Seifer
Jumping on the bandwagon of this new intelligant FF discussion I thought Id share this with you, I wrote this about 2 years ago originally during a boring day in the summer holidays, basically its a character study of Seifer from ff8 - enjoy -
The character of Seifer in Final Fantasy VIII is an interesting role to study. Seifer is a very unstable and spontaneous person; he reacts to instinct rather then common sense many times in the game. His insecurities are often shown through his disdainful, mocking tone, not just to Squall but to anyone he dislikes. Despite his skill in fighting he cannot exploit the advantage he has over ordinary people, seeing the ability to fight as an exclusive “gift” which should be used for a specific purpose, but it is this that he cannot find. This theory contradicts the whole idea of SeeD, which sees fighting as a profitable skill rather then the chivalry that Seifer craves. This is mainly the cause of his rebellious nature, he wants something more then anybody else wants, and blames SeeD for holding him back. This desire that Seifer has creates an antithesis with Squall, who has no emotion towards fighting or people. It therefore could be said that Seifer would make the better hero, challenging the orthodox of SeeD and looking for honour. But this is impossible, there are hundreds of SeeD’s in Balamb Garden and others who are equal or better at fighting then Seifer but he still holds the belief that he is better then all of them (he even refuses to wear the uniform). This makes him a outcast and an instant threat as Seifer is demonised from the very beginning, in the opening he slashes Squall across the face and seemingly gets pleasure out of it, far from the chivalrous knight image he has imposed on himself. He often sacrifices his ideals during the game in order to continue this dream he is living in. No price is too high for him to achieve it, despite the fact that his actions contradict his own dream. Thus we see how deluded he really is. Seifer, unlike Squall is driven to fight through emotion, and thus his reliance upon them is his ultimate weakness.
Seifer is a simply a troublemaker at school, a school bully that starts him off as a pathetic villain for the rest of the game, we are never afraid or intimidated by him, and neither is Squall. Enemies like Griever or Ultimicia worry us more mainly because of their abstractness to the story, we hardly see Ultimicia before the final fight, but are told how dangerous and evil she is, it is the distance that makes an enemy threatening. Seifer is a constant factor in the story, he is present in Garden and we relate to him instantly despite our views, at the beginning of the game Squall doesn’t care about Seifer, so neither do we. In Balamb Garden he surrounds himself with Raijin and Fujin, both humorous and confusing characters, Raijin and Fujin both have irregular speech patterns and often have comic actions (in almost every instant where we meet them, Raijin annoys Fujin, so she kicks him) but this odd characterisation tells us much about Seifer. There is little chance that he could have an emotional or serious relationship with these two people. They even call themselves the “disciplinary society” rather then admitting their friendship. This makes him similar to Squall as Squall also cuts himself off emotionally from everyone. But this also creates a contrast, Squall is happy as the lone wolf, but Seifer secretly craves human emotion. (Indeed there are many instances where Squall and Seifer are seen as total opposites to each other, even their playing cards have the same numbers, but are on opposite sides.) This is a key problem with Seifer; he has two good pals, but no friends, no-one who is really dependent on him. His dream is of becoming a knight to a sorceress, a simple desire to be responsible, needed and in return loved. During the SeeD exam he deliberately disobeys orders and heads into the thick of the battle, endangering himself and the team he was placed in charge of. This is a typical attention-seeking attitude, a short term response to his desire. This action passed Zell and Squall but failed him, but at least he was noticed. Maybe Seifer doesn’t want to join SeeD and join the other faceless troops? He does say how much he loves the exams, but whether he wants to fall in line with the other SeeD’s is debatable, once a SeeD he will be independent to make his own mistakes, no-one will be there to tell him off. It is this emotional, almost parental craving that allows him to be so easily manipulated into becoming Edea’s “lapdog” as Squall calls him, but to Seifer he finally got his dream, he stood on the head float, sword drawn defending the sorceress with his life. He becomes more sadistic and cruel due to his constant failure to perform his duties and eventually goes to far, losing his pals and all hope of dignity and responsibility along the way. Thus his emotions that he relied upon so heavily to fulfil his dreams betrayed him, showing his ultimate weakness.
The simplest reason for this behaviour is that Seifer is an orphan, he never had any role modals or people to love him, except Edea, maybe this is why he followed her, some motherly instinct called him. This would also explain why he defended her to his last strength at the end of the second disc, fighting the party twice before passing out. The motherly instinct is again part of Seifer‘s emotional craving discussed earlier. The lifestyle he was forced to lead means that Seifer would have grown up trying to be self-sufficient, he will only rely on himself when it comes to the crunch. Again this links him to Squall, who also grew up with similar ideals. All of the other characters, except Rinoa, grew up in the orphanage but due to human interaction have developed social skills, Seifer and Squall haven’t, Squall hasn’t because he is totally dependent on himself, the loss of his “sis“ triggered that. But Seifer still craves the parental desire that all the others have taken for granted, he didn’t even have a “sis“ to lose. The relationship between Rinoa and Seifer is also interesting. Rinoa reveals early on in the game that she slept with Seifer a year earlier, but she doesn’t talk as if they had a meaningful relationship. Seifer probably not only saw the chance to have sex, but maybe to find the love he desires. Sadly due to his social abstractness he couldn’t handle the commitment. Rinoa is the only character who grew up in a loving home, despite her views on her father. This would have made her more trusting and naïve then the other characters. Unfortunately for her she chose Seifer who probably broke her heart. Notice how this is almost an echo of Squall and Rinoa’s story. Rinoa meets a guy who is emotionally abstracted from life and feels sorry for him. With Seifer she decided to sleep with him to try and trigger some emotion, but with Squall she slowly gained his trust rather then diving straight in. Introducing Seifer to a relationship this deep terrified him, despite craving it he couldn’t handle the level of commitment and he ran at the first chance he got. Seifer never got the emotional development to have a proper relationship, he was too caught up in his own little world, created to ease the pain of being alone to ever grasp it, whether it was becoming a SeeD (honour), Rinoa (love), or having a group of friends (respect). At the end of the game, Squall has all of these things and Seifer doesn’t. It shows clearly who chose the correct path through life. It is obvious that Rinoa was the catalyst that finally got through to Squall, but Seifer doesn’t have anyone who’s close to him, he cannot trust anyone emotionally but still wants to be respected and loved, a sad paradox. Thus Seifer fell under Ultimicia’s veil of love, manipulated by her control of Edea and was used like a puppet, Seifer jumped at the chance to be unconditionally loved, but couldn’t escape when it came to the hard part, thus he releases his anger on anything that comes into contact, even his own friends.
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