With the release of Final Fantasy VII Remake, one couldn’t help but think about the Compilation of Final Fantasy VII. One of the projects in the multimedia blowout that celebrated the first five years was Advent Children. At the time it felt like a love letter to fans.

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How does it hold up now? That’s the big question. In order to talk about some of the bigger points there will be spoilers. As this is almost two decades old, well, that shouldn’t matter as most fans probably saw it by now. 

10 Love: The Beginning Of Final Fantasy VII’s Return

Whether one ultimately likes, or dislikes this movie, Advent Children can at least be thanked for kick-starting the expanded universe of Final Fantasy VII. Not everything in the compilation was well regarded. In fact, among these few titles, Crisis Core on PSP is the one outlier that holds up. In a way this did all lead to the remake. 

9 Hate: Sephiroth Triplets

Positivity aside, one of the first things shown in the film are the trio of Sephiroth clones: Kadaj, Yazoo, Loz. What makes them annoying is their incoherent babbling about “Mother.”

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They have no plot. They just sort of appear demanding her and then fights break out. Kadaj, as the lead and eventual host of Sephiroth, is tolerable but the other two hurt the ears whenever they appear on screen. 

8 Love: Character Redesigns

Except for Red XIII and Vincent, everyone got a redesign in the main cast. Thankfully they all work. Well, except for Barret. His cornrows and mesh shirt are questionable, but everyone else looks great. Tifa especially had a nice improvement as she was given more clothes and was less emphasized as an object to gawk at. 

7 Hate: Reset Cloud

The one part of the redesigns that don’t work are in regard to some character resets. Cloud is namely the header on this as he has been demoted once again to a sad sack.

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For players that grew with him for hundreds of hours over the years, seeing his character evolve, it was an odd choice to make that game not matter in the long run. That is to say it reset the progression in character development. Overall the tone of the film is dour.

6 Love: Aerith & Zack Together At Last

If there is one aspect to Final Fantasy VII that upset fans the most, it was the death of Aerith. It is a pivotal moment in video game history. No one talks about Zack as much though which is probably due to the fact players didn’t play with him in their party to then loose after hours of hard work. Point is this movie gave a good redemption to his character, or at least a start, showing both he and Aerith mean a lot to Cloud. It also led to Zack getting his own aforementioned game, Crisis Core

5 Hate: Bringing Back The Dead

It was great to see those two again as spirits, but there were dead characters coming back that weren’t appreciated. The Sephiroth triplets were bad but so was relying on Sephiroth as the villain.

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Again, it made the end of the game seemingly not matter any more. On top of that how did Tseng make it out of the Temple of the Ancients and how did Rufus survive the WEAPON blast at Midgar? All three of those dudes should have stayed dead. 

4 Love: Action Choreography 

Besides some character fan service, what most appreciated back then and still appreciate today are the action scenes. The choreography was one of the best at the time and definitely influenced the direction the remake would head into. The remake is more impressive now, of course, but it would not have happened if not for Advent Children’s choreography. 

3 Hate: Visuals

On the downside to that, some of the visuals look dated. It’s not as jarring as playing the PS1 game what with the jagged polygons and Popeye arms, but it certainly isn’t cutting edge CG anymore. What holds up the least about the visuals are the lip-sync motions for the dub. They are all over the place. 

2 Love: Voices For The First Time

On the plus side to the lip-syncing it was nice to finally hear everyone speak for once. Cloud and a few others did appear prior to this film via Kingdom Hearts, but hearing everyone together was a treat even if some characters didn’t get that much screen time. On the subject of sound, the remixed soundtrack was amazing. 

1 Hate: Pacing

The absolute hardest thing to stomach about Advent Children is the pacing. It begins with a flash forward 498 years and then a flashback to the present. This is followed by multiple flashbacks in-between an incredibly slow first hour. There are a few fights to mix things up a bit but as it was said earlier, the vibe for the first hour is dour. Once Bahamut is summoned things get crazy up until the end which is good. 

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