Jecca Mehlota (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
jecca_mehlota) wrote2006-09-05 01:15 pm
jecca_mehlota) wrote2006-09-05 01:15 pm
Soapbox entry
I've finally snapped. Stupid ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
fanficrants. *blames* So, yes, this was brought on by a rant on FFR, but isn't actually directed at the author of said rant, who was both frustrated and exaggerating to make a point (and who's main point was a rather good one - familiarize yourself with the canon). Just so we got that cleared up.
I am sick to death of the hate Advent Children gets from the FFVII fandom. Okay, sure, sure, it had some problems. You can't retell VII in an hour and a half long movie. Was that what you were expecting?
I liked AC. There, I said it. Yes, the characters acted differently and they didn't tell us why. Use your imagination or something. Cloud had an extremely hard time in the game and didn't really have time to come to grips with it. Maybe that's why he's all angsty in Advent Children. Maybe he spotted his own Geostigma and, knowing that meant he would end up dead, took off. Why? I dunno, maybe he was hoping to spare the others the grief of knowing he had it? Maybe he was hoping that, by distancing himself now, when he finally died it would hurt the others less? There's a couple hundred different reasons you could probably come up with.
You don't like that Tseng is alive, but he never died in the game. There was a bad translation in the console version, yes, but he was only stabbed by Sephiroth. From what we saw, the people stabbed by Sephiroth tended to either die right on the spot or be fine after getting treatment.
Rufus is a bit of a stretch, I'll admit. Maybe he's got loads of Mako in him. I dunno.
Yes, the Turks were reduced to some comic relief, but not completely! Did you miss the parts where Rude and Reno took on Loz and Yazoo and managed to hold their own? TIFA couldn't stand against Loz, and she's one of the main protagonists!
Sure, they both lost to Kadaj, but everyone lost to Kadaj (with the exception of Cloud, but remember that Cloud has successfully taken out Sephiroth a few times now).
They saved the kids? Well, it wouldn't look too good if Shin-Ra had people right there and everyone died, would it? It's stated right in the movie that what remains of Shin-Ra is trying to rebuild their image from all the blows it suffered throughout the course of the game. Of course they're going to be acting somewhat nicer and not be going around dropping plates on people. If the Turks are ordered to Go Do Good then, by the Planet, that's what they're going to go do!
All this, and did you also miss the parts in the game where the Turks were, essentially, comic relief? That whole stint in Wutai? Sure, they dropped Corneo off the face of the mountain (who wouldn't?), but only once he kidnapped one of their own. How about the time under Midgar where they don't want to fight you and you can chose to let them just walk off, or the conversation you can spy on outside of Gongaga where they discuss who they like? They've got some funny moments, and they aren't really going to do anything they don't want to unless they've been ordered to.
(Besides, if SquareEnix really was only making Advent Children to make the fanfic authors happy, don't you think they would have been portrayed as completely incompetent drunks, especially on Reno's end? Last I knew, that was a fairly common idea.)
No, the silver-haired men (and would it kill you to learn their names? Really, would it?) didn't get too much. Loz and Yazoo get very, very little in terms of character development and dialogue. Yes, you have to go a little out of your way to find out what was really going on with them. All we get is that they're all remnants of Sephiroth. With that we can, in theory, again use our minds and think about it. Hmm. Kadaj is kind of crazy with a sadistic streak and is incredibly powerful. He's also the youngest and the leader. Gosh, I wonder which part of Dear Sephy he could possibly represent? Loz is oddly emotional, also very strong, older than the others...
Guys, really, you figured out some of the strange obscurities of the game. The movie was not that complex.
You don't like that Aeris/th/who cares? isn't dead? Surprise! She's not alive! She hasn't returned to the planet yet, but that really, really shouldn't be news. She never fully returned to the planet during the game. You can see her in the church in the slagging game! She's been watching out for Cloud because she's Aeris and she just knows somehow when someone needs looking out for. At the end? Did you miss that bit at the end where she asks him, "you'll be okay now, right?" (or whatever the dialogue is) and then she and Zack walk off into the light? Cloud smiles? Yeah, that? That was character development. The whole film was building to that moment, where Cloud finally lets the past go and moves on with his life! You want happy Cloud back? THERE HE IS, OKAY?! He goes back to being okay. This is good, we like that. We see, yes, everything was okay after Meteorfall - or at least that things are going to be okay now.
Honestly, you people grouse on and on about the Advent Children "fanthings" not playing the game, but I can't help but think sometimes that you didn't, either!
I really, really wonder if the reason you hate everything about Advent Children so much is because it introduced so many new people to the fanbase. Yes, many of them have never played the game. I know several of those people, and yes, they are amazingly frustrating to talk to. Deal. You can either help educate them (let them borrow your copy of the game, help them through it, discuss the plot with them to make sure they understand it all), or you can keep on complaining, which is probably only going to put them on the defensive and make the situation worse.
If all else fails, can't you just ignore them?
I guess I should just finish this before I get too worked up. In conclusion? Advent Children, despite how much you may or may not like it, is canon. If you don't like that, you don't need to work with it. People were writing in the fandom long before the movie and I'm sure most of them don't care that all of their work is now AU, since it doesn't make it any lower quality. (Though I do agree that authors should be familiar with the game canon before trying to write about these characters.)
But going around spouting how you don't like Advent Children because it was just a bunch of pretty fanservice that ruined all the characters is getting really old. Maybe it was, but it still happened, and you can either accept that and work in the "new" world of VII, or you can ignore it and stick to game canon. It doesn't make you any worse or better as a person. Really.
Just, please stop going on about how AC ruined the fandom and how anyone who likes it obviously didn't appreciate VII for what it was.
Primus, you're starting to make the Transformers fandom look sane. Do you have any idea how hard that is?
...And in closing, akuksfjknfks gah
fanficrants. *blames* So, yes, this was brought on by a rant on FFR, but isn't actually directed at the author of said rant, who was both frustrated and exaggerating to make a point (and who's main point was a rather good one - familiarize yourself with the canon). Just so we got that cleared up.I am sick to death of the hate Advent Children gets from the FFVII fandom. Okay, sure, sure, it had some problems. You can't retell VII in an hour and a half long movie. Was that what you were expecting?
I liked AC. There, I said it. Yes, the characters acted differently and they didn't tell us why. Use your imagination or something. Cloud had an extremely hard time in the game and didn't really have time to come to grips with it. Maybe that's why he's all angsty in Advent Children. Maybe he spotted his own Geostigma and, knowing that meant he would end up dead, took off. Why? I dunno, maybe he was hoping to spare the others the grief of knowing he had it? Maybe he was hoping that, by distancing himself now, when he finally died it would hurt the others less? There's a couple hundred different reasons you could probably come up with.
You don't like that Tseng is alive, but he never died in the game. There was a bad translation in the console version, yes, but he was only stabbed by Sephiroth. From what we saw, the people stabbed by Sephiroth tended to either die right on the spot or be fine after getting treatment.
Rufus is a bit of a stretch, I'll admit. Maybe he's got loads of Mako in him. I dunno.
Yes, the Turks were reduced to some comic relief, but not completely! Did you miss the parts where Rude and Reno took on Loz and Yazoo and managed to hold their own? TIFA couldn't stand against Loz, and she's one of the main protagonists!
Sure, they both lost to Kadaj, but everyone lost to Kadaj (with the exception of Cloud, but remember that Cloud has successfully taken out Sephiroth a few times now).
They saved the kids? Well, it wouldn't look too good if Shin-Ra had people right there and everyone died, would it? It's stated right in the movie that what remains of Shin-Ra is trying to rebuild their image from all the blows it suffered throughout the course of the game. Of course they're going to be acting somewhat nicer and not be going around dropping plates on people. If the Turks are ordered to Go Do Good then, by the Planet, that's what they're going to go do!
All this, and did you also miss the parts in the game where the Turks were, essentially, comic relief? That whole stint in Wutai? Sure, they dropped Corneo off the face of the mountain (who wouldn't?), but only once he kidnapped one of their own. How about the time under Midgar where they don't want to fight you and you can chose to let them just walk off, or the conversation you can spy on outside of Gongaga where they discuss who they like? They've got some funny moments, and they aren't really going to do anything they don't want to unless they've been ordered to.
(Besides, if SquareEnix really was only making Advent Children to make the fanfic authors happy, don't you think they would have been portrayed as completely incompetent drunks, especially on Reno's end? Last I knew, that was a fairly common idea.)
No, the silver-haired men (and would it kill you to learn their names? Really, would it?) didn't get too much. Loz and Yazoo get very, very little in terms of character development and dialogue. Yes, you have to go a little out of your way to find out what was really going on with them. All we get is that they're all remnants of Sephiroth. With that we can, in theory, again use our minds and think about it. Hmm. Kadaj is kind of crazy with a sadistic streak and is incredibly powerful. He's also the youngest and the leader. Gosh, I wonder which part of Dear Sephy he could possibly represent? Loz is oddly emotional, also very strong, older than the others...
Guys, really, you figured out some of the strange obscurities of the game. The movie was not that complex.
You don't like that Aeris/th/who cares? isn't dead? Surprise! She's not alive! She hasn't returned to the planet yet, but that really, really shouldn't be news. She never fully returned to the planet during the game. You can see her in the church in the slagging game! She's been watching out for Cloud because she's Aeris and she just knows somehow when someone needs looking out for. At the end? Did you miss that bit at the end where she asks him, "you'll be okay now, right?" (or whatever the dialogue is) and then she and Zack walk off into the light? Cloud smiles? Yeah, that? That was character development. The whole film was building to that moment, where Cloud finally lets the past go and moves on with his life! You want happy Cloud back? THERE HE IS, OKAY?! He goes back to being okay. This is good, we like that. We see, yes, everything was okay after Meteorfall - or at least that things are going to be okay now.
Honestly, you people grouse on and on about the Advent Children "fanthings" not playing the game, but I can't help but think sometimes that you didn't, either!
I really, really wonder if the reason you hate everything about Advent Children so much is because it introduced so many new people to the fanbase. Yes, many of them have never played the game. I know several of those people, and yes, they are amazingly frustrating to talk to. Deal. You can either help educate them (let them borrow your copy of the game, help them through it, discuss the plot with them to make sure they understand it all), or you can keep on complaining, which is probably only going to put them on the defensive and make the situation worse.
If all else fails, can't you just ignore them?
I guess I should just finish this before I get too worked up. In conclusion? Advent Children, despite how much you may or may not like it, is canon. If you don't like that, you don't need to work with it. People were writing in the fandom long before the movie and I'm sure most of them don't care that all of their work is now AU, since it doesn't make it any lower quality. (Though I do agree that authors should be familiar with the game canon before trying to write about these characters.)
But going around spouting how you don't like Advent Children because it was just a bunch of pretty fanservice that ruined all the characters is getting really old. Maybe it was, but it still happened, and you can either accept that and work in the "new" world of VII, or you can ignore it and stick to game canon. It doesn't make you any worse or better as a person. Really.
Just, please stop going on about how AC ruined the fandom and how anyone who likes it obviously didn't appreciate VII for what it was.
Primus, you're starting to make the Transformers fandom look sane. Do you have any idea how hard that is?
...And in closing, akuksfjknfks gah