#if zerith has no fans i am dead

[dutchdread]

Welcome

Before you ask me a question, read this and see if it applies to you! Welcome to my page, I made this account mainly to respond to a few arguments concerning the love triangle in FFVII.  Since it now exists anyway, I might as well use it as a suppository where I can gather my thoughts and writings on the manner. I intend to slowly fill this in and expand it as I go along so don’t assume that every piece of writing is final and 100% conclusive. The tale will grow in the telling. If you have any questions you can send them my way, put please check first if I haven’t already addressed it.

if something isn’t clear in the way I have addressed something, go ahead and ask so I can tweak my explanation. But do please check first so I don’t have to do double work, I know this might be the first time you’ve asked this question, but I may have answered it a thousand times already.

Thank you.

Intro

“Who am I” “Intro to my page, how does it work?” “Why do I care? The importance of stories”

”The LTD for remake onlys”

The LTD for beginners:

“What is the LTD?” “What do the different sides believe?” “Why does it exist?” “Who is correct?”

The LTD for fans:

“Clouds behavior in ACC” “What is a soulmate?”

The LT Debate:

“Foreword: Setting the stage” “Cloti vs Clerith: the premises” “Cloti: Central case” “Clerith: Central case” “Do I think Cloud had feelings for Aerith? Plottwist: yes”  “What is love? Baby don’t hurt me” “Does Cloud have Zacks memories? I don’t care!” “The lifestream, I think I can dump you here!” “Why Aerith is either Dead or friendzoned, the Aerith uncertainty principle”

     Fallacy index: 

This is a list of (informal) fallacies that are often encountered in the LTD. They are explained here so I can reference them when needed.

“The spaceball effect” “The superman effect” “Misplaced nitpicking” “The Wittgenstein Test”

Articles:

“Developer perspective: How Cloti became canon”

“Aerith and Cloud aren’t star-crossed lovers, they’re meteor-triangle lovers”

“Cloti: A canonical tale” Cloti as told by official quotes.

Themes of FFVII: Gnostic Symbolism”

“Theme breakdown: fantasy vs reality”

Point by point arguments:

“If Tifa and Aerith are equals, Cloti has to happen”.

“Romanticizing depression isn’t cool, Clerith is immoral”.

Rebuttals:

"things won’t go well between Tifa and Cloud, even without Sephiroth", the most misrepresented quote in the LTD.

“While Cloud might have loved Tifa when he was younger, we don’t know if it’s still the case”

Quotes:

“general suppository”  

Frequently asked questions:

“Why does Cloud think about Aerith if he isn’t in love with her?” “Why does Cloud not answer Tifa when she asks him whether he loves her?”

Highlighted responses:

“Why do you defend Clouds actions in ACC?”

“Why don’t you just accept that Clouds feelings are up for interpretation!?”

“Why are you telling people Cloud and Tifa had sex?”

“Why do you think Aerith and Cloud ending up together would be bad storytelling?”

“Why can Cloud and Tifa have true love if Rinoa/squall can’t? (on account of being teenagers)”

“Do you think they’ll make Zerith Cannon?”

“You do know that it’s possible people fall out of love right?” “What are your thoughts on the localization?”

“Why do you care who Cloud ends up with, it doesn’t matter, FFVII isn’t about romance”

“Why do you say Clouds character revolves around Tifa?”

Recommended reading:

Some external sources and articles that I find particularly engaging.

Best single article argument for Cloti, by insanehobbit

Times Cloti was confirmed, by DipperDog

Difference between Narrative and Plot, video by me.

[iaintyourbro]

Hey! I just newly found out your acc and so far, I’m loving your posts/analysis. Idk if you’ve already answered or been asked this question but... how did you become a Cloti fan and the reason why you stan them (like what did you like about their tandem etc)? I’m just curious about your “journey” lol. Anyways, keep it up and have a nice day 😁

Hey anon! Thank you!

Oh you want me to ramble! I can ramble about this. Adding a Keep Reading!

You know, I’ve thought about this a lot today because of a conversation on Twitter. I can’t say I TRULY remember much about when I first played FFVII prior to the other pieces of the compilation coming out, things I saw in passing online, or other things that probably have affected how I remember it. 

My Thoughts on What My Journey MAY Have Been

I played FFVII 20 years ago. Of course I THINK I remember how I felt about everything, but the more I do seriously think about it, the more I think the bulk of my opinions have been impacted by multiple different areas over that 20 years. On top of it, I’m not sure anybody who didn’t stay very active in the fandom would fully remember what went on 20 years ago with the game, nor could you truly remember what you felt prior to seeing everything else. It impacts your ability to say “Yes, I was this way, 100%.” 

I wasn’t the biggest FFVII OG fan. I liked it a lot, but I preferred FFVIII and Xenogears by far. Those were the two I focused on the most. In terms of things like FanFiction, for example, I didn’t read Cloud and Tifa or Cloud and Aerith ones, I read Vincent x Lucretcia ones. As an adult, I appreciate FFVII OG much more.

I recall not being the biggest fan of Aerith, and I honestly don’t remember how I felt initially about Tifa. I do remember it feeling like it came out of left field when suddenly she’s in love with him in Mideel (we know it wasn’t sudden, but there was no real obvious buildup to me). If I’m being completely honest, I don’t think I cared at all about who Cloud “ended up with.” My assumption - and this I can say with certainty - was that Aerith died, so that was that. There wasn’t a relationship past that, nor could there be. She was dead. 

Playing FFVII first, but FINISHING FFVIII first may have impacted this opinion as well. FFVIII was in your face romance. FFVII was not. There are a lot of people (myself included) that felt there was very little romance in OG. However, as with all of the other games I played, I did not question the story much at all. Cloud and Tifa have the Lifestream, which I do remember being like “WHAT?!” over that reveal of Cloud being a Shinra Soldier, not a First Class SOLDIER, they have some words Under the Highwind, and then at the end he catches her from falling. The dialogue during the ending bothered me because it made no sense to me at that point. After seeing the original story board, I can see why. I don’t think that was the intention, but for some reason they changed it. One thing I’m pretty certain on is that I got that weird feeling in my stomach where I got annoyed over that line. 

I can recall being weirded out when people said that Cloud and Aerith ended up together, because I remember her dying. In life, 21 year old’s don’t pine for somebody that they knew for a month. That’s just reality. I’m not saying he didn’t feel anything for her, but it still weirds me out that people are okay with thinking he’d shut down and/or take more extreme measures to “reunite” with her, that I don’t even want to get in to. I will say that CA fans were much more vocal online, which I think is why folks like me who didn’t care never really got involved in online fandom. I never understood how it would make sense after beating the game, but I wasn’t the only one who assumed they did something weird at some point and made it where they could be together. I just didn’t care enough to look in to it. 

My sister actually said to me, “Isn’t he with Aerith?” And I said, “No, but I had the same feeling at one point for some reason, and have no idea why.” And I reminded her Aerith died and she said “You’re right.. why would they be together?” Shrugs. I honestly think at one point I assumed they pulled a FFX and revived her in some offshoot game I didn’t play and that’s why people were saying CA.

Oddly enough, I think when I played KH and KH2 it made it obvious to me that they weren’t really pushing CA at all... even though I know some use those games as an argument. Mind you those are NOT canon to the FFVII Compilation, but I found it interesting that they bring in Tifa for KH2 and it ends up that a) Cloud was looking for Sephiroth and b) Tifa appears to have been his light. Even they way Aerith acts towards Cloud in KH never felt romantic to me at all. 

Why I Like Cloud and Tifa

I like Cloud and Tifa because their relationship is very complex. It’s not flowers and sunshine like a lot of the FF romances. Not to say those don’t have drama - I mean Tidus is technically a dream, but they “revive” him anyway later on (never felt right about this, by the way... but I accepted it as part of the story). 

Even in OG, it’s shown that they have quite a history, and Cloud pretty much has built all of his life decisions around Tifa. I do laugh every time I see the meme of the Lifestream and it’s all “Tifa Tifa Tifa”. I believe, I truly do, that the intent in the Lifestream was to make you realize that Cloud had a false persona up until he breaks at the Northern Crater, and once his TRUE SELF is revealed, along with it comes his true feelings. So up until that point, when you, as the player, could make decisions for Cloud and move him in a direction you thought was YOUR CHOICE, it’s not. It was an illusion. 

I, in no way, thought that eloquently 20 years ago. However, I realized that he was in love with Tifa (which I thought was interesting for some reason) and that he created this fake personality to protect himself. The game doesn’t go into it much past that point, you get Under the Highwind, really, as a follow up to the feelings part, but that’s it. So I never saw the romantic aspect of it all as super important - it’s a nice to have.

Remake, however, really does seem to be pushing a more romantic angle, which ultimately made me a hard Cloti stan. I can’t say I WAS one before, even with all the “wait, is he with this or that one?” I never really thought he ended up with anybody TRULY except Tifa, but, like I said, I just didn’t care.

REMAKE MAKES YOU CARE ABOUT ALL OF THESE CHARACTERS. Like a lot. So I didn’t like Aerith in OG - I love Aerith in Remake. I love her relationship with Tifa, I love her sassy, judgemental attitude and her trolling of Cloud, because it’s hilarious. I don’t agree with EVERYTHING,  but she’s by far better for me than she was in OG.

So Remake definitely made me go “holy cow” on the Cloti stuff. IT’S SO IN YOUR FACE. The Train Roll, the touching, the staring, the longing, the flirting. Even if you go the Aerith route, you can’t avoid a large chunk of that. You can skip all of her side-quests and still have a boatload of Cloti. Remake made me love the pairing and love all of the characters. 

Cloti is now by far my favorite media pairing. When you compare it to Squall and Rinoa or Tidus and Yuna it seems much more interesting. Yeah, I’m saying it, and I’m a huge Squinoa fan. BUT - Remake didn’t make me care until now. Remake had me start researching the compilation, to understand where this and that came from. Folks on here have explained things that I may have missed or previously didn’t care about. 

I also have a hard time with CA now after all of the compilation stuff. CC and ACC made it clear that Aerith loved Zack. This is NOT obvious in OG. The only references you get about Zack are “we weren’t that serious” when it’s first brought up in the park, IF you take Aerith with you to Gongaga, then she’ll say he was her first love, and Zack’s parents will say he wrote home about a girlfriend. None of that makes you believe that there was anything really serious between them.

CC clears that up, ACC reinforces it. After that, I can’t mentally do it because of the whole “bro code” thing. If Aerith knows Zack and Cloud were best friends, I can’t see her simply saying “cool I’ll just go with him now.” If Cloud was aware that his best friend was Zack, I don’t think he’d go with her. Prior to that, I can see why people would be okay with it. After finding out everything we know about how close Zack and Cloud really were, I can’t do it. This is a personal thing to me, it doesn’t mean I think nobody should ship CA. This is just how I view it, and I can’t see Aerith OR Cloud being okay with it if they were aware of it. This is also my view post compilation.

Remake reinforces, even further, the whole Zerith thing. As somebody who was meh before about them, I love them now. Remake makes you really look at the whole compilation if you’re not totally familiar with it or haven’t seen/played something in a long time.

So yes, I am definitely a Cloti stan, and probably always may have been, but just didn’t care until Remake. 

But aside from all that - I took it as True Cloud’s One True Love was Tifa - and that’s part of what comes out in the Lifestream. So I don’t think True Cloud would have dropped Tifa. 

[oveliagirlhaditright]

What are all your Kingdom Hearts pairings?

I am so sorry I never answered this:( I kept meaning to, but every time I’d get distracted with family being over for the holidays.

I used to have a ton of KH ships, but I’ve kind of cooled down on a lot of them now (for some reason. IDK why I think I’m just not as interested in romance as I used to be. I still love it, of course, but now I value other kinds of relationships in series, too.) So for the most part, I’m really only going to tell you the ones I search for in the tags every day and maybe a few others.

SoKai is my ultimate OTP forever and ever. It always has been and it probably always will be. I don’t really ever see that changing. I should maybe mention that I also like the fandom’s invention (that I helped to create;)) of dark Sora and Kairi. And, yes: that even includes the rare dark Kairi… that I should really finish my fic of.

I love RokuShi a lot, but I’ve even cooled down on them a little. They used to be one of my ultimate OTPs–and to be fair, they still kind of are–and were my second favorite KH pairing (heck, there was a hot second where I even liked them more than SoKai. Weird, I know), but now they’re probably more equal with my other ships and most don’t even come close to reaching SoKai level for me.

Namiku. I love it a lot and mostly always have. RokuShi and Namiku are my ideal pairings when it comes to shipping Roxas, Xion, Riku, and Naminé with people. Though I do love RokuNami now, and have for a while.

Speaking of: RokuNami.

Terqua. But maybe not as much as the above. IDK. I’ve kind of flip-flopped on this one over the years. And KHIII really made me love them again… but at the same time, I’m okay with them being platonic and like siblings… which is apparently what their relationship in canon is, along with their relationships to Ven and vice versa. (According to the KHIII Journal and Ultimania).

Gulava. They’re precious and I love them a lot.

Skulmera.

PlayerStrelitzia.

Epheplayer (I’m also okay with SkuldPlayer, or EphemerSkuldPlayer being OT3d, but I probably prefer PlayerStrelitzia and Epheplayer first… and the latter one is funny, because I think I used to prefer SkuldPlayer over it. But not anymore. I blame all you people who make cute Epheplayer stuff:)

ElrenaStrelitzia.

VentusStrelitzia, because of the fandom. Because of the fandom (also with a side bit of VanitasStrelitzia because of the fandom). But not if Ven in any form is her killer.

IraInvi… just because of that one line in Back Cover about Invi not wanting the others “to get the wrong idea about them”… even though I kind of don’t like Ira that much (yet. Hopefully that’ll change), because he kind of feels like a wet blanket to me so far.

Maybe Aced and Invi, but just because of Terra and Aqua feeling somewhat similar to them, if I ship AcedInvi at all. I don’t know if I do. Also, maybe Ava and Invi. IDK. 

AkuSai.

XehanortEraqus, I guess (even though I hate Xehanort).

Xionami.

The one Sewer Squad girl with the newest girl added to the Sewer Squad?

SoRiKai… Because I can take the things I don’t like about S*Riku if Kairi’s involved, though it’s not my favorite (I’ll always prefer SoKai by itself. But I’ll still happily take SoRiKai posts, since it’s better than the alternative… which is Kairi being left out of everything, that I can’t stand).

RiKai. I ship RiKai a lot. Mainly because my old best friend loved loved loved loved them (and a few other of my RL friends, oddly enough), and she was always trying to pull me over to the RiKai side… And while I still prefer SoKai, she did make me like RiKai a lot. And because this pairing is made up of tropes people usually love, so I don’t get why it’s not more popular. And because their story in KHI (mainly on Riku’s side) breaks my heart in the best way possible.

Roxiri… for some reason. I blame awesome YouTube editors for this one.

Vanaqua (that I actually ship a lot, and also look for in the tags a lot. Even though I don’t love them as much as the first pairings I posted here, but still maybe moreso than some of the other ones I put in the middle here. I don’t know why I put this ship so low).

Vennami (same thing as VanAqua).

Venaqua… or at least I did until the age difference.

Vannami.

Slightly VaniKai now, but just for the good fan art.

Some Kailette…

SoNami in CoM only (and also kind of one-sided on Naminé’s part).

Replinami. But I probably don’t ship it as much as I should, especially if Nomura’s now trying to sell that Naminé’s always had some great love for him (that I don’t really buy, but shh).

Rion… but more because so much of the fandom ships them, and I feel I sort of have to because of that and not so much because I really want to. They’re okay. And I get why people ship them, but they’re kind of meh for me, but maybe getting a bit better. I’ve just… always had some issues with them (mainly that I feel like Riku kind of goaded Xion into committing suicide to save Sora: which is an issue I had with RokuNami for some time, too, and took me many years to get over for them. But now I have and they’re one of my fave pairings). But at the same time, I wouldn’t hate it if it happened.

Riku and Aqua, for some reason (though that darn age difference!). Maybe because I ship Terqua and this ship has stuff in common with it, and Riku’s sort of the version of Terra that passed with flying colors?

RikuShiki.

ZackAqua.

Perhaps Marluxia and Larxene, since I think that’s where the narrative is going. Perhaps.

Haynette. I also don’t mind Pencette. I also like Roxette quite a lot.

I shipped Larxel long ago, but not anymore. And yet I always feel the need to still put it down for some reason…

EphemerAva

Ira and Aced, maybe: they did have a good arc in Back Cover.

Brain and Lauriam, possibly, because of the fandom. I’ve seen some Ephemer ships here too, I think, that could be cute.

I feel like part of me would have shipped Sora and Roxas somewhat, if they weren’t Nobody and Other…

TerraVen a bit… Well, maybe I did a bit before I knew their ages… probably not now (I shipped them a bit back in the day, when I felt like in BbS they cared way more about each other than they ever did Aqua).

Xion and Repliku a bit… maybe. But I’d prefer them more to have a sibling bond.

Sora and Ariel for crack… and a bit of Sora and Rapunzel.

Terra and Cinderella and Aqua and Cinderella (also, Aqua and Philip) for the above reason. Maybe even Ven and Snow White.

Roxas and the Accessory Shop Girl for crack.

A bit of KairiXion.

Yozora and brown-haired Stella! I will go down with this ship, as I’ve been shipping “them” since Versus XIII, essentially. And maybe Yozora with some of his bros, but we’ll see.

There are probably some FF ones, too (though I don’t care about them that much)… usually the canon ones, like CloTi, Zerith, Clerith, TiYuna, Squinoa (because Nomura eluded long ago that she was a part of the fall of Radiant Garden and why Squall changed his name to Leon, in losing her for the time being), and maybe Seifer and Fuu. But I’m also okay with things like Selphie and Tidus, Leon and Yuffie, Leon and Aerith, and even Leon and Tifa because of one amv (where he started liking her in seeing her as a replacement for Rinoa, and then began to fall for her as her).

Oh, and Neku and Shiki… slight JoshNeku, and maybe Joshua and Rhyme (because I’m still somewhat Joshyme trash, gosh darnit) and some BeatJoshua (though this is moreso for TWEWY, of course, than KH. But they seem to be their true TWEWY selves in KH, so…)

All of the canon Disney couples, of course.

Edit: Maybe Ven and Skuld, now that Ven asked her to build a snowman together and all. Their interaction there was cute.

Aqua and Axel for crack.

…I realize I told you I was going to make this list short, and really I pretty much put everything I could think of. I apologize (and a lot of this did not end up in any good order whatsoever), but SoKai, RokuShi, Namiku, RokuNami, Terqua, Gulava, Skulmera, PlayerStrelitzia, and IraInvi (for some reason) are the ones I look for in the tags every day (also, Vanaqua. And sometimes Vennami). Then, it’s probably RiKai and SoRiKai at this point? With some of these others thrown in there? Like the “If Kairi died and sadly stayed dead, maybe Sora and Naminé could be a thing” kind of ones? Even though they don’t come close to the other ones? IDK.

Edit: XioRokuNami is a major one!