Hopes for Remake & Rebirth (story/content)

[Clement Rage]

Keep the line blurred, best option IMO.

Besides, until Disc 3, Seph is anything but silent.

Sometimes. He has three big portions of dialogue, which actually have a point -keeping Cloud on his trail, twisting the knife of Aeris' death, and talking him into passing on the black materia. Much of the time he uses his actions (trails of blood, giant impaled snakes, instead of giant monologues, until in the ending he doesn't need to do anything beyond standing there and letting the characters realise that 'he's way outta our league'. It's a very standout trait.

 

[Ite]

Keep the line blurred, best option IMO.

Besides, until Disc 3, Seph is anything but silent.

Sometimes. He has three big portions of dialogue, which actually have a point -keeping Cloud on his trail, twisting the knife of Aeris' death, and talking him into passing on the black materia. Much of the time he uses his actions (trails of blood, giant impaled snakes, instead of giant monologues, until in the ending he doesn't need to do anything beyond standing there and letting the characters realise that 'he's way outta our league'. It's a very standout trait.

Seph monologues about as much as Kuja. All over Nibelheim, the Temple of the Ancients, the Northern Crater, and apparently he blabs on to President Shinra before stabbing him, so much so that even whimpering Palmer picked up a thing or two. The "birth of a god" segment is the only time he ever appears without tooting his own horn.

 

[Lex]

I do expect to see them emphasize Jenova's consciousness more this go around with how much the source books cite her involvement. They treat her as a partner to Sephiroth rather than a puppet.

As for being conscious all along, one of the source books (I can check if you'd like me to verify which) said she awoke because of Sephiroth. So, assuming they stick to that, she'd be inert at least until the Nibelheim Incident.

Who was it that wanted the Jenova fight in CC again? The one you scolded me for wanting involved. Was it Nojima or Kitase?

 

[Starling]

Jenova delivering the taunts and keeping Sephiroth silent wouldn't work. Cloud's personal conflict is with Sephiroth so taking away from that would be a rather poor idea. Likewise, Jenova is the alien entity of unknown origin so it remains more threatening the less it talks. I still don't think there's a good way to rewrite things as Jenova participating in Sephiroth's plan as more than simply an extension of him.

 

[Clement Rage]

Keep the line blurred, best option IMO.

Besides, until Disc 3, Seph is anything but silent.

Sometimes. He has three big portions of dialogue, which actually have a point -keeping Cloud on his trail, twisting the knife of Aeris' death, and talking him into passing on the black materia. Much of the time he uses his actions (trails of blood, giant impaled snakes, instead of giant monologues, until in the ending he doesn't need to do anything beyond standing there and letting the characters realise that 'he's way outta our league'. It's a very standout trait.

Seph monologues about as much as Kuja. All over Nibelheim, the Temple of the Ancients, the Northern Crater, and apparently he blabs on to President Shinra before stabbing him, so much so that even whimpering Palmer picked up a thing or two. The "birth of a god" segment is the only time he ever appears without tooting his own horn.

Not a chance. Kuja monologues to Garnet. He Monologues to Brahne. He monologues to Vivi, Zidane, Garland, he monologues to himself when there's no one else around.

In the cargo ship and Nibelheim basement (throwing the materia), Sephy barely speaks at all, he has about two lines each.

 

[ForceStealer]

I do expect to see them emphasize Jenova's consciousness more this go around with how much the source books cite her involvement. They treat her as a partner to Sephiroth rather than a puppet.

As for being conscious all along, one of the source books (I can check if you'd like me to verify which) said she awoke because of Sephiroth. So, assuming they stick to that, she'd be inert at least until the Nibelheim Incident.

Who was it that wanted the Jenova fight in CC again? The one you scolded me for wanting involved. Was it Nojima or Kitase?

Kitase.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

Yep, that was him.

Jenova delivering the taunts and keeping Sephiroth silent wouldn't work. Cloud's personal conflict is with Sephiroth so taking away from that would be a rather poor idea. Likewise, Jenova is the alien entity of unknown origin so it remains more threatening the less it talks. I still don't think there's a good way to rewrite things as Jenova participating in Sephiroth's plan as more than simply an extension of him.

Could not agree more. You also put it better than I did.

Not a chance. Kuja monologues to Garnet. He Monologues to Brahne. He monologues to Vivi, Zidane, Garland, he monologues to himself when there's no one else around.

In the cargo ship and Nibelheim basement (throwing the materia), Sephy barely speaks at all, he has about two lines each.

He may not go on as much as Kuja, but he still likes having an audience and being theatrical (gesturing widely, sticking his sword in the ground while he tells Bond his diabolical plan, generating disorienting illusions, etc.). The cargo ship is hardly the go-to demonstration for his speech mannerisms -- and even there he's putting on quite the show with the slaughter.

 

[hian]

In a way, rewriting it to have Sephiroth being a character who's brains been addled by the mutations caused from the Jenova cells might make more sense than the way the plot originally was.

I mean, in what conceivable way does flying around in space destroying planets ad infinitum have any merit to it what so ever?

In fantasy you always get these Satan/Sauron like bad-guys who either want to destroy the entire world, which begs the question where they plan on living after they've done that, or they plan to turn the world into this giant charcoal, and then rule that charcoal as if that's the best thing ever since sliced bread.

I mean... No - that's dumb. Most people who want to rule shit build giant thrones of gold for themselves, and get a harem of sex-slaves.
And as for those who just want to burn stuff - they tend to be mentally ill and they have no conception of living out their days in happiness after they're done burning stuff.

Now, Sephiroth strikes me as a peculiar case, because he's in that Sauron camp of villainy where he wants to have his cake and eat it too - burn everything and then rule it - but it's like, what's the point?
What could possibly be the point of just flying around destroying planets for all eternity? It will definitely get old. What about when he runs out of planets?

I could grant that to Jenova would just mindlessly do this, if we see her as this parasitic creature who literally just responds to her environment like a virus or lower animal, but to a human being like Sephiroth?
He'd have to be pretty mad for that to make any sense, and I don't think the plot gives him enough character development to justify that level of madness.

I love his design though. Cool character.

 

[Ite]

In a way, rewriting it to have Sephiroth being a character who's brains been addled by the mutations caused from the Jenova cells might make more sense than the way the plot originally was.

I mean, in what conceivable way does flying around in space destroying planets ad infinitum have any merit to it what so ever?

In fantasy you always get these Satan/Sauron like bad-guys who either want to destroy the entire world, which begs the question where they plan on living after they've done that, or they plan to turn the world into this giant charcoal, and then rule that charcoal as if that's the best thing ever since sliced bread.

I mean... No - that's dumb. Most people who want to rule shit build giant thrones of gold for themselves, and get a harem of sex-slaves.
And as for those who just want to burn stuff - they tend to be mentally ill and they have no conception of living out their days in happiness after they're done burning stuff.

Now, Sephiroth strikes me as a peculiar case, because he's in that Sauron camp of villainy where he wants to have his cake and eat it too - burn everything and then rule it - but it's like, what's the point?
What could possibly be the point of just flying around destroying planets for all eternity? It will definitely get old. What about when he runs out of planets?

I could grant that to Jenova would just mindlessly do this, if we see her as this parasitic creature who literally just responds to her environment like a virus or lower animal, but to a human being like Sephiroth?
He'd have to be pretty mad for that to make any sense, and I don't think the plot gives him enough character development to justify that level of madness.

I love his design though. Cool character.

Quite right, his plan makes no sense. Makes you wonder...

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

I kind of read Sephiroth (and Jenova) differently. They are like a virus, but not one that's just striving to kill everything -- it's more that they're doing what the planet Terra did in FFIX or what the Phantom homeworld's Gaia was trying to do in The Spirits Within: infect and convert.

Seph wanted to become one with the planet's cycle of life, so I think he was just carrying on the work Jenova started (i.e. what she did to the Cetra). He would have turned everything into an extension of himself.

At its most basic, that does still amount to killing everything currently alive, but it doesn't rule out spinning off new life forms whose spirit energy comes from and returns to him.

 

[Flare]

I always took Sephiroth's whole 'making the Planet his vessel' to be an extension of Jenova's influence (as I'm with the idea that he merges with her at least somewhat by AC's events). Like it's a bit of an instinct pulling him on to do something similar to her.

But I always found his line of 'And one day we'll find a new world, and on it we'll build a shining future' to be evident that he was actually intending to find a new planet with a different species, and rule over them in some way as a God or something. He didn't care about the Planet itself already because by that point he despised humans already, and so what better plan than to make use out of the humans and Planet (absorbing the Lifestream, which of course means the humans too, and using the Planet's shell) and use them to travel to a 'better world' that he can be a God on for real?

Just my thoughts anyway. I always though that was his intention, not that he become a somewhat mindless parasite like Jenova or anything. (I don't think Jenova is mindless either, she sounds very intelligent by the Cetra's tales). Jenova might be a more malicious entity though, who knows? A malicious parasite that enjoys sucking the life out of worlds.

 

[Starling]

Sephiroth's more likely to wipe out any sentient species he finds on the next planet so he can repopulate as he pleases, though he wouldn't have to destroy said world to do so. He might still have to nondestructively assimilate that planet as well if he wants to have the kind of control that would allow him to do it without personally murdering everything he doesn't want.

 

[leadmyskeptic]

I was actually gonna make this a separate thing, but since we're talking about Jenova, I'll put it here: I'm SURE this must have been said at some point in FF7 discussion, but after catching it again on TV the other night, I realized...Jenova is "The Thing" (From the John Carpenter movie). Found frozen in a 'geological stratum' by a scientific team, mistaken for a great scientific discovery, then upon thawing it freaks out and begins infecting people and things. It uses its ability to mimic them (as described by Ifalna) to win their trust, and then..."gives them the virus". It does this in a simultaneously mindless and highly intelligent fashion, functioning like a sinister sentient disease, in order to take over the planet. Also, the individual pieces of it can splinter off and do their own thing. Just thought it was interesting.

 

[Octo]

^Yup, and this is why I find Jenova moar scary and moar interesting than Sephiroth ever was

 

[Tashasaurous]

I was actually gonna make this a separate thing, but since we're talking about Jenova, I'll put it here: I'm SURE this must have been said at some point in FF7 discussion, but after catching it again on TV the other night, I realized...Jenova is "The Thing" (From the John Carpenter movie). Found frozen in a 'geological stratum' by a scientific team, mistaken for a great scientific discovery, then upon thawing it freaks out and begins infecting people and things. It uses its ability to mimic them (as described by Ifalna) to win their trust, and then..."gives them the virus". It does this in a simultaneously mindless and highly intelligent fashion, functioning like a sinister sentient disease, in order to take over the planet. Also, the individual pieces of it can splinter off and do their own thing. Just thought it was interesting.

Except that Jenova didn't move when she was found, so she's not really "The Thing"(Ugh, I had trouble sleeping after seeing terrifying parts of that god awful movie).

^Yup, and this is why I find Jenova moar scary and moar interesting than Sephiroth ever was

If Square ever decided to make a crossover with FFVII and FFX(because some believe that FFX is a spirital prequel that leads up to the events of FFVII), then Jenova may be or at least somewhat connected to Yu Yevon and/or Yunalasca.

 

[leadmyskeptic]

"The Thing" is a freakin' horror classic! I can't stand by while you call it awful just because it got inside your head and freaked you out...that's what it's supposed to do ; )

And yeah, it's true that Shinra keeps Jenova 'locked up' until the whole Incident...in making the comparison, I combined some elements of when she's found by Shinra and when she initially approached the Cetra, as described by Ifalna...but ya gotta admit, the similarities are high.

 

[Tashasaurous]

"The Thing" is a freakin' horror classic! I can't stand by while you call it awful just because it got inside your head and freaked you out...that's what it's supposed to do ; )

And yeah, it's true that Shinra keeps Jenova 'locked up' until the whole Incident...in making the comparison, I combined some elements of when she's found by Shinra and when she initially approached the Cetra, as described by Ifalna...but ya gotta admit, the similarities are high.

That's okay. I found it awful because horror movies have never been and never will be my taste in entertainment. Everyone has different opinions in their favorites.

Yeah I can see what you mean, but Jenova attacked and approached Cetra before she was found by Shinra.

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

You're being too literal in your comparisons. The point isn't that FFVII is a remake of "The Thing" -- the point is that Jenova seems to have been inspired by the creature from that movie.

 

[Tashasaurous]

You're being too literal in your comparisons. The point isn't that FFVII is a remake of "The Thing" -- the point is that Jenova seems to have been inspired by the creature from that movie.

Point taken.

If that's the case, then maybe Xehanort in the KH universe has been somewhat reinspired by Hojo from the original game and in the Compilation.

I mean, both of them have similiar and deadly goals and believe that other lifeforms are nothing more than toys they can just break or throw away and that they themselves are gods to the universe.

For example, Hojo implanted some of Sephiroth's cells into twelve people(including Cloud and Zack) to transform them into Sephiroth clones; Xehanort implants pieces of his own heart to turn his chosen victums into clones of himself.

Hojo wants the destroy the planet to rebuild it just for science and has plotted it through Sephiroth who plotted the same goal, not realising he was doing all this not just for Jenova, but for that sicko.

Xehanort wants to gain the X-Blade and Kingdom Hearts and destroy the Realm of Light and rebuild it to gain the light like in the first Keyblade war, in curiousity.

In retrospect, both old men have a few things in comman and their goals and actions are slightly different. Both have very dangerous and deadly curiousities to the point of abandoning and willing to destroy all lives just to get what they want.

 

[The Blue Bandit]

On the matter of Sephiroth (and it's been a long time since I have played through FFVII, so I'm going mostly off of old memories), I get the sense that he and Jenova are going to wipe out humanity and destroy the planet because the beings on that planet wronged them terribly. Whether or not Jenova's original intentions were to take everything over/destroy all life on the planet/use the planet as an intergalactic convertible, it was made clear by Sephiroth that they both felt like both the Cetra and the humans did evil to her. First being defeated and put into stasis by the ancients, then being dissected and experimented upon by humans...

They could have simply conquered the world and called it good, but that wasn't enough. They were both consumed by hatred and revenge. Neither of them wants this planet, because it is the place where she was defeated and nearly destroyed, it is the place where humans live. Destroy it, destroy them, and eliminate all evidence that there was ever a place where Jenova was opposed and overcome, because they don't even deserve to have a planet anymore.

 

[Ite]

I'm of the opinion that Jenova was just hungry for soul juice. She's an eldritch space horror that eats souls for breakfast, she hunts like those brain parasites that cause ants to climb up a blade of grass. But, as her prey is much more complex than ants, so are her tactics. Illusions, desires, manipulating even the most willful creatures, all to deliver their own souls to her thousand impossible mouths! Sweet delectable souls! Dripping with fear, sorrow, and delicious morsels of hope! Line up before the mother of death! Throw yourself from the cliffs brothers and sisters! Soon we will be subsumed by her mighty will! Churned into crude oil to fuel her eternal machine! Destroy this pitiful rock! Suck the life from it and deliver it to mother's warm, black stomach. There we will experience only pain! Only the slow rupturing of our memories as we travel to a new world, so that mother may hunt again! HAIL JENOVA H'LATH FGARM SEPH'RTH

 

[The Twilight Mexican]

On the matter of Sephiroth (and it's been a long time since I have played through FFVII, so I'm going mostly off of old memories), I get the sense that he and Jenova are going to wipe out humanity and destroy the planet because the beings on that planet wronged them terribly. Whether or not Jenova's original intentions were to take everything over/destroy all life on the planet/use the planet as an intergalactic convertible, it was made clear by Sephiroth that they both felt like both the Cetra and the humans did evil to her. First being defeated and put into stasis by the ancients, then being dissected and experimented upon by humans...

They could have simply conquered the world and called it good, but that wasn't enough. They were both consumed by hatred and revenge. Neither of them wants this planet, because it is the place where she was defeated and nearly destroyed, it is the place where humans live. Destroy it, destroy them, and eliminate all evidence that there was ever a place where Jenova was opposed and overcome, because they don't even deserve to have a planet anymore.

I think you might be attaching Sephiroth's rationale from when he thought he and Jenova were Cetra (i.e. his desire for revenge on "the traitors") to his behavior after he learned what Jenova actually was.

I'm of the opinion that Jenova was just hungry for soul juice. She's an eldritch space horror that eats souls for breakfast, she hunts like those brain parasites that cause ants to climb up a blade of grass. But, as her prey is much more complex than ants, so are her tactics. Illusions, desires, manipulating even the most willful creatures, all to deliver their own souls to her thousand impossible mouths! Sweet delectable souls! Dripping with fear, sorrow, and delicious morsels of hope! Line up before the mother of death! Throw yourself from the cliffs brothers and sisters! Soon we will be subsumed by her mighty will! Churned into crude oil to fuel her eternal machine! Destroy this pitiful rock! Suck the life from it and deliver it to mother's warm, black stomach. There we will experience only pain! Only the slow rupturing of our memories as we travel to a new world, so that mother may hunt again! HAIL JENOVA H'LATH FGARM SEPH'RTH

Praise the Lord and pass the peanuts.

 

[Tashasaurous]

Only the slow rupturing of our memories as we travel to a new world, so that mother may hunt again! HAIL JENOVA H'LATH FGARM SEPH'RTH

Praise the Lord and pass the peanuts.

Oh Great mighty Lord Above, thou pass Cupcakes we Shall Love.(I'm not sure if these comments are sarcasm).

But Sephiroth did kinda realise he and Jenvoa are not Cetra, but he was still insane enough to think she was his mother and that's why he killed Aerith, because he knew she was the last real Cetra and would get in his way.

 

[hleV]

I think Sephiroth's agenda is his own, which only somewhat goes in hand with Jenova's because he treats her as his mom (due to having her DNA). So the idea to become a god is completely his own, though if we go by AC, he doesn't exactly desire to be a god of THIS Planet in particular, so he intends to do what Jenova did and use the Planet as his vessel for traveling the cosmos.

 

[Random Nobody]

If Barret is characterised as he is in the original game, I hope they get someone who is actually black to look over the localisation because.