SPOILERS LTD Remake — It's like New Coke except ... no, it's exactly like New Coke

[Eerie]

No Ichigo does NOT end up with his childhood friend wtf he met Ori ONCE when they were younger but didn't even remember her. Why is this lie spreading, his childhood friend is Tatsuki.

 

[abzy1200]

No Ichigo does NOT end up with his childhood friend wtf he met Ori ONCE when they were younger but didn't even remember her. Why is this lie spreading, his childhood friend is Tatsuki.

Hang on am I crazy? I could have sworn Ichigo and Orihime were also atleast childhood acquaintances

 

[Eerie]

They met once when her brother died. That's it.

 

[abzy1200]

They met once when her brother died. That's it.

Damn, my bad then.

 

[Hellenic]

I agree this is the most annoying thing.

I get annoyed with it when I remember that in all of these novels they beat it into your head how much Tifa loves Cloud, how important they are to each other, keep them together after the series, etc. *I’d be more understanding if they included ANYTHING about Cloud romantically longing for Aerith and not just hammer it in how it’s guilt.

It’s like they say every thing right up to “they love each other”.

You *can’t say it’s ambiguous but then say “yes Tifa ad Cloud will stay together” or show in the game that Cloud’s subconscious is literally nothing but Tifa. I feel absurd for arguing the point because it’s like…they are the ones who gave all these details and depth to the relationship but then skirt around calling a spade a spade.

See this is why you don't really need these clear statements from the devs. All this content hammers it down to us and if you choose to ignore it in favor of your own headcanon then what can we really do? The NPTK debunk from Nojimas mouth himself says a lot that it doesn't really matter if they state this stuff or not, it's all pointless. People will still go against everything no matter what.

 

[frosty]

I knew I wasn't crazy, I knew there were so many examples of the childhood friend "winning", I just couldn't think of them lmao. I don't think it's shonen but I'm pretty sure The Quintessential Quintuplets is another example of the childhood friend "winning" I can think of off the top of my head.

You don't even have to look at anime. The final fantasy series already has many childhood romances. See Clive/ Jill, Cecil/Rosa. Everything is context. And furthermore doesn't the Nojima/Nomura trope say - "The transfer student that makes a big impact/impression but leaves" and "is the childhood friend that remains with you forever" ?

The problem with the Clerith are that they are taking everything in isolation and assigning ONLY romantic meaning to it. Yes giving flowers to someone is a romantic act. However, if the context is that I'm giving flowers to a person where he/she is wearing a mortar board in front of a university lawn with a card that says "Congratulations!" there is a possible chance I'm not necessarily in love with that person.

It's this why trying to argue with them is impossible when they take anime tropes like a woman dragging a man to mean - "it's a common anime trope that the shonen hero doesn't know how to act when a beautiful woman drags him around but usually he's secretly in love with her"

You know who else did that? Iris with Noctis, aka Noctis the married man. D:

Wait, I think we may be onto something.

Sephiroth could totally use Aerith death at this moment. But not how we think. He doesn't want to break Cloud, he wants Tifa to doubt about him ! And showing her that Cloud is really strange about it and doesn't care about Aerith gone will reinforce this idea of Muppet. That's HER breaking point ! The few seconds where she's not sure who this Cloud is, and when Cloud loses it.

I actually like this - I can imagine in Icicle Inn, everyone's reading Gast/Ilfalna notes and feeling sad about Aerith and Cloud does not seem to care. And if they have to snowboard down the Northern Crater and Cloud's even more indifferent to Aerith's death because he doesn't believe she's dead to create even more tension between him and the party.

Then when they get to Sephiroth and Cloud goes full denial over Zack being in Nibelhiem + insisting Aerith is alive that Tifa loses faith that Cloud is Cloud.

See this is why you don't really need these clear statements from the devs. All this content hammers it down to us and if you choose to ignore it in favor of your own headcanon then what can we really do? The NPTK debunk from Nojimas mouth himself says a lot that it doesn't really matter if they state this stuff or not, it's all pointless. People will still go against everything no matter what.

No, I want it. I want Square Enix and the official FFVII twitter handle to post a happy white day / valentine's day post with Cloud and Tifa smooching and I want to watch twitter go up in flames

 

[abzy1200]

You don't even have to look at anime. The final fantasy series already has many childhood romances. See Clive/ Jill, Cecil/Rosa.

Lulu and wakka aswell, no?

The NPTK debunk from Nojimas mouth himself says a lot that it doesn't really matter if they state this stuff or not, it's all pointless. People will still go against everything no matter what.

Tripled down on it too.

 

[Hellenic]

I rewatched the OG Lifestream sequence last night and it made me cry it's so good!! Honestly if I shipped a couple and then saw one half of the ship go through a mind-meld-esque sequence where another woman helps him rediscover his true self and assures him that he was the hero she always saw him to be all along despite his personal belief that he was a failure I'd just give up on the spot LOL so I'll commend them on their resilience haha. I wouldn't have the strength.

RE: anyone else seeing Cloud attack Tifa at Gongaga, I don't think anyone else saw, everyone else's reaction while waiting for Tifa after the Weapon takes her is way too chill. Like, Cloud ain't getting away with just a slap from Barret if he saw Cloud attack Tifa, Red and Yuffie wouldn't be as nonchalant as they are if they all saw it.

Yeah i commented about this before and i don't believe anyone actually saw Cloud attacking Tifa. Aerith and Yuffie were blocked by the big mako pipe while Barret, Red and Cait were below the platform so they couldn't have seen it happen. I don't think anyone besides Tifa and Aerith would even be fine with Cloud potentially being a threat to the party in that way either and be fine traveling with him after. The girls are being protective of him and so they don't want to really spread this stuff around for his sake.

 

[Hellenic]

The 2nd choice debate is back how lovely.......

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1781757288111317494

Yeah this is just pathetic. No one comes out of Rebirth believing this for a second without being dishonest.

 

[Hellenic]

It’s very easy to make a second choice argument if you completely disregard the story.

I love how the person says “even party members know”. I don’t even claim Barret’s statement at GS is about Tifa. But if we wanna talk about the party noticing…pretty sure statements are specifically made about Cloud and Tifa and not a vague statement from Barret.

Barret also knows Cloud is important to Tifa, hence why he slaps the shit out of him. Find it hard to believe Barret is dumb as hell and doesn’t know they have something going on.

Not a single time anyone in the party even hinted at Cloud and Aerith being a thing versus all the Tifa stuff. All of this is just willful ignorance and nothing else.

 

[Yoru]

Not a single time anyone in the party even hinted at Cloud and Aerith being a thing versus all the Tifa stuff. All of this is just willful ignorance and nothing else.

Aerith herself doesn't ignore it and teases Cloud about it. It's weird that an Aerith fan hasn't seen this. It's as if they're very picky about what's important in the game and what's not. Strange.

 

[Hellenic]

Right?

I'm sorry, but if anyone honestly believes Cloud is going for Aerith in a romantic way after playing through Rebirth, they have some growing in life to do. Cloud and Aerith both acknowledge they aren't and won't be a thing. I've seen people actually make the argument now an alt Cloud is going to end up with alt Aerith. Smh

An alt Aerith and Cloud in a saved world is the next best thing they can go for after Aerith didn't end up surviving this time around either, showing that they don't even really believe in their own star crossed lovers idea or whatever that works out with them in the afterlife after Cloud passes on to be with Aerith.

 

[nars305]

Cloud is the ultimate simp. Clerith lost from the start.

 

[Hellenic]

*Now that I think about it, couldn't you also make the argument for dragon ball aswell? If my memory serves correctly that is, it's been a while since I watched it.

I assume you mean Chi Chi and Goku and yeah they met when they were kids, though i don't remember there being many occasions of them meeting up and hanging out, maybe even just the one time before they grew up and met again at the end of the series. Still i guess it does count.

 

[Ryeleigh]

I knew I wasn't crazy, I knew there were so many examples of the childhood friend "winning", I just couldn't think of them lmao. I don't think it's shonen but I'm pretty sure The Quintessential Quintuplets is another example of the childhood friend "winning" I can think of off the top of my head.

*Now that I think about it, couldn't you also make the argument for dragon ball aswell? If my memory serves correctly that is, it's been a while since I watched it.

(another edit sorry) *Bleach is an interesting comparison to make aswell, since Clotis and Ichihimes are in the same boat from what I gather. and it's an even funnier comparison to make since not only does Ichigo end up with his childhood friend, Renji also does! Two whole examples in the same manga of lead characters ending up with their childhood friends, and in an incredibly popular and influential one too.

I've always seen "engraving" as making deeper grooves than "etching", I guess it was just a me thing.

Eerie already replied, lol, but Ichigo and Orihime were just classmates who knew of each other at the start of the manga. So not exactly childhood friends.

But if you want other examples of childhood friends winning, there's also Air Gear and Psyren off the top of my head. Kanojo ni Naru Hi was an interesting example of it, lol. Same with NG Life (although if I still recall correctly, they met in middle school?). I guess Taiyou no Ie and Oresama Teacher fit too even with the age gap? And I guess The Kindaichi Case Files? Though, I'm not sure if they actually got together or if their feelings stayed as "implied". So there are a few I can remember, lol. (Oh, and Tomo-chan wa Onna no ko!)

I assume you mean Chi Chi and Goku and yeah they met when they were kids, though i don't remember there being many occasions of them meeting up and hanging out, maybe even just the one time before they grew up and met again at the end of the series. Still i guess it does count.

They met once when they were kids and then again when they were eighteen, iirc. Never mind that Goku basically forgot all about it. So again, not exactly childhood friends, lol. I think Bulma and Goku would be a better fit for "childhood friends".

 

[Hellenic]

CLOUD IS IN LOVE OF SOMEONE ELSE FROM THE START.

Yeah this is the main difference that we have with the losing childhood friends and the winning ones in general. The ones that tend to lose have pretty one sided feelings towards the protag who never thought of the other in a romantic sense, while the winners have a more deeper bond from the get go that comes to light at some point. The setup is too strong in Tifas favor from the get go as a childhood friend.

 

[Hellenic]

Cloud is the ultimate simp. Clerith lost from the start.

I should've quoted this in the same post, but out of curiosity, have Cleriths said anything about all the simp moments Cloud has towards Tifa? And if they have, what were their takes?

 

[Hellenic]

No Ichigo does NOT end up with his childhood friend wtf he met Ori ONCE when they were younger but didn't even remember her. Why is this lie spreading, his childhood friend is Tatsuki.

Wish they did more with Tatsuki. I feel like her character was wasted in Bleach.

 

[Hellenic]

No, I want it. I want Square Enix and the official FFVII twitter handle to post a happy white day / valentine's day post with Cloud and Tifa smooching and I want to watch twitter go up in flames

Well i can't say no to that .

 

[Yoru]

I should've quoted this in the same post, but out of curiosity, have Cleriths said anything about all the simp moments Cloud has towards Tifa? And if they have, what were their takes?

Clerith : "What Tifa moment ?"

 

[Hellenic]

They met once when they were kids and then again when they were eighteen, iirc. Never mind that Goku basically forgot all about it. So again, not exactly childhood friends, lol. I think Bulma and Goku would be a better fit for "childhood friends".

Yeah that's what i thought. Too little to consider childhood friends of any sort i suppose.

 

[abzy1200]

Wish they did more with Tatsuki. I feel like her character was wasted in Bleach.

This is honestly the best way to describe bleach in one sentence.

"They should have done more with it's characters."

I'll never forgive Kubo for power cliffing Chad like that, so much wasted potential.

 

[Hellenic]

This is honestly the best way to describe bleach in one sentence.

"They should have done more with it's characters."

I'll never forgive Kubo for power cliffing Chad like that, so much wasted potential.

The dude added way too many characters in instead of focusing more on the actual main cast. Chad is a good example. He's supposed to be a main character, but he barely does anything most of the series. Instead he constantly just focuses on the million different Soul Society characters and give them all the big moments. Easily the most disappointing main cast in a shounen ever. But anyway i don't wanna derail too much into offtopic with this.

 

[abzy1200]

The dude added way too many characters in instead of focusing more on the actual main cast. Chad is a good example. He's supposed to be a main character, but he barely does anything most of the series. Instead he constantly just focuses on the million different Soul Society characters and give them all the big moments. Easily the most disappointing main cast in a shounen ever. But anyway i don't wanna derail too much into offtopic with this.

Yeah, don't get me wrong the soul society characters are awesome, but more of the original main cast would have been appreciated.

 

[Stiggie]

Huh, I just realized that Clerith is like the Pixar Theory. For anyone unfamiliar, the Pixar Theory is a fanon that all the Pixar movies happen in the same universe, just at different times. For every new Pixar film that is released, no matter how different the lore or world it takes place in, it's retrofitted into the theory by purposefully moving goalposts and introducing new truths. This way, the theory can never be plausibly disproven.

But the fun of Pixar Theory is the creativity and off-the-rails interpretations of making it work while fully acknowledging that it isn't canon. I wish extreme Cleriths could subscribe to that same freedom, unencumbered by the need to be canon.

It's the Clerith of the gaps essentially. They will never follow the preponderance of the evidence, they will always find some wiggle room somewhere and insert Clerith into it. If she's dead it can still be a story about love after death. If Cloud is with someone else it can still be that he doesn't love her.
At each step it requires a misrepresentation of the characters, making them so unlikable. And after 10 steps they'll start making arguments that conflict with step 1 but since they ignore context and everything else that is not the single zoomed in thing discussed right at that moment that doesn't phase them.

I might be wrong but this childhood friend/transfer student dynamic may be referenced in some ultimania with Nomura or someone referencing Tifa and Aerith like this.

Yeah.

"Nojima: As a motif for them, Tifa is “the childhood friend who’s been with you since nursery school”, and Aerith is “the girl who transfers school mid-term and quickly leaves for another school.” Since she doesn’t have many scenes, you’ve got to make it so that the transfer student has a big impact. That was what I thought. ~10th anniversary ultimania

I was talking more along the lines of explicit harem romcoms like Highschool DxD, Toradora etc (honestly I have almost zero experience in this genre so could totally be off-base). Shonen I've consumed almost all my life so I definitely know the childhood friend wins often here (Yusuke and Edward Elric are goated protagonists tbh).

I agree this sort of thing should not be typecasted all. Yet I see this trend of focusing on the childhood friend and transfer student among Cleriths recently and being used as "proof". Ultimately this is all just clutching at straws.

Well, I watch A LOT of anime, and I mean A LOT. Like 30 per season. And yeah, this is a trope....HOWEVER. There are two problems here.
For one, when it's the childhood friend archetype it's usually one of two scenarios. Either the childhood friend already loves the main character, and the main character is already in love with someone else, or, the childhood friend and main character love each other, but then a new girl shows up and before the childhood friend and MC get together the new girl overtakes the the childhood friends place in the heart of the protagonist.
This second one for instance is essentially the premise for "more than Married, less than lovers", which I was just reading.

FFVII would be the second case if Clerith were to be a thing, but there is a problem, namely that in these stories the fact that the MC loves the childhood friend IS KNOWN FROM THE START TO THE AUDIENCE. It's a required part of the premise that to tell a story about the new girl overtaking the old love interest it has to be established that the old love interest NEEDS to be overtaken. It makes zero narrative sense to go "I love new girl now, oh btw, I used to love the old girl". If that's no longer relevant then what's the point of saying that? It adds and changes nothing. If you don't know that's happening while watching then the experience is indistinguishable from it simply not being that case. The only thing it would do is kick the old love interest while she's down.

For instance in More than Married the main guy and girl both love someone else (the guy loves his childhood friend) and the set-up is that they try to help each other get together with their respective love interests, but they fall in love themselves while doing this.

But in FFVII OG this is decidedly not the case. It is never established that Cloud loves Tifa and that Aerith is slowly overtaking Tifas place in his heart. Instead the fact that Cloud had always loved Tifa IS the twist, and the reason that's not irrelevant is because its STILL the case. It's not "btw, I used to love Tifa". It's "Actually, it's been you this whole time".
One of those twists is a sound way to tell a narrative, the other is not, which honestly is the STRONGEST reason to believe it's the case, more so than even any factual evidence arguably.

The second problem is that something being a stereotype isn't evidence. It could be that this exact scenario had happened a 100 times, wouldn't mean it also will happen the 101st time. Story stereotypes can be good guides for what to expect, but they don't overwrite ACTUAL events since sometimes authors specifically want to subvert expectations, which is EXACTLY what they wanted to do with Aeriths death. So pointing at the "childhood friend always loses" cliche as evidence is simply wrong.

I knew I wasn't crazy, I knew there were so many examples of the childhood friend "winning", I just couldn't think of them lmao. I don't think it's shonen but I'm pretty sure The Quintessential Quintuplets is another example of the childhood friend "winning" I can think of off the top of my head.

Wouldn't say the childhood friend won there either, instead who won was "random girl he happened to spend 1 day with as a kid" rather than "the girl who

Spoiler: This WILL NEVER NOT ANGER THE EVERLIVING FUCK OUT OF ME!

fucking did EVERYTHING TO WIN HIS LOVE!!!"

god I hate that show.

furthermore doesn't the Nojima/Nomura trope say - "The transfer student that makes a big impact/impression but leaves" and "is the childhood friend that remains with you forever" ?

Yep, they created Tifa to be the heroine who will stay by the heroes side forever. Hell, her earring in Remake actually references this.

As well as the page from TOTP.

The problem with the Clerith are that they are taking everything in isolation and assigning ONLY romantic meaning to it. Yes giving flowers to someone is a romantic act. However, if the context is that I'm giving flowers to a person where he/she is wearing a mortar board in front of a university lawn with a card that says "Congratulations!" there is a possible chance I'm not necessarily in love with that person.

Thanks, that's a perfect analogy, I think I'll use it.