Why Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth's Ending is Actually Good (Mostly)

this video was lot more fun for me to make than usual! expect more stuff focused on parts of a game rather than full reviews, i think that's part of why i found it easier to put passion into a project. aiming to have a new video every Monday at 5 PM EST!

We are meant to have questions. We are supposed to be confused, angry... we are supposed to be living this through Clouds eyes. Until part 3 and he sorts his shit out. This is how Cloud feels.

during the death scene, they purposely show cloud's "speech" but leave it muted. they cut out the chunk of time where the water burial happens but frame it in a way that shows it's obvious that's what happened. i think these scenes are being saved for cloud's lifestream moment with tifa, where he has to come to terms with who he is and with what truly happened. it makes sense for them to want to save the most emotional scenes for the third game, especially at one of the most significant moments of the original game. i think it'll make the lifestream scene with cloud the standout of the entire trilogy if they pull it off right

I adored the ending. One of the biggest problems with getting older is you have less surprises, less moments that get your heart pumping and emotions running. You get married, have kids, achieve many milestones and after that there are very few pivotal moments left in life and in stories. Ff7 rebirth ending actually suprised me and got the emotions that i didnt think were still possible. Aerith death broke my heart when i was 10 years old and im amazed they broke my heart again. I really wanted to save her this time, the remake ending gave me hope for years. The entire rebirth game gave me hope. And the last hour of the game i could see it slipping away but i still had it. I had hope i could save her till the last second when i deflected the blade. But i couldnt save her in the end. I literally had to explain to my RL wife that i was in mourning after a video games ending...a remake at that. Too me that means you did a good job. Im in my mid 30s and a bunch of fake anime video game characters broke my heart and i love the ending for making that possible.

Couldn’t agree more - seeing Aerith as a person - like really really dropping her cover and showing her true desires and needs and impulsive energy - but having all that still tempered by her deep understanding of her responsibility and task ahead of her made my heart hurt on a whole other level . When she finally pushes cloud into the portal and we see Sephiroth open the church doors her sacrifice that she made from the original until now feels like it carries so much more weight emotionally. I have a lot of faith they will nail the conclusion in part 3 - and think they are doing a fantastic job overall.

Didn't realize people thought the ending was bad. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I beat it

i think the ending is one that gets better the more you think about it, when i finished i was a little confused, but now i'm in awe about how masterful the remake trilogy is

Some spoilers included. It's a long running theme in Final Fantasy games that your characters are fighting against fate. They also showed that things can travel between the alternate realities, or meet between them. Cloud met and interacted with Zack, who should have been dead to him. The white materia passed from a dying reality to the main story one. Aerith and Sephiroth seem able to initiate these changes and move between the worlds. It's unclear whether Cloud and Aerith inhabited the comatose bodies at Aerith's home, or something else happened, since her mother, Marlene, and Zack were not there to witness them waking up. All that being said, my theory is that the planet itself ends up being the final enemy. We've already had a direct armed conflict with Sephiroth in a handful of ways in the Rebirth finale. Whether that planet is somehow bonded to Sephiroth, or the characters have to do battle with fate one final time in the end, the party's goal will be to reassemble the realities in to one where the characters finally live, the threats from both Sephiroth and the planet's will are gone, and the characters that everyone has wanted to see live for decades are somehow restored to life through the reality reassembly. That's a wildly optimistic prediction. But I'll be very sad if they wrap this up for a final time and do nothing for one of the most innocent and likeable characters in final fantasy history.

FF7 has entered the Quantum realm, and Aerith has become Schrödinger's cat, she is placed in a box, and without knowing about what's inside the box, she is both alive and not alive at the same time.

Amazing video, and as someone who cares deeply about the OG, Cloud and Aerith, this ending landed in a way that amplified everything beyond any expectation or experience I could have had if it was a 1 to 1 retelling,.

To each their own, I guess. While I didn't like the writing of this ending it is still good to see some optimism in this project. Just one thing: while it is confirmed that there is a timeline where Cloud blocked the attack, she's most likely dead there. In fact, what probably happened is that Cloud blocked the attack but then Sephiroth "merged the worlds" and essentielly retconned reality before Cloud's eyes.

What i liked with this ending is that the theme of "Cloud can't cope with his failures and needs a worls where he succeded" is still there. In the OG, it was his failure to make it to SOLDIER and seeing Zack gunned down, here it's Aerith dying. Now, it cannot be said 100% that Aerith is alive in another timeline or not (both work for me), but fact is that she is gone from the main timeline and he can't really cope with that. And this is consistent with what we know of Cloud, and he'll need to face the "truth" and how to go on and mend himself in part 3.

Reminds me of the end to the Silent Hill movie. Leave the audience questioning survival, and what even counts as surviving.

I agree with a lot of what you said here. I was struck by the lack of emotional impact, but figured it was intentional for part 3. I don't know if/how they'll do it, but for now I'm happy to wait and see if it all pays off in the final part!

Enjoyed this, good summaries and ponderings!

out of all the breakdowns i've watched this one has gotta be my favorite- there's still a lot of dangling threads that the devs can pull on and despite my overall confusion...especially with the final scene...im excited to see how this all plays out.

Awesome video! It’s so easy to talk about things you hate, but you did a great job finding the gems in the ending of this game.

I appreciate your breakdown

An inspiring analysis. Thank you.

I do think the overcomplexity COULD be interesting IF Jenova is using Cloud’s memories of Aerith to manipulate him. If Aerith really is dead (she probably isn’t “dead”) and Jenova is just appearing as her, then that would be interesting and canon. Jenova is said to use loved ones to manipulate the Cetra, so she could be using Cloud’s memories of Aerith to hand him the white (actually black) materia, so that he takes that black materia to Sephiroth. That would explain why Cloud has the black materia (instead of the white materia) at the end of the game. Overcomplicated but canon. I’m worried it’s not that, though.