Eerie
Fire and Blood
After talking about it and being too lazy, I guess this is it. What are exactly Aerith's powers and her knowledge, how does this work, what does it mean for Remake in general?
There's no way to deny that Aerith's powers have gotten a big overhaul in Remake compared to the OG, where it was her quest to understand and embrace them.
Aerith's special's powers, that are not present in the OG, can be for now specified as:
First, I want to go with the "my intuition never fails me!" line because well... it's a light line often thrown by girls and women, and you could think that Aerith says it alike. However, you know what's spooky? Did anyone look at its synonyms? Premonition, prescience, foreknowledge. Yes, these kind of things Aerith has exhibited throughout Remake, she told everyone very early that she had them. Since we've been shown at this point Cloud having this kind of premonition knowledge through flashforwards, we can guess that Aerith's work the same, except they are clearer, stronger, longer as shown in chapter 18 when she was baited with Zack's flashbacks. So I also used this to build my theory about Aerith's powers and how this works. This is her connection to the Lifestream that makes this possible; the knowledge that flows through it is also accessible to her, albeit in a diminished, truncated way.
About the flowers talking to her
As seen in chapter 8, Aerith explains that, despite talking to flowers, she can't hear them. "Something... they have to tell us. In any case, that's the impression I get." Despite getting her powers boosted for Remake, Aerith still understands little about them. She gets flashforwards, she can see the dead, she likes flowers and nature... but she can't master her powers. She doesn't know what they are. My guess is that being in a city as big as Midgar, she is blocked from hearing the Planet's voices through Nature. She's spooky, yes. But she still doesn't understand nor master that connection with life and death that she has. So that means that this understanding and embracing her Cetra powers is still part of her story, despite them being bigger than what they were in the OG.
About her speech in her room in chapter 17
"When the Whispers touch me, I get the feeling of losing a part of myself."
I always wonder, even now - does she lose a part of herself because she loses knowledge, or does she lose a part of herself because she has so much knowledge that she is drowning into it, and her own character is lost for something bigger (the plot)? I've always wondered because the Aerith that we see from chapter 17 and onwards isn't really the Aerith we've made friends with. She becomes more like Sephiroth's white pendant, a mysterious Aerith that had to take a bigger role to protect the planet, but had to leave her own self behind in the battle. Both make sense to me.
"For now, I am lost. The more I go forward, the less I know where to go."
This would seem to indicate that she loses knowledge as the Whispers touch her, but she also states:
"The yellow flowers were the ones that showed me the path."
Which makes me think that this link is cut off at least for now, she's explored all the possibilities she had access to at this point (prior to her getting knowledge about Zack's Last Stand at least), the flower has given her the answers she sought, but not anymore.
The Case of Cloud
Going through this, it is actually a wonder if she really recognises Cloud as someone she should know from her knowledge pool the very first time they meet.
I'm going to try to push down the number of pictures I will use, but this one is important; this is Cloud from her POV, and to me, Cloud is slightly off the center axe when right before we had a shot of Aerith right in the middle of the screen - seen through Cloud's POV. And he's tilting off to the right because there is a light emphasis on Zack's sword on his back. Not "oh lala right in your face" kind of thing, but... Aerith definitely saw it. She knows that sword. So what does she do? She gives him the yellow flower - remember, the one that guides her.
We know that Aerith talks to flowers and that she can't hear them back, but because the yellow flower is the one that guides her, I'm thinking it's kind of a motif that allows her to focus on something she wants/needs to know. This is how she gets to know things that she shouldn't, like Cloud being a mercenary, like the plate fall. But I've been thinking that when it comes to people, it's a bit different. She needs to meddle with her empath powers, to try to follow dots and links. So the flower she gives Cloud in chapter 2 allows her to delve more knowledge about him. So when she meets up with him, she knows more about him - even though she could guess the SOLDIER part, there was no way to guess the mercenary part, nor the bodyguard part. And, oddly, she is not able to see to whom Cloud did give the flower - however it doesn't mean that its purpose ended so fast. The fact that she saw it on the bar's counter shows that it was there to answer one of her questions - not whom Cloud did give the flower, but Tifa's significance to him - and yes in chapter 11, there is also a specific shot where she ponders about Cloud's reaction to Tifa, so that's definitely a question that came back to her: to which point is Tifa important to Cloud?
The case of Tifa
Because indeed, how her knowledge power works is really shining with Tifa.
This is the first time that Cloud mentions Tifa, and this is Aerith's first reaction: it's to assess "who is Tifa". At this point, she has no clue about it. So, she tries to "guess", has suddenly a very mischevious face and:
And this is when she thinks she has found the answer: "'Tifa', is it... your girlfriend's name?" she clasps her hands together in a "ha, I've found it" motion - and that's why the camera is focused on that moment. But Cloud denies so the mystery remains - however at that point, Aerith has understood Tifa's importance to Cloud. When she meets up with Tifa for the first time, she's instantly happy, as if she's reunited with an old friend, because yes, she already has at that point understood who Tifa is to her too - a dear friend! So She's happy. But at the same time, when Tifa explains why she went to don Corneo's mansion alone, she stares at her like she stared at Cloud in the previous picture. She definitely assessed her there too, understanding why she acted so recklessly, and deciding to jump in as recklessly as Tifa did. She may know that Tifa and her will be best friends, she also needs to connect to them and get a better understanding of the people around her, because she's still trying to connect all the dots.
The Case of Sephiroth
In chapter 8, Cloud asks Aerith what does she know about Sephiroth, and she's very calm and assured when she answers that "5 years ago, he died in an accident. They announced it in the news..." However, when Cloud insists, we have the famous shot of the lower half of her face with her saying "It would be... surprising..." (about Sephiroth not being dead). At this moment, she suddenly connects dots. She certainly feels that there is trouble in the Lifestream, that an evil force was doing its deed somehow, his wrongness in the Lifestream... but she never connected it to Sephiroth. And suddenly, she realises the truth as she speaks. Sephiroth is dead, but even dead he remains a threat. She's not lying, he's still dead, but still malevolent, and suddenly she understands that her task involves Sephiroth somehow, because to whom the yellow flower guided her? To Cloud. Who led her to Sephiroth. Her arch-role is taking shape, slowly.
The Case of the plate fall
There is one thing that Aerith knew right away; and Eligor knew it too: that the plate was going to fall. It's such a big shock to the Lifestream in itself that everyone with such spooky powers regarding death probably knew about it. During chapter 10-11, Tifa's going to be extremely unsettled about it, and we are shown through Aerith's immediate reactions that it is going to happen. She's the one who compels them to move swiftly, right away. Here there is no assessment, no hesitation. It's something so big that she knows they are in a hurry. In chapter 10, her role is to guide Cloud and Tifa. At that moment, she's already set up as the guide the party will need in chapter 18 against Sephiroth - she's the one doing the convincing, it's through her words that the others will act.
With the plate fall, we can see that Aerith has also access to the big events; so she tries to connect the dots and the big events together, trying to tie up all the foreknowledge she has - however it's not an easy task.
The plate fall is also where the biggest bait happens - for players. In chapter 10, Aerith states "We can change the future. Whatever it is." Which immediately gave hope to the OG players that we could save Aerith. However, even though she stated that, the plate drop still happened, and there was nothing we could do as the players - the only difference in the end is that at least Biggs is alive, and maybe he's not even alive in our timeline, so. It is to note that chapter 11 is also when she meets "Marlene" for the first time, and later on I shall pinpoint that she knows that Barret - that big Black guy she saw from afar - is her father without ever being told that, when Marlene looks nothing like Barret (well... of course).
When she tells Tifa to follow her heart, the interesting thing to me is that once again, Aerith is the one who pushes other characters to do what has to be done to follow the big plot. Another interesting angle about Aerith is when she talks with Wedge; when she tells him "Cheer up! Everything's not lost! If we believe in it, we can save lives!" we can see her true complexity and nature showing off. Yes she knows the plate will fall. When Wedge asks her that, there is a zoom on her pained face. She is very distressed about it. But she will do her utmost to save people, even in this dire situation.
In conclusion
Aerith's knowledge is scattered, her empath and foreknowledge allow her to guess and connect things a lot - however these have their own limits. So far, what Remake has shown is that despite her getting more in tune with her Cetra powers, Aerith is still stuck and missing pieces of information, knowledge, understanding about her powers and about the future. She has been a guide through the first part, but how this will play a part in the next parts? I don't know. She's always been a guide figure, and it's something they expanded on in the first game - and I'm kind of expecting them to go on with this theme for her, because she needs to be Sephiroth's counterbalance, when it comes to... the philosophy and meta of the game as a whole. So far, Remake part 1 has left us at the same place that the OG did at the end of the Midgar portion - and I would argue that it's the same with Aerith. Aerith's foreknowledge has not fundamentally changed anything... in this timeline anyway. Whether it will change things a lot in the next parts remains to be seen.
There's no way to deny that Aerith's powers have gotten a big overhaul in Remake compared to the OG, where it was her quest to understand and embrace them.
Aerith's special's powers, that are not present in the OG, can be for now specified as:
- Foreknowledge - we'll come back to this one, as I do not think that Aerith has the full script, and as I think that this foreknowledge works in a certain way
- Empath - with Marlene and Red XIII specifically: hence why I think that this power is limited to *who* can receive it. Marlene can because she's a kid, Red XIII can because he's more in tune with the Planet/nature than humans. It also does seem to give them some knowledge they shouldn't have access to (see Red XIII who's very explicit about it in chapter 17)
- Changing a portal into a Singularity
- The yellow flowers guided her (somehow the French implies that it's not the case anymore as it's used in the past but I don't know if it's the case in JP too)
- When the Whispers touch her, she loses a part of herself
- That she is lost, and the more she goes forward, the less she knows where to go
- That her intuition never fails her (this is when she talks to Cloud again in the church against Reno)
- She talks to flowers, but can't hear them back, because, reasons?
First, I want to go with the "my intuition never fails me!" line because well... it's a light line often thrown by girls and women, and you could think that Aerith says it alike. However, you know what's spooky? Did anyone look at its synonyms? Premonition, prescience, foreknowledge. Yes, these kind of things Aerith has exhibited throughout Remake, she told everyone very early that she had them. Since we've been shown at this point Cloud having this kind of premonition knowledge through flashforwards, we can guess that Aerith's work the same, except they are clearer, stronger, longer as shown in chapter 18 when she was baited with Zack's flashbacks. So I also used this to build my theory about Aerith's powers and how this works. This is her connection to the Lifestream that makes this possible; the knowledge that flows through it is also accessible to her, albeit in a diminished, truncated way.
About the flowers talking to her
As seen in chapter 8, Aerith explains that, despite talking to flowers, she can't hear them. "Something... they have to tell us. In any case, that's the impression I get." Despite getting her powers boosted for Remake, Aerith still understands little about them. She gets flashforwards, she can see the dead, she likes flowers and nature... but she can't master her powers. She doesn't know what they are. My guess is that being in a city as big as Midgar, she is blocked from hearing the Planet's voices through Nature. She's spooky, yes. But she still doesn't understand nor master that connection with life and death that she has. So that means that this understanding and embracing her Cetra powers is still part of her story, despite them being bigger than what they were in the OG.
About her speech in her room in chapter 17
"When the Whispers touch me, I get the feeling of losing a part of myself."
I always wonder, even now - does she lose a part of herself because she loses knowledge, or does she lose a part of herself because she has so much knowledge that she is drowning into it, and her own character is lost for something bigger (the plot)? I've always wondered because the Aerith that we see from chapter 17 and onwards isn't really the Aerith we've made friends with. She becomes more like Sephiroth's white pendant, a mysterious Aerith that had to take a bigger role to protect the planet, but had to leave her own self behind in the battle. Both make sense to me.
"For now, I am lost. The more I go forward, the less I know where to go."
This would seem to indicate that she loses knowledge as the Whispers touch her, but she also states:
"The yellow flowers were the ones that showed me the path."
Which makes me think that this link is cut off at least for now, she's explored all the possibilities she had access to at this point (prior to her getting knowledge about Zack's Last Stand at least), the flower has given her the answers she sought, but not anymore.
The Case of Cloud
Going through this, it is actually a wonder if she really recognises Cloud as someone she should know from her knowledge pool the very first time they meet.
I'm going to try to push down the number of pictures I will use, but this one is important; this is Cloud from her POV, and to me, Cloud is slightly off the center axe when right before we had a shot of Aerith right in the middle of the screen - seen through Cloud's POV. And he's tilting off to the right because there is a light emphasis on Zack's sword on his back. Not "oh lala right in your face" kind of thing, but... Aerith definitely saw it. She knows that sword. So what does she do? She gives him the yellow flower - remember, the one that guides her.
We know that Aerith talks to flowers and that she can't hear them back, but because the yellow flower is the one that guides her, I'm thinking it's kind of a motif that allows her to focus on something she wants/needs to know. This is how she gets to know things that she shouldn't, like Cloud being a mercenary, like the plate fall. But I've been thinking that when it comes to people, it's a bit different. She needs to meddle with her empath powers, to try to follow dots and links. So the flower she gives Cloud in chapter 2 allows her to delve more knowledge about him. So when she meets up with him, she knows more about him - even though she could guess the SOLDIER part, there was no way to guess the mercenary part, nor the bodyguard part. And, oddly, she is not able to see to whom Cloud did give the flower - however it doesn't mean that its purpose ended so fast. The fact that she saw it on the bar's counter shows that it was there to answer one of her questions - not whom Cloud did give the flower, but Tifa's significance to him - and yes in chapter 11, there is also a specific shot where she ponders about Cloud's reaction to Tifa, so that's definitely a question that came back to her: to which point is Tifa important to Cloud?
The case of Tifa
Because indeed, how her knowledge power works is really shining with Tifa.
This is the first time that Cloud mentions Tifa, and this is Aerith's first reaction: it's to assess "who is Tifa". At this point, she has no clue about it. So, she tries to "guess", has suddenly a very mischevious face and:
And this is when she thinks she has found the answer: "'Tifa', is it... your girlfriend's name?" she clasps her hands together in a "ha, I've found it" motion - and that's why the camera is focused on that moment. But Cloud denies so the mystery remains - however at that point, Aerith has understood Tifa's importance to Cloud. When she meets up with Tifa for the first time, she's instantly happy, as if she's reunited with an old friend, because yes, she already has at that point understood who Tifa is to her too - a dear friend! So She's happy. But at the same time, when Tifa explains why she went to don Corneo's mansion alone, she stares at her like she stared at Cloud in the previous picture. She definitely assessed her there too, understanding why she acted so recklessly, and deciding to jump in as recklessly as Tifa did. She may know that Tifa and her will be best friends, she also needs to connect to them and get a better understanding of the people around her, because she's still trying to connect all the dots.
The Case of Sephiroth
In chapter 8, Cloud asks Aerith what does she know about Sephiroth, and she's very calm and assured when she answers that "5 years ago, he died in an accident. They announced it in the news..." However, when Cloud insists, we have the famous shot of the lower half of her face with her saying "It would be... surprising..." (about Sephiroth not being dead). At this moment, she suddenly connects dots. She certainly feels that there is trouble in the Lifestream, that an evil force was doing its deed somehow, his wrongness in the Lifestream... but she never connected it to Sephiroth. And suddenly, she realises the truth as she speaks. Sephiroth is dead, but even dead he remains a threat. She's not lying, he's still dead, but still malevolent, and suddenly she understands that her task involves Sephiroth somehow, because to whom the yellow flower guided her? To Cloud. Who led her to Sephiroth. Her arch-role is taking shape, slowly.
The Case of the plate fall
There is one thing that Aerith knew right away; and Eligor knew it too: that the plate was going to fall. It's such a big shock to the Lifestream in itself that everyone with such spooky powers regarding death probably knew about it. During chapter 10-11, Tifa's going to be extremely unsettled about it, and we are shown through Aerith's immediate reactions that it is going to happen. She's the one who compels them to move swiftly, right away. Here there is no assessment, no hesitation. It's something so big that she knows they are in a hurry. In chapter 10, her role is to guide Cloud and Tifa. At that moment, she's already set up as the guide the party will need in chapter 18 against Sephiroth - she's the one doing the convincing, it's through her words that the others will act.
With the plate fall, we can see that Aerith has also access to the big events; so she tries to connect the dots and the big events together, trying to tie up all the foreknowledge she has - however it's not an easy task.
The plate fall is also where the biggest bait happens - for players. In chapter 10, Aerith states "We can change the future. Whatever it is." Which immediately gave hope to the OG players that we could save Aerith. However, even though she stated that, the plate drop still happened, and there was nothing we could do as the players - the only difference in the end is that at least Biggs is alive, and maybe he's not even alive in our timeline, so. It is to note that chapter 11 is also when she meets "Marlene" for the first time, and later on I shall pinpoint that she knows that Barret - that big Black guy she saw from afar - is her father without ever being told that, when Marlene looks nothing like Barret (well... of course).
When she tells Tifa to follow her heart, the interesting thing to me is that once again, Aerith is the one who pushes other characters to do what has to be done to follow the big plot. Another interesting angle about Aerith is when she talks with Wedge; when she tells him "Cheer up! Everything's not lost! If we believe in it, we can save lives!" we can see her true complexity and nature showing off. Yes she knows the plate will fall. When Wedge asks her that, there is a zoom on her pained face. She is very distressed about it. But she will do her utmost to save people, even in this dire situation.
In conclusion
Aerith's knowledge is scattered, her empath and foreknowledge allow her to guess and connect things a lot - however these have their own limits. So far, what Remake has shown is that despite her getting more in tune with her Cetra powers, Aerith is still stuck and missing pieces of information, knowledge, understanding about her powers and about the future. She has been a guide through the first part, but how this will play a part in the next parts? I don't know. She's always been a guide figure, and it's something they expanded on in the first game - and I'm kind of expecting them to go on with this theme for her, because she needs to be Sephiroth's counterbalance, when it comes to... the philosophy and meta of the game as a whole. So far, Remake part 1 has left us at the same place that the OG did at the end of the Midgar portion - and I would argue that it's the same with Aerith. Aerith's foreknowledge has not fundamentally changed anything... in this timeline anyway. Whether it will change things a lot in the next parts remains to be seen.
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