Wow, what I feel about Aeris… Frankly put, not intended to hurt any feelings, I think she is the counterproductive of what humans are striving for towards perfection. The near epitome of what people point at, can sigh, and thank God that at least they are not that low on Darwin’s score. Think it harsh, but during the game I could find little of value in her at all, and what I set the belief on is not blank air.
I’ll admit that I had a bias before I had ever seen her in Final Fantasy, but I believed that at most she was just an irritating character as my friends tend to over-react when ranting to me about their soon to be effigy of the month.
However, as I played, watched, read… I began to feel stronger feelings against her. I didn’t mind her when you first few times that you met her… she was down right normal in reaction and character. Down to earth… relatable as it was, asking for help, wanting to go home, a nearly cliché, but apt account of how one would act. My opinion of her really only started to turn sour when, after knowing Cloud for almost no amount of time, she offers herself for a date, as payment… Cloud is by no means warm to this, by no other means, stranger, and yet she goes straight to this. Cloud is not being coy by any means saying that it will cost her, we all saw after the explosion how intent he was on getting his money.
Not only arrogant by all means, but more than that. My thoughts were split between, the idea that she was retarded, or a whore. She grew up in the slums for Shiva’s sake. Would that not instill a bit of self preservation? Would any sane person not be concerned that someone just fell through the roof, the same person that you saw during the explosion of the first reactor? Most people’s reaction might be close to wondering about the fact that this is obviously not an innocent, well-wishing, harmless man… My mind would go to the type of people that I assuredly grew up around, the fact that there are dangerous people around, most people would be less careless than to, overly stated, offer themselves up as a payment.
Especially as she just finds out that he is a mercenary that will “do what ever is needed,” but still wants to go on a date… Intelligence just springs eternal on this one, doesn’t it?
That right there dented her character for me… she threw herself at a stranger, one that she knew was not harmless by any means.
It only got worse….
The part that sticks out in my mind worst of all was the scene where you are allowed to set Tifa as your girlfriend. No matter what you pick, she still acts the same, which is more than conniving by any means. It is obvious that she gets jealous as the thought of competition, giving that I did choose Tifa as my girlfriend, and she acts in a way that we have all frowned upon. When in school we did not look at the girl lusting over a spoken for man with compassion… pity maybe. I am sure that most of us did not condone, no push, her behavior of trying to snake the man out his loving relationship. Now I understand that, yes, Cloud and Tifa, were not dating, but Aeris did not, and she would have acted the same regardless. Hell, I wouldn’t want a person like that around my children, let alone my party.
It got worse too… no matter that Cloud was not welcoming, no matter that he NEVER gave any hint that he wanted her to join… in fact he spelled it out clearly that he did not want her coming, and she still followed. One might consider this loyalty, but loyalty is something for someone you trust, some one that you know… again this was set towards an absolute stranger. Far from loyalty as I see it. Cloud even tries to respect Aeris’s mother’s wishes that she not get involved. But Aeris practically imprisons Cloud in her home, this may be extreme, but I nearly drove myself batty trying to leave her house. Cloud! A grown, fully functional man, being confined to some freak show’s house, not being allowed to leave. It bothers me that she listened that closely, and could not take the hint… when the man tries to sneak out the bedroom window, it tends to mean that he don’t want you. Then when you finally escape she’s out there waiting for you! Stalker much? I have heard arguments on that being devotion… yeah…. To a man she’s know for a day… who has shown little interest in her… maybe a bit too much devotion.
That entire scene made me thank God that I did not know people like her… I would fear for my life every waking moment… I wouldn’t sleep… ‘cause it appears that she doesn’t…
The parts of the game with her droned on… I had to cringe every time she made an inane, useless comment. For me, respectively, she offered no valid input, her fighting with me held no gain on my part.
Now, the part about Aeris that got me the worst was the bit about Zax. I am a hardcore Zax fan ^^;; And I felt terribly for Zax throughout the entire game. Yes, I understand that she didn’t know that he had died, but that doesn’t excuse her callous treatment of his, for the lack of a better word memory. While in Gongaga, it is confirmed about his disappearance, but she still feels that he found some one else, faithful little thing, isn’t she? It is not just bitter left over feelings about not getting any closure. If anything, she uses the fact that no one has seen this man for at least five years, and tries to get a little more out of Cloud.
“Are you… jealous? Hmm? Hmmm? Are you Cloud?” She does apologize but it is after Cloud, saying nothing, turns away. Typically in final fantasy, that does not symbolize embarrassment, it’s more of a cold shoulder. She apologized to save face. Wow… conniving, damn-near heartless, and two faced. Don’t we just love her. Trying to gain something over the disappearance, and it must be serious if he hasn’t even written his parents (which he obviously did if he was able to inform them of the fact that he had a girl friend) for sometime, and whom she claimed to have loved. …That does not symbolize some one with a new love… it just symbolizes a b***h…
She plays the part of the damsel, but tries to be so much more to Cloud. It doesn’t work…
Aeris fans were the last straw…. If you like a character, more power to you, but don’t be ignorant. More than once have I had to listen to point after point, story after story. Of this loving, caring girl… don’t make me sick. Put some evidence. Yea, she may have warmed up Cloud, but lets not give her that much credit. The world does not revolve around her, contrary to what many Aeris fans have tried to tell me. The entire journey helped heal Cloud, and, depending on who you put in your party, Aeris may have had a part in it. I am not denying that much. Saying, however, that it was all her, well… that’s just nuttier than squirrel crap. They completely ignore the Tifa factor, even the Barret one, liking a character is fine, being blind is not so. I have seen her placed on a pedestal and I die on the inside, it makes that one little part of me that hopes for a better world from humanity get run through along with Aeris in my oh so favorite scene.
I am not going to lie… I am not a Saint, nor do I pretend to be, and, certainly, no one is setting me as such… unlike many do with Aeris.
Perhaps, if so much of the game didn’t center her, she would be tolerable, many of her reactions are quite human. Albeit, not a very model sort of citizen, but few people are. It may have been how the game was run, but trying to put so much attention on her, allowed more room to see her faults, which for whatever reasons I was quite in tune with, but somehow people are able to ignore them.
In short, in Aeris all I see is an immature, conniving, almost lost person.
I am, of course, almost bypassing any sort of positive that she has. But that is where my bias comes in (that and the fact that it is only based on her personality from the PS game, not the story, or anyother resources of her). Maybe I have felt that she doesn’t need more people to sing her praises. I may be wrong, who knows, maybe she was so kind to Cloud in the beginning for simply that reason, maybe she was just a kindhearted person… But all that it does is push me to believe in her ignorance in that scene. This becomes almost totally contradictory throughout the rest of the plot. I would love to go on about this, it, obviously, gets me going. However… I have wasted enough of my life force on her totally waste of space, I do not care what other’s feel about her, nor will I care what they feel about my opinion on her, but this is it.
People can agree, or, as many Aeris fans would be so inclined to do, argue with me about it, on the validity of these statements to defend her, go ahead, you only prove my point further. (These opinions are, most likely, the far extreme of the spectrum, and, by most, going to far, but with out this extreme, people with less of an opinion would be going to far, the extremes are a necessity.)
There are faults with other characters, true, but when one sees an almost ethereal aura around her, it is so much easier, not to mention fun, to shoot the wannabe angel down to the ground, on earth where she belongs, with the rest of us.
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