What does Advent Children mean to you?

[Sephiroth]

To me it means everything. It is the sequel to Final Fantasy VII and reflects exactly what Nojima- and Nomura-san thought of it. And Advent Children is only half known by people as long as they do not read On The Way To a Smile, a book written by Final Fantasy VII scenario writer Kazushige Nojima. And the entire movie is fanservice. I hate it when fanservice is automatically treated as a bad word. It is the very essence of a company to make money and use all the power they have to do so. People just hate to see something they claim they could have done better while seeing that they did not even understand essential parts of what they loved. And that is about everything life.

And Final Fantasy VII Advent Children has a fantastic story. It is a short story about life going on with the immediate consequences of saving the world. The movie gives Cloud a natural behaviour based on his normal character + what happened in the first game which works together in a very believable way. And on top of that of course we once again get to see the guy who always resists from fading away. Which is incredible in On The Way To A Smile because it gives Sephiroth an even more human description for such an inhuman character: He has a natural fear of death seeing it as the non-existence of his very self, directly opposing to Aerith's view of that. Which is by the way a very understandable and logical way to think, psychologically spoken as the very self, the consciousness is simply what we are. And even Aerith's thinking of "ascending to a new state of being" does not directly explain if you still exist or not. Because if it is just metaphorical, then "you" still don't exist anymore and just the leftovers of you. So Sephiroth would actually be right - very fitting indeed considering I also would not want to give up but who knows - maybe Aerith's view does not even mean we do not cease to exist as person. And that is just one small part of what we get to know. There is a lot more to the book and movie.

And there was also a reason in-universe for the fight with Sephiroth.

1. He is the evil guy. If he wins, everything is doomed.
2. By the end of the day he is inevitably and always something CLoud needs to deal with to overcome obstacle x and cope with the past.
3. Sephiroth himself holds a grudge against Cloud and wanted to show off that it was all his doing so he wanted to meet Cloud face to face.

"
Sephiroth and Jenova gain new powers as the plot demands, ...Even Nomura mentioned in earlier interviews that the original story of VII created several problems that made the script somewhat implausible, but simply retcon what they could so the film could have all the elements fans wanted to see like a rematch fight between Cloud and Sephy. "

That is absolute nonsense as Sephiroth's alien powers that he uses in the movie and to return stand in direct relation to the abilities that he has used before. And I would love to see the "interview" that you have read. By the end of the day the writer is Nojima-san who wrote the powers in the first installments as well and Sephiroth's transcendence, his ability to project himself into other things and shapeshift and all perfectly fit - the only really new thing is his "linking his existence to memories" and even that stands in direct relation to the first installments. Also even gaining new powers "as the plot demands" for a highly inhuman entity that inherits the powers of an alien is nothing special. You are also making it yourself always very easy with "it is weak writing if the person cannot implement a certain part of the story" -> "well, the person can make this decision for several purposes like it would disrupt their narrative flow or their just want a certain focus on another aspect more" -> "if that person were a good writer they would know how to do it" -> "but then the person would not always do and write the way they want to -> "if that person were a good writer they would do this and that". You are always trying to construct this mirage of an impenetrable argument that because of any reason you want to insert the person is a good writer but by the end of the day what that person writes and how they choose to write and choose to focus for a certain narrative flow the person is not automatically a bad writer or writes a bad story. And I am sorry that I have to say that but I have yet to see you guys providing some actual writing skills and actual communication skills. Truth be told most people here like other people all over the world just want to see what they want to see and that's it, and yes, you do, because you are obviously aso leaving out parts of the story or justify your arguments with totally irrelevant stuff like "well, Hironobu Sakaguchi's view of the franchise ... and therefore I too", as if that be an actual argument. You don't like it, fine. You do not need to like it. And yes, sometimes things make less sense - it is fiction, it does not matter for the existence of that world as it is not bound to those rules but in that case I understand that sometimes it can disturb someone's entertainment. But don't think being the forum's "resident critic" and always adding your great coffee + monitor smiley adds any plausibility and credibility to your posts. By the end of the day I also have seen a lot of questionable stuff from you.