The sky in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth has hidden meaning. We try to untangle it by talking about the ending and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy 7.
Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth poses a ton of questions, and then it doesn’t leave players with very many answers.
Questions pertaining to the sudden appearance of the once-dead character Zack Fair, or the fate of Aerith, have implications that could change the game’s entire world and the story people have loved for decades. However, after letting those big questions dangle in front of players, the ending of the game still doesn’t give a clear-cut answer or resolution for any of them.
As I leave the game behind, I’ve resigned myself to not knowing everything; after all, the third game in the trilogy is yet to come. But even then, one small detail has continued to gnaw away at me. It’s a question that doesn’t just involve Rebirth, but also spans other media, like Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Crisis Core: Final Fantasy 7. It’s become the worm I can’t get out of my head.
My big question? I want to know what the hell is up with the sky in the Final Fantasy 7 games.
[Ed. note: This post contains spoilers for the endings of Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, as well as discussion of plot points from Crisis Core: Final Fantasy 7.]
I’m talking about the actual sky in the world — or worlds — of each game. A lot of the time, it’s just your run-of-the-mill sky with, you know, a bright blue color and clouds. But if you start to analyze the way the characters mention it in the story, it becomes clear that the sky plays a much larger role in the symbolism of the game and is one of the only recurring motifs that branches across several Final Fantasy 7 compilation titles.
The very first time the story introduces Aerith Gainsborough in Crisis Core: Final Fantasy 7, she talks about living in the slums in Midgar city and how she’s afraid of the sky. She tells Zack Fair, her first love and friend of Cloud Strife, that she’s not normal. She says, “The sky… frightens me. It’s like it’s sucking me in.” Zack seems somewhat confused but also doesn’t seem like a guy to judge, so he promises to show her a sky that’s beautiful. Later, Zack reveals that he’s a SOLDIER and has mako-infused eyes because of it. In those moments, he likens his eyes to the color of the sky, and Aerith says, “Uh-huh… but not scary at all!”
The general idea then comes back full circle with the big ending of Crisis Core, when Zack dies after he rebels against Shinra. In his last moments, he lays on his back and looks up at the clouds. As he starts to pass away, his voice narrates, “She said that the sky frightened her. But it must feel so good up there.” Then, as his body lifts into golden, heavenly light, Zack says, “It does feel good.”
The symbolism of the sky seems somewhat more straightforward in Crisis Core. The developers use it as a way to highlight the contrasts between the confident Zack and, at the time, the more timid Aerith.
