Latest Posts by spoiler-alert-andabunchofnumbers - Page 4

I’m gonna be a complete nerd and say that the whole “Vincent Valentine doesn’t have a phone” thing in Advent Children is actually more than comedy.

Because why does he not have a phone? He thinks nobody would call him / he would not have to call anyone.

Because who is left? He spent thirty years in a coffin. The woman he loved, the guys he worked with – dead and gone, or moved on. Who would he need to call? Who would want to reach out to him in turn?

And then he goes “Where can I buy a phone?” (yes at the most impossible time ever but this is Vincent)

Because Marlene would have needed a phone, and he couldn’t provide one when she needed it.

Because Cloud couldn’t reach him to call for backup.

Because his allies couldn’t reach him when they needed him.

This is not Vincent realizing he’s behind on technology and now wants to catch up. This is not even really funny.

This is just Vincent realizing there’s still people who need to be able to reach him. People he wants to help when they need it.

So if he’s gonna have to buy a damn phone, he’s gonna buy a damn phone so that next time, he’s there to provide backup on time.

A small PSA to all those new to dealing with the porn bots that Tumblr now has a fresh wave of – I understand that when you go to report them, you want to report them as "[containing] sexually explicit material", but don't do that. Report them as spam instead.

These are spam bots flooding tags and the website in general with spam links. They often do not have anything sexually explicit on their blog (although they often have implicit material). Plus, these two reports get very different results. Reporting explicit material gets the bot slapped behind an 18+ wall, so minors can't check if they're a bot or not. Reporting spam gets the bot taken down.

Remember, folks: when dealing with a bot, report spam, not smut!

CRISIS CORE FINAL FANTASY VII REUNION (2022) dev. Square Enix ↳ ✨ MOOGLE POWER ✨

It's That Time Friends LET'S TALK ABOUT SEPHIROTH!!!

Specifically, we're talking about OG Crisis Core Sephiroth because my hopes are high for this remake and though they made sure most of the OG lines are the same, why are the voice actors unable to raise their voices and shout into their mics like what?

Anyway, let's start with his friends because Genesis and Angeal deserve more attention for shaping Sephiroth into who he is.

We all know the fight scene, we all know how epic it was, but let's break it down because yes I've watched it practically frame by frame what do YOU do with your free time?

Did you notice Genesis does the sword prayer at the beginning of the fight, same as Angeal does with his Buster Sword? It could just be Genesis showing off his weapon for the audience, but he closes his eyes and specifically lowers his head a fraction. We have little of pre-Crisis Genesis to go off of and how friendly he truly was - I mean, his best friend's Prove-Your-Honor-to-Me Angeal and Sephiroth actually does seem to admire him for his genuine efforts to get stronger. Most people who face Sephiroth likely just give up knowing they'll never match him, but Genesis is insistent on becoming stronger even when he's beaten. He even makes headway against Sephiroth in this fight, something that no one else has probably EVER done, but we'll get to that later.

The music track my goodness it's so great! *Dramatic violins*

But to the actual fight, it makes you think about why Sephiroth's sword is so freakishly long and how anyone in Shinra possibly invented a metal strong enough to hold up to Sephiroth's strength. Angeal's Buster Sword is extremely thick, Genesis enhances his weapon through magic, but Sephiroth's just got an extremely long sword that can somehow hold its own no matter which way he's using it, which falls in line perfectly with his fighting style. With a blade that long, Sephi can basically block a hit from every angle just by twisting with little effort, which becomes relevant when he's fighting as a left-handed fighter against a predominantly right-handed society. In order to properly turn his blade at the right angle to parry, he would need to turn his blade at a sharper angle. Or he could just swing however he pleases and force his opponent to be the one turning their blade at an awkward angle.

Because he's basically the equivalent of hitting a brick wall, every time he parries an attack from Angeal or Genesis, he is never flinching or bouncing back from the blows no matter how terrible the angle should be. This is literally a scene showing how impossibly strong Sephiroth is, not just from a big-muscles standpoint, but from an illogical "how-are-you-not-moving?" standpoint, and it should be showing you how frustrating it is for Genesis to try and keep up.

We all know physics hopefully, and how length increases force the further down you go. That means that hitting further down the length of Sephiroth's blade should be increasing the force needed to block the hit, but because Sephiroth is so strong AND his weapon is good at holding up to that strength, even if you're hitting the tip of his blade and he's blocking at a very poor angle, he is STILL successful at being completely unmovable.

These two slam their blades into Sephiroth's, and then they press forward together and lean in, AND look at the downwards angel Sephi is holding his Masamune. It's cut off in the picture above, but Sephi's thumb is facing downwards towards the blade, meaning he's not using his palm to push as effectively as if his thumb were facing upwards. You can tell because right after this, he swings up to slice the pair's blades back in their respective directions.

And during this first clash, he NEVER uses his right hand as a leverage point to reinforce the other end of his sword. The only time he uses his right hand is when he and Angeal are bashing it out at the last clash, and it looks like he was doing that mostly for aesthetic purposes.

Motion blur is a bitch.

Anyway, when Genesis powers up his sword and smashes his blade down to put Sephiroth into a crater, you can tell that both of them are having so much fun. Like even Sephiroth smiles because now Gen is putting up a decent fight. But then Genesis's hits actually start driving Sephiroth back. He's hitting fast enough and hard enough that Sephiroth's parries are becoming detrimental to him. His blade is useful for long-distance hits, keeping his opponents outside of a bubble where he can parry from literally every angle, but Genesis is getting too close and he isn't letting up, meaning that every time Sephiroth parries, it's at an angle that prevents him from resetting for the next swing. It's become more of getting his sword in the way than it is actually meaning Gen blow-for-blow, and he has to actually jump back in order to put real distance between them.

Then, Sephiroth makes a small "tsk" noise. He's genuinely upset that Genesis is actually making headway. This is probably the first time he's been on the defensive for a single opponent in a sword fight, and while he's slightly upset, he's also excited. This is why the fight gets out of hand. Genesis is determined to come out the winner, even if it's just in the training room, but Sephiroth is eager to have a real fight that he can put his full strength into - or at least more strength than normal.

When he blocks, this time, he uses his right hand for leverage. It's gotten serious. He uses both of his hands to shove Genesis back, and it is epic. Also do y'all think that's why he wears those bracelets? Are they for this exact purpose, to act as a bracer for when you gotta use your other hand to hold your sword?

Anyway, you can tell that Sephi is turning the tide because he's completely reversed the situation. Genesis is barely managing to keep up with the speed of his strikes, and because this is Sephiroth, getting your blade in the way of his is actually less effective than just dodging. When Sephi is doing the striking rather than the parrying, it means you're at risk of your own sword bouncing back in your face from the force of his hit.

Genesis jumping up is a reasonable response, putting distance between them, but in the air he also has no footholds, making blocking strikes even harder for him. Ignoring the lack of gravity because fall-damage doesn't exist in Final Fantasy (except for 15 but 15 isn't real I'm sure of it), Genesis using magic to try and turn the tide is precisely what his strengths are. He manages to match Sephiroth when he infuses his blade with magic, and let's be honest I don't think anyone else is capable of using Fire Materia like he has. He's basically using a SHG technique from FF Type-0, firing little blasts from every finger, and THEN controlling them remotely to converge on Sephiroth to create a creaking mini-sun worthy of Ifrit. I don't think his final blast would have stopped Sephiroth if Angeal hadn't stopped him, but I think Sephi was enjoying being overwhelmed even for a second.

No one can beat Sephiroth in terms of his raw strength, and his long blade is suited for his casual style of blocking and poking (it's embarrassing how easy it is for him to take Cloud down in Advent Children when he stops smacking his Fusion sword and just bypasses it by using a thrusting motion), but then Sephiroth starts using magic just like Genesis and all bets are off the table. The energy blasts that come from his sword just casually slice through the Mako Canon, and the way he just casually falls out of sight only to tear his way straight towards Genesis as his theme starts is Sephiroth having so much fun.

You know he did that to be dramatic. You know he did that because Genesis is a dramatic theater nerd and he's respecting Genesis by matching him in using magic to enhance his blade. He knows the fight's basically won now because he's actually trying. He's being nice. And he's having a blast.

The fact that Sephiroth is no longer being careful of his surroundings is also telling of how much effort he's putting in. Sure, he's slicing up the Mako Canon probably just to show off, but he's also just swinging his sword like you naturally would in a fight. He's just ignoring its length and letting it cut through whatever gets in its way even when he misses; it's a casual warning to Genesis that he's going to slice through him without pausing if Genesis gets in the way of Masamune. The situation is completely reversed from earlier as Genesis grunts in frustration before powering up to match Sephiroth's hit.

I love how when Angeal gets between the pair, he uses his Buster Sword to block Sephiroth from behind knowing that he'll need the foothold if he's going to stop Sephi mid-attack, but he's actually pushed towards Genesis because Sephi is pushing down so hard even after he's been stopped.

Genesis breaking Angeal's small sword is actually really interestingly set up and executed. This is the wound that begins Genesis's degradation, setting off the plot of Crisis Core's story. Genesis is really good, don't get me wrong, but it's unlikely that he didn't get his fair share of cuts and scrapes while he was learning to fight; I don't think Genesis would have begun degrading if he'd taken a hit like that normally.

I think this scene is setting up that Genesis's wound was really an anomaly of anomalies and the worst of bad luck. He infused his sword to maximum strength while he was determined to hold his own against Sephiroth when he was actually trying, he was so determined to keep the fight going and get Angeal out of the way that he used two types of magic at once - the red fire as well as what I think is ice magic to potentially immobilize Angeal (or he could have been using the same blue magic that Sephi was using when he first created those giant energy waves to make that first cut against the Canon). Because his blast hit Angeal's sword, which was blocking his own enhanced one, the two magics mixed in an explosion so strong that not only did it break the sword, but it created a Mako magic nightmare that was then injected straight into Genesis's shoulder.

I mean after everything that Sephiroth and Genesis did while they were going at it, it was Genesis's blast that actually broke the simulator. Sephi isn't even celebrating his victory. Though he doesn't say anything, he's concerned about Genesis and guilty that he'd let the fight get out of hand. When Angeal got between the pair, Sephiroth actually seemed to come to his senses - the original has Sephi seemingly like he was warning Angeal to stay out of the fight, but the remake seems to imply that Sephiroth was realizing how serious it was when Angeal intervened to stop them. I got this from the way Sephi says the line "Angeal..." That's how subtle the difference in voice acting a line can be!

His narration after confirms that he was concerned that Genesis wasn't healing and quietly blaming himself for letting this happen.

He finds Angeal's lectures amusing, he's memorized LOVELESS from being around Genesis for so long. He cares deeply about his friends, he's heartbroken when he has to accept that they're turning against Shinra, that they're working with Hollander. Zack has a full-on breakdown when Angeal dies because he was the one that had to watch his downward spiral, his transformation into a monster, and kill him, but imagine what Sephiroth is going through. He's not an emotional person, but he's enraged when he learns that Angeal left in Wutai, he does his best to appease Genesis when they meet in the Mako Reactor and tries his best not to fight them. He goes so far as to go rogue and tell Zack that they're going to fail to eliminate the wanted fugitives - probably the first time Sephiroth has ever actively rebelled after being raised in Shinra under Hojo.

Crisis Core is the story about Zack but it's also a story about Sephiroth. He was a person born and raised in Shinra to be nothing but a soldier, and the first time he actually gets friends (from a small humble town rather than a big city) and gets a new perspective on life, finding out they were experiments and monsters absolutely breaks them. He watches his friends fall apart, drift away from the kind and fun people that had been his first and only friends and taught him what friendship was truly LIKE.

Zack is probably the only reason Sephi doesn't break from Shinra then and there; he has the power to leave, even if he doesn't know what he'd do with his life, but Zack becomes a cheerful 1st, as passionate in his beliefs as Genesis and as kind as Angeal after being mentored by him. Another friend who doesn't let Sephiroth's cold attitude hamper his ability to see the good in life, one who believed in Angeal enough to even try believing in Genesis for a moment too. Sephiroth still has hope.

That's why it takes Nibelheim to absolutely break him. Not only is he close to Jenova, but he has the knowledge that his friends were failed science experiments, the informtaion causing them to absolutely fall apart - he's seen it happen and has been forced to accept that his friends are gone. Learning about his own past as an experiment sends him down the exact same rabbit hole that his friends fell into, but he's a "perfect" monster, and even Genesis showing up at the reactor confirms it. He says to Genesis "you will rot" when he comes asking for help, which seems like a great moment where Sephi refuses to let Genesis's harsh words get to him. In actuality, it just proves that he's aggressively distanced himself from the pain of losing those he trusted, reminding him and reinforcing the idea that Sephi can't trust his fellow 1st class friends. How easy would it have been to convince him that Zack was going to turn on him too?

This is serious manipulation from Jenova, taking advantage of Sephiroth's upbringing being isolated in Shinra with Hojo, taking advantage of his trauma from finally finding friends who went mad and turned on him, and then taking advantage of the fact that their history was revealed to them to drive them mad to do the same to him. Quite honestly, why WOULDN'T Sephiroth hate a world that did this to him? He's been a loyal soldier all his life, he's angry at Shinra who made him, tired of the whole world being too weak to pose a challenge against him, and he learns he's a monster who can help Jenova if she helps him

Honestly, I'm on board with that fan theory that Remake is Sephiroth trying to break free of Jenova's control over him as well and break the chains of fate or whatever. Not so he can be a free good guy or anything (that theory is reserved for the fanfiction), but so that he can take all her world-ending power for himself. You go, dude. Be the greatest villain ever and force the world to get its shit together in order to stop you.

Anyway, Reunion just finished downloading so I'ma go play now. Byeeeee

You ever just look at the cover of a book and be like "I want that outfit. Why can I not have that outfit? How dare you look so great in that outfit when I can't look that great even if I had that outfit irl?"

Out and About

Let's talk about Caius and Yeul, shall we?

First, who in the world thinks it's a bad thing for Caius to be obsessed with protecting Yeul? Seriously. Is it the purple hair? Is it the fact that you fight Caius over a dozen times (counting Paradox Endings and DLCs)? What in the world is wrong with Caius loving Yeul to the point that he wants to destroy time itself?

Not to get too existential (but to get slightly existential), Caius is basically being told that his daughter is destined to die before she can reach 20 years old. He starts out as a Guardian, impressing the Goddess so much that she gifts him her immortal heart so that he can protect Yeul for eternity. His job has now become to eternally protect and care for Yeul, but he's also being told that Yeul will never be allowed to have a long and fulfilling free life. His job is to protect her, but the one thing he can't protect her from is her fate. If she sees a vision where she has to die, Caius is not allowed to stop it. He raised and protected this girl just so that she can die to keep the timeline stable or whatever. His job is to make sure that she dies the "correct" way for the sake of time. Can you blame him for being driven mad after being forced to escort Yeul to her destined death generation after generation?

Caius loves Yeul. He is not in love with Yeul (you creeps of the internet), but he loves her. He loves every version of Yeul that comes along like his daughter, no matter how different she is, no matter how she is destined to die. He remembers every one of them, he loves every one of them even with how many he meets and raises and loses each generation.

"Although they had the same soul, every one of them was unique! A Yeul who dreamed of travel! A Yeul who loved to sing! A Yeul who collected flowers. They all died. All of them, before my eyes!"

Serah collapses after he says this, even though she's just standing to the side. Why? Because she's horrified. In 400AF, a single Yeul had to die because of Serah and Noel's presence - for the first time, Serah realized that changing time is hurting someone. Serah is responsible for that Yeul dying. Every change in timeline, even if it's to fix it, is forcing an innocent girl to walk into the arms of the nearest monster so she can die and keep things from getting worse.

Serah was horrified that Yeul just walked to her death willingly, like Yeul sacrificed herself just to allow Serah and Noel to continue their journey, but Caius has seen Yeul accept her fate hundreds of times. He paid attention. He remembers every Yeul, their dreams, their preferences, their favorite activities and favorite experiences, and he's had to watch them die just like Serah watched 400AF Yeul die without being able to do anything.

Caius got so tired of being immortal, but the main reason was that his entire existence was to watch a girl grow up and then die - often in his arms because he has to protect her up until that point. It finally ended at 700AF, Yeul's cycle of reincarnation was likely at its end since there were no more humans, and the next Guardian was born who might finally be able to end Caius as well. He hoped the cycle would finally end, but Noel was too weak to kill him. Yeul believed in the future, and that was awful to Caius because it meant that this wasn't the end. Yeul would keep living and dying for others, never living for herself, and Caius would be forced to keep watching it and letting it happen forever.

"Her only purpose is to die over and over! Even though she can see the future, she's not allowed to escape her fate! She is born knowing that she will die before she has truly lived! Countless deaths, without a life to give them meaning."

Let's talk about Noel too, because his relationship amounts to only truly knowing one Yeul but overall valuing her just as much as Caius.

Now, remember that Noel is having memory problems for the entire game. His memories are in flux, sometimes leaving him, perhaps even changing without him knowing it. That's why, when he's killed in the Void Beyond and sent into an endless dream, his dreamworld sends him home. The end of the world is depressing, it's dark and sad and he's only holding into hope for Yeul's sake - to see her smile, to find more people so she won't have to be alone. Noel's dream is to see his Yeul again. Even if he has to go through losing his life again, this is the world that he knows and the world that he was slowly losing as a result of his memories vanishing.

Right after you wake him from his dream world and enter the lighted (real) 700AF (since you can eventually reach it from the Historia Crux, I believe the lightened version is the actual 700AF time period; they escape the Void Beyond by translating Noel's dream into a real time location at the end of the world by slaying the Gogmagog), Noel says that he "can't remember what happened to her", despite just remembering Yeul's fate dying young to her vision - this is the place we learn that visions eat away at a seeress' life and Serah is one too.

This is probably lost in the English translation, but I interpret this as Noel knows in concept that Yeul died because of her visions, but he can't remember details of the event itself. Right after Yeul dies in the dream, Noel pauses to give the narration of how he learned why Yeul died in his arms. How did he learn that Yeul's death was a result of her visions? As far as Noel was concerned, in the cutscene we viewed, Noel walked up to Yeul putting a prophecy in an Oracle Drive, she collapsed in his arms and told him they'd meet again, and then she died. Caius was already gone; no one could have told Noel that Yeul didn't just randomly keel over. Maybe he could have guessed that her vision was related to her death, but he could have very well just assumed she had a particularly terrible vision that killed her, not that each one takes a part of her life.

When confronting Caius in the final battle(s), Caius assumes that Serah doesn't know about visions killing her - he is proven wrong. When Caius declares that Yeul is bound by a curse, Noel asks "What curse?" I interpret this as Noel not thinking that Yeul's visions and rebirth are a curse. It's tragic and scary, certainly, but Serah's situation is what Noel is more worried about. Unlike Yeul, Serah won't be reborn; she gets one life's worth of visions and that's it. Yeul has to die over and over, but Noel only focuses on the fact that she gets to live over and over. Her lives are short, but even when she was at the end of the world with only two people left to accompany her, she kept smiling. Noel concludes that she must have made the most of every life, because even though her lives were short, she lived so many that she had more time than anyone could have lived in a single long lifespan. Noel does not see Yeul's endless death and rebirth as a curse.

When Serah is brought to her knees at Caius's words about Yeul's deaths, she is able to rise again because Noel declares that Yeul's deaths weren't a curse. "She knew we'd meet again. Think, Caius. Think. Was it really a curse? Was it forced on her by Etro? Do you really think that Yeul wanted to die, and not come back? Of course not. Yeul wanted to come back. Every time she died in your arms, she wanted to come back. She knew her next life would be short. She knew! Because she wanted to see you! Again and again, without end!"

The Eyes of Etro are a curse that take away a seeress' life with every vision, there's no denying that. When the timeline changes or is put at risk, someone has to bear the weight of the consequences. If Yeul hadn't been reborn, it's likely that a random candidate would have been chosen each time a seeress died, similar to how Serah gained her Eyes when her personal timeline was altered and her subsequent journey was the catalyst to the entire timeline being put in flux.

But Yeul choosing to live again and again must have been her own choice. She wanted to keep others from suffering, but she could also live what amounted to a long life, living in every era, seeing Caius again, having new experiences and new interests and new adventures as the world changed with each life she lived. She didn't need immortality; she wanted reality, no matter how cold and harsh it could be. The sad moments were worth the happy visions and happy futures.

Caius was the one consistent thing about each of Yeul's lives, the one thing that didn't change. She lived life after life in every time zone, probably missing large chunks of time and being disconnected from her reality because a seeress needs to be careful who she interacts with (see the fall of Paddra for an example of how her presence is dangerous). Of course she grew attached to Caius as an anchor, the one consistent thing about all the times she's lived.

Notice how there are scenes depicting both Noel and Caius alike crying over a Yeul who is smiling when she dies. Noel was the first Guardian who gave Caius hope that Noel could kill him; Noel was the first person that a Yeul valued besides Caius because she had a vision that she was going to see him again. Yeul likely lost everyone else in each of her lives; by the time she's reborn, all the people she might have become friends with are gone and she's isolated from everyone except for the Paddraen tribe and the Guardians. Caius and his immortality is the only one that she always knew she'd see again - until Noel happened. Yeul died in Noel's arms just like she had so many times in Caius's arms, but Noel chose to value the idea that he'd see her again, not dread it.

As revealed in Lightning Returns, the Unseen Chaos (a different type of Chaos from the regular one that makes up all souls; a more volatile version that destroys) is made up of Yeul's souls specifically. The Unseen Chaos protects, empowers, and even revives Caius because it is Yeul looking after her Guardian just as Caius was looking after her. Yeul is the Chaos that floods Caius after Noel's speech where he has to strike back as Caius doesn't believe his words, the Chaos that transforms Caius into the Jet Bahamut for the final boss of XIII-2. She was desperate to keep the one consistent thing about all of her lives with her. No matter what Caius did, how "I don't want to please her, I want to save her", and how he destroyed the world even when she just wanted to see visions of people living happily, she can't let him go.

Ever had to make a decision and kept going around in circles about the pros and cons, what you gain but what you have to sacrifice for one decision then the next? Imagine every thought you had existing as a separate entity - still fundamentally you, because you came to that conclusion at one point or another, but conflicting and arguing over which opinion mattered most. That's what Yeul is, hundreds of people all with different thoughts and opinions but who fundamentally start out as the same base person.

She hates Caius for some things, but that doesn't mean she doesn't also care about him and need him. For all he does, Caius cares about Yeul, telling Lightning that Yeul cannot go to the New World without destroying it with her Unseen Chaos, so he's fine accompanying her to make sure she isn't doomed to be alone forever.

Caius is very evil at times, driven to his goal with absolute focus. But his greatest flaw is being completely dedicated to Yeul. In Oerba 200AF, that Caius is not hell-bent on destroying the timeline yet. That Caius is the first one, living through all of the lives of Yeul, before 700AF happens and he declares he's going to slay the goddess. That Caius is dedicated to eliminating time-travelers because "To change history is a sin." He bows to Yeul and accepts her judgment when she declares that they can remold history as they desire. The only reason they go to Augusta Tower is likely because it is the sight of a massive Paradox; that 200 AF Caius is dedicated to stopping all Paradoxes to hopefully extend Yeul's time.

However, Yeul gives Serah and Noel the artifact that allows them to resolve the Paradox, killing Yeul with the vision in the process. Notice that Caius doesn't see Yeul happy at her vision where everyone's smiling. He just sees her dead. This is how Caius came to want the timeline destroyed; he tries to keep history in line to keep Yeul from having visions, but she's completely fine with dying if it means a happier future. Nothing he does can save her. Nothing except destroying time and fate itself.

In the end, he died in Valhalla to be with Yeul forever, he stopped her cycle of reincarnation, but it didn't save Yeul because her Chaos was too strong. She destroyed the world, not even on purpose because she can't control it. It's just her existences themselves that cause destruction. Time was destroyed, Yeul no longer was born into new lives and no longer had to suffer visions, but in return, the two of them live in an eternal half-dead, half-living state within Etro’s Temple. Yeul has Caius with her forever, Yeul no longer has to die, and yet it’s all still wrong.

So really, the main enemy of XIII-2 was Etro, who loved humanity so much that she broke the timeline, gave a man an immortal heart to the point that it drove him insane, allowed a girl to be reborn so many times that her souls became a living weapon, and who gave Serah the Eyes of Etro even though Noel can travel the timeline without needing them.

Final theory of the post: what if 700AF Caius deciding to use his power to change the timeline is what began Yeul's many deaths and rebirths in the first place? If he hadn't begun messing with the timeline to try and destroy it, what if Yeul rarely would have had visions without all those disturbances? She wouldn't have had a short life, she wouldn't have wanted to be reborn. Random people would have still been blessed/cursed with visions every now and then, but not to the point of always dying young. What if Caius created his own suffering with his vendetta? Caius is the eternal paradox, the one that started it all and who maintained the distortions so long as he lived.

Are you a writer working on an original story and are looking for your hype-people? Join our discord server!

Hey guys! My friend @fortuna-et-cataclysmos and I are setting up a server for writers that are developing a story/ working on drafts and would like a small community of friends to support each other along the way.

So, the basic idea is based some good experiences we had within our fandom server, where we hosted Nanowrimo last year and ended up with like, 14 people creating their own stories.

The idea is to just have a small community of friends that can hype you, motivate you, and bounce ideas off with.

In our Nanowrimo experiment, we all had channels to talk about our books, host Q&As, exchange resources (for example referring to larger writer servers or tips and tricks for querying and publishing) and other fun writing and development activities. We are sort of trying to emulate some of those dynamics here.

So anyway, if you're interested, hit us up with a dm and we can give you more info/answer any questions/ give you the server invite if it sounds like it's up your alley.

(Or if you are not but would like to support, please reblog! We would be super thankful if you help us spread the word out)

❗❗Trigger warning for suicide❗❗

Okay, let's talk about it.

Vanille's VA tried her best.

Moving on.

From the very beginning of the game, Vanille's character is foreshadowed very well. When she's held among the other refugees of the Purge, she's smiling and willing to joke around with a gun...even though she has no idea how to use a gun and likely her only experience with them is death. That's how good Vanille is at hiding from despair.

When Hope's mother is killed, she hugs him and tells him to face it later. Notice how she says "Ciao!" here and when she will say it again. She tells Hope to face the death of his mother and the Purge "later", so happily as if she's used to being part of a mass murder scene. She's running away from fhe fear and existential pain; her motto when things get hard has become "face it later."

*Bonus how she gives Hope a gun to defend himself, but that scene ends on a gentle musical score panning down to show how Hope doesn't take up the gun for fighting in that moment - he's not angry at Snow yet, he doesn't need his anger to survive yet.*

In the Vestiage, Vanille tells Hope that he needs to tell Snow how he feels or he'll regret it forever. This is an allusion to how Vanille has many things she needed to confess, lies that she never told the truth about that are tearing her apart - but more importantly, they're tearing others apart too. When she hears about Serah being held by the fal'Cie, remember that she knows and is friends with Serah already. Serah was the one who told her to look at her problems from a distance and that running away doesn't solve anything.

When Vanille asks "Why is she turning to crystal?" Hope answers the literally reason that "She fulfilled her Focus", but actually this was a really smart use of double-meanings. Vanille wasn't asking why Serah literally turned to crystal - she was asking why Serah is turning to crystal, what Focus did she complete? They've all just kinda been standing there, so what did Serah do?

In Lake Bresha, while Hope is having a meltdown, Sazh is loudly asking questions, Lightning is angrily reeling with her emotions at both losing her sister and being a l'Cie, and Snow is completely in denial, Vanille just interrupts by saying "Oh-oh! Then let's run away! Ciao!" Her first reaction when under duress is to run away. Her cheerful reaction is her completely absolute ability to hide her emotions when bad things occur.

*Another fun bonus: when Lightning is holding Snow at sword-point when he encourages them to complete their Focus and everyone's interrupted by PSICOM soldiers, Lightning very easily could've just pretended to still be an active Guardian Corps member from Bodhum since her resignation was so unofficial and she's still in uniform. Instead, she actively takes the chance to drop-kick that sucker because she is pissed off and it's hilarious*

When Lightning splits off from the group in the Vile Peaks and she and Hope get cut off from Vanille and Sazh, she just says, "Run? We should run. If we rush in now, we'll just get in [Lightning's] way." When they see the army converging on Palumpolum and likely on Lightning and Hope, Vanille comforts Sazh by saying, "Right, no choice. We run—the other way."

What really begins to test Vanille's resolve is when she learns that she was responsible for essentially cursing not only Serah but now Dajh too. Because of her running from her Focus by pretending she doesn't know what it is, Serah was branded by Anima into a Pulse l'Cie, and Dajh got branded in the Euride Gorge by Kujata into a Cocoon fal'Cie.

What really hurts about this reveal is that Sazh first told her that he just had a son. She's encouraging him to hold it together and defy his l'Cie fate, thinking that "the l'Cie thing" is Sazh himself being a l'Cie, not Dajh.

Vanille's running is hurting people, and when people are hurt, she runs even further. Then more people are hurt and she keeps running. Similar to Snow, Vanille doesn't know if she can ever even begin to apologize for how many lives she's ruined. Unlike Fang, she also remembers the War of Transgression, where her actions doomed many both Pulsian and Cocoon people (Cocoonians?) - she's holding the guilt of running away from a war, then when she wakes up, she runs from her Focus again because she can't stand more people getting hurt, but people get hurt anyway.

It's one thing for she herself to be a victim, but seeing Sazh mourning his son - younger than Serah, younger than Hope, just a little kid in the wrong place at the wrong time - and she knows it's all her fault is tearing her up inside because she can't run from Sazh. The last time she lied about information, Fang went on a murder spree to try and kill the fal'Cie which caused Dajh to be made a l'Cie in the first place. So naturally, it all blows up with Sazh too.

The worst part about it, in my opinion, is that Dajh was the one who found the Pulse l'Cie in Bodhum. A child was the reason that the entire town of Bodhum was Purged, but Dajh likely didn't know what he was doing, and the only reason he was branded was because Fang and Vanille attacked Kujata at Euride. Fang and Vanille waking didn't cause Bodhum to be Purged; Dajh being branded caused the Purge.

In Nautilus, Sazh is trying to cheer her up. Sazh is protecting her along their journey because he can't leave Vanille to fend for herself. He's confessed what happened to his son to her, he trusts her enough to tell her about how much Dajh loved the chocobos, how he went to the fal'Cie trying to kill it for Dajh's sake...and even that he'd considered killing his fellow l'Cie if it would save Dajh from his fate. That also means that Sazh is willing to kill himself - but his chocobo just lands on his pistol and shakes its head.

Sazh bought that chocobo chick for Dajh on the day Dajh got branded - purchasing that chick was what made him lose Dajh that day. But that chick also reminds Sazh of the reason that he's still going. Dajh wouldn't want him to kill himself or turn on his friends...so instead he's just running away with Vanille. He has no idea whether Dajh is a crystal or not, whether he'll ever be able to see Dajh again now that he's explicitly a Pulse l'Cie and his son's direct enemy.

Both Vanille and Sazh represent the party running from their fate, while Lightning, Snow, and Hope are charging head-first into delusions and danger in order to avoid confronting the truth. Keep in mind that Nautilus comes after Palumpolum, where the latter three have just confronted their feelings and have made the decision to stop running.

Now, in Nautilus, Sazh is the one telling Vanille to forget about the heavy stuff, to forget about the other l'Cie in Palumpolum, to let their brands just fade away. He takes Vanille to Nautilus Park where Dajh always wanted to go. And let's be honest, a whole park with chocobos and fuzzy sheep is heaven, okay?

Now Final Fantasy has dealt with terrible situations before, but 13 has always had an air of levity to it and a PG 13 vibe. But when Sazh finally admits that he's going to turn himself in, that's Sazh finally giving up on running from his fate and essentially volunteering to get killed if it means he'll have one last chance to see his son.

He says he's tired of running. All this time, Vanille has been living on the fact that running will help put the bad things behind them or at least give you time to face the situation later. Sazh has run away with her, but he's tired of running - running hasn't helped him, running never can.

Vanille is so desperate to give him a chance to keep living, she tries using revenge. Notice the parallels in this scene with Hope's situation. Hope is using anger and revenge as the only thing to keep himself going, and Vanille is reasoning that revenge will be enough motivation for Sazh to keep going. It all plays out a bit like a soap opera where Vanille gets cut off before she can confess that it was her, but it reinforces that Sazh may be willing to let himself get caught, but keeping Vanille alive is motivating him more than killing her might have.

The scene after the Midlight Reaper is honestly horrifying if it weren't such a cartoony game. Sazh's son should be locked up under PSICOM's security, and you almost think it has to be an illusion when Dajh runs up and finds his father like it's just a game of catch to him. Dajh has been made his father's enemy, and Dajh's ability to sense Pulse is probably what brought him there. This is the boy whose power caused the Purge, who was branded because of Vanille specifically (even if her inaction caused Fang to be reckless). And Dajh is here in Nautilus because Sazh wanted to take him to the amusement park to see the chocobos. The chocobo chick lands in Dajh's hair, Dajh is just happy to see his dad, Sazh is just amazed that he's able to see Dajh - which he thought would be impossible without turning himself in to PSICOM to die.

(Reminder that Nautilus is actually a city and the amusement park aspect is just built into it; people actually live full-time in Nautilus and there's a Nautilus security regiment just like Bodhum has a security regiment in the Guardian Corps)

Then, literally in an instant, while Sazh is close enough to embrace him, Dajh turns to crystal. The difference between Pulse and Cocoon crystals is amazing, but Dajh's crystal is made arguably worse than Serah's transformation because it happens so quickly that he doesn't get last words, and rather than being turned completely to crystal, Dajh is more encased within it - he's still smiling up at his father, oblivious to the whole situation, and he'll be frozen like that potentially forever, his last smile to his father on his face for essentially eternity.

The bell tolls above them (fun fact: there are 13 hours, as revealed in Lightning Returns), signaling the end of Dajh's time. I was honestly worried that the chocobo chick had got caught in Dajh's hair and turned to crystal too - like that would just be insult to injury.

Crystallization is essentially a family-friendly way of saying we just killed this kid. Even if it is later revealed that Dajh can and will one day wake up just like Serah, in this moment Sazh just lost his entire reason for continuing on as long as he had. His chocobo chick was a reminder of Dajh, that if he just kept surviving, there was still hope that maybe he'd see Dajh again - not knowing if Dajh was a crystal or not was one thing, but seeing Dajh fully turn to crystal essentially in his arms was enough to make Sazh completely fall apart.

Nabaat strolls in and makes a bad situation worse when she reveals footage (impossible angles and that picture is in no way grainy, but whatever) of the Euride incident showing Vanille as one of the Pulse l'Cie that attacked the energy plant. Though notably, in the footage, Vanille is advocating that they ignore their Focus, but PSICOM wouldn't care, so neither might Sazh.

Vanille's reaction is to run.

She full-on imagines Sazh angry enough to shoot her, reminding her of how many people she's used as shields. She acts kind and innocent and those who care about her like Fang and Sazh put themselves in the line of fire to save her, but Serah and Dajh and all the innocents in Bodhum, all the people of Cocoon who are Purged or will be Purged, all the people of the War of Transgression - Vanille's got an extremely high death count and running can't save her forever.

She's run for so long that her guilt has piled into an enormous weight that absolutely crushes her when she has no one left. Serah was kind to her, but Serah's a crystal now. Hope relied on her for a short period, but he's surviving with Lightning and Snow and honestly on his own now. Fang looked after her to the point that they got separated and Vanille's lies caused her to act recklessly. Now, Sazh, who had relied on her to keep smiling and keep faith that he'll see his son again, has also had his son turned into a l'Cie and then into a crystal because of her. She has no one left who need her and no one left to protect her.

Notably, that's just an illusion of Sazh. She's convinced that he's telling her to die. She stands up and is ready to die when he catches up to her. She wants to die so that Sazh can get revenge and feel better.

But unlike Hope, Sazh is an adult. He recognizes that killing Vanille isn't going to make him feel better. It isn't going to bring Dajh back. In fact, he gets even more angry when Vanille says that he should shoot her for his son's sake. Sazh isn't someone who would shoot and kill someone, let alone in the name of his son. Dajh was kind and light-hearted and comforted his father even when his mother was out of the picture. Killing someone in Dajh's name would be an insult to his son, and Sazh has no time for that bullshit when he has to do everything he can to remember Dajh and honor his essentially-dead son.

Somehow, these two suicidal l'Cie actually managed to give each other therapy because both of them want the other to survive even if they themselves die. My favorite line in this part is "You think you die and that's that? You think you die and everything will be sugar and rainbows?" He's fully aware that just killing Vanille isn't going to make anything better. Her death won't fix everything, it will only let her escape her guilt.

He's making Vanille choose whether to live or die, because if she wants to die so much, he isn't going to be the one to kill her.

Sazh is holding his brand from the moment he confronts Vanille, conflicted on whether he himself should live or die. What makes Sazh rise up to fight his Eidolon isn't his own life - it's Vanille's. Vanille is willing to stand up to keep Sazh from giving up and dying to an Eidolon who's trying to convince him to live, Sazh is willing to get up to keep Vanille from dying for him.

And Brynhildr is cool and got me into the Volsunga Saga, so like, yeah.

The fact that Sazh tries but isn't able to kill neither Vanille nor himself proves that his Eidolon actually did help him. Sazh was so frustrated at himself for being unable to shoot Vanille, no matter what she had done and how many mistakes she had made. He's frustrated that he still wants to live and he's willing to fight to live. He thought that he was fighting his Eidolon in order to save Vanille, but he was also fighting for his own life, and by defeating his Eidolon, he proved that he wanted to keep living, whether he realized what he was doing or not.

What's worse is that Nabaat comes in again and says that Dajh's crystal will be put on display as a memorial. Like literally, this little boy turned to crystal is just going to be put up as a "monument to sacrifice", as though Dajh intended to give up his father to PSICOM to be killed in a public execution, as though Dajh found his father in an effort to turn to crystal rather than just wanting to see his father in Nautilus where he'd always wanted to go. As though Dajh Purged an entire town for the sake of Cocoon, as though he captured his father so that he wouldn't live in shame as the son of a Pulse l'Cie rather than actually just loving his dad and being an innocent kid.

It really makes you hate Dysley/Barthandelus later when the anticipated boss battle with Nabaat is cut off abruptly by him. Like, the first time that scene happens, it's a huge reveal! Nabaat is a cunning and sadistic ass who you look forward to beating up, but she's struck down by Barthandelus and he reveals himself to be an actual fal'Cie, where we all thought of him as just a human tool. Turns out, Nabaat is a took, and all her loyalty and cruelty can be cut down by her own superior in an instant.

Her DLC fight in XIII-2 is pretty cool though. Nabaat as a villain is really good. She's top of her class in the army, she's got fabulous hair, she's good at emotional manipulation through a caring façade, and unlike Rosche, she actually did capture her target l'Cie. Though Rosche also had a change of heart at the end and admits to orchestrating mass murder when he falsely trusted the fal'Cie and he would've been a great villain to reform but that's not a story for now.

Sazh hears the full story from Vanille, how his son will eventually be freed from crystal, and just like Lightning and Snow, he resolves to wait and survive however long it takes to see his son again. Just like them, he doesn't know how or when it will be, but he's holding onto something again.

When they escape in the Palamecia, they're not running away anymore. They're both scared of what awaits them, but Sazh points out that they're more scared of dying and giving up now. He's scared of dying so much that he's pushing himself to live now, remembering his son's laughter rather than mourning his loss. It's "time to split. Not run. There's a difference."

I've reached my image limit for Tumblr! Will I reach the word limit? Is there such a thing?!

Basically, if you complete the first some 14 quests on Gran Pulse before pursuing the storyline, Vanille reveals in the Paddraean Archaeopolis that she's claiming to have been the one to have become Ragnarok, leaving Fang to think that she did nothing - when it's actually the opposite. (Also the characters point out that they should try following Dahaka since it lives near Oerba, so Taejin's Tower isn't the first time they can technically see it).

Vanille's still lying. She tries to tell the truth on the Palamecia, but she gets delayed. Then Barthandelus happens, and she gets delayed, thinking that perhaps telling Fang the truth will make her want to destroy Cocoon to fulfill their Focus.

Hope confides in Vanille that sometimes you do have to lie to keep yourself going. It wasn't unreasonable for any of them to use lies to survive, but what mattered is what happened afterwords. Vanille just kept lying and kept running. Hope used his lies to survive, confront Snow, and then he let go and faced his feelings in the end.

Meanwhile Sazh makes up with Fang when he finds the chocobos. He knows Fang's also responsible for Euride, but he doesn't blame either of them - at least, he's willing to forgive because he knows who they are as people. He's taking responsibility for letting Dajh out of his sight, but he's not facing his guilt alone. He's learned that facing everything alone is their downfall. Foreshadowing for Fang in the ending, taking on everything alone.

When Vanille faces her Eidolon, her last lie has been revealed. She's not alone anymore, she has a new family, and there will be no more running away.

A Long Rant About Why Hope and Snow’s Arc is Brilliant

"You've changed, haven't you? Seems like you've toughened up."

"I'm a l'Cie. I had to."

"The only ones that ought to be fighting the army…are us dumb grown-ups."

"You think it's stupid to fight?"

"It is if you get killed. Anyway, just lay low. Let the dummies duke it out. The army's no match for NORA, right?"

"He was…he was smiling!"

Let's talk about this. LET US TALK ABOUT THIS!

In just one scene this game managed to make you believe that Hope and Snow are going to implode.

Right before this, when Hope was with Lightning, Hope was on the path to healing. He'd confessed what happened to his mother - for the first time since the incident, I might add, - and how much he hates Snow. The Gapra Whitewood alone is amazing but let's stay focused.

Lightning and Hope are brilliant together, with Lightning seeing what her influence as a role model is doing to an innocent kid. She's a maternal figure, both to her sister and eventually to Hope, but she's been running from her failure to save and believe in her sister as well as losing her entire home and identity. She finally realizes that the warpath she's on is unhealthy and the wrong path for her. Maybe she'd succeed in toppling the Sanctum, maybe she wouldn't have, but an enemy and a goal are things she can kill and accomplish.

The only problem is Hope. When she gives him the advice that she herself is following, to control her emotions, find an end goal and block out everything else, she starts to see how unhealthy her choices are both physically and mentally. She's sent Hope on a warpath, and when she finally announces that "I made a mistake!", Hope is still left angry, thinking there's nothing left if he doesn't have anyone to fight. Hope is shouting at her "Then what battles do we fight? And against who?!"

When she finally convinces Hope to calm down, he says "I'm sorry, I messed up" and you can feel his anger slowly fading as he regains his reason. At the end of that section, Hope's final words are, "Snow believed Serah, didn't he?" That one line demonstrates how Hope is willing to see past his first impressions of Snow and listen to who he is as a person, that maybe Snow really was just trying to save everyone. Both Lightning and Hope together are on the path to forgiving Snow and healing for their own sake.

Then, the next scene happens. They're reminded of how little hope they have of surviving, how they're on the run, how Rosch reminds the army that they aren't people, they're targets. Lightning immediately volunteers to sacrifice herself if it will give Hope a chance to live and find himself in whatever time he has left - "You survive."

Snow was a bonus, since she doesn't want Hope with her while she takes on the whole army and draws their fire so Hope can get away, but leaving him with Snow is safer than bringing her with him. She chucks him at Snow saying "Take care of him", knowing Hope will be uncomfortable but he'll be protected. She likely didn't account for Fang following her and hadn't intended Hope to be left alone with Snow.

Fun bonus is that when Hope is thrown off of Shiva and the soldiers converge on him, Hope rises to his feet and is already in a battle stance. When Snow last saw this kid, he cowered at nothing but the hopelessness of their situation, much less a soldier aiming their weapon at him, but now Hope was fully ready to kick those guys' butts if Snow hadn't intervened. And so began the slow descent as Hope started seeing everything he hated in Snow - Snow automatically assumed he couldn't defend himself, that Snow needed to save the day.

Hope had begun to forgive Snow, hearing Lightning coming to the realization that he believed Serah when no one else did and believed in her when she was ready to give up because of her fate. Then Snow is back in his arrogant glory, treating Hope like a kid because he hasn't seen all the growth Hope has gone through. Lightning treated him like a kid until Odin happened and she started properly supporting him to grow stronger rather than just "babysitting" him. She talked to Hope like he was an adult with a little less life experience - which is how you should be treating a kid as smart as Hope.

Then the scene comes up.

But Snow keeps calling him "partner" in their battle quotes and taking charge when Hope clearly already knows what he's doing now thanks to Lightning.

Hope is a bit confused at where Snow's been and what he's been up to with a branch of the army trying to kill them, but he's passive aggressive at best. Just because he doesn't want to kill Snow anymore doesn't mean he has to like him. Snow does not get the hint, still seeing Hope as just a kid and he has a right to teen angst considering all he's been through.

"The only ones that ought to be fighting the army…are us dumb grown-ups."

From Snow's perspective: he's telling Hope that kids shouldn't have to go through such a horrible thing, to have the whole army training their guns on you and calling you nothing but a target. Hope shouldn't have to be running for his life, taking on the military that's supposed to be protecting citizens and kids like him. Adults are just dumb like that, getting ourselves into trouble. Kids should be smarter than that - be smarter than that, Hope.

From Hope's perspective: Snow just called any adult who tries to fight the army a fool - including his mother when she volunteered to help fight their way out of the Purge. She fought because Snow asked for volunteers (he knows but often forgets that her main reason for joining was to keep Hope safe; Snow hadn't even thought of asking for volunteers until a bunch of people asked to help them). He just called Nora a fool for fighting to save Hope’s life at Snow’s behest.

"You think it's stupid to fight?"

"It is if you get killed."

Whew we're just gonna stop right there mid-sentence. In those two sentences we managed to create two sides of a conversation that perfectly encapsulate the miscommunication between Hope and Snow that’s driving a 14-year-old kid into a murderous rage even after he'd begun a path to healing.

Snow just called adults stupid for fighting the army, then he goes and pushes it further by saying that it’s only really stupid if you get killed. From Snow's perspective, this is a perfectly reasonable thing to say. It helps no one if you run into battle and get killed - no matter if it's just your life on the line or if you have others you're trying to protect. The people you're trying to protect don't necessarily benefit from your sacrificing yourself by throwing yourself at the enemy in a desperate kamikaze, and Hope himself shouldn't just give up on his life even when the army has them outnumbered and they have no plan - he'll find hope to go forward, he should never just give up and go out in a blaze of rageful spite.

From Hope's perspective, that idiot just insulted his mother! He just called Nora stupid for fighting the army even though she had multiple good reasons to have volunteered - Snow asking for volunteers and putting civilians into the line of fire (even though they were already and Nora joined for Hope and it was entirely her choice). Then he calls her especially stupid because she got herself killed.

In essence, Snow just voiced the thoughts of everyone who hates on Nora's character in general. “She was a MOTHER, what was she DOING volunteering to FIGHT, “Moms are tough”? psssh she DIED, what an idiot.”

I was angry for Hope in that moment, man. I was ready to stab Snow too.

"Anyway, just lay low. Let the dummies duke it out. The army's no match for NORA, right?"

Ooof, and then we have the final line where Snow uses the name NORA as his acronym for "No Obligations, Rules, or Authority." As Lightning had told Hope in the Gapra Whitewood, (let me quote the datalog entry for that moment): “They wish to live without restrictions, she explains, though some might argue that what they really wish is to live without responsibility.” This means that Snow just used NORA in the context of ignoring the responsibility of those who he himself brought into the battle under his leadership. He was in charge of those volunteers, including Nora, but now he acts as though he’s forgotten all of the weight of their deaths that were directly or indirectly his fault.

So in conclusion, Snow just insulted Nora Estheim in three different ways in the span of one short conversation. Nice going, bud.

To be clear, it’s made very obvious in the beginning that Snow is absolutely crushed by the guilt of everyone who died under his command. Nora in particular has traumatized him because he blames himself for letting her fall out of his grip (see this post for that rant). Snow isn't a children's cartoon character telegraphing his every thought and the lesson you need to learn from him; he's repressing his feelings and he's very good at hiding it. He is brilliant at acting like he's happy and fine and running away from the guilt because if he let it crush him, more people would get hurt because he was too distracted and didn't protect them.

His breakdown when Hope presses him explains the final puzzle piece: he didn’t know how to possibly atone - so he just kept avoiding it.

“There is nothing that can make something like that right again. When someone’s dead, when someone’s gone, words are useless…I know! It’s all my fault! But I don’t know how to fix it! Where do you start? What do you say?”

When Hope finally wakes up, Snow has finally come to terms with his guilt and confesses it outright. It was his fault Nora died, he shouldn’t have said a lot of what he said before about words being useless, how he could never make up for someone dying so he needed to keep going.

“I thought if I couldn’t make up for it, then all the apologies in the world wouldn’t mean thing. So I decided I had to find a way to pay for it first, before I’d even have the right to say sorry. But, it’s like you said. I was using that as an excuse, so I could run from my own guilt.”

Snow finally acknowledges that he’s been running, that Nora’s death is his fault, and notice that he hands Hope Lightning’s knife, telling him to dish out any punishment he wants. Hope could kill Snow right then and there, but instead, he just finally confesses, “She’s gone, Snow.”

Hope closes the knife. He lets go of his hate.

Let’s quote the datalog again, because no one likes reading except me, apparently, but the datalog has genuinely brilliant writing: “He didn’t survive this long to see revenge - he saw revenge as a means to survive.”

Palumpolum concludes three character arcs:

Lightning

She admits how she snapped from losing Serah and her life all at once and went down a dangerous warpath (dragging Hope along with her)

She finds a new goal in surviving to see Serah wake up

She apologizes to Snow!

Hope

He gathered the strength to pin the blame on Snow despite knowing it was the Sanctum’s fault for killing her, despite knowing killing him wouldn’t bring her back

He acknowledges that he went down the wrong path, even if he did it to survive

He accepts his mother’s death

He forgives Snow

Snow

He admits that Nora’s death is his fault and that he’s been running from the guilt of not only her but many who died because of him

He was too overwhelmed by the idea that he didn’t know how to atone for his actions, so he just kept avoiding his responsibility

He faces the consequences, apologizes even knowing that it won’t fix everything

Anyway, if you made it this far, here’s a picture of some chocobos and sheep just hanging out in order to form a barrier:

On the next edition of Final Fantasy XIII actually had really good character arcs: Sugar and Rainbows

Okay but like,

In the beginning of the game, Nora (Estheim) is killed by a Skytank explosion behind her while she's kneeling to help Snow after saving his life.

There are those who hate on the scene for quickly killing her off, but like man that's a woman who just went on vacation with her son and ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time, who was brave enough to join the other Purge victims in trying to fight back because yes, she's a mom, but she'd rather go out fighting with the people actually willing to help keep them alive in this desperate situation where there own government and entire planet turned against them for no reason other than bad luck.

Snow failed to save her because he didn't manage to keep his grip on her; Nora was injured and she gave him her last request because she had given up at that point. Snow looks at his hand in the aftermath because letting Nora fall alone was his biggest mistake.

Some point out that Snow survived the exact same fall as Nora, but barring the fact that he's a 6 foot 7 inch man who is also a fit fighter and she is a mother who lives in a peaceful city, the idea is actually supposed to be that if Snow hadn't let her go and had shielded her body with his - MAYBE SHE WOULD HAVE SURVIVED.

We don't know, certainly, and Snow is definitely still injured after his fall and stumbles as he gets up. He's traumatized by all of the people who died under his command; NORA the gang is equipped to fight, but they've never fought in an actual war before, much less against their own government. But Nora is the one who died closest to him, to the point that she told him she had a son she wanted him to protect. He needs to keep going for Serah, but he and Gadot specifically go and check to make sure all the kids are okay - under the logic that if he instructs his crew to keep all of the kids safe, that'll keep Nora's son safe by default. He can't do any more than that for her, and it's killing him, but he has to shove it down because there are more people - especially the one he loves - relying on him to keep going.

And then he has to keep going. He uses Serah's wishes to give himself a reason to keep going. No time to process his guilt because he has to keep going.

But then, the beautiful scene in Palumpolum happens.

Hope is blasted by a Skytank explosion from behind as he's kneeling to end Snow's life, a direct parallel to how Nora DIED.

In that moment, Snow doesn't care that Hope is trying to kill him. This time, he doesn't hesitate to dive off the ledge after Hope to catch him and shield him with his body and make sure that Hope isn't falling out of his grip. The fall is brutal, Snow is nearly crippled from the damage, but Hope is ALIVE, and can you imagine how that makes Snow feel?

Sure, the drop was probably shorter than in the Hanging Edge, but beyond the regular reaction to Snow finally facing his guilt and acknowledging he was running, still picking himself up and dragging Hope up a ladder back to the apartment levels, I just love the parallels in that scene. Snow finally got to save Nora's son, and he's fully willing to face the consequences of his actions.

Then, Hope is able to come to terms with his own running and denial. He had admitted multiple times that killing Snow won't bring her back, but he needed to keep going. And Snow knew his optimistic attitude led people to their deaths and smiling even in horrible situations was awful from other (Hope's) perspectives, but he had to keep going.

Don't ever tell me that there aren't great character arcs, developments, and nuances in FF XIII.

How can something so simple be so pretty though?

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Can you imagine how terrifying it must have been to be Hope in Chapter 4? He’s following this chick because he rightfully acknowledges that she is a badass and can probably help him get stronger, but this chick also resents his presence the whole way. She almost abandons him completely.  

He was almost abandoned for real. 

In the most dangerous place still in Cocoon. 

He isn’t yet the Hope he is at the end of the game and nowhere close to the Hope of FFXIII-2 that could convince an entire Academy to follow his lead.  

His story almost ended there in the Hanging Edge.

It hurts my feelings that he begs Lightning to take him with her, that he says “I’ll try harder, I’ll get stronger…” Just don’t leave me. is the silent plea at the end. After all, what reason does he have to believe that she wouldn’t when he has already watched her walk away from Snow, who she is connected with through her sister, without even looking back and then left him once already? 

He knows that this time there is no Sazh and Vanille following after them. They parted ways. Hope knows that no one will find him if she does actually leave him behind. The stakes are so much higher.

So, when Lightning decides to allow him to keep following her, Hope’s relief is so potent and painful. “Oh, thank god, she likes me after all,” is the joke I made at seeing it this go-round but, in reality, he was likely thinking of how he could stay useful to her, how he could prove to her that he could toughen up. 

I don’t believe Lightning would have actually left him considering that Odin came because she was growing desperate. Lightning has already been established as a protector with Serah. She entered herself into the Purge and took on a Pulse fal’cie all for the sake of her sister. Odin targeted Hope the moment he appeared. The Datapad says that she moves without thinking to protect him. There are multiple times when Odin attacks Hope and you, as Lightning, have to heal him; in those moments, Odin’s bar goes up faster. (It takes a significant jump when you use magic. Just attacking him as Commando will not impress him.) 

Hope’s little foot stomp when he is venting at Snow is just adorable. Like this little 14 year old wants to be taken seriously and he stomps his foot, immediately ruining the effect. He is throwing his frustration and grief around–understandably–but he is also kicking a hornet’s nest by saying it is all Serah’s fault that they are l’cie. He’s a kid; he doesn’t have all the pieces of the puzzle, but none of them do. All Hope sees is this dude that got his mother killed, running around talking about saving Serah and all of Cocoon when this buffed up bastard couldn’t even save his mother. 

He’s been in a constant state of fear since getting off the train; then watching his mother walk away to join the resistance, watching his mother die, and then getting kidnapped essentially by Vanille, and talked into going onto a fal’cie vestige. He’s likely never seen half of the animals that he ends up fighting alongside Vanille; and we know that he’s never seen Cie’th or a Fal’Cie. Of course, he is terrified.  It doesn’t help that he is surrounded by strangers who have thus far: 1) failed to save his mother and keeps running around seemingly only consumed with his own self-interest; 2) attempted to help what he (and most of Cocoon even Sazh) believe to be the enemy of Cocoon and has at least once struck another person in front of him for saying something she didn’t agree with and then straight up attacked a Fal’Cie. 

He didn’t feel safe a second into that journey; he hid behind Vanille when things got bad and stuck to her like glue in the vestige. Instead of finding comfort in the adults’ presence, he latched onto someone he had just met that night who acts even younger than him and is the one that talked him into going on the vestige in the first place. Hope is adrift and is searching for any kind of substitute for a lifeboat that he can find.     

It’s not surprising that finding out he is now a l’cie himself is a last straw. He likely hasn’t been able to come to terms with the fact that his mother and he were in the Purge at all, much less dealt with his grief or rage over his mother’s death. It’s a lot for the adults to handle. To expect Hope to handle it the same as his older, non-riddled with hormones companions is completely unfair. Even Sazh asks “why me” about being turned into a fal’cie, even Lightning rages against her sister’s and her own fate. 

In short, Hope is fourteen, dealing with multiple stressors at once, cut the boy some slack.