainous goals (i.e. become a god, destroy the world), it’s really the heart of his breakdown in Nibelheim that confounded me regarding his motives and the causal factors behind how he becomes what he becomes. I think Sephiroth's story can be interpreted in drastically different ways depending on how you see the explanations for his breakdown preceding the Nibelheim Incident. Not to mention, there’s the multiple retellings of the incident within the Compilation and the inconsistencies that come with it.
I’m still in the process of unraveling how to approach Sephiroth’s psychology, so this won’t be a regular analysis. Rather, this is mostly going to be a stream-of-consciousness type of piece, where I just let my thoughts flow. Definitely expect some stuff to sound rough or disjointed, and possibly some inaccurate facts due to my terrible memory (please let me know). Also, for the sake of the most updated canon, we will go with the Crisis Core version of events.
~Major FFVII and Crisis Core spoilers ahead~
Firstly, I want to address the clinical term that can describe what happened to Sephiroth at Nibelheim. I’ve heard people call it a mental breakdown or psychotic break, among other things. If we want to be consistent with the psychiatric language of the DSM-5, we would say that Sephiroth experienced the onset of a psychotic episode.
Psychotic episodes are a state of significant psychological disturbance that involves a loss of touch with shared reality. Historically, what we now know as psychotic episodes were once called madness or insanity. The duration of an episode affects what type of psychotic disorder would apply, but overall, psychosis can be either transient or continuous.
It’s hard to say which is the case for Sephiroth, specifically because of how his prognosis transforms pre- and post-Lifestream dip. Pre-Lifestream, it’s clear that he went into an abrupt and severe state of psychosis. Even though there were already warning signs prior to when he holed himself up in the Shinra mansion basement, Sephiroth’s behavior change still occurred in a short amount of time and marked a drastic change from the anguish and confusion he initially experienced upon first learning what Jenova is. He is experiencing a psychotic episode that marks a clear departure from his prior functioning.
Afterwards though, Sephiroth learns what Jenova truly is and makes a conscious decision to use its power and influence over the Lifestream for his own means. At this point, we can’t say that it’s a temporary condition. Not to mention, the question of how much Jenova is influencing Sephiroth also complicates how we understand Sephiroth’s psychology. At best, I would say that post-Lifestream Sephiroth is experiencing an ongoing psychotic disturbance.
At the heart of Sephiroth’s turning point to villainy is a delusion, a fixed and false belief that is resistant to change even in the presence of contradictory evidence. Although I've seen it used a lot in casual contexts, delusions are in fact a clinical term for distorted beliefs. Essentially, delusions exist beyond reason and cannot be logically refuted. Delusions are a hallmark feature of psychosis, involving a resistance to the facts of reality that conflict with one’s beliefs.
There are several reasons that someone might develop a delusion. Obviously these reasons aren't always mutually exclusive, but I think what reason you attribute to Sephiroth's breakdown influences how you understand it.
Certain people are genetically predisposed to delusional thinking. Jenova. Injected in the womb. Supernatural prenatal development. Need I say more?
People come up with distorted ways of explaining the unexplainable. This is the type of thinking that is linked to an inclination for conspiracy theories. Sephiroth was searching for answers about his birth and origins, and with false, piecemeal information, he formed the erroneous conclusion that he was a Cetra. I wouldn't say this is the driving force behind his decision to burn down Nibelheim, but you can see the gateway to vengeance through this avenue.
People have trouble coping with life and preserving their self-esteem, therefore they use delusions to attempt to uphold it. This is the most sympathetic perspective, mainly because it boils Sephiroth down to the misunderstood savant that is mourning the loss of his self-worth. More on this later, since this is the angle I see portrayed most in Crisis Core.
People experience significant life stressors, such as low socioeconomic status, trauma, and drastic life changes that heavily influence how they perceive and understand the world. We could create a whole list of known or presumed "life stressors" in Sephiroth's life, but if we want to highlight a specific one, it would be the discovery of the Jenova Project files. It could be argued that it was deeply traumatizing to him, enough to rock his worldview.
Reasons aside, there are also several different types of delusions classified in the DSM-5. I think Sephiroth shows features of at least two types. You could say Sephiroth experienced a grandiose delusion, or what you might know as a delusion of grandeur. This is defined by the belief that one is extremely powerful or important. Sometimes it even takes on a religious bend, leading to the belief that one is omnipotent or holy. Sephiroth believed he was the last of the Cetra race, one that was more connected to and respectful of the planet compared to humanity. He was "the chosen one to rule this planet," someone exceptional and superior to everyone else.
You could also say that Sephiroth was experiencing a persecutory delusion. This is when someone believes he is "being conspired against, cheated, spied on, followed, poisoned, maliciously maligned, harassed, or obstructed in the pursuit of long-term goals." Sephiroth drew the conclusion that he had a duty to punish humanity for persecuting the ancient Cetra. He believed he had to pursue vengeance for Jenova and for Cetrakind. People with persecutory delusions tend to demonstrate significant anger and violent behavior, which also checks out with Sephiroth's subsequent decision to burn down Nibelheim.
Obviously, both the grandiose and persecutory delusions transform a bit when Sephiroth learns about Jenova's true nature as an extraterrestrial, not a Cetra. But that's a conversation for another time; remember, we're talking about the psychotic episode that became the gateway to Sephiroth's villainy. So, let's backtrack a bit and talk about how Crisis Core chose to lean into a sympathetic portrayal of Sephiroth's psychology.
We still know very little about Sephiroth’s childhood and upbringing (although it looks like Ever Crisis may change that?), aside from several key facts. We know that he was born an experiment, having been injected with Jenova cells in the womb. We know he was essentially raised by Shinra and did not get to experience a normal childhood. He was known to be a prodigious fighter and was the reason that the SOLDIER program was created. As a teenager, he fought in the Wutai War and gained his status as a war hero.
This is all to say that though Sephiroth knew little of his childhood, he knew one thing for certain. He was a very good fighter, and a hero to Shinra. Sephiroth’s established self-concept revolves around this fact. He was likely praised and lauded for his wartime achievements, and even before then, we can presume that Shinra scientists noted him to be an exceptional fighter. He was the epitome of prestige and strength.
Let’s contrast that with the information he gains right before the Nibelheim Incident. When Sephiroth sees the monsters at the reactor and begins to question his connection to them, he began to mull over his identity and existence. Sephiroth knew he was unusual and exceptional even as a child, and he said so himself that he doesn't know what it was like to have parents or a hometown to speak of. Genesis then reinforces what Sephiroth feared, that he is a monster and a product of experimentation. He was told he was subhuman, repulsive, an abomination.
Sephiroth’s self-concept started as that of a prodigy, someone who is an extremely capable fighter. After the war in Wutai, he was labeled a war hero. Once he was led to believe that he was a monster, this shatters his worldview. He went from seeing himself as a prominent hero to seeing himself as subhuman. This is further driven by the fact that Sephiroth had already lacked answers about his origins and craved a sense of home, of parental warmth and connection. Because of this gap in his history, the premise that he was no more than a monster was eerily plausible. With his self-concept dramatically rocked, he was left starving for answers to what he is. This is what led him down the rabbit hole, seeking an explanation that would either tell him that he was not a monster, or that his initial self-concept can still be upheld somehow.
And thus, Sephiroth was in a vulnerable place where a grandiose or persecutory delusion can uphold his self-esteem and self-concept. If Jenova is truly the last of an ancient race, then Sephiroth is exceptional, not an abomination. If the Cetra had powers that humans didn't have, then Sephiroth was powerful, not just a monster. The delusion takes hold because it is something Sephiroth needed in order to preserve his worldview, his belief that he is special and important.
This is how Crisis Core gets you to sympathize with Sephiroth. He's painted as a lonely savant that lacked a home and a family, and so when he was told he was a monster, his self-concept was shattered and radically warped. In order for him to protect it, he needed to come up with a delusion that would uphold his understanding of the world. Sound familiar? I don't think it's a coincidence that Sephiroth's psychology here sounds parallel to Cloud's, especially since I've considered delusional disorder for them both.
It'll be a while before I gather enough thoughts to move onto how Sephiroth progressed from this state to his post-Lifestream-dip, Meteor-summoning, god-seeking self. But for now, I think this helps paint a picture of how I've been trying to conceptualize him.
CHAINSAWMAN SPOILER!
Denji bragging about his previous dates..
...His actual previous dates
A good match indeed
Zack and Aerith from Final Fantasy VII Ever Crisis
Now I can officially say my birthday falls on Final Fantasy VII day 🥳
#no one can resist the puppy
Now everything makes sense
“HAIRTONIC Ideal Scalp Care. For astonishingly radiant & spiky hair!”.
This particoular tassellation, alternating squares and octagons, present in many parts of the Remake, appeared also in other previous parts of the compilation.
After the victories at the Colosseum and in the Shinra combat simulator, the characters perform their OG victory poses.
If the player finds Corneo’s secret stashes they can fins three tiaras (Ruby, Emerald and Diamond tiaras) inspired to the OG Ruby, Emerald and Diamond Weapons.
While in Trace of Two Pasts is stated that Elmyra’s house was full of flowers and plants even before the arrival of Aerith, it surely isn’t a coincidence that the sector she lives in, contrary to the rest of Midgar, is full of nature. Moreover the orphanage near her house is called “Leaf House” and the name of the teacher is Mrs Folia (”leaf” in Latin).
The place where Tifa lives in Sector 7, and where she suggests Cloud to live too, is a wooden building called Stargazer Heights, which is a reference to the water tower where they shared the promise. I’d say also that the presence in the same building of a black caped man isn’t a coincidence, considering that the first time these beings bould be spotted in the OG was indeed Nibelheim.
Tifa: Be sure to pick an outfit that goes with mine, okay?
Cloud: Will do.
Nailed it.
Jokes aside there’s a subtle clever mechanism behind the choice of the Wall Market dresses.
- If the player prefers Tifa, they’ll probably choose the refined dress and will have a good chance to get Chocobo Sam’s odd jobs (giving answers a bit more pro Tifa), so both Cloud and Tifa will wear the blue outfits.
- If the player prefers Aerith, they’ll maybe choose the sporty dress and will have a good chance to get Madam M’s odd jobs (giving answers a bit more pro Aerith), so both Cloud and Tifa will wear the satin outfits.
I’m not totally sure here if this was intentional, but when I saw Barret’s death I couldn’t help but think that during the first drafts of the OG he was the one who had to die instead of Aerith.
We don’t know yet if there’s any connection between the Whispers and the Black caped men, but it’s hard not to notice the visual similarity of their designs.
In Aerith’s childhood room in Shinra HQ there’s a book about the Lifestream written by Gast Farmeis, Aerith’s father.
In the same room there’s also a book about Stamp mentioning his fan club, which is an element that comes from Crisis Core
There are some signs in Sector 8 - more a music disk - about Costa del Sol.
In one of the ads inside the trains there’s a FFVI quote from an author called “Gabbiani” - Setzer’s last name.
In Shinra’s museum there’s a picture with a FFX-2 character, Shinra.