Least Favorite Character

[Captain Maxx Power]

I voted Heidegger...

[Slicksword45]

i voted other cause of Dio

[SummonerYuna]

Why is Aeris so annoying to so many people? She doesn't deserve all these votes. Let's see she was:

1 - a very useful fighter, (Awesome Limit Breaks, Fury Bard and Great Gospel)

2 - a character that brings a lot of emotion to the game (her death),

3 - and the very small fact that she SAVED THE ENTIRE PLANET!!!

The fact that she flirted with Cloud is what people don't like because she used to date Zack, but can you blame her for that? It was Cloud the one that looked like Zack so of course she is going to be reminded.

You're right!!

[Christmas]

Scotch and Kotch.

[raskerino]

Christmas, how could you? Scotch and Kotch had amazing backstories and unbelievably subtle motives.

Ok, here are the reasons to hate Aeris:

Aerith, in my opinion, was a selfish person in many instances. The way she treated Tifa most especially, by hanging all over Cloud and demanding things like her love fortune read right in front of poor Tifa, whom she knew had feelings for Cloud. I'm not saying Cloud belongs to Tifa or anything, but a little tact and kindness on Aerith's end would be nice. The fact that being mean to Tifa will bring your points with Aerith up but doing the same to Aerith will make your points with Tifa go down says a lot about both girls.

Besides, it's all a matter of opinion. We dont 'need' to respect her, and we dont need to share the same views on her. Personally, I was quite glad when she died, and glad to be rid of her. She annoyed me to no end.

Describing a little of her character:

I didnt find Aerith to be much a goody-goody at all, despite the 'church girl' label everyone gives her. She was weak (physically), but she was a very forward girl, not at all a goody-goody in my eyes. Especially once I learned about how mean-spirited she can be in the triangle, as far as love points go.

A more forward response:

aeris has an annoying personality and isto much of a good guy. not even the slightest bit of evil. she is weak andjust sucks. she kis although friends with tifa trying to get to cloud before her.aeris is jusy an unlikable character.

More from TheAbominatrix:

Treating other people cruelly and flirting opening in front of them is not fair. When someone does it to you, see how fair it feels. It isnt fair, it isnt nice. If you think she's still a good person, fine, but I certainly dont.

Some interesting points though I disagree with the conclusion this is by far the most interesting post I've seen that likes Aeris:

For whatever reason; Aeris tends to be an extremely polarizing character among the FF community at large; this is further compounded by the fact that both her fans and her detractors are often fairly vociferous as regards Aeris' character.

In any case, it seems that the most people that dislike Aeris fall into three broad categories. These are admittedly generalizations, but they cover most aspects of the debate.

The first category includes people that dislike Aeris based on her ostensible lack of utility in battle. This category itself divides into two subgroups; people that think her magical inclination/relative physical limitations make her a bad character (in terms of gameplay), and those who dislike her for her death, as this effectively renders all statistical development with Aeris pointless.

The first argument has more to do with style of gameplay than anything else, although judgment of Aeris in this way is usually misplaced. While her Strength growth curve is the lowest of any party member, and her Vitality and HP growth curves are significantly below average, her MP, Magic, and Spirit curves are by far the highest of any character. Her Dexterity and Luck growth are average. However, all statisitical variation is relatively meaningless in FFVII; there's never a huge difference, and anyone can be turned into a statistical powerhouse via Sources. Aeris leaves the party before Morph can be effectively turned to the purpose, of course, but at the time she leaves no one can derive these advantages.

The best way to evaluate a character in battle, really, is based on Limit Breaks. This can, depending on how you play, petrify your opinion of Aeris in battle. Given that her Breaks are all healing/defensive/indirect, as opposed to damaging, interpretation of Aeris can and will vary. Had Aeris survived, however, Great Gospel would have been almost undeniably the best Limit; it would have, really, unbalanced the already easy gameplay even more. Still, considering that most consider it a burden to level up Aeris' Limits/acquire Great Gospel while she's with the party, this isn't a necessarily significant factor.

My point here is that actually disliking a character based on battle doesn't really make a great deal of sense. As to her death ruining her development, just use her as desired.

The second category lays the only real claim anyone should have with regards to disliking a character (unless there's a character who really does suck compared to everyone else in battle). In this case, aspects of Aeris' personality, and interpretation of her character as regards the story, can lead people down wholly different paths as far as opinion goes.

Aeris' detractors in the area of character tend to point to several different developments and facets of personality. The one I find most relevant is her supposed cruelty to Tifa; there's no denying, after all, that she flirts incessantly with Cloud, undoubtedly aware of Tifa's feelings. I personally differ with many people on this score; however, I can certainly appreciate their point of view. While I don't feel that Aeris' actions regarding Cloud were meant to hurt Tifa, I can certainly see why somebody could hold a different opinion here.

The other character criticisms are somewhat undone by inconsistency; it's amazing how many people criticize her for being "quiet" and "subdued." While anyone can really attack any character trait (some people, for example, might be turned off by Aeris' optimism), this argument is flawed simply because Aeris did not display those traits.

I would thusly consider the "cruel to Tifa/flirting with Cloud" angle to be the primary relevant criticism, although (as I said) I don't necessarily see it that way myself.

The final group is basically the people that have jumped on the "I hate Aeris" bandwagon. People like these are inevitable; you'll also find no dearth of "FFVII fanboys/girls for no reason," "FFVII haters for no reason," "FF classic fanboys for no reason," and so on. That's not to say anything as regards other characters and titles, either positively or negatively; I merely suggest that there are many that have no reason to hold their views or are incapable of articulating why they hold them.

Aeris' fans probably fall into a larger number of groups, although they can generally be patterned after the same groups as the detractors. I won't go into greatdetail here, as the thread revolves around why people dislike Aeris, but her battle utility is a two-edged sword. The more magically inclined will certainly find her useful, although (as I said earlier) statistical variance generally balances out.

Aeris' fans, regarding character, are generally laudatory as regards her sacrifices, her general cheerfulness/optimism/trying to keep characters up, and her resolve regarding events at large as the game unfolds.

Like the detractors, there are also "bandwagon Aeris fans."

For myself, I've always liked Aeris' character. Strangely, I've always been a fan of Tifa as well; the two, along with Rydia, are probably my three favorite playable females in the series.

A less meaningful comment:

she simply sux.

Again the Abomiatrix, this time first argueing with someone saying they thought Aeris didn't know because Tifa is shy and then making the point again:

If you love someone, you do what's best for them, not what's best for you. Tifa cared about Cloud, but was quite aware that now was not the best time to tell him given the events going on and the fact that Cloud wasnt even in his right mind. Tifa was willing to step aside and let Aerith have Cloud, not for herself, not for Aerith, but for Cloud. That doesnt neccesarily mean Aerith would have made Cloud happy, or even that Tifa would. That lies on Cloud's end, and Tifa was willing to let Cloud make that decision for himself.

And that quote shows what? That Tifa denies her feelings for him because she's shy? Yep. Good job there.

Aerith's cruelty is cruel, whether she knew she was about to die or not. I hate people like that, so naturally I strongly dislike Aerith.

edit: Oh, and before anyone gets rabid on me... I just dont like her, and these are of course my opinions. Im not a rabid Tifa fan, and I really dont care who Cloud winds up with.

A post I made in that thread, I don't know if I still agree with all I said, but I think there are some interesting points:

You people are missing a valid point: sometimes people just don't like someone... I couldn't stand her mainly for the reasons that Abominamatrix has stated really well, and also because I didn't find her character to be remotely interesting which is my opinion (there doesn't have to be a reason she just wasn't interesting).

Also something else, people say she sacrificed herself. I never noticed that, I personally only saw her go off optimistically thinking she was going to succeed, saying to Cloud not to worry- this did not strike me as going off to sacrifice yourself. It was also plain stupid if she thought sacrificing herself was the case because with a group she'd have time to complete the prayer- if she thought she'd die she'd have no way of knowing whether she'd have time or not.

So I consider her not to have sacrificed herself as I can't remember any evidence for that, I consider her to have tried and died trying, without expecting there to be much risk.

Once more I'm quoting the Abominamatrix against an argument saying Tifa was lustful while Aeris wasn't:

While I hate the love triangle argument, I would like to know what makes Tifa 'just lusting'. If anything, Aerith would be 'just lusting' (not saying she is).

Tifa has known Cloud all her life. Aerith just met him, and her intial attraction was because he reminded her of her dead boyfriend Zack. Aerith never even knew the real Cloud, as his memories and persona were screwed until the Lifestream incident.

Well, I've over quoted Abominatrix so here are someone elses views:

1. Although she has great limit breaks, she still dies not even halfway through the game hence rendering those limit breaks futile.

2. She may have a specialty over magical attacks but the Walled Snake boss at the Temple of the Ancients (where Aeris is a mandatory character) has rampart defense against magical attacks, again rendering Aeris futile.

3. How can someone so pure be so flirtatious over the guy she loves and in front of another girl who loves the same guy?

4. And the way she never considered Barret's feelings at the Gold Saucer. All she said was "Let's have some fun!" not even caring how bad Barret's mood was that time regarding his past towards Corel.

5. She may be 22 years old but still acts so juvenile. Far more sickening than Rikku from FFX-2 IMO. She's older than both Cloud and Tifa but the two former act more maturely than she does.

6. And basically, it was Tifa who actually cared. She held Aeris's hand when she died. And even after Aeris expired, Tifa still reminded Cloud of her in her memory.

7. And besides, Aeris never loved Cloud because of his natural being but because of his resemblance to Zack. Basically speaking, her feelings for Cloud are merely a reiteration of her feelings for Zack.

A quick statement of opinion:

I just think Aeris is really, really obnoxious most the time, and I really, really like Tifa. Aeris is like, the embodiment of everything I can't stand in a person.

I'll admit, she does have her moments, but most of the time, that's the way I feel about her.

A thought from what used to be Unknowns and is now Christmas:

Well, maybe because people used to love her until she is dead and we realized she cannot be revived. So:

Love ---> Grief ----->Sorrow-----> Despair ----->Anger----->Hatred.

In the end, those that love her begin to hate her and those that had never love her begin to hate her even more.

For anyone who read through all or parts of this it should give a sense of the main reasons Aeris is disliked. Most of the responses to these arguments have seemed empty to me except simply not minding, or just liking Aeris without needing proof that she's kind.

[summoner_skylar]

im not very fond of tifa

[UWAOOOOU]

Cid or Barrett. Cait Sith was awesome.

[DMKA]

Barret because he's black.

[Shiny]

I voted for Hojo, but I also dislike Dyne and that Don dude.

[UWAOOOOU]

Barret because he's black.

xD [leeza]*snip*[/leeza] cant get a lil love

[leeza]Use that word here again and you will be banned. ~ Leeza[/leeza]

[Zeromus_X]

pres. shinra sr. (and no kitten sith hating! youve all been warned! well...i cant really stop you anyhow...nyaon...)

i hate shinra sr. in the beginning , shinra was a really evil corparation. (ill never forget them killing all the sector 7 people. )

then alot of people forget that, it was pretty short into the game. still...all those innocent people...

but...cait sith doesnt suck! apparently no one has gotten three cats on the slot machine...ive gotten it like three times

first- lost number
second- schizo
third- jenova synthesis.

(but not all in the same play through...still...)

palmer, scarlet, and heidegger are kindof annoying too, but they all die, so that makes it fair (or does palmer die? well, hes gone anyway.)

eh...kind of ranty. but yeah, the older shinra is my least favorite character.

[TurkSlayer]

I hate Aeris, mostly for the reasons pointed out by raskerino and TheAbominatrix. Her cruelty (while perhaps unintentional) toward Tifa is intolerable. That and I dislike nearly everything else about her. The only moment I can think of that I actually liked her was when she was being capture and told Cloud and the others that Marlene was safe. After that, I hated everything else about her.

[Cloud_omnislash_Strife]

that Don dude.

cause hes horny Right????

[Christmas]

cause hes horny Right????

He is just experiencing puberty.....

[crashNUMBERS]

Cait Sith