Surprisingly, Final fantasy never tried to make two forays into the world of cinema. The games are full of stories that could constitute real trilogies with their duration. It would also be a question of whether a JRPG-style story would pass well to movie audiences, and none of their attempts gave a firm answer to that question.
The two Spirits Within and Advent children are flawed movies that are beautiful to watch but have storylines that don’t always connect with viewers. Most would say Advent children was the better of the two, but Spirits Within has more strength than people realize.
ten Spirits Within: he launched a new animation brand
For a box office bomb as big as Spirits Within was, his ambition cannot be denied. Square Pictures wanted to be the first photorealistic animated film in existence, and they got there, but it came at the cost of bankruptcy. The film cost a lot more than expected, sinking the business before it recovered.
However, the greatness they achieved with the character models cannot be taken away from them. They pushed the boundaries where no one else would and created animation a decade before its time.
9 Advent Children: it contains recognizable faces
When it comes to movies on a video game series, having familiar faces is a plus. This gives fans of the show someone to connect with instantly, and in this case, there are multiple people as most of the cast were all in. Final Fantasy VII, except for three characters.
As the most popular game in the franchise, even those with only passing interest know who Resident Hero Cloud is. His sword is one of the most iconic parts of the franchise, even bringing him into a second series of video games because of it.
8 Spirits Within: You don’t have to be playing a game to understand what’s going on
Because as beautiful as the recognizable faces are Advent children, it runs into a huge roadblock in its history. Given who ends up being the main antagonist, viewers must have played Game 7 to get a feel for what’s going on.
The film expects viewers to already know who these characters are, which makes it unwelcoming to new viewers. Spirits Within doesn’t have that problem, making the story something newcomers to the franchise can follow.
7 Advent Children: it enabled good character development in the cloud
As the plot progresses quickly and focuses more on the fight scenes than anything else, Cloud gets a lot of focus. The development that Cloud receives in Advent children is first-rate, forcing him to face his past and the thorn in his side that will never leave him, Sephiroth.
He is able to completely overtake them at the end of the movie when lying in the church. With his friends surrounding him, he realizes that not only is it not time to join Aerith in the afterlife, but that he is no longer alone.
6 Spirits Within: the cast is full of Hollywood actors
Spirits Within Spared no expense in finding actors for the film, drawing well-known actors like Ving Rhames and Steve Buschemi to prominent men like Alec Baldwin and James Woods.
The cast was star-studded by 2001 standards, something non-Disney animated films have rarely seen. Neither actor mailed it in for an easy paycheck either, all bringing their characters to life and doing their best with the plot.
5 Advent Children: Much Superior Fight Scenes
The fight scenes in Advent children are amazing. Even those who were completely lost in the intrigue could stop to appreciate the sweetness of the fight sequences. The animation was smooth by today’s standards, let alone 16 years ago.
It pushed the boundaries of what an animated fight could look like, and it wasn’t just the final fights, either. It was all. Tifa vs Loz is possibly the best in the movie, and it happened very early on.
4 Spirits Within: Aki and Gray’s relationship helps continue the journey to collect spirits
While the plot of Spirits Within is a little over there, even by Final fantasy standards, it’s a more personal story than Advent children is. Advent focuses more on battles, while Spirits Within is more about the characters.
This is no more true than the relationship between Aki and Gray, two former lovers, who rekindle what they once had. It also doesn’t happen in a snap of the fingers, to the point where the viewer feels bad when Gray has to sacrifice himself in the end.
3 Advent children: his antagonists had a real personality
When ranking Final fantasy villains, few will ever rank as high as Sephiroth. He’s the iconic villain of the series, which has one of the best themes of any video game villain. The rivalry between him and Cloud is beautifully shown in this film, although it will be a bit confusing for new viewers.
Even Loz, Kadaj, and Yazoo are solid villains compared to what’s shown in Spirit within. The antagonists are the biggest weakness of this whole movie.
2 Spirits Within: the stakes seem real and the actions have consequences
For a movie as fun as Advent children that is, there are no real issues or consequences for anything. It’s nothing more than a fun popcorn movie to begin with. Spirits Within tries to be more than that, presenting an issue that puts the whole world at risk, and slowly shrinks the cast until there are only two people left at the end.
By the end of the film, the viewer knows that if Aki and Gray fail, the whole world will fall, and it is not a given that the film will have a happy ending.
1 Advent Children: the music makes you feel like you’re in a Final Fantasy movie
The music is there Advent children, making the film feel like a real Final fantasy movie. Any fan of the show will tell you how important music is to the show. Even more than storytelling, music has always been one of his strengths, helping to stage and bring out emotions incredibly well.
Advent children manages to do this, especially when the Sephiroth theme slowly starts to kick in, and you know he and Cloud are about to fight.
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