Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children

Two years after Meteor was stopped by the Lifestream, Midgar struggles to return to its former glory.  A new sickness known as Geosigma, begins to infect children everywhere.  At the same time, three young men, their leader Kadaj who bears a scary resemblance to Sephiroth, arrive with a plan they simply refer to as “reunion”.  The world needs its heroes again.  But Cloud Strife is still haunted by the final battle with Sephiroth, a battle that cost him someone close.  Yet once again, he takes up his sword to put the past to rest one final time.  The saga of the legendary JRPG Final Fantasy VII continues…

You’dve thought everyone should have learned from The Spirits Within.  But the announcement of a new Final Fantasy animated movie surprised everyone when it was revealed that it would not only be based off a game…it would be based off Final Fantasy VII.  The trailers all looked stellar with great action, awesome character designs and the presence of Nobuo Uematu’s “Sephiroth Theme” playing in each one.  So many questions were possed: What had Cloud and company been up to since the end of the game (which they survived apparently)?  Who were these three Sephiroth looking clones and would they herald the return of everyone’s favorite big bad?  Would the action be even better in the finished film? 

Well Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children arrived with a lot of hype behind it…and only managed to meet maybe half of it.

The film is way more gorgeous than the Spirits Within.  I think it definitely has a more Anime feel to it than the Live Action Sci Fi style of TSW.  But Advent Children is definitely a good demo of what a solid Final Fantasy Anime could look like should it ever come to pass.  The characters  look amazing and since it’s been two years since the end of the game, a nice touch of age has been added to them.  Cloud, Tifa and their allies don’t look like sprites in the slightest.  Tifa was easily my favorite character design of the film.  Given a nice new outfit and attention to her hair that would make Aki Ross jealous, plus she had way more emotion than Cloud, I wished that this story would’ve focused more on her as the lead heroine. 

Tifa easily gets some good moments early on, especially in a one on one fight scene with Loz which leads to my next point.  The action is simply amazing.  Tifa’s Church battle, the eight on one showdown with Bahamut leading to Cloud’s one V one fight with it, the final battle with Sephiroth, all evidence of where the real love for this movie lies in, making it look cool and stylish as possible.  Some of the action does tend to drag or feel unnecessary: the forest duel.  But some scenes like the chase on the highway are saved by an awesome score from Final Fantasy veteran Nobuo Uematsu. Uematsu takes his Final Fantasy music to the next level, showcasing the return of many fan favorites like Tifa and Aerith’s themes.  But he also applies some nice remixes and rock enthused updates to Sephiroth’s theme that make the final battle feel more epic.

But good animation, music and action can only get you so far.  What about the story?  To be honest, I never really saw much of a story in Advent Children.  I only saw lines of dialogue spouted out to get viewers from one fight scene to the next.  It doesn’t really help that the hero and villain are both less than great.  Cloud sure can handle himself in a fight but he mopes and mopes and mopes whenever he isn’t hacking away with a sword.  On the opposite end, Kadaj is just a poser with big words and no real clue how to escape Sephiroth’s shadow.  His brothers, Loz and Yazoo don’t offer much more either and are kind of just there for the fight; Yazoo only brings a bit more cause he has a Final Fantasy VIII style gunblade.  There’s no real development for anyone and mood changes come based on how far we are into the movie.  By the time I got to the Bahamut fight, I had turned my mind off from the would be story and just let the action take over…that’s not a good thing.

As I said above, the movie feels like a demo for a much bigger project somewhere down the line…and at this point we we’re only just starting to hear rumors about an HD remake of VII on the PS3 (now it’s officially confirmed for PS4).  The story, however is a mess.  And the project seems to know that but want to hide that as much as possible under some flashy fights and good animation.  If I had to choose between which Final Fantasy film project was better, I’d say Advent Children overall just barely edges out The Spirits Within.  For all of it’s flaws, Advent Children at least focuses on a Final Fantasy world and has all of the elements needed to make it work: familiar characters, materia and summons, the music, etc.  It’s a good second draft (the first being The Spirits Within).  Let’s just hope that the next Final Fantasy film attempt is more successful all across the board rather than just about half of it.

6.5/10

Holy crap it’s November next week.  And I’m kicking it off with a film trilogy I’ve wanted to review for a while and managed to finally fit into the schedule.  See ya next Monday (on my birthday no less) for Mamoru Oshii’s Patlabor Film Trilogy, starting with Patlabor The Movie.