Final Fantasy 7's scandalous love triangle burned even hotter in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's 2024 reappraisal of the 1997 game, and while some fans still disagree on which empathetic, pretty girl is best for bad boy protagonist Cloud, the original Final Fantasy 7 director thinks he should simply be grateful.
"Cloud's thought of deeply by two different women," producer Yoshinori Kitase told Inverse in a new interview. "What a lucky guy."
If you can look past the murderous fervor of the Final Fantasy 7 shipping wars – those who believe Cloud's level-headed childhood friend Tifa is the love of his life, opposing those who want Cloud and flirty spellcaster Aerith to get married – Kitase has a point. Some people can't even get one girlfriend. Why be ungrateful about two with close-combat experience?
"Aerith has always been this sort of sisterly character pulling Cloud along and encouraging him," Rebirth director Naoki Hamaguchi instead told Inverse with more finality.
In an emotional sequence in Rebirth, Aerith and Cloud go on a bittersweet date in an alternate timeline, which Hamaguchi thought showed that Aerith "is feeling what is to come, and understanding her fate. She's still pushing Cloud along and leading him in this way, and it shows her pure heartedness and inner strength."
But "there can be many different interpretations of what this scene truly means for each player," Hamaguchi conceded to Inverse. Ultimately, we can all agree that love is complicated. Even more so, I imagine, when there's magic involved.
