Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children

I will start by saying I have been a fan of FFVII since it came out. I have played the game more times than I can count and I loved it. Thought Cloud was awesome, Tifa was sweet and beautiful, Vincent was the coolest secret character in gaming history, and Sephiroth was the baddest baddie in badtown. And Reno made me laugh. "We may be retreating...but we're still victorious." What the hell? Fantastic. And I loved this movie. It was a visual delight the likes of which I had never before seen. The story was probably hard for people to follow if they weren't die-hard fans, but I really enjoyed it. SPOILERS That being said, this movie made me dislike Cloud and start to find Tifa...grating at best. Our hero became very emo and standoffish (more than usual) and was chasing something that no longer exists. I found that part irritating. Aeris is dead. Get over it. And Tifa is throwing herself at a man that is clearly not interested. She needs to move on. Other than those two incredibly minor things, I thought the film was quite brilliant.

EVERYBODY has played the original Playstation classic, Final Fantasy 7. It was one of the best selling PSX games of all time and the very first 3D Final Fantasy game. It is also one of the most beloved in the entire franchise. Advent Children is part of a collection known as the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII. This includes Crisis Core for the PSP, Dirge of Cerberus for the PS2, Before Crisis for mobile phones, and of course Advent Children. I don't even know where to begin with this film. I grew up with the game so I feel like I must write a proper review for this amazing film so this will be much longer then my normal reviews. Story: 10 The story I don't really need to get into because every Final Fantasy VII fan already knows what to expect when coming into this movie, plus if you wanna know it so bad you can just look at it's main page. All I can say is that wow, Square-Enix really pulled out all the stops for this one. Art: 10 The art speaks for itself. It's one of the most beautiful films ever made. Every element of it's art direction is stellar beyond words. FF7 fans finally get to see these beloved characters in all their CG rendered glory. Cloud looks badass, a certain bad guy looks amazing, Tifa looks gorgeous as does Aerith. Water, fire, light, wind, sky..everything just looks amazing. Sound: 10 Now I gave the sound section a 10 not so much because of the sound effects but because of the musical score that series veteran Nobuo Uematsu composed for this film. Every Final Fantasy fan loves his music and this movie is no exception. "Divinity Part 1 & 2" are incredibly hard hitting scores that really get you pumped up. "Aerith's Theme" is composed beautifully and is almost sad to listen to. But, my stand out track is of course "Advent: One Winged Angel". Sephiroth's infamous final battle theme song returns in an Orchestrated/Metal hybrid that defines the word EPIC! Character: 7 Okay, this one didn't get a 10 because I was very disappointed in how 2 dimensional the characters are. The creators put more time into creating mindblowing battle sequences rather then fleshing out the characters. Mind you, they were all fleshed out in the PSX game so maybe that's why. Enjoyment & Overall: 10 If you grew up with the series, chances are you have already seen this. A new director's cut is coming out soon on Blu-Ray called Advent Children: Complete which features new scenes and stuff so if you have not seen it yet, go for the Complete version. I haven't seen the Blu-Ray one. I bought this movie on it's release day on UMD PSP because all the damn DVD copies were sold out. When I watch this movie, I get a deep feeling of nostalgia. The game was funny, breath-taking, exciting and even heart-breaking. Those feelings will come back to you the moment you see Cloud, Tifa, Yuffie, Cid, and everyone else again as they come to life. As I write this review, I am listening to Aerith's theme from the soundtrack and I feel sad for some reason..

I devote most of my time to watching action anime, so you can take my word for it when i say that final fantasy advent children is a pure masterpiece. Am not referring to the story of course, i could care less but the action is not the slightest bit disappointing. If you really love action anime then final fantasy advent children is definitely for you. The graphics are extremely amazing and the action scenes, the brawls.......are truly spectacular...You will not be disappointed.

Advent Children is a very mixed bag. Most of it qualifies as "good, but could have been a whole lot better". Since it was coming eight years after the videogame, most people who watched it were expecting a nostalgia trip in addition to a compelling, original story. One of the biggest problems is that the vast majority of the cast is brushed aside in order to make room for three brand new villains. Of the nine protagonists in Final Fantasy VII, Cloud is the only one to receive more than token scenes. Tifa, Aries, and Vincent have more than bit parts, but Cloud is still the focus of most of those scenes. The rest of the cast shows up at the end to assist Cloud in a fight (which is just a summoned monster; not even a significant antagonist), but it is far too little and far too late into the movie for their appearances to have any meaning. In the final battle the rest of the characters don't even join in Cloud's fight against his nemesis because the writers decide to invoke the "this is something he must do alone" BS. That said, the fight scenes are all excellent. There are fights spaced throughout the movie, and one of the best ones is actually between Tifa and one of the villains. All of them are ridiculously over the top by movie standards, but exactly what one could expect (and hope for) from a videogame. In this sense the transition from game to movie actually worked very well. The plot was alright, as long as you're expecting an epilogue to the game instead of an independent plot on the same level of the game. Cloud has regressed to his mid-FFVII level of depression and isolation, but he is eventually dragged out of it by all of his friends and pulls himself together in order to save the world once more. His regression is understandable to a degree, but it is also annoying to watch considering how he was fairly likable by the end of the game and then we jump right into him being at a low again. It doesn't help that they bring back two characters that, by all reason, should have died in the game (and no, not the character whose death everybody already knows about) with absolutely no explanation They even go so far as to have Cloud interrupt one explanation, which just leaves the audience hanging. The amount of exposition is incredibly unbalanced. They start off with several minutes of exposition reviewing the plot of FFVII as well as what has happened in the interim. Unfortunately it isn't enough of an overview for people new to FFVII to catch up, but far too much for dedicated fans who end up bored by it. Then, other things which both fans and new viewers need to know, they gloss over or ignore completely. If you haven't played the game then watching the movie is only going to leave you confused since it is expected that you know the entire plot of the game and are familiar with all of the characters. Two minor characters from the game, Reno and Rude, have significant roles in the movie, both in terms of plot progression and as comic relief. They do provide a few humorous moments without coming across as stupid or inappropriately goofy. The sound and visuals are absolutely outstanding, and will serve to make fans even more eager for a PS3 remake of the original game. They are top of the line CGI, even years after the movie came out. For the most part the characters look like they were taking out of the game and had they're polygon counts increased by a factor of eleventy zillion. There were a few cosmetic changes, such as giving Tifa a new outfit, all of which worked out for the best. The soundtrack is equally as impressive, and the remakes of tracks from the game are all better than the original. The tracks not only sounds great on their own, but fits into the scenes where they are used. The translation was pretty good, for the most part and the voice actors are all excellent and sounded appropriate for the roles then were given. As can be expected, there are certain things that just don't have an exact Japanese-English translation, such as when Aries is being dismissing of Cloud's angst-fest by saying something nonsensical. Both the subtitles and the dub work well - the only problem is that they don't match up in many instances. About half the time there are discrepancies, the sub is better and the other half the dub is better, so nobody really wins that one. Overall, it was a good movie for the fans as long as you aren't expecting too much from it. It had enough of a story to be interesting and had the fight scenes that fans were looking for. It just could have been a done a little better and Square-Enix should have done a whole lot more for viewers who either haven't played the game or played it so long ago that they didn't know the story inside and out.

i saw this masterpiece when i was a kid and it was amazing. i really like this anime. its on my <a href="https://myanimelist.net/myreviews.php?seriesid=317&go=write">top 10 animes</a> . i remeber . i watched it with my cousins. i remember after watch final fantasy i thought im cloude. we could choose a charactor and i became him. honestly i wasnt really liked anime at first but after watching this baby i totally changed my mind. the animation was perfect storyline gooood characters one by one perfect you know what i really miss them i should have watch it tonight. i wanna call my cousins and tell them lets watch a movie and then take this sweetie out.

First let me say that I absolutely love the FFVII universe. (Spoilers below) This movie is definitely not for those who haven't played the games. You will have no idea what's going on and they don't bother explaining. The animation and soundtracks are top notch. It is a little confusing about what's going on even for a fan though. That aside this game is a great conclusion to the series. The moment when you see Zack with Aerith. The way they fast forwarded time and how the only one alive was Red. In terms of a conclusion, this is one of the best movies/endings I've ever seen.

I must admit, when I first saw this movie, had not even played any Final Fantasy games.. only Kingdom Heart II. Shame on me, I know. The reason I wanted so badly to see the movie was probably because I really liked Cloud as a character when he appeared in KHII. And so I found some video's at youtube and found myself lost. I bought the movie because it was quite cheap, and then I did some Final Fantasy research while I waited for it to arrive in my mailbox. So I learned a big deal about the characters, which I think was a good idea. - The story is rather unfinished in this movie. But I liked the idea, the setting and stuff, so it is good. I give it a 7. - The art, in the shape of animation here is simply outstanding! I love how they put so much work into it. I rate it 10. - The sound effects and music is awesome and cool! I love the Final Fantasy music very much. I dare say it is unique. I rate it 10 as well. - I didn't know the characters to well when I saw this movie. And some of them seemed like they had been placed there because it was necessary. You didn't really understand where they came from. That's why I rate it 8. - I remember enjoying the film a lot. And it was one of my favorites! Even with the loose threads. I rate it 9. Overall it is a very good movie. I give it an 8. I think that now as the Complete edition of Final Fantasy Advent Children is out there is no reason to watch this. But I remember enjoying the Complete one even more because I saw the old version first.

story: it was good cause ive never played enough of ff7 to know the story, but it kind of flew over my head or i dont remember it anymore art: the cgi looks amazing as well as the environment sound: great effects, great music, great VA characters: everybody already knows them, and to see them look so detailed and smooth was pretty cool enjoyment: nice movie, cool fights, nice cast of characters

Thouroghly enjoyed the film and would recommend it to anyone who is a fan of the genre. Opening with Cloud, looking depressed as usual, and only throwing him into a fantastical story of genetics, mystery and action. Mix in a plot that only fans could follow with motorbikes,explosions,shinra reborn,supernatural martial arts and of course, the legend, sephiroth and you know youre in for something special.

Playing Final Fantasy VII before watching help with much of whats happening. If you never played the FFVII, you won't get much. The storyline for the game is just amazing, and one of my favorites. The animation for this movie is just amazing. Very realistic and takes anime to a further level. The characters were greatly created and animated.Much of the sound effects were very affective to catch viewers attentions, mainly during the fight scenes. This is a great movie for those FF fans out there. It's a trill for those who aren't. Great movie,great animation,great sound, storyline could have been better.

Excellent movie till you turn off Mute. Look. The story sucks. The characters are dumb. The vocal direction is cringeworthy. The pacing drags on at times. But dang if this isn't one of the prettiest, flashiest animations I've ever seen. I've watched this too many times to justify a lower score. The whole thing is a massive video game cutscene with exactly what I want from a video game cutscene. The music is solid, too. Doesn't matter whether or not you've played the original Final Fantasy VII. I promise you, you're not missing much if you're going into Advent Children cold like I did. I played the game later and am only more confused than before. Certain character models make less sense in HD than they did on the PS1. But they're minor characters anyways, don't worry about it. If you're gonna be dumb, be fast and flashy. For the most part, Advent Children is all three.

I'll admit that I'm a huge final fantasy fan. Even though I really haven't played FF 7, I have played bits of it and have seen some of it online. The reason for that is because one, I didn't have the appropriate system to play it and two, I didn't get into Final Fantasy until IX came out. Nevertheless though; I was familiar with the story, the characters, the villian, etc. So, when I heard that they were making an actual animated movie on FF VII, I got really excited. I rented it, (now own it), and while it was a little lacking, I actually did find myself enjoying it. While at first the story was good and kept me engaged at the beginning, but I did find myself getting a little confused with it. I knew that this geostigma had something to do with Jehova and Sepheroth, but never really understood how it worked and bringing Sepheroth back from the dead with the help of Kidash and his gang and how all the orphans were involved. Also, some of the translating for the subs were off and that really didn't help either. The dubbing was good, but again, they really didn't sync up most of the time with the movements. In the end, the story was good but I think it could had been made better. The art work and animation was great though. I did love the art work just like I do in any final fantasy series. The animation of the characters looked great as well, especially; the art designs of the characters. The sound was great too. While the story was kind of lagging, it was the music and themes that really kept me engaged and to keep watching. The battle themes were great and that song; One Winged Angel, that was freaking epic. It's probably one of the best choir songs that I've ever heard in any final fantasy series. It was loud, it had a great rock theme to it as well as a little heavy metal to it, and that choir was just awesome. I will definetly say that it's definetly the longest song in any final fantasy series period. The characters were great too, but I think a few of them were downplayed. Cloud was great and I liked how he started out as a little down and kind of forgotten how to fight but comes back as the true warrior that we remember him to be. Tifa and the others are good too, but most of them don't come in until a 3rd quarter of the way and after that they're cut out till the end. Of course, though you'd come to accept that since the story is mainly about Cloud and Kidajh. Speaking of which, Kidajh and his gang were really not that interesting as villians in my opinion. Yeah the voice actors were good but the character themselves really didn't do that much till the end. Overall though; despite all of that, I did actually enjoy it. It could had been improved a bit, but it was enjoyable and was pretty good. If they just had made a few changes and had tried a little harder, this could had been a great film after the events of Final Fantasy VII.

The movie is average, but certainly better than the game it was based on(And I say this as a full-fledged fan of the FF and JRPG genres) . Another movie based on a game, something like Tekken Blood Vengence. The fights are typical JRPG. If the figure had been cut in half, it would have stood for another hour. And although the fights can be spectacular, on the other hand everything else makes no sense. Characters jump from left to right as if I were watching Transformers The Movie 1986. The only difference was that Transformers The Movie 1986 had music to match the situation. In Advent Children there is some boring, incongruous music played on a piano. It doesn't help even when you hear a remix like "Thurks", "Jenova", "Those Who Fight" Or "Fanfare". The plot isn't any better either. The creators probably don't know whether (FFVII Spoilers) the characters are alive or dead. But I can't be too harsh on this movie considering it will influence the series quite a bit. After all, if it weren't for this movie, we probably wouldn't have gotten Cloud in Dissidia or Chinese Demake on Nes. After all, there is nothing more creative than Sect on Motorcycles. To sum up: The movie is okay, I don't recommend it if you haven't played the game, but it's better to watch it in this order: Crisis Core on Psp --> FFVII Remake/1997 original --> This Movie --> Dirge Of Cerberus On Ps2 --> (Maybe I'll watch Advent Children Complete someday) Ps: I do not recommend Japanese dubbing. It's not that he's bad, but he just doesn't fit in with a lot of characters like RedXIII or Vincent Valentine. Especially when playing Dissidia or Remake in English. It's actually funny that RedXIII got a special place in the credits even though he said maybe 3 sentences

Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children takes place two years after the events of the main game, in this time, Sephiroth has poisoned the lifestream and began to spread a disease through the mako that was released into the world when the main characters stopped METEOR. If none of this makes sense to you, don’t worry, the movie doesn’t explain it either. Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children requires a deep understanding of the source material in order to fully enjoy the movie, and that’s a pretty big issue right there. Story: The story is relatively hard to follow, but it’s kind of smart when you have all the pieces to the puzzle, the problem is the fact that there’s a puzzle to solve in the first place. Three descendants(?) of Sephiroth are trying to find Jenova, who they consider to be their mother. There’s a subplot about all of the children in Midgar being infected with the Geostigma disease, which is that mako disease I had mentioned earlier. So, our heroes are primarily occupied with trying to save the children. Sounds simple enough, right? Well, the way the movie tries to deliver the narrative is reminiscent of a rollercoaster. It leaves out important details until way too late, sometimes omitting important details entirely. I can’t remember a single time that one of the Sephiroth descendants even mentions that “mother” is Jenova, and that’s kind of extremely important. 4/10 Sound: Most of the sound work in this movie is generally solid. I watched the dub, so there were one or two scenes with some goofy interactions, but that’s more than made up for by some of the epic musical moments. One specifically I will not go into due to spoilers, but it gave me chills. 8/10 Animation: The animation in this movie is near-perfect, for CGI in 2005 especially. The action scenes in this movie are STUNNING. Even if you have never played Final Fantasy VII, this movie is still worth a watch simply for its top tier animation. Final Fantasy VII Advent Children is visually wonderful. 10/10 Characters: Most of what’s done with the characters is somewhat disappointing, you get plenty of Cloud, Tifa, and the Turks, but all the other main characters are designated to background characters that have a couple lines just to please the fans. Red XIII only has one line of dialogue to himself for god’s sake. Not to mention, you are subjected to far too much of those three Sephiroth descendants. Those three are the worst. They’re so whiny and I personally don’t see them as good villains by any means. For what characterization there is for the other characters, they all remain consistent with how you’d expect them to act in the main game. It’s just unfortunate that Cloud and Tifa are the only main characters that receive any development. 5/10 Overall: Despite the lacklustre story, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is definitely entertaining. I enjoyed the action and some of the dialogue. If they tidied up the storytelling a bit, the movie would benefit highly. And unlike most movies that would just leave it at that, they went back and made Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children Complete, practically a patch of the original movie that fixes up the story a bit, but this is a review of the original, and the original is a… 7/10

So I'm going to write this in two parts: as someone who has played the game and as someone who hasn't played the game. As someone who has played (and loves) the game: this movie murdered the characters. This movie is the reason Cloud now has the reputation of being a whiny wimp. You really don't get that impression of him in the game. This movie really didn't need to be made and it makes me angry. It's a vanity project. The story itself isn't actually bad but it just doesn't need to exist. Rant over. So as someone who hasn't played the game, the story would be kind of confusing but it's gorgeous, the music and sound in general is great and most importantly, it's just fun to watch. The battles are very well choreographed. Overall, I would still recommend this to both fans of the game and people who haven't played the game, the caveat being that if you're a fan of the game, there's a good chance you won't like how the characters (especially Cloud) are portrayed in this movie, and if you haven't played the game, you're going to be kind of lost. But it's still really fun to watch.

Animation-wise, there’s no question about it—it looked amazing back when the movie came out. Story-wise, though, it’s obviously not as strong as the game, and honestly, it still feels a bit weak. To be fair, I was kind of disappointed with Sephiroth's screentime, but given what the story needed, I get it. On the bright side, Cloud gets some really solid character development. And my absolute favorite thing about this movie? Hands down, the soundtrack—it’s a total masterpiece. So yeah, I think for Final Fantasy VII fans, this movie is great entertainment and a nice way to reconnect with all the iconic characters. But if you’ve never played the game before, you’re definitely gonna be pretty lost watching it.

Before I write this review, or even watch the movie in the first place, I want to state my own history with Final Fantasy 7 and the overarching franchise first, for perspective. I grew up with Nintendo consoles and MMORPGs, never owning anything Playstation until I was in high school, and that's when I began to rapidly explore everything I reasonably could in the Final Fantasy franchise. That said, I deliberately put off 7 specifically, instead playing every other mainline game before it. I was (and still am) a bit of a contrarian, and when things become incredibly popular, I tend to get skeptical and more critical, and I genuinely didn't think 7 would live up to the hype. I played it for the first time as a sophomore in college. And to put it short, I was right. Don't misinterpret me, I thought it was very good, but not great, and far from the masterpiece that the Internet had led me to believe. In particular, I'm not a fan of the characters - and of relevance to this movie, I don't think Cloud or Sephiroth are particularly engaging, mainly due to having bland personalities. Granted, they have genuine character development and backstory, but that's not enough to endear them to me, considering how much of the game has them both act too stoic and cold to leave a positive impression. By this point in my life, I'd experienced so many colorful and fantastical worlds from all the other Nintendo RPGs and MMOs I'd played, so despite how much good there was about the game, FF7 came off about as dark and smoggy as the city of Midgar itself. At the time and still now, I swear by 5, 6, and 10 as being the peak games of the series (for single-player games, anyways - 14 is its own beast entirely). A year or so later, I played Crisis Core, and while I think it made the story retroactively better, by virtue of fleshing out the backstories for both characters, I'm still annoyed that this wasn't a bigger role in the original. And one last note, having now played through Final Fantasy 14's story through the conclusion of Endwalker, I genuinely think that Emet-Selch fills the same antagonist role, purpose, personality, and everything tangentially related that Sephiroth had in 7, except so much more improved, to the point where I can confidently call him the greatest fictional villain, and I won't be able to separate my opinion of him from Sephiroth as I watch the movie. ----------- Within the first ten minutes, the movie confirms my existing opinion with this absolute "gem" of exposition: "He hated the planet so much that he wanted to destroy everything." This line, exemplifies why I don't like Sephiroth as a villain. To me, it doesn't matter what a character's backstory is if their immediate goal is as shallow and naive as this. Compare this to Emet-Selch, who's end goal might be virtually the same, which does come off as fatiguing for the order of ascians alongside him, but he opens up more about his personal struggles, and how it ties into his past and present person - all while being amazingly entertaining. When people say how much they like him as a villain, I sure hope they're referring to his intimidating presence, because I didn't ever get anything like that from the base 7 and Crisis Core. My biggest problem with the first half is how it keeps setting up new elements without explaining or even showing what they are in relation to the overarching plot. First, it keeps hyping up geostigma as some kind of threat, but *what is geostigma*? Is it a disease? Magic? Bile? Can it spread from person to person? How does it manifest? How many people have it? I can't take this seriously when I don't know how severe of a threat this is. Also, who were those three people on motorcycles, and why do they have the worst case of one-dimensional personalities? Their prattle is completely hollow. I genuinely don't want to compare this to the "you don't understand me" emo edginess of the mid-2000s, but there really is nothing to understand with a lot of this drivel. On top of that, there's so much waiting and delay and emptiness between major events. I was thirty minutes in when I started seriously considering upping the playback speed. In the context of a standalone movie, this is heavily flawed. Now, how is it in terms of a sequel? It's horribly unnecessary. The plot of FF7 was wrapped up about as perfectly as it could have been, with Cloud defeating Sephiroth in an iconic duel (that's undermined by being an unloseable fight, but that's besides the point). This movie unties the plot and adds the most obvious contrivance to keep milking the FF7 brand - that being, Sephirith didn't actually die, he's in the planet all along! Oooh! ...Give me a break. That's a cop out, not a concrete foundation to a sequel to one of gaming's most beloved stories. And this opens itself up to the next big plot twist of the movie, the incredibly predictable revelation that Aerith didn't actually die, she's in the planet all along! I didn't know anything about this movie's plot beforehand, yet I hate that I called this from so early on. (In retrospect, I'm not sure if he really was in the planet, mainly because the movie doesn't explain that part. One of the characters just transforms into him, no reason is given, other than, he's a remnant... whatever that means.) Speaking of characters, everyone in this movie is incredibly flat and uninteresting. As much as I think Cloud himself is a lukewarm protagonist, I can appreciate how he has some legitimate, albeit subtle character development in the base game. Right before the final boss fight, he states to the team, quote, "Let's mosey!" It sounds dumb, but it's brilliant, showing that Cloud doesn't need to keep his cold persona to be a badass soldier, and can embrace his country-boy upbringing more freely. Why does he have to backpedal to being an emotionless supersoldier for this movie? In fact, he's even worse in this one, almost coming off like a flanderized parody of Cloud that assholes like me would cite about the original game. And Sephiroth is even worse. When he appears, he just spouts the most cliche emo one-liners and attacks. He's just a villain for the sake of being a villain. Still better than the three guys before him, on the grounds that he wasn't obnoxious. So, what did I like about this movie? Well, actually a few things. First, Reno was solid, the exception to my ranting about the characters above. He couldn't salvage every scene he was in, given that they were already too dull to begin with, but his presence never made them worse and often enhanced them with some much needed silliness that perfectly contrasts his legitimate skill as a mercenary. But the big thing are the fight scenes. I will complain that there is too much downtime between action, but the action hits incredibly well when it does happen. From Tifa's encounter in the church up to Cloud's engagement with Sephiroth, all of them are incredibly choreographed and entertaining. Specifically the moment where everyone helps throw Cloud up into the sky to pierce through a monster's big glowy energy attack, it's honestly more silly and over-the-top than I was expecting and yet that made it all the better, I unironically love it. But still, there's not much action to go around, even the fight against Sephiroth was too short to be impactful. Still, as a complete package of a movie, this was honestly terrible. It's going down in my memory as a worthless footnote in a part of the Final Fantasy franchise that I already think is too overrated. Play the original game and Crisis Core, but leave it at that. (Footnote: I originally wrote this review for a community event at retroachievements.com and its Discord server, wherein watching and reviewing this movie was one of the tasks. My username there is MeloDeathAtmoBlack rather than epicninjask123 like it is here.)