Square Enix broke the internet in 1997, and then asked gamers in 2024 if we wanted to watch them take the same event and break the internet again.
I’m of course talking about the ending of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, the second part of the FF7 remake trilogy that covers the second half of Disc 1 (Kalm to the Forgotten Capital). The developers were in a bind – forced to craft an ending that’s both worthy of a AAA game and faithful to events that take place at roughly the 45% mark of the original game.
Despite the outrage, fancy timeline charts, internet trolling and feigned confusion, the ending is pretty clear. In Part I it’s established via two sets of wisps that OG FF7’s events are foretold and said events can be altered. This point is hammered home when it’s revealed that “the good wisps” intervene during Zack Fair’s final stand and save his life, creating an alternate timeline where he survives SHINRA’s betrayal and successfully escorts Cloud Strife back to Midgar.
It’s speculated, and to be honest this theory is so sensible it may as well be fact, that this remake trilogy takes place in a reality where the events of the OG FF7 have already taken place. The black wisps are a force of Sephiroth (who lays defeated in the lifestream, refusing to assimilate) and the white wisps are a force of Aerith Gainsborough (an Ancient who as depicted in OG FF7 assimilated with the lifestream following her death and saved the planet from Meteor with the Holy spell). If this is true, this would make the remake trilogy both a “sequel” and a remake!
At the Forgotten Capital, the black wisps try to stop Cloud from saving Aerith from Sephiroth’s Masamune. Cloud fights through them and in a split-second is able to create a branching timeline where successfully parries the blade. We, the player, see both of these realities play out, and it’s made clear to us that the Cloud we’re playing as experiences both outcomes as well.
After a way too long, way too annoying (“THE END IS NIGH!”) final boss battle, we watch an ending that only shows us one of the lifestream timelines (the OG FF7 one – in which he fails to save Aerith). But something is completely different here! Cloud is talking to Aerith, and discussing their next move regarding stopping Sephiroth.
There are only two possibilities at play here:
- Cloud has completely lost his mind, and is in denial. I think this is unlikely because 1) It’s already established via the rainbow glows at divergence events and white wisps that new timelines can be created and 2) it’s highly unlikely Square Enix would introduce all of these new elements to rugpull the player and reveal that the OG FF7 events occurred all over again despite the player being shown and instructed otherwise.
- Cloud is superpositioned between multiple (all?) lifestream timelines. We, the player, witness Cloud both parry Sephiroth’s Masamune and watch it impale Aerith just like it did almost three decades ago. We watch Cloud plan the logistics of stopping Sephiroth with Aerith like her split from the party is a short temporary one and that they’ll regroup later.
I’m inclined to go with the second point. I don’t know how much clearer Square Enix needs to be – Aerith literally thanks Cloud for parrying the Masamune during the final final battle of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. One of the phases includes Cloud fighting side-by-side with Zack Fair in the most mindblowing, fan-fiction-like event in Final Fantasy history.
Literally nothing in the fan-fiction realm comes close to the idea of Zack Fair and Cloud Strife fighting Sephiroth (again). Leo Cristophe surviving Final Fantasy VI? No. Recruiting Beatrix in Final Fantasy IX? No. Saving Reks in Final Fantasy XII? No.
I have a rough idea, but I’m not entirely sure what’s going to happen in Part III. That’s a whole other article. Regardless of the direction Square Enix decides to go in – I’ll always appreciate the ingenuity and ability to make compelling something we’ve already seen 30 years ago.