Eyes on Me and Not on Final Fantasy VIII

I don't know many people who finished Final Fantasy VIII. Maybe like three people I know, myself included, actually sat through it. And some of those people liked it. I'd make fun of them, but I like Sonic the Hedgehog and Final Fantasy VIII is a hell of a lot more respectable than that.

You're seriously hurting me now, Sonic.

But say what you will about Sonic-- and there's a lot to say-- Final Fantasy VIII crosses some pretty bold lines as far as characters, story, and even music goes. But bold isn't always a good thing. I mean, I know we're all about breaking the mold and finding new ways to tell old stories (or just telling new stories in new ways), but even saying that, there are reasons conventional things are conventional and reasons why new ideas bomb. In the case of Final Fantasy VIII, I know exactly why they went all squishy and romantic on us. It was to remove themselves from the gritty, war-riden future in Final Fantasy VII. If they'd made another game in the same vein as Final Fantasy VII, it would just draw comparison to the two games. The series as a whole banks on the notion that you don't draw parallels between any two games as far as setting and character arcs go. Each game is, in and of itself, a "final fantasy", and it hurts me to write that because now the games within the series are getting sequels.

And the inherent issue there is that we are of course, bound to compare the games within the series because the series is, in fact, a series. Of course we compare VIII to VII, but we're not comparing the setting, just how well the story is told. Hearing now that the story of Final Fantasy VIII was a love story, people like to say that it bombed because it was a love story and therefore, crappy. However, these people are forgetting that love stories show up everywhere, in almost every medium. Even Final Fantasy VII had a love story.

But when we think about Final Fantasy VII, we don't think about squishy love stories even though the death of a character who is a love interest is common fodder for romantic stories from a war perspective. We think about long hair and even longer swords, whiny over powered characters, guns-- war, we think about war. And I guess if you're a guy, Tifa.

Or Yuffie, I guess.

But I find that a lot of people who remember Final Fantasy VII also remember Sephiroth's theme for just being kickass and what not. Mind you, if you remember the soundtrack of FFVII, you probably also remember JENOVA or Aerith's Theme too-- the game was loaded with fantastic tracks. Which brings me now to Final Fantasy VIII, because I can only remember two things from Final Fantasy VIII. The first thing is that Seifer calls Squall (and Zel) a chicken-wuss, which is hilarious since I don't see how it's an insult and because everyone gets all worked up about being called a chicken-wuss by a guy who has a pretty decent David Bowie going on.

I am not the only one who thinks this.

The second thing is Eyes On Me, and quite frankly, I'm not a huge fan of this song as it relates to the game itself.

I'm not a musician, except on the occasions in which I am, but I understand the usage of "theme" when we're talking about "theme music". The term theme (as far as music is concerned), is a melody in which a composition is based. It doesn't always have to be the entire composition, but usually it's at least a piece of it. What we're talking about here is more like theme from a narrative standpoint, and a theme song should do what a thematic concept does-- namely, it should bring to mind the theme of the work at hand. Final Fantasy VIII is a love story, therefore its theme song should be a love song. Right? Right. Except the theme to Final Fantasy VIII is Liberi Fatali.

This isn't a bad theme song-- I'd argue it's pretty good, actually-- but you know... I don't usually think about it as a part of Final Fantasy VIII because Liberi Fatali is exciting and the only part of the song that even has remotely to do with love is the Gabriela Robin-esque made up words "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec", an anagram for "Succession of witches" and "Love". Literally the entire rest of the song could be considered part of a song about children of war or something completely unrelated. I'll give you a translation without the fake words just so you can see what I mean.

Arise from your sleep, my children
Your cradles shall no longer exist
Arise from your sleep, children of Fate

Abandon your cradles

Arise
Discover the garden of Truth

Brilliant truth
Burn the heavens of evil
Burning truth
Set ablaze the heavens of darkness

Prevail, children
Fated day

Lyricswise, compare that to One Winged Angel, where literally every lyric has to do with how wildly pissed off Sephiroth is about literally everything. It's on the opposite end of the spectrum because, as far as that game goes, the song can really apply to Sephiroth (helped by the fact that they say his name like a million times in the song). But I bet money if you hear the theme song to Final Fantasy VII, you'd tell me that I'm being unnecessarily cruel to Final Fantasy VIII.

But I stand by my word because Liberi Fatali is never once given a chance to become a theme like this song was. This song was played in the overworld, plus the theme (musically, not narratively) can be heard literally all over the place in game, including on the world map. Compare to Liberi Fatali, heard in a few places, although I really only noted it in the Ending Theme. But it doesn't have nearly as much impact as Final Fantasy VII's main theme, partially because it has to share top billing with Eyes On Me.

Eyes On Me represents what should be the emotional high point of the game, considering when they chose to play it and the nature of the song itself. It shows up way late in the game (disc... 3? 4?) and as far as songs go, it deserves the acclaim it gets. Faye Wong's vocals do get across the idea of a wistful woman who can't really get across her thoughts to a shy man she believes loves her as much as she loves him. And do I have to say anything about Nobou Uematsu? The guy is a musical genius. So yes, the combination of the two make this song phenomenal, certainly deserving of the acclaim it got. I think considerable amount of work went into the composition and the production and it shows.

Which, I guess, is why they decided to have it play over Squall and Rinoa instead of the two characters it actually applies to, Laguna and Julia.

But to be completely fair, she wrote the song after the fact. Odd that she was writing it the day that Laguna went to the bar to listen to her, but whatever.

But this song is treated like a main theme song, mostly because it is the main theme song, hands down. You just aren't able to sell lonely love ballads to the key demographic, namely males who played Final Fantasy VII. Yeah, there was love and sad things in VII, but that's completely different from trying to market a love story to these people who just finished playing a game about revenge and war and a guy with a gun arm!

Okay, the game wasn't actually about Barret. He's just a guy. A guy with a gun where his hand should be.

So I can see why Liberi Fatali came to be, at least as far as the opening sequence is concerned. All you can really do with Eyes on Me as far as making a music video is put sweet or sad images around, maybe some water, maybe some fades of characters crying... I'm not joking, the song lends itself to a more wistful take than the bombastic Liberi Fatali.

"But... you," You say, frowning, "this all sounds like you have glowing reviews for Eyes On Me and Liberi Fatali, so why write this at all?"

I never said I hated Eyes On Me (unless I did, in which case I was lying), I just dislike how it was used, especially considering the game it was in. Now if you haven't played Final Fantasy VIII, you literally never will because it's not that great of a game and Final Fantasy VII outdoes it in literally every aspect. So I'll tell you the story really quick. Just as an exercise, try to figure out where Eyes On Me plays here. It plays over Squall and Rinoa, so make sure you listen closely to the song and place it where it makes the most sense in the story. Ready?

Oh come on.

Squall is just a guy, with a haircut, who becomes a SeeD soldier in the military. I don't know what SeeD stands for, so let's just skip right past that. What is important is that Balamb Garden, where Squall is training, is the only place that trains SeeDs, until later in the game when that's not true and the explanation for this is really weak. Anyway, SeeDs can summon GFs, Guardian Forces, who for the most part are just... Gods. They're just gods and SeeDs can summon them. So he has to go get Ifrit and then he's sent to war with a classmate Zel and his captain for the mission he's on, Seifer. If it seems like I'm jumping ahead, don't worry, this takes place pretty quickly in the beginning of the game because, surprise, this is part of the final exam to become a SeeD.

They're fighting the Galbadian Army and Seifer's like "Screw the rules, I have... bloodlust," and leaves his team behind. So Selphie joins... wearing a skirt to a battlefield but I guess there was a pants quota that  the army had reached or something. So anyway, Squall and the others find out why the Galbadian Army is there (to reactivate a radio tower, which sounds silly when you think about all the technology these people are using) and try to stop them, but ultimately fail and fight a giant robot spider machine instead. But they all survive and end up passing the SeeD exam, except for Seifer, who sulks somewhere.

So then they have to go to a dance to celebrate surviving a war and being SeeD members now, where Squall meets the girl who thinks he's the best looking guy at the dance. She's right because every one else happens to be background characters from anime. But Squall is too quiet/shy/whatever to dance with her, so she forces him, and then she abandons him when she sees her friends.

"Be vewy quiet. I'm hunting wabbits."

But Squall's in love with her (or something) and so even when his teacher Quistis, who isn't all that much older than he is, comes onto him he's like, "Meh, women." and goes off to do things elsewhere. He gets a mission with Zel and Selphie to join a group called the Forest Owls and help make a small nation called Timber become independent. They have to take a train there. On the train they all fall asleep and have the same dream about a guy named Laguna. After awakening, they meet the Forest Owls and the girl, Rinoa, is the leader of the group.

The Forest Owls are like, "We're going to kidnap Galbadia's president using like, three trains and the fact that no one seems to care about the president's safety!" and all of the SeeD members are like, "Yeah, I guess that doesn't seem like a deliberate trap," and then of course they're all shocked when the president isn't on the train, just a zombie dolled up to look like the president.

"My first order of business is to create a renewable resource of brains."

So they find out the (real) president is actually going to be on TV and it turns out he's going to make a Sorceress the nation's new ambassador. But then Siefer shows up and takes the president hostage, because I guess the president thought he wouldn't need any guards outside of the useless ones who are easily beaten that all presidents get. So the sorceress comes out and lures Siefer to her side by calling him a boy and promising to make him a man, which isn't as creepy as it sounds. But because Zel (I'm pretty sure it was Zel, though I could be wrong) mentioned that Siefer was mad about not becoming a SeeD or that they were SeeDs, Balamb Garden is suddenly a really suspicious place. More than it was before, anyway. So of course, they go back to Balamb Garden to regroup. On the way, they all have a dream about Laguna again.

Squall and the others are like, "Shit, we better like... stuff, you know, and things!" and so they decide to assassinate the Sorceress. They get the help of Rinoa's father, who Rinoa is feuding with, and he comes up with a perfectly logical course of action: Split into two groups-- one that snipes (Squall and a sniper) and another which is supposed to be signalling or clearing the way or something (Literally everyone else). But it doesn't matter because Rinoa wants to do her plan, which is make the Sorceress wear a bracelet that supposedly would eliminate her power. Supposedly. They also enlist a sniper named Irvine.

"...Ladies."

So Quistis is like, "No, stick to the plan" when Rinoa tells everyone her plan, but later leaves her post (and Selphie and Zel follow her, because...?) to apologize, only to then end up locked in a room. Rinoa confronts the Sorceress, who has none of Rinoa's crap, and then she goes out to accept her role as ambassador.

Squall and Irvine are there and ready to take out the sorceress when Irvine suddenly gets cold feet for no reason, saying "I always get like this," which makes no sense because he's a sniper and this is his job and even less sense because that makes it seem like he's been trying to murder this woman for ages and failing. In any case, the sorceress, being a sorceress, stops the bullet with a magic barrier when he does fire at her, so Squall tries to brute force her death with melee attacks, but Seifer shows up. After a rousing Dance Magic Dance number, Seifer is defeated, but again the sorceress remembers she's a sorceress and just stabs Squall through the chest with some ice. Usually that would kill a guy, but Squall lives.

God, every one of Seifer's fight scenes is such a production.

So then the entire group gives up after Squall psuedo-dies and they're all jailed. Squall dreams of Laguna again, then wakes up to Siefer complaining about how he doesn't know what SeeD does. Squall goes unconscious from the sheer thought of having to hear Siefer keep complaining, and then Not A Moogle saves him. He meets up with the rest of his group, who escaped jail because their guards were kind of stupid, and together they determine that Galbadia is firing missiles at all the gardens. So they have Squall go back to Balamb and stupid ditzy Selphie try to stop the missiles. Of course, Selphie fails.

"Tee-hee! I can't do anything right!"

At Balamb, people are fighting each other over... morals?... because it was revealed that the Headmaster borrowed money from a guy named NORG. Squall ignores that and finds out that Balamb Garden can fly, praise Jesus, so he moves the garden. But then the controls break so they're just stranded in the ocean. Then Squall and the others defeat NORG. Then they coincidentally crash into a town of train mechanics who fix the Garden. Also, Selphie and her team are there, for some reason. So they rejoin and fly the Garden back to Balamb, where Seifer is looking for a girl named Ellone. But they beat the crap out of him and then go to Selphie's home Garden.

When they get there, everyone (except Irvine) remembers that they came from the same orphanage. Irvine, who knew the whole time, didn't tell them because...? But they determine that they didn't know about the orphanage thing because they all can use GFs, which... cause memory loss, but no one felt like mentioning that to these guys. Whatever, right? But the sorceress used to be the headmaster of their orphanage, shock and appall! They figure they should go to the Orphanage, but Galbadia forces are there. They defeat literally everyone and take down the sorceress.

The Sorceress returns to her normal self, Edea, and tells them that she was possessed by a sorceress from the future called Ultimecia, who just... wants to destroy time by compressing all of it. They believe it because Rinoa gets possessed by Ultimecia soon afterwards. Squall also realizes that he's in love with Rinoa because she makes him feel things. So he's like, "How do we stop her?" and Edea's like, "I guess go back in time and make it so Rinoa can't be possessed? But that would cause a time paradox, I think."

So Squall finds out that the group hallucinations are because a girl named Ellone, who wanders about in what looks like a kimono and makes appearances throughout the game, has been sending them back in time to possess Laguna. Ellone is of course eons away from where the party is.  With Edea in tow, they go to Ellone, but they find out that they need to go to the moon where another Sorceress is, but she's like... frozen up there, and then Rinoa gets for real real possessed and forces her way to this new Sorceress so that she can undo the seal on the moon Sorceress, and then Ultimecia leaves Rinoa floating around in space and possesses the moon Sorceress.

Squall and deus ex machina Ragnarok rescue Rinoa, who is thought to be a sorceress and has to be handed over to the proper athorities. But Squall doesn't want to do that, so he just hands her over and then shows up again like, "On second thought, no, I'll keep her."

So then they rescue Ellone, who was captured, and learn that she can just make people time travel by sending their consciousness into other people. Why? Who knows. But she's part of Ultimecia's plan, because it turns out that a doctor in the nation of Esthar named a machine after Ellone because it does the same thing she does. So Ultimecia was just looking for the real Ellone, and when she found her, planned to use her to control time. Laguna, president of Esthar, is like, "Okay, so let her do what she wants and we'll stop her when that's done" and everyone's like, "Sounds good to me" and so they let Ultimecia possess the moon Sorceress, defeat her, and then let her possess Rinoa so that Ultimecia can go back in time and compress time. Also, Laguna just happens to know that love will help them survive in a world of compressed time, because that's knowledge every president has.

And that works.

They get separated after defeating Ultimecia and Rinoa waits for Squall to return at a garden (a real one, not the ships) and when he doesn't return, just wills him back with magic. So Seifer decides he'd rather be a townie, Quistis no longer pines after Squall, Squall smiles, Rinoa and Squall kiss, Zel is Zel, Selphie is somewhere, and that's the game.

Good thing Ma-Ti was th-- oh, he wasn't? Then this doesn't make any sense.

Now if you read all of that, you're probably thinking Eyes On Me played during the scene where Rinoa was waiting for Squall and he didn't come back, because that fits with the song thematically. Eyes On Me is about a woman waiting on a man to approach her, in a sense, unable to tell him how she feels even though she seems certain that he must love her like she loves him. And they're separated by a "last night" together, in which the man leaves and so it gives her an opportunity to have a song like this written about them. It explains the wistful tone and the ballad. In the case of the game, had Rinoa not been able to just Power of Love him back into reality, it would've been pretty much case in point the overall theme of the song. But, she brings him back... and though it's not explained how, exactly (she's a sorceress?) it still fits with the song. If you're thinking that this was the scene where Eyes on Me was played, you're absolutely right. But I'm only saying that because I wish that was the case.

Actually, Eyes on Me plays when Squall saves Rinoa in space. I guess it's supposed to be like... role reversal...ish? Except for the part where none of it really matches up. The singer is a woman, so... am I supposed to think that Squall sounds like a woman? The song is sung from a first person perspective and Rinoa was pretty much about to die, so you could argue it was from her point of view, but it's a weak argument because I'm pretty sure she was unconscious that whole time. The lyrics talk about shy glances, which doesn't apply to Rinoa but does apply to Squall. So I guess what I'm trying to say is, the emotional high point as far as our main characters go isn't in space. It's when Squall is "dead" for the second time.

Tell...Zel... I always loved him...

Of course, Eyes on Me isn't even about Squall and Rinoa, which is the giant punch in the face. See, I told you the main story and you might be confused in thinking that the game marketed as a "love story" doesn't really have much love in it, and you're be right (mostly because the love scenes are unnecessary in a recap of the plot, which doesn't have a lot to do with love).  I mean, Squall and Rinoa meet and dance, then travel together and get to know each other and then fall in love, which is... pretty status quo. So what, or rather where, is the "love story" in this?

Well, you might've noticed the cutaways to Laguna. He's actually pretty taken with a woman named Julia, who works at a bar playing piano, but she's not allowed to sing. He gets a chance to talk to her and they confess to loving each other before he has to go out on a mission where his friends get injured. He gets separated from them and ends up living in Esthar. Julia wrote Eyes on Me as a tribute to their love. Laguna ends up married to a woman named Raine and adopts Ellone with her and Julia ends up marrying a commander and giving birth to Rinoa, then dying. (Squall is supposedly Laguna's son, but it's only hinted at.) Remember earlier in the review when I said it applied more to these two? Yeah, I'm not kidding.

But here's the thing. Laguna and Julia? They like, don't really tie into the story much at all. Julia pretty much never does. I mean, yeah, she's Rinoa's mother... but so what? Rinoa's mother has, what, nothing to do with this story? I mean, Julia's death is why Rinoa's arguing with her dad, I think, except that's a pretty throwaway way to put Julia in the story, considering you wrote a song for her. I'm not saying I like FFX-II, but the way the song about the two "dead" characters was put into that game makes more sense than this one.

Then there's Laguna, who ties in more but tends to cause a lot of plotholes. For example, he adopted Ellone-- are you telling me he never once was like, "Yo, Raine, why is it that everyone seems to want to kidnap our adopted daughter?" When he finds Ellone, a doctor is like, "Hey she can send people back in time." Did Ellone... never mention this to Laguna? Then later, Laguna sends Ellone to go live with Raine-- you know, his wife?-- but doesn't actually send for his wife to come live with him, because that would make it so that Squall didn't grow up in an orphanage. That's Lamiroir levels of bad parenting.

"I married a dude and had a kid. But then he died, so I abandoned his entire family and my kid to go back to my previous life."

See, I get that unrequited love is interesting and I get the whole, "Squall and Rinoa complete the love their parents had for each other" thing, but... I mean, this story isn't a love story. So Eyes On Me doesn't really apply. You know what would be a love story? If we dropped the time compression, the Laguna and Julia story, and made it such that Rinoa and Squall meet in a bar, join up and fight the Galbadian Forces, and then at some point one of the two gets mortally injured and the other one goes off looking for a cure. To make it fit with Eyes On Me, Squall would probably need to be the one who gets injured. But whatever. When the injured one is cured, they don't remember the love the two had, so the remainder of the game is just one of them re-building their relationship with the other, still while fighting the Galbadian Forces.

I guess the sorceress is a pretty interesting idea, but ruling time via time compression was a bit... odd. I suppose we could maybe just change what Ultimecia was trying to do with time then things would be more digestible? Maybe if Ultimecia wasn't trying to rule time but was just trying to create a time loop so she could live forever? Wait a minute. That was Garland's story, wasn't it?

Okay, so how about drop time altogether? How about Ultimecia also has some love related issue she's trying to solve via being evil? Like... Okay, Ultimecia could be a girl who's been rejected a lot in love and... Laguna, since he actually is kind of important, happens to be really nice to her. She thinks she has a chance, tries to go for it, and gets spurned. She's devastated by the constant rejection and spends her time honing her sorceress skills, making herself look beautiful through magic, and thinking about revenge. She then decides she wants to straight up remove men from society. So while the civil unrest is going on, she puts herself in a position to start just erasing men from existence by slowly rising in political ranks-- but doesn't erase anyone from existence yet. Years later, she finds out Laguna got married and then left his wife to do military things, so she shows up at his front door, realizes that Raine is pregnant, and waits for the baby's birth. It's Squall, and technically she should erase him, but she gets the idea to have Squall defeat his father for her, since Laguna was her last love and she believes he was leading her on. So she steals Squall away, kills Raine, and raises him to hate his father like she does. Squall gets sent to the Garden, she starts focusing on erasing the men from existence, and the story could just roll from there. Squall becomes a SeeD and joins up with Rinoa. Rinoa is the daughter of a rich guy who isn't backing Ultimecia, calling her a sorceress and implying that she has a secret plan that would rock the foundation of the world and that she can't be made ambassador because she would have free reign over the people. Squall thinks this is frivolous and departs from the team, meeting Irvine who backs the idea of Ultimecia being ambassador, and they hang out on a rooftop overlooking the throng of people and wait for Ultimecia to become ambassador. Ultimecia, unaware that Squall is watching, becomes ambassador and uses her magic to control the women in the crowd to become her army and murder men on sight. Fortunately, Rinoa and the others show up to save Squall and Irvine from being mauled to death by other women. Irvine knows another sorceress, Edea, and theorizes they should go see her. Edea tells them she'd love to reverse what Ultimecia's doing but she's gotten weak and if someone might save her daughter Ellone perhaps Ellone could do something about it. But Ellone's been kidnapped by someone who was really, creepily in love with her and wants to preserve her for all time and jealously stowed her frozen body on the moon. Squall wants to go get her, but he meets Laguna and they get into an argument after Squall determines that Laguna is his father. Laguna tells Squall his real mother is Raine and that Ultimecia killed her. Squall doesn't believe him, but he stops being angry at Laguna when Laguna proves he couldn't have known his wife was pregnant using Squall's birthday and the date he left for the military. Squall and the others try to rescue Ellone from the moon, Squall gets mortally wounded and everyone thinks he's going to die, Edea says they can save Squall with everyone else if they stop Ultimecia, and suddenly everyone has a newfound reason to go stop Ultimecia on top of their already pretty big reason to stop her.... or whatever. That way it's a ton of love stories from different angles: Raine and Laguna's working and complete love story, Ultimecia's broken love story, Squall and Rinoa's budding one-- all while having a war as a backdrop.... you know, so that it is actually a love story and not just a war with love stories on the side?  

Why not just make the whole thing just a bunch of entangled love stories instead of two love stories that don't really have anything to do with the plot as a whole? I mean, this story would have worked without the love plot too. If Rinoa was male, the story would barely change at all.

Eyes On Me is definitely a love ballad, meant for a love story. It's a great song, made clearly with the intention of giving the listener the same longing feeling that the singer has about her loved one. That's exactly why the game should have based itself around Eyes On Me, which it really didn't. Musically, yes, Eyes On Me is clearly the theme of the entire game. Narratively, Eyes On Me takes a back seat to Liberi Fatali, which barely is in the game at all. It's just a poor mixture of music to game, never mind the fact that the game's story is damn near stupid even if you suspend your disbelief. But then, Sonic 2006 exists and I like Sonic the Hedgehog, so I guess I've got no stakes in a argument of stupid stories.

Look, it's just-- It's really stupid. There's time travel and a girl who literally does nothing but get captured, cry, and kiss Sonic. And if you're trying to follow the emeralds, GOOD FUCKING LUCK.