Hopes for Remake & Rebirth (story/content)

[55-]

The way I see Jenova, she was a parasite, and never had any conscious thought or desire other than to destroy all life on Gaia and repopulate the planet in her own image. The reason why Sephiroth is so terrifying is because he's a little bit of that and a little bit of human. So, he's Jenova, but with all of the the conscious thought and the emotion of a human, and mad with resentment and anger and the desire for revenge. Crazy human + powerful alien.

But yeah, I think anyone's interpretation of the source material is as good as anyone else's, including the creators. (I think the thing we're thinking of where someone said they think that Sephiroth was using/piloting Jenova was an interview, but it's been a while for me too and I have no evidence to back that up.)
I think that things can be appreciated on their own regardless of any future clarifications or changes established outside the thing itself.

 

[Starling]

And she's *the last* of her kind, right? The *last* Cetra...? I'm just wondering if her parents and grandparents all just sort of...died rather abruptly....?

She looks like a normal person and so does Aeris so...who's to say there aren't other Cetra running around...?

Well, my interpretation was that the difference between humans and Cetra is more spiritual than genetic and that humans resulted from the Cetra that gave up their nomadic ways and no longer listened to the planet. Over time, more and more of the remaining Cetra just faded into the human population. This could go a way to explaining stuff like Bugenhagen's insight regarding the planet, Reeve's inspire ability and how children seem to be more in tune with the planet. Aerith would still be the last person who could be properly considered a Cetra, albeit only half.

 

[trash panda]

Hrm....I just read a theory involving Jenova which stated that only a sentient being would be capable of convincingly pretending to be friends with the Cetra...which is exactly what Jenova did, according to Ifalna. How can one pretend to be human (or Cetra) without being able to understand human nature? I mean, you can't replicate emotions without knowing them first...

 

[CameoAmalthea]

Have you seen John Carpenter's "The Thing?"

To me, that's Jenova - smart and tricky, but also driven to spread, take over and consume. As humans we are locked in to our idea of being sentient as individuals, omnivores, social creatures - Jenova is a parasite but that doesn't meant it can't think.

As for Cetra - my thought was Cetra were the native people of the Planet and humans came from another planet and colonized this world after Jenova had all ready greatly reduced the Cetra population. However, Cetra and humans are similar enough that they can interbreed and it's hard to tell the difference by looking.

Then again - Hojo seemed to think he could breed Aerith and Nanaki - so maybe Cetra have a unique ability to reproduce with anything?

 

[Starling]

I'm not entirely sure Ifalna meant more than just Jenova taking the form of the Cetra's deceased loved ones, walking up to them without necessarily attempting to behave like said loved one and then attacking. I wouldn't really expect Jenova to want to waste much time on it. However, its ability to draw from the memories of others suggests it probably would've been able to do a convincing job imitating someone should it actually feel the need to interact with the Cetra before attacking them.

The similarities between humans and Cetra make it unlikely that they originated from different planets.

 

[Octo]

Denver the last dinosaur
He's my friend and a whole lot more...

Sorry just had that in my head.

Yeah I never really got the whole last of the Cetra thing, I mean it does seem pretty odd but not impossible. I'm still confused about what the Cetra are, IIRC the implication was that everybody was Cetra, until some of them decided to give up Cetring (?) and be regular joes.

So could a regular person become a Cetra through some sort of voodoo bullshit meditation stuff or what? Are there actual physical differences? Cos we know they can breed with humans.

 

[trash panda]

I'm just at the beginning of a new game but I Googled this quote from Ifalna:

"He first approached as a friend, deceived them and finally...... gave them the virus."

Which sounds sort of like Jenova infiltrated/went undercover, spending time enough to convince the Cetra that s/he was their friend.

 

[Starling]

I think humans could potentially regain some Cetra abilities but it'd take a lot of effort and probably multiple generations. The whole thing kinda reminds me of how bending in Avatar the Last Airbender and Legend of Korra seems to result from a combination of genetics and spirituality. In that setting, children of benders are more likely to end up with the ability than the children of non-benders. Which element they can bend also depends on which nation they belong to. The spirituality element comes into play when comparing the culture associated to each nation and their ratio of benders and non-benders.

Hojo's comments in the boardroom meeting seemed to suggest there was a genetic difference between human and Cetra but that could be latent ability to do stuff like talk to the planet or use magic, which would presumably come more naturally to a Cetra than the average human. Considering the split probably didn't occur long ago enough for them to become separate species, the genetic differences would be minor enough not to interfere with the viability of offspring.

 

[Novus]

If FF7 was real life, it would obviously be Jenova in control because (as far as we know) we are only our genes and we do what is programmed for them to do, plus outside influence.
But since it is fantasy and souls exist in this world, does the game answer the question as to whether or not Jenova's motivations differ from that of Sephiroth? From what I remember, we decided that there was no major difference between the two in what their end game was.

 

[Dragonslayer Ornstein]

Didn't Sephiroth control Jenova entirely or not? @novus

 

[Starling]

The degree by which genetics affects the way a person ends up is a matter of nature vs nurture. Genetics determine the framework we have to work with but our environment determines what becomes of it. Behavior is more nurture than nature as shown with the differences in behavior of identical twins, as well as how being raised by a different species affects the behavior of animals. As for whether or not souls exist in real life, that depends on how you define a soul and whether or not you want to start a philosophical debate about it.

 

[Novus]

Didn't Sephiroth control Jenova entirely or not? @novus

In terms of the literal interpretation, yes. I believe all Hojo's lines at the reunion are direct plot exposition (minus the parts about Cloud which is to setup for the further twist in the lifestream).

Hojo "But being a genius that I am, I soon figured it out. You see it
was all Sephiroth's doing."
"Sephiroth is not just content to diffuse his will into the
Lifestream; he wants to maniplate the Clones himself."

However fans who are looking deeper into the plot notice several
discrepancies such as Jenova opening the seal in Nibleheim which
indicates the creature wasn't brain dead. And the fact that the two
share the same motivation. If Sephiroth wanted to do something radically
different then there would be notably less discussion.

 

[trash panda]

I always thought that what set things into motion was the idea that Cloud's presence (having been injected with Jenova's cells) caused her to "awaken" inside of the ShinRa building...and from that point on she was attempting to reunite with the rest of her cells, e.g. the clones.

She assumed the appearance of Sephiroth because she needed to reunite with Sephiroth's clones. The clones are (or were) all people who had very specific memories of Sephiroth (being that they were all victims of the incident at Nibelheim), so...Sephiroth was a commonality that would help draw them together.

But that's all fan theory hocus pocus.

 

[Starling]

While Cloud's presence near Jenova probably did have something to do with the timing of its escape from Shinra HQ, it seemed more like Sephiroth setting his plans in motion. I mean, Jenova could've just slaughtered its way out of the building rather than up to the president. Sephiroth's the one who wanted to mess with Cloud.

On that note, I don't really get why no one looked at the trail of blood leading right out of the tank and suggested that Jenova got out on its own. They just kinda follow it up, see the masamune and apparently assume Sephiroth carried it out.

 

[Obsidian Fire]

^^Well, no one but Cloud and Co. being alive would contribute to no one at Shin-Ra noticing that. And the people who should be responsible for that aren't competent enough to notice, and the people who would notice aren't exactly going to bring it to the attention of those who could do something about it.

My pet theory on why Sephiroth starts moving Jenova when he does is that Sephiroth doesn't have any good reason to move Jenova any earlier then he does. Because up until then, Sephiroth has been sitting in the Lifestream absorbing all the knowledge in it. And then Zack dies... and he knows that Aerith is an Anchient and that Cloud is specifically a Sephiroth Copy. And then Cloud goes and meets Aerith and sticks his face right in front of Jenova's headless body in the Shin-Ra building. Depending on how much Sephiroth can see that his copies sees (and the OG suggests this is a lot)... well, there's a good reason for Sephiroth to draw Cloud and Co. towards him. Sephiroth by this point knows that the Ancients are the only beings capable of successfully stopping him and he's got influence over Cloud anyway. He might as well kill two birds with one stone and kill off the last Ancient and absorb Cloud's cells all at the same time. It's not like in his mind anyone else can do anything about it. So I see him as being more opportunistic at the start of the OG then just being obsessed with Cloud, although that does come later once Aerith is killed and Cloud's head gets fixed.

 

[55-]

Pretty sure Sephiroth didn't carry Jenova's body out of the Shinra Building, he projected himself onto it and drove it out, just like he was projecting himself onto the Jenova arm you find on the boat. That's what Sephiroth's sword is there, and why Palmer claims to have seen him.
I think maybe he used Cloud to open the thing Jenova's in? Thus explaining why Cloud's cell door was unlocked. Idk why kinda magical door unlocking power he has tho, and why he could use it with Cloud but not Jenova.

Also the Sephiroth copies, I had assumed were people like Cloud, who had Jenova cells but didn't have the strong will to resist them. Maybe Soldiers. I thought everyone in Nibelheim burned to death.

 

[Ⓐaron]

Pretty sure Sephiroth didn't carry Jenova's body out of the Shinra Building, he projected himself onto it and drove it out, just like he was projecting himself onto the Jenova arm you find on the boat.

That's more or less correct, I believe. Sephiroth was in the Northern Crater at the time. Jenova has shape-shifting abilities and I was always given to understand that Sephiroth had her assume his form in part because it had deep personal meaning to Cloud. It's been awhile since I played the game so I'm fuzzy on some of the details, but regardless, it's definitely not Sephiroth that carries Jenova's body out of the Shinra Building; he was still encased in materia at the time.

 

[trash panda]

I am so happy that we are all nerding about this....

 

[Ⓐaron]

So'm I. Anyway, the FF Wiki agrees with me:

Later, when Sephiroth was defeated by Cloud Strife at the Nibelheim Mako Reactor during the Nibelheim Incident, he traveled through the Lifestream to the Northern Cave to recuperate. Five years later, Sephiroth, controlling Jenova and making her use his form, leads the Sephiroth Clones to the crater.

So yeah.

 

[trash panda]

OMG WIKI IS NOT A RELIABLE SOURCE OF INFORMATION

....but I'll let it slide this time.

 

[Starling]

I'm pretty sure Jenova's tank was busted open from the inside.

I thought everyone in Nibelheim burned to death.

It's amazing how many people Sephiroth failed to kill. In the case of the Nibelheim villagers, I suppose he only slaughtered the ones in his immediate vicinity and the rest would've died form the fire, save for the ones who probably would've ended up too injured to be able to escape from Shinra afterwards.

When I said Sephiroth carried Jenova out, I meant that was what the party presumably concluded, knowing Sephiroth killed the president and Jenova is missing, not that it was what happened.

The wiki quote's pretty decent, though I'm not sure Sephiroth had any choice in where his body ended up.

 

[CameoAmalthea]

The wiki is as descent as the people editing it - and sometimes people like to edit it to include their own head canons so they can claim their interpretation is canon. There have been editing wars.

The similarities between humans and Cetra make it unlikely that they originated from different planets.

To be fair, a lot of scifi has creatures on other planets look like humans. (Probably because scifi written for the screen needs to accommodate for human actors). I'm sure in those works there's an explanation - like similar planets give rise to similar dominant creatures - and I'm not saying it's a good explanation just that it's not outside the realm of Scifi.

So if we accept the FFX theory that the people of that world eventually colonized the people of FFVII's world - it would explain why humans and cetra exist and are different. Cetra are native to the planet and those more in tune with it.

 

[55-]

I am so happy that we are all nerding about this....

LOL. "The original FFVII was very vague and left a lot up to individual interpretations, FOR EXAMPLE:" *everyone goes on for pages and pages*

 

[Starling]

Human-like aliens are in this grey area where too human-like and they stretch the suspension of disbelief. Not human-like enough and a lot of people might have difficulty empathizing, hence why the ugly ones are usually bad.

If humans came from Zanarkan, they should be able to use magic without materia. As I've said while discussing the topic before, the cultures in FF7 don't really match up with the ones in 10. Those aren't the only issues with connecting the two games either. The only notable difference between humans and Cetra is that the Cetra can talk to the planet and guide the flow of the lifestream and we seem to have instances that suggest humans can at least hear the planet under certain circumstances.

LOL. "The original FFVII was very vague and left a lot up to individual interpretations, FOR EXAMPLE:" *everyone goes on for pages and pages*

This is the kind of discussion I've been waiting quite a while for. They don't happen nearly often enough.

 

[Cat on Mars]

Then again - Hojo seemed to think he could breed Aerith and Nanaki

Wacky science cartoon logic at its finest. I could never take Hojo seriously after that. Which means I never took him seriously and spent the whole game wondering who the hell at Shinra was still funding Hojo's research, because all the projects he was involved with fall into one or two categories: batshit crazy or dangerously unstable and unpredictable. And always deeply disturbing and unethical, but we know Shinra is okay with that shit.

Spoiler

Lucrecia is a piece of work too. Apparently, academic rejection is the first requirement for getting hired at Shinra.

Dr Hojo=Dr Mephisto.

"I have created things that will change the world for the better. For instance, here is a monkey Cetra with four asses."