Herrp a derrrp

[chionos]

It doesn't matter one bit what her name was "supposed to be" if they released it as "Aeris." I don't care if it was a mistake or not. A mistranslation, a snafu, a late-night drunken joke, none of that matters.

"Aerith," when used in the west, is usually a sign of elitist hipsterism, and quite silly.

When "Aerith" is insisted upon, it's just hipsterical.

For the one, the transliteration "Aeris" showed up in not one, but TWO Final Fantasy games (Tactics is the other).

For the two, 's' and 'th' are both transliterated into Japanese by the same symbol (pronounced 'su') which is the last syllable of Aeris's Japanese name (Earisu), and it's always been that way from the beginning.

For the three, "Aerith" sounds moronic, whereas "Aeris" sounds...less moronic.

For the four, "Aerith" only gained traction in the west when someone decided "Aerith" was almost an anagram of "Earth." Which, of course, is a bloody coincidence, and points to this 's' vs. 'th' junk being ex post facto revisionist gobbledygook.

Look, it boils down to the fact that the majority of us spent AT LEAST 7 years calling her Aeris, and there's no substantial reason at all to go back and change that now. I still have my copy of FFVII from 1997, and it still says Aeris. My Tactics still says Aeris. I still say Aeris.

Also, I want to point out that there seems to be an incorrect understanding of how "canon" works perpetuating in this thread. Canon is about a body of work. You can't cherry pick elements of a work of fiction. You can cherry pick works of fiction, but not elements within individual works. Do you follow? In other words, if you want to say that "Aeris" isn't canon, then you have to say that FFVII the game as published in the west isn't canon. The whole game. For me, FFVII is the most canon (only canon?), and the other games/movies/whatever are the deviations. Fun/interesting deviations, but deviations nonetheless. Nomura doesn't give a rat's rear end about continuity. Neither does Kitase.

Now, if SE ever gives us a FFVII remake (would make sense as a 20-year anniversary gift to the fans, yeah?), and "Aeris" is changed to "Aerith" then I'll consider the canon officially altered (though I myself will still call her Aeris--for the most part).

[Spooniest]

People call things what they call things

I really hate the idea of literary canon in the first place. The whole thing seems tangential when considering the entertainment value of a work of fiction.

Put another way, Nick Meyer once said, of filmmaking, "My theory is that nobody cares what the movie's called, who's in the movie, or what the movie is about, they only care about one thing, 'Is the movie any good?'"

[Karifean]

I fail to see why the creators can't fix an old mistake without having to rerelease the entire game for it to be acknowledged. She's been called Aerith in all new games to feature her ever since Kingdom Hearts. Is that not enough to tell you that her name is officially Aerith? Why is it so impossible to change this little fact about the game without making the entire game non-canon?

Of course Square Enix could hardly care less what we call Aerith over here in the west, but I can say without a doubt in my mind that if they ever hypothetically DID remake FF VII, her name would be Aerith.

If you prefer the name Aeris, that's fine. Call her that, you're not harming anyone. There is no pressing need for you to change your mind on it. But don't denounce people who prefer to call her the name the creators intended for her to have. Don't present your way of calling her to be apparently "superior" to theirs. I think calling her by what has pretty certainly become the "official" pronunciation a rather natural and understandable approach.

And just a little fun fact: her name IS in fact Aerith even in the original western Final Fantasy VII releases up until you get to rename her, where her name defaults to Aeris. Just like how Cloud's name is Ex-SOLDIER until the rename screen, and Red XIII's name is just Red until the rename screen. The only difference with Aerith is that the player does not once get an opportunity to witness Aerith's original name, unlike the other two. But hey, it's in the game's code.

[chionos]

I think a lot of you are missing the point.

It doesn't matter what's "in the game's code." There are a lot of things that end up in a game's "code" that never makes it into the game. All that matters is what makes its way into the game for the player to experience. If the creators TRULY intended for her to be Aerith, she would be Aerith.

I'm not against people calling her Aerith. I'm against people insisting that her name IS Aerith, and acting like it always has been Aerith, which is revisionist nonsense. Her Japanese name isn't Aerith OR Aeris. It's Earisu. So if you really want to call her by her "real" name, call her that. If you're going to go hipster, go all the way.

So if someone were to uncover part of Van Gogh's "Starry Night" and found that originally the swirls in the sky were "supposed to be" teal, but then Van Gogh painted over it with yellow, would we then say that the teal version is the real version? Even if Van Gogh painted "Starry Night 2" and this time with teal swirls, that wouldn't change the fact that the original finished product had yellow swirls.

How a work of art, including a video game, is presented, is published, determines its reality. The player is not meant to experience the game code, so anything that doesn't make its way into the game doesn't matter. The player experience is the point, and the FFVII experience is Aeris.

As far as Compilation, I think all of it is bastardization. Kitase practically said as much while working on it. So many things were changed, many stupid things, not because the creators were thinking about a true core FFVII experience, but because one thing or another worked for that particular game. Many changes are outright contradictory, and it's impossible to consolidate the entire compilation into a single reality. I'm not griping about this, it's what they wanted to do so whatever. However, it means that I only really care about FFVII, as is true with many other people. You can't retcon my FFVII with lesser games intended only to milk the franchise.

Also:
Aeris shows up in Parasite Eve 2
Aeris magazine in FFVIII
The PC version of FFVII retains "Aeris" even though the script was highly edited to fix mistakes.

I guess I despise retconning in most cases. I think it's silly. Especially something that was established for a decade before anything new came along to contradict it. If it were a true mistake, a true translation mistake, then there might be a point, but Aeris IS in fact an acceptable translation of Earisu, so there was actually no mistake made. If anything there might have been miscommunication or lack of communication between SE and SCEA. If Nomura truly wanted her name to be Aerith and it was always supposed to be Aerith, then it should have been communicated to the translators. It wasn't, we got Aeris, so that's what her name is. It's really as simple as that.

[Spooniest]

lots and lots of words

You should find something else to think about for a while

[chionos]

lots and lots of words

You should find something else to think about for a while

You only say that because you don't like thinking. I do, so...



And actually, this, in a way, hits close to home, because what it's really about is the idea of a received text vs. an intended text, something I've worked on in my studies of poetry, something that when you get right down to it is part of my worldview, my life philosophy.

Sorry to bore you though, Spoony. I mean, I'm not, but if it would help, I could start using a spoiler: boring tag in my posts?

Oh, I meant to comment on the Meyer quote. First of all, that's not the quote. But I'm not going to fuss with it, because it's almost close enough. Secondly, though, it doesn't work. You're using it to say that all this talk of Aeris vs. Aerith is pointless, and you can say that, but Meyer's quote doesn't apply. His perspective is not that of an audience, but one of a producer, writer, and director. In the creation process, the specifics of names, titles, plot, locations, etc. are not nearly as important as the craft surrounding those details.

But we're not artists talking about how to make FFVII. We're nerds talking about our experience of the thing. Once a piece of entertainment or art is published it's out of the creator's hands and into those of the audience. It's not that Aeris vs. Aerith factors into my enjoyment of FFVII, but it does factor into my having enjoyed, the nostalgia that comes along with having played something for so long, and the annoyance of seeing people try to retroactively change it.

Also, I've been writing for long enough now that I typically come across as more, uh, argumentative or harsh than I really am. That's just habit. I actually don't care at all what anyone calls her, but the nature of the argument, why it exists in the first place, is something that definitely interests me, even if it's just a big dumb joke to everyone else.

[Spooniest]

Well that's, just, like, your opinion, man

[Sephiroth]

And yes, intention that never has been changed is part of fictional canonicity. Otherwise Sephiroth would be pronounced "Sefirot" as the original Hebrew word his name is based off and in this language you don't use the American "th". But he, a fictional character who only exists through an authors intention, is meant as American "th" pronounced "Sephiroth", therefore he is not written Se-fu-i-ro-to, but Se-fu-i-ro-su. As is Aerith meant as Aerith, always was and will always be.

By the way, there are people who pronounce Sephiroth wrong for real. Like in Germany. And it does not even sound like "Sephirot" but like "Sephirottt". Oh man. Even though they use the "th" for Aerith. But they only get his name's origin and not the character name's intended pronounciation reflected through katakana

[Shorty]

Let's get back on track here; no more snippy posts please!

[Bubba]

I think everyone should just accept that there are two ways of spelling her name. Yes I know she was always meant to be called Aerith. BUT, the only version of FFVII that I played labelled her as Aeris. This will be how the majority of Western players (who only played the main game) will know her.

I shall always refer to her as Aeris. However, I will not be offended in the slightest if anyone wishes to say her name with a lisp.

[Pumpkin]

I think at the end of the day, she's a video game character and won't really care what we call her. Plus she's dead, so... ya know.

Plus tons of video game characters get their names changed. Aeris just seems to be one of the ones who has the biggest stink surrounding it.

[Carl the Llama]

I think at the end of the day, she's a video game character and won't really care what we call her. Plus she's dead, so... ya know.

Plus tons of video game characters get their names changed. Aeris just seems to be one of the ones who has the biggest stink surrounding it.

No no no shion, she lives on... in youuuuuu!

Seriously though I only made this lightheartedly, as a joke lol.

[Pumpkin]

Oh I know you did, KD, its just in response to some of the more serious posts :P

[Sephiroth]

Plus tons of video game characters get their names changed. Aeris just seems to be one of the ones who has the biggest stink surrounding it.

That is because there is a difference between a change and a mistranslation based on the thought it is the right word. You can go with Seifer and Cifer, Ultimecia and Artemisia, Firion and Frioniel but thinking Fourth is right when Force is meant, Reverse when Rebirth is meant or Aeris when Aerith is meant is not the same no matter if Foosu, Ribasu and Earisu habe both possibilities. Intention is a part oft context. If they would have known and still called her that because they wanted to give her that name even knowing she'd have a different one it would have been something else.

[Newmani]

I don't mind calling her Aerith or Aeris. Either name suits her just fine.

In off-topic news however I'd find it hilarious if someone caught a Groudon and named it Aerith.