Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children by and large is nothing but fan service. If you've never even played through the PS1 game (let alone looked up the plot details on the Final Fantasy wikia if you can't be fucked to play through a 3-disc game from 1997), you're not gonna understand a lick of what's going on and chances are you'll probably hate it. What I fail to understand is how the blokes at Square Enix thought it would be a good idea to make a FILM sequel to a VIDEO GAME. Did Final Fantasy VII become the .hack// franchise overnight or am I missing something here? Why couldn't we get a video game sequel in the first place? Oh well, what's done is done and there's no changing that now is there?
My biggest gripe with Advent Children is that it feels like Square Enix just hastily slapped this together and threw it out to the fans because they knew that Final Fantasy VII fanboys and fangirls will buy it and eat it up without a second thought. Say what you will about the PS1 game but there was a lot of thought and effort put into making it and for the time, it was revolutionary. You'd think that such a game would get a fitting sequel, right? Well no, it's just a sequel for the sake of being sequel. The story feels like fan fiction to such a large degree that it's not even funny. Sephiroth has a fanclub consisting of three "brothers" who want to revive him with the remains of JENOVA, they travel on motorbikes, and get into a swordfight with Cloud because why the fuck not? It looks cool, right? That's just one example, by the way.
Honestly, I could forgive this were it not for the fact that Square Enix in their infinite wisdom decided to omit around ~30 minutes worth of footage from the original DVD release of the movie and only decided to include it in the "complete" release on Blu-ray. Way to screw fans out of their money, guys. What's next? Are you guys gonna slap together a clip show made entirely out of clips from the original video game in a vain hope to get people who didn't play it to understand the story? Wait... they actually DID do that. Come on! Why couldn't you guys just make a 30 minute summary of the game with updated animation that matches the rest of the film's?! That's just a gigantic middle finger to anyone who actually bought the movie, especially given how Square Enix went all out with the rest of the movie's budget.
If there's one redeeming quality that Advent Children has, it's the production values. Seriously, this movie came out 10 years ago and it's still unmatched in terms of production values. Not even the third Berserk movie can come anywhere close. The English dub of the movie's also quite lovely to say the least, but it does have one nasty little problem: a REALLY bad case of lip-lock. Remember how Akira had the voices pre-recorded before Katsuhiro Otomo et al began animating the film? Well, Square Enix in their infinite wisdom decided to do that. Whilst the ADR crew did their best to make the performances feel natural, you can kinda tell that they slipped up every now and then. Aside from the fact that some lines don't quite match up with the mouth movements, there's also a few rather odd translations thrown into the mix. If you want to know what I'm talking about, the Japanese onomatopoeia for a zipper is translated to "dilly-dally, shilly-shally" (which never ceases to make me cringe when I hear it). I don't think I need to go any further than that, really.
Now where does this leave Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children? Honestly, it's mediocre entertainment for the sake of being mediocre entertainment. If you're in the mood for a senseless action movie with great production values, this certainly fits the bill but then again, movies like Akira, all three films in the Berserk: The Golden Age Arc trilogy, and Ninja Scroll already fit the bill there and then some. Plus, you don't have to play through a ridiculously long PS1 game to properly understand what goes on in those movies either. Fans of Final Fantasy VII have been voicing their thoughts on this movie for years. The bulk of them enjoy it, but there are people like me who don't particularly care much for it anymore. Whether or not you'll enjoy it is a matter for you and you alone to decide. Anyway, that's all for now. Feedback is always welcome, and with that I'm out. Peace :)
