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sephirothishere
08-04-2006, 05:05 PM
in icicle inn in a video of ifalna and professor gast, ifalna says something about the calamity from the skies and about "him" befreinding the cetra and whatever....its the part where she calls the calamity from the skies,who i thought was JENOVA, a woman, a he???whats the deal with that??? is it that it wasnt jenova that came down from the heavens or jenova has no specific sex as she can shape shift by preying on the memories of the people it wishes to deceive or i am i just confused............ :( :confused: :eek:

Cipher
08-04-2006, 05:21 PM
Nah, you've got it right. Jenova is a gender-neutral being that changes its shape and appearance based on the memories of others.

Best explanation I've found so far: Jenova - Wikipedia, the free encylopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jenova)

You should note that in the PC Version, Ifalna uses the word 'it' in reference to Jenova in the Icicle Village videos; her use of the word 'he' only seems to appear in the US Release.

Xurts
08-04-2006, 08:03 PM
Jenova is actually a virus. It has no gender.

sephirothishere
08-05-2006, 01:17 PM
ok...thanks....just a weird thing i thought i would question....did you ever notice how aeris looks like sephiroth....look in the menu...they look exactly the same i thought there could have been something weird goin on and whatever...but i guess there isnt...

Dragon Mage
08-06-2006, 02:34 AM
It's probably just a bad translation.

Hey Xurts, how is Jenova a virus? I thought Jenova was an alien with weird powers. Was I wrong or what?

Xurts
08-06-2006, 04:54 AM
Hey Xurts, how is Jenova a virus? I thought Jenova was an alien with weird powers. Was I wrong or what?
As soon as Jenova crashed on the Planet, it spread its cells to the Cetra, making them go insane and turn into monsters. That's what viruses do. Ifalna even says Jenova is a virus when Gast interviews her.

silentenigma
08-06-2006, 05:20 AM
i don't think jenova was literally a "virus," but the disease it infected others with spread much like one. A true "virus" is not any type of living cell-it's just some DNA wrapped in a protein coating. The only way for a virus to reproduce it for it to invade a living cell, in which the cell itself takes the virus's DNA and uses it to create new viruses. so to say that jenova itself, being a living, multi-celled creature, was a "virus" is false, although it would transfer its own cells to others to make them diseased. Ifalna made the innocent mistake of using the word "virus" when she really meant "disease".

Xurts
08-06-2006, 05:37 AM
i don't think jenova was literally a "virus," but the disease it infected others with spread much like one. A true "virus" is not any type of living cell-it's just some DNA wrapped in a protein coating. The only way for a virus to reproduce it for it to invade a living cell, in which the cell itself takes the virus's DNA and uses it to create new viruses. so to say that jenova itself, being a living, multi-celled creature, was a "virus" is false, although it would transfer its own cells to others to make them diseased. Ifalna made the innocent mistake of using the word "virus" when she really meant "disease".
No. Viruses show the same characteristics of BOTH living and non-living cells. Saying that they are one or the other is wrong.

You have no way of determining what happened to the Cetra's own cells in their bodies once Jenova had infected them with its own cells. They could have done any number of things, including what you described in your post. We just know that the end result caused the victims to become insane and turn into monters.

Jenova was from a different planet. Meaning it wasn't going to be the same as some of the things on Gaia, like viruses for instance.

You're reminding me of Viator now, saying that you are right and the game is wrong. That's definately not a good idea.

Kawaii Ryűkishi
08-06-2006, 05:43 AM
Jenova spread a virus. She was not a virus herself.

Xurts
08-06-2006, 05:54 AM
1) _-The JENOVA Thesis-_

-Explanation of JENOVA and its Goal-

JENOVA is an ancient lifeform that arrived on the Planet Gaia some 2,000 years
before the main events of the game. Its landing site was the giant fissure --
and wound to the Planet -- known as the "Northern Crater." The area where
JENOVA had arrived was in the vicinity of the land known as the "Knowlespole"
in those days. The Knowlespole was likely a lush and fertile land, as it was
the home of a Cetra tribe that had cultivated it. These Cetra at the
Knowlespole had been the first to discover the Planet's wound and attempted to
help the Planet heal, using their abilities to guide the Planet's flow of
Spirit Energy to the wound. However, the wound was too severe, and would have
to be left to the Planet to heal on its own. Further still, due to the
Planet's Spirit Energy being redirected to the Northern Crater, the land
around the area of the Crater -- the Cetra's Knowlespole -- withered away, and
the Planet tried to persuade the Cetra to leave the land they loved.

As they prepared to abandon their land, a being appeared at the Northern
Crater and approached them, feigning friendship, appearing to them (either
through projected psychic illusions, or through shapeshifting) as their dead
relatives. When it got close enough, it infected those Cetra that it could
with a virus that caused insanity and physical transformation into monsters,
and then proceeded to approach other Cetra clans and do the same to them.
This being was JENOVA, the Crisis from the Sky:

Gast
"Tell us Ifalna... Where is the land called 'Knowlespole'?"

Ifalna
"Knowlespole refers to this area. The Cetra then began a
Planet-reading."

Gast
"Ifalna, what exactly does Planet-reading entail?"

Ifalna
"...I can't explain it very well, but it's like having a conversation
with the Planet..."
"It said something fell from the sky making a large wound."
"Thousands of Cetra pulled together, trying to heal the Planet..."
"But, due to the severity of the wound, it was only able to heal
itself, over many years."

Gast
"Do the Ancients, rather, the Cetra, have special powers to heal the
Planet?"

Ifalna
"No, it's not that kind of power. The life force of all living things
on this Planet becomes the energy."
"The Cetra tried desperately to cultivate the land so as not to
diminish the needed energy..."

Gast
"Hmm, even here so close to the North Cave, the snow never melts."
"Is that because the planet's energy is gathered here to heal its
injury?"

Ifalna
"Yes, the energy that was needed to heal the Planet withered away the
land... then the Planet..."
"The Planet tried to persuade the Cetra to leave the Knowlespole,
but..."

Gast
"Ifalna... Let's take a break."

Ifalna
"I'm all right... When the Cetra... were preparing to part with the
land they loved..."
"That's when it appeared!"
"It looked like... our... our dead mothers... and our dead brothers.
Showing us spectres of their past."

Gast
"Who is the person that appeared at the North Cave? I haven't any
idea."

Ifalna
"That's when the one who injured the Planet... or the 'crisis from
the sky', as we call him, came."
"He first approached as a friend, deceived them, and finally......
gave them the virus."
"The Cetra were attacked by the virus and went mad... transforming
into monsters."
"Then, just as he had at the Knowlespole."
"He approached other Cetra clans...... infecting them with... the
virus..."


A small number of uninfected Cetra banded together and mounted an assault on
the Crisis, defeating it and sealing it away, though how is not explained in
the game. JENOVA is eventually discovered by Professor Gast of Shin-Ra Inc.,
studied, and falsely believed to have been a Cetra by the Professor. Sadly, he
and his assistant Hojo extract some of the creature's Cells and use them to
the effort of enhancing Sephiroth while still in the womb of his mother,
Lucrecia, in an attempt to create a new Cetra, and thus a great many of the
problems that have to be faced by AVALANCHE and the Planet Gaia begin.

The exact details of the creature's origin are unknown, but what it is, and
what it's goal was, can be determined. JENOVA was essentially a virus. The
virus it unleashed upon the Cetra was actually its own Cells, which are stated
in-game to be capable of changing form:

"The ability to change one's looks, voice, and words, is the power of Jenova."

Viruses have two goals: 1) Survival, and 2) replication. By infecting other
life forms, JENOVA was replicating, as these other creatures would be part of
JENOVA itself, an extension of the creature.

We find further suggestion of this concept in the official Final Fantasy VII
novel, "On the Way to a Smile," written by Kazushige Nojima, which serves to
bridge the two-year gap between the events of Final Fantasy VII and those of
Advent Children. In this story, Denzel tells Reeve that those people INFECTED
(note the terminology) with JENOVA's Cells that were spread by the Lifestream
flowing across Midgar were discharging a black pus through the pores of their
bodies. With this in mind, recall that the malady known as "Geostigma" is
revealed in the film to be the result of the body overworking itself in an
effort to rid itself of JENOVA's Cells. When JENOVA's Cells entered people, at
first they would discharge this black pus, as this is the body's natural
reaction to an intrusion by viruses: One's natural immune system involuntarily
rushes white blood cells to the location of an infectious substance within
one's body in an attempt to contain it and then discharge it from the body.
That's exactly what was happening with those infected by JENOVA's Cells.
However, the virus was too strong to be removed as simply as random bacteria
would be.

In regard to the creature's gender, while it typically appears as a female
during the main events of the game, in light of its ability to change its
shape ("Sephiroth: 'Cloud... Don't blame Tifa. The ability to change one's
looks, voice, and words, is the power of Jenova.'"), and it -- or parts of it
to be more specific -- taking the form of Sephiroth during the course of the
game, it cannot be reasonably classified as female with any strong measure of
certainty, nor as male. It may very well be genderless.

NOTE: That JENOVA had taken a male's form before this point, and that the
Cetra had not even identified it as having a gender for certain, is something
that is often fallaciously made reference to based on the following dialogue:

Gast
"Who is the person that appeared at the North Cave? I haven't any
idea."

Ifalna
"That's when the one who injured the Planet... or the 'crisis from
the sky', as we call it, came."
"HE first approached as a friend, deceived them, and finally......
gave them the virus."
"The Cetra were attacked by the virus and went mad... transforming
into monsters."
"Then, just as HE had at the Knowlespole."
"HE approached other Cetra clans...... infecting them with... the
virus..."


Note that other times, JENOVA is simply referred to as an "it":

Cloud: "...Did IT get away? Jenova...?"


Barret: "Where's ITS $#&*&@ head? This whole thing's stupid. Let's keep
goin'."


Ifalna: "When the Cetra... were preparing to part with the land they loved..."
"That's when IT appeared!"
"IT looked like... our... our dead mothers... and our dead brothers. Showing
us spectres of their past."


Further, while the PlayStation Version of FFVII's script has JENOVA being
referred to as a "he" during those first parts of Ifalna's story related above
from the Original Crisis Reports seen at Icicle Inn, in the PC Version of the
script, in which many errors were corrected, all dialogue during the Original
Crisis Reports refers to JENOVA as an "it." Taking this into account, the
gender references within the PlayStation version of the script would not be
valid in regard to discussing the matter of JENOVA. JENOVA's shapeshifting
abilities and the fact that Ifalna didn't identify the creature by any gender
tells us that JENOVA cannot reasonably be considered as definitely being
female, or definitely having a gender at all.

That should clear it up. SoS is such a genius.

silentenigma
08-06-2006, 05:55 AM
You're reminding me of Viator now, saying that you are right and the game is wrong. That's definately not a good idea.

you're probably right.

Kawaii Ryűkishi
08-06-2006, 06:04 AM
The area where
JENOVA had arrived was in the vicinity of the land known as the "Knowlespole" in those days. The Knowlespole was likely a lush and fertile land, as it was the home of a Cetra tribe that had cultivated it."Knowlespole" was a mistranslation of "North Pole." The idea of the North Pole being a lush and fertile land is pure comedy.

Anyway, considering Squall of Seed is completely insane, a post of his is not a viable source for evidence to present in an argument. Get it down to under ten thousand words and maybe I'll give it a look.

Xurts
08-06-2006, 06:14 AM
The area where
JENOVA had arrived was in the vicinity of the land known as the "Knowlespole" in those days. The Knowlespole was likely a lush and fertile land, as it was the home of a Cetra tribe that had cultivated it."Knowlespole" was a mistranslation of "North Pole." The idea of the North Pole being a lush and fertile land is pure comedy.

Anyway, considering Squall of Seed is completely insane, a post of his is not a viable source for evidence to present in an argument. Get it down to under ten thousand words and maybe I'll give it a look.
It's possible that it was like that before Jenova crashed there. We have no way of knowing what Gaia was like that long ago, so we have to assume Ifalna knows what she is talking about.

SoS is far from insane. He explains nearly everything about the FF7 universe very thoroughly and provides in-game dialogue and quotes from Square to back up his theories.

sephirothishere
08-06-2006, 02:24 PM
yeh everything SoS said in that long thing xurts quoted is dialogue from the game with theories built on the evidence given....square do try to leave things to our imagination but lets not go crazy....and havent you been paying attention to climactic changes happening in the world such as global warming and global dimming....its all to do with evaporation and movement of the equator and whatever.....plus i think i found a real world equivalent of mako....i havent been able to talk to it or anything about the ancients yet, but i think it is a thing called methane hydrate....

Dragon Mage
08-07-2006, 07:23 PM
Wow. Thanks for the help Xurts. That really cleared things up. I didn't mean to make an argument about it-sorry! But thanks again. I was really confused about that.

Xurts
08-07-2006, 08:37 PM
Wow. Thanks for the help Xurts. That really cleared things up. I didn't mean to make an argument about it-sorry! But thanks again. I was really confused about that.
It was my pleasure.