GOD WHAT A TRIP

So I got off school early at 10am as it was just the first day of class so I thought about coming to the event. I went home immediately (arrived 11am) to prepare my stuff. I left around 30 minutes later.

The trip was hell I'd tell ya. I got lost along the way, and there was a part where there was like 20 trucks trying to manage getting through the freeway.
It took some time till it all ran smoothly again.

And So, I got theArc Light Studio Theater at around 1:30 (whew)

WHAT!!? THERE'S MORE!!?

It says on Square Enix's site that tickets would ONLY be available at noon, right (right?)?

Well wrong - by the time I got there, they ran out of that wristband thingies. I was the fifth wristband-less person so far.

5 to about 6 hours later, the theater staff finally started gathering people. Unfortunately for us who don't have a wrist band, we were put on our own "standby" line.

But It wasn't unfortunate after all!!

Guess what?
We lucky bastards get to see the arrival and some photoshoot of the FFVIIAC staff which consisted of Tetsuya Nomura (who was wearing an FFVII shirt which I don't knwo if it was AC or DoC related), some other staff members whom I don't know yet, and 3 of the US VAs - Steve Burton, Rachael Leigh Cook, & Mena Suvari.

Finally, at a few minutes past 7 (which was supposed to be the scheduled start of the show), the first 10 people (with me as the third) were finally allowed to get in.

Now the real fun Begins

THE SHOW

It started out with the speeker welcoming all the guest to the event. Because of the show starting way behind schedule (about an hour late already), she decided to make a quick intro.

- starting with a trailer of Square Enix products
- English dubbed version of the FFVIIAC feature
- a quick word from the S-E staff and the US VAs
- giveaways

Okay so the lights went out after that. The curtains opened....

....and voila!!! - it started with a long, spoiler-filled trailer of Kingdom Hearts II with Hikaru Utada's Sanctuary playing as the BGM.

The next one was a subbed version of the long Dirge of Cerberus trailer with Gackt's Redemption plaing as the BGM. Of note though is the "coming 2006" at the end of the trailer. I can't remember if that was originally there the previous time I saw the trailer though.

And then the, FFVIIAC film itself!!!

*ENGLISH DUBBED FFVII:AC IMPRESSIONS*

The first thing everyone noticed was that the Final Fantasy VII logo was removed from the intro with Red XIII. This seems awkward to me as it made the scene felt like it kinda dragged unnecessarily.

After that, the parts with the spoken dialogue!!
I wouldn't put too much detail as to avoid spoilers and also for the sake of length.

Let me just tell you that the dub may be as good, if not superior to the Japanese dub!!!

What the hell?
How did that happen!!?

To start, the NA VAs sounded almost, if not truly, identical to the Japanese VAs (most notably Quinton "Raiden" Flynn's exellent work with Reno). That is with the exeption of Mena Suvari who nearly completely lacked the enthusiasm Maaya Sakamoto put to Aerith.

Then there was the English dub script. I hate it when the translators make the dub script too accurate and not consider what actually "works". IN FFVII:AC however, they kinda played with the script a bit.

- Rufus was addressed as "Rufus Shinra" which then avoids any confusion of his relevance to those who haven't played the game
- Some lines were completely changed to make it work with the mouth flaps (though it's sometimes noticably imperfect).
- Some nice touches were made like Barret saying "Foo" and Caith Sith Having a weird accent. And the grunts, moans, and other expressions were (GASP) immitated from the Japanese dub instead of trying to come up with their own (which US VAs are not good at as far as I'd know)
- Everything else that were seem to be confusing in the Japanese version were reworded into a more straightforward form. This resulted into the story being more understandable, approachable, and better overall.

Some minor nitpicks though. I already did mention some slight problems with the lip flaps. I also mentioned Mena Suvari's lame version of Aerith. We'll there are also some other very minor things which I thought should've been given a little more thought like the "zuru-zuru" being changed into "Dilly-Dally-Shilly-Shally"

But what's incredible though, was to hear the crowd going "WO-HO-HOA" when they heard the line "Good to see you.... CLOUD!!!" from Sephiroth himself (voiced by a guy named George Newbern whom I don't know).

Long story short, rest assured - the English dub track was given the love and effort this show deserves.

Besides that, the crowd was kinda noisy (we'll I'm one of them ) as the laughed, cheered, went ooooh and aaaah, during the entire show.

The worst part was closing the curtain whent the end credits wasn't finished yet (right at the moment "that" was gonna be shown in the end)!!!

And oh yeah, the names of the NA dubbing and distribution staff were added on the end credits. Too bad the song was still in Japanese

AND THE REST

I'm already sleepy. So I'll make the rest short.

The speaker invited Tetsuya Nomura and the other guys, including the NA VAs, to the stage to make a short speech.

You already know how that goes: thank you for your supports, and some thigns like that.

Steve Burton mentioned that he never realized how cool Cloud was until tonight and thanked Nomura and the other for the opportunity. The other two US VAs (Rachel and Mena) mentioned that the film was a real piece of art.

Then giveaways time. The speaker told us that whoever has a sticker of a star and/or a check under their seat wins a prize. Unfortunately, I wasn't one of them. The prizes were:

- the ones who got a check get a Tetsuya Nomura autographed brochure and pamphlet that were previously given to the previous screenings of FFVII:AC (like the Venice Film Festival). They also get some PSP peripherals.
- the lucky ones who get the star..... GOT A PSP!!!

After that, Tetsuya Nomura himself picked a lucky audience to recieve a prize. He picked the one sitting on the seat F-7.

After the show, they were giving away free goods to those who attended the event. They were:

- FFVII:AC theatrical poster which has the same image from the DVD/UMD cover.
- FFVII:AC OST standard edition (not the LE with the cardboard slipcover)

Oh and yeah, the speaker's last words we're thank you to those who attended the event, buy the upcoming DVD/UMD release this April 25th, and to further support Square-Enix!!

...now why was that not surprising?

WHEW
OK THAT'S ALL FOLKS!!!

Last edited by nataru on April 04, 2006