I love J.J. Abrams, why? because he took Star Trek, and not only appeased its already immense fanbase, but created a whole new one from scratch. People who had never really dialed into Star Trek all of a sudden became interested. How? was it the graphics alone? Hell no, whil the graphics were amazing beyond recall, it was the story, the characters and/or ensamble, and the way it was told. It didn't insist on itself, and assume that the audiance would catch up as the story went on, while only those who've followed the serise are satisfied.
It gave us a chance to see each character and enjoy each one to their penerth, WITHOUT it being all monologue inner monologue. We got to enjoy and know everyone and their story AS it pertained to the main original plot. I liked it cause it MADE us remember the characters, we WANTED to. Example, Lord of the Rings, people who had never read the book now recognize the name Aragorn, Frodo, and Gollum. Now take Transformers, or National treasure, aside from Benjamin gates, what was the name of his techy side kick or the guy that sean bean played? in Tranformers, what was the name of the other young kids besides Sam Whitwicky? I bet alot of you dont even remember the name Megan Fox's character had. It was all action, and no depth. Getting back to star trek which will in tern lead to Final Fantasy, Star Trek by Abrams gave people a chance to sink into the characters and feel what star trek was like, it was fair to people who'd never heard or cared about it, even though it didn't go down the orthidox story line of a usual Trek movie, its purpose was to introduce characters and get people INTRESTED in the saga, and thats precicely what it did.
NOW on to Final Fantasy, Like star trek Final Fantasy is aboundingly RICH with juicy concepts, and more importantly characters, each intresting, each with a level of immportance, not even because of their placement IN the story per say, but because the fans love them so. I believe the same method that Abrams used to portray Star Trek would work For Final Fantasy, because again like ST it can be convoluted and confusing to those who haven't seen or heard of the characters, or even understand the laws of the world these characters live in. I should know because before Advent chidlren I had very little concern for Final Fantasy outside of knowing that there was a hot character named Tifa. My ignorant and unknowing reaction to the movie was, "Who are these white haired fruits? Why are they after that box again? How can cloud hold that sword? And why did the mountain dew looking contence of the box turn the white haired fruit leader into a longer haired fruit with a bigger sword?" (Pardon the language but that is word for word what ran through my mind)
NOW, of course i am a fan of the serise and like the characters and nearly every game that comes out based on them including Kingdom hearts, BUT I remember what it was like being on the outside looking in, wondering what it was that was getting everyone excited about what was happening, and why certain things were significant, and why certain things that baffled me maid perfect sence to they who were next to me.
If we could disspell that, and make a movie that has main characters in it, favorite ones at that, that didn't follow a specific game story line, but focused on a crisis that would introduce the characters to a whole new audiance as well as the die hards, Final Fantasy could be shaken from its funk of only arousing people who follow the serise intently, and make it worthy of a big screen veiwing. Being that it would be live action possibley, it should definatly be portrayed in a way that Final Fantasy XIII seems to approach it, with more drama/less stiff silant acting by the characters with stiff lines. And of course, nothing LESS then graphics that either match or surpass Star Trek for the fight scenes, worlds, etc. All this combined i think would make for a victorious project.
ALL THAT TO SHARE MY CAST IDEAS.
For Cloud, I know you'll say i'm whoring out to him but Ben Foster, and yes I like him as an actor, but also he has the manerism's of cloud down, with make up he could REALLY pull of his look, and he CAN do a cloud voice really well...
for Tifa Lockhart, I choose Yifei Liu
For the girl looking leader of the Jenova Strain, who better then the girl looking guy whore Jamie Cambell-Bower
For Luz I choose Channing Tatum
Yazoo? another chick dude, Vincent Kartheiser
For Rufus, I choose Peter Facinelli
For his Turks I choose Gaspard Ullil as Reno...
And Ironmans' Faran Tahir as Rude
Now for who you've been waiting for
I give you Jonathan Rhys Myres as .........
SEPHIROTH!!
Now that the STAB-BER is out of the way, time for the stabb'E, Aerith-
For whome i choose Emmy Rossum
Now for my personal Favorite, Vincent Valentine, took me a while but i think i pegged it, Skeet Ulrich, he has facial expressions that are DEAD ON to Vincent...
For Yuffie the plucky Ninja I choose Cho Chang
For Barret I choose Terry Crews
For Zack, I choose garrett Hedlund
And lastly for Genisis....Taylor Kitsch