#project s

[01] The Amnesiac

Guys, I hate to be that person, but Genesis and Angeal being older than Sephiroth is not a theory: it's the literal narrative of Crisis Core.

Genesis is an academic with a perfect use of language for dramatic purposes, and he told the story of the Jenova Project in perfect order: first Project G, then Project S, using the failures of the former to ensure a good success of the latter.

The progress is clear: Failure (Genesis) < still not there (Angeal) < success (Sephiroth)

Sephiroth being the youngest is not speculation, but intentional storytelling. They could always retcon this, but there was no doubt in the original script, at least the fact that Project G came first.

There could still make Genesis the middle child because their order of birth has not being stated, but there's no doubt about Sephiroth being the youngest, since Genesis stated it in Nibelheim.

Yeah, it would be awkward having a character called "The Origin" not being the first born, but in meta he would still be the origin of the crisis, so it could work. I don't like this option -logically the biggest "error" should be on the first try- but that's the only non-canon thing they could change without retconning.

I got our derse pj pants for Christmas from the project s merch on FRAF, and my fuck ass cat won't leave me ALONE

Children are dangerously impressionable for the first several years of their lives, it's indescribably easy to condition them into seeing things as normal—this is why a lot of abused children don't talk about anything being wrong, because that's their normal. It would have been very little work to indicate to Sephiroth starting very young that his mother died when he was born, but it's fine because that's not uncommon and he doesn't need to worry about it.

But Gast (and Hojo) didn't do that. Gast at the very least ingrained this concept into his head that his mother was special; he'd have been the one who told Sephiroth her name, who told him anything about her, because he had him at his youngest and he was the one who was so obsessed with the Cetra. One of them even gave him a photo of her* so that he'd know what she looked like, even if the woman in that photo wasn't Jenova.

They nurtured that longing for a loving parent, something that would only have been worth the effort to instill if being used as a form of manipulation. They knew his mother, she was involved with the company, the only way he'd ever know anything would be if he stayed and listened and did as he was told. The longer he stayed, the more he'd understand, and the more likely it would be that he'd find out about her. They made sure that he knew the only way to ever get any information on the one person who might have loved him unconditionally, who wouldn't have abandoned him or abused him if she'd had a choice, was to be loyal and obedient.

They led him along with the prospect, the hope that someone out there might have loved him for himself instead of for what he could do. Someone out there might have loved him for who he was, not what he could become.

They absolutely must have done this intentionally. Gast started it, Hojo continued it, and Lucrecia never had a chance to intervene. Gast may not have had ulterior motives in the malicious sense, as he believed that Sephiroth was the son of a Cetra—but he never told Sephiroth that, did he? Because Sephiroth was shocked by the discovery in Nibelheim, he didn't know until then that he was, allegedly, the last of the Ancients. Gast never told him.

But he told him his mother's name was Jenova, he told him he was special, he was kind and supportive through Sephiroth's most formative years. We know that because of how he behaves as a young teenager, the values and patterns of behavior that were instilled in him prior to being surrendered to Hojo's abuse in the name of progress. We know that because of how he talks about Gast, and how he compares to Hojo.

Gast and Hojo gave Sephiroth the concept of "mother" as someone that was good and kind and would love him no matter what, and turned it into a leash that bound him to Shinra for life.

Absolutely evil people.

*The photo was given to Sephiroth by Hojo, as a note. Based on FSBR and DoC, Lucrecia was still with the company until around 1984, when Gast left; she was on Project 0 then, not the Jenova Project, and there didn't seem to be any overlap since Hojo also didn't appear to have access to Sephiroth until he got control of the department, but it still would have been a very risky thing for Gast to do. Hojo seemingly got custody of Sephiroth around the same time that Lucrecia ran off into the mountains, which was also around the same time that Gast went AWOL, so Hojo may very well have given the photo to Sephiroth in an attempt to ingratiate himself to the boy during the transition in custody.

JJ KRISSANAPOOM as SHAN

PROJECT S: SHOOT! I LOVE YOU — 2017, dir. Cook Tanida Hantaweewatana

+ bonus

This is MANEERAT SRINAKARIN, a cinematographer. She takes care of every camera angle, lighting decision, and color palette that we as a fandom collectively drool over. She also worked on Project S: SPIKE and fucking I Told Sunset About You! She may not appear on the screen, but she’s what really makes this show perfect.

PROJECT S: SPIKE (2017) dir. Seua Pichaya

I TOLD SUNSET ABOUT YOU (2020) dir. Boss Naruebet

(inspired by an idea I saw on Ao3 once)

At some point, S dozed off. When he finally came to, all of his senses were heightened. It was like he was a computer being fed too much information at once. The cold floor underneath him, the sound of a fan somewhere in the room, loud bangs still going off somewhere outside. If S concentrated hard enough, he could feel the very molecules of the air around him. S whimpered and pressed his eyes shut. It was too much. He stayed curled up.

S couldn’t hear the sound of the scientists’ voices anymore. Did they leave? Some part of S felt . . . something at the thought that they left him. He couldn’t quite figure out the emotion. But then again, why should he care? The scientists didn’t care about him. He shouldn’t care about them.

There was another explosion, this one much closer, and suddenly there was a loud bang. S shuddered as the sound of something heavy and metal slamming into the lab tore through his skull. Someone must’ve blown the heavy security door out from its frame. Someone was here now, someone not friendly. S curled tighter.

A voice that came through a filter spoke. “You see anything, Tony?”