Is Advent Children REALLY better then SW?

[Ishin Ookami]

In a movie however, there must be a grater emphasis on story telling. Could the film makers have a meteor strike cloud and have the party use an X-potion to heal the damage? Yes but it would look incredibly stupid. Even in lord of the rings, which has characters coming back from the dead and falling through the earth, there are rules put in place on all the mystical aspects. The witch king in Return of the King is defeated not because he fought a more powerful warrior, but because he wasn't aware that he wasn't fighting a man, and he is immortal under the condition that no man can kill him. Logic often trumps brute strength, even in mystical plot lines. The best Storytellers have a gift for involving their audience on a cerebral level, by making the audience involved on acct that they can see and understand everything thats happening in their minds eye, and have it be totally believable to them. Yet there was none applied to any part of Advent Children, especially not the final battle. There was no way cloud could take a wound of that magnitude and continue fighting in a cinematic storytelling sense. Powerful he may be, but the film would have us believe he is mortal, and thus cloud is subject to mortal failings like having the flesh fail due to severe wounds. Having him continue the fight like nothing was wrong removed the believeability and whatever dramatic strength nomura was shooting for.

I thought that they probably gave up the believeability and whatever dramatic strength nomura was shooting for when evryone started flying through the air mysticle creatures pop out of no-where. And wich flashback do you mean with the whole 498 years prior thing?

The fantasy aspect I don't have a problem with. The fact that there isn't even an attempt at storytelling at anytime in the film.

And yes, I'm referring to the beginning of the film. Where we see the ending of FFVII re-shot using AC's CGI engine. typically starting a film off a scene set in the future is done to set up the story that will follow. Like in Citizen cane where you see the main character, supposedly dead and the entire story is a flashback. Or in "It's a Wonderful Life" where the film begins with the angels talking about the main character committing suicide, and the first 3/4 of the film is a flashback about all the events that lead him to that, and the angel interfering.

But nope, AC just sorta, sticks it in there for no discernible reason whatsoever. Like hey, how bout having cloud with a busted sword arm telling the story of how sephiroth came back and crippled him, and his friends saved him. Or maybe have Someone who's life was dramatically affected by the events in AC, like maybe having one of the three seph clones survive and be a good guy and he tells the tale to some villagers he just saved from a monster. Instead, nope. Its fan service. Stupid fan service. Like, am i supposed to get all giddy that we are seeing the ending sequence again. Am I supposed to squeal like a schoolgirl about seeing RedXIII and his children better animated? Cuz it certainly didn't do jack for the story.

EDIT: You can accuse me of nitpicking, but I think this just shows the lack of focus AC has. Nomura stated that if he thought something was cool, he stuck it in regardless of whether it was believeable. I guess he thought starting the film off this way was "cool" as well. Try and stir all the fuzzy warm memories of FFVII istead of, y'know, starting the film off with something that actually meant a crap to the overall storyline of the film.

[Lilliputian Hitcher]

That scene was pretty much just there to show of the movies CGI by upgrading a scene from the game. I didn't really have a problem with this, since the entire movie is designed as one massive FFVII fanboy wank-fest anyway.

While we're at it, here are a couple of things that I found irredeemably stupid about AC’s plot:

1. They never bother to explain why Rufus wanted Jenova's head. I mean, he must have SOME reason for carrying it around and potentially putting the entire planet at risk rather than destroying it. Why did he go to fetch it in the first place? How did he KNOW that it was still there in the first place?

2. There is seemingly no reason as to why Aeris would wait until the end of the movie to cure everyone's Geostigma. I mean I don't know about you but if I had God like powers that could end people's suffering I wouldn't wait until my sort-of-almost crush from when I was alive defeated his nemesis and learned the meaning of life before I started to cure everyone.

3. Sephiroth's soul was supposedly divided up into all 3 SHM (or at least that's what we are to assume "remnants of Sephiroth" means) and yet Sephiroth was some how able to obtain his original form with only Kadaj. How does that work?

I mean don't get me wrong, Spirits Within was a cliche, boring-ass movie but at least it all generally made sense. When a movie doesn't even try to explain some of its biggest plot points it kind of screams out 'poor story telling'.

[Dark_Mage_Palom]

I like TSW better

there I said it!