Who is Cloud's TRUE love in FF7?

They are discussing this on the FF7 board

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/371123-final-fantasy-vii-rebirth/80926745

What do you think?

I always interpreted it as Cloud really wants Aeris and doesnt really notice how much Tifa wants him, even after Aeris is dead. It used to make me feel bad for Tifa.

That's not how the the game's story works, let alone real life.

Regardless, it was only towards the very end of her life that Aerith started trying to see Cloud for himself instead of a stand-in for Zack, and Cloud himself was never really able to truly be himself around her, so it's difficult to say what would have happened if she'd survived.

Barrett

Jessie

People have to not be paying attention at all to not very clearly see that Cloud and Aerith are the canon couple as it's so obvious and in your face. Cloud thinks of Tifa like a sister.

MagicalPrincess posted...

People have to not be paying attention at all to not very clearly see that Cloud and Aerith are the canon couple as it's so obvious and in your face. Cloud thinks of Tifa like a sister.

Okay

He canonically rails Tifa in the crater, and Aerith is just a needy girl who saw her missing boyfriend in Cloud and he's too braindamaged to process her behaviour.

MagicalPrincess posted...

People have to not be paying attention at all to not very clearly see that Cloud and Aerith are the canon couple as it's so obvious and in your face. Cloud thinks of Tifa like a sister.

People have to not be paying attention at all to think that Cloud and Aerith are the canon couple.

The first game (and some of the follow up games) implies pretty strongly that she's originally only interested in him because he reminds her of her ex-boyfriend. Meanwhile, he's kind of brain-fucked when he meets her and he's sort of idealizing her more as the maiden he can heroically defend as part of his own delusions of who he thinks he is (and it's potentially even an attraction he picked up by being experimented on with Zack, and tied to the whole issue of him sort of confusing himself and Zack's identities in his own head). Then afterwards he's mourning her loss more out of a sense of his own failure than he is because he loved her.

Then Advent Children more or less implies that Aerith and Zack are reunited in the Lifestream, meaning they were always soulmates, and Cloud was always destined to be with Tifa.

Meanwhile, the entire flashback sequence pretty strongly implies that Cloud had a crush on Tifa but never had the courage to tell her. And that she felt the same to some degree, which is why they're drawn together so easily when he finally arrives in Midgar, and why their relationship evolves as they both sort of come to terms with their own damage.

You can prefer Aeris/Aerith as Cloud's love interest, and you can play FFVII to deliberately shun Tifa, but that doesn't make it "canonical" (any more than being able to "date" Yuffie makes that a canonical romance). Which is why a lot of people are dreading that the remake resetting timelines and narrative are going to retcon that, and piss a ton of people off.

Sephiroth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-DYwT2f_ec

cait sith

Tifa

ParanoidObsessive posted...

People have to not be paying attention at all to think that Cloud and Aerith are the canon couple.

The first game (and some of the follow up games) implies pretty strongly that she's originally only interested in him because he reminds her of her ex-boyfriend. Meanwhile, he's kind of brain-fucked when he meets her and he's sort of idealizing her more as the maiden he can heroically defend as part of his own delusions of who he thinks he is (and it's potentially even an attraction he picked up by being experimented on with Zack, and tied to the whole issue of him sort of confusing himself and Zack's identities in his own head). Then afterwards he's mourning her loss more out of a sense of his own failure than he is because he loved her.

Then Advent Children more or less implies that Aerith and Zack are reunited in the Lifestream, meaning they were always soulmates, and Cloud was always destined to be with Tifa.

Meanwhile, the entire flashback sequence pretty strongly implies that Cloud had a crush on Tifa but never had the courage to tell her. And that she felt the same to some degree, which is why they're drawn together so easily when he finally arrives in Midgar, and why their relationship evolves as they both sort of come to terms with their own damage.

You can prefer Aeris/Aerith as Cloud's love interest, and you can play FFVII to deliberately shun Tifa, but that doesn't make it "canonical" (any more than being able to "date" Yuffie makes that a canonical romance). Which is why a lot of people are dreading that the remake resetting timelines and narrative are going to retcon that, and piss a ton of people off.

Id mostly agree with this interpretation except I always thought of it as Cloud never getting over Aeriths death and therefore not noticing that Tifa was right there.

Its obviously Tifa. Aerith goes with Zack.

It's been so long since I've played the original, but the story was kind of confusing for me even back then. I played it for the first time in 2007, so much later than its original release. I had always heard about Aerith's death and how tragic it was, but when I played it, I remember thinking, "that was it?" Like, I didn't understand the point of it and it never really felt like that big of an impact narratively. Cloud was mopey over it for a while, but it felt more like he was just upset with himself for not being able to protect her because that was his his whole identity. And it quickly seemed to become irrelevant and never really talked about again.

Also, Cloud and Tifa's relationship never seemed to be elaborated or built on in the original, not like they were trying to do with Remake. It made it clear that they grew up together and had a history, but there never seemed to be a "will they, won't they" dynamic. Maybe a lot of it had to do with the archaic graphics that couldn't really show body language.