SURE. It's actually for a couple reasons (or sets of reasons) some of them IC and some of them OOC
The simplest (and also one of the less important) reasons is that simply that I've kind of been-there, done-that with a toppy hot murdered spiritualist identifying as dead. There are some major ways in which Mia is a similar character to Aeris, and I know that playing Mia as "dead" had made some things really hard for me (such as forming relationships and not kind of generally being a major downer), so since it could really go either way, that was a considerations.
Now, having her decide to see herself alive is definitely something that can be argued either way. The Aeris that is in camp right now is Aeris from around Advent Children. She's been dead a long time and has made her peace with that, buuuuuuuuut just because you're at peace with something doesn't mean you have to like it, and canon (even discounting the novel) makes it pretty explicitly clear that Aeris's death sucks. While, yeah, the Lifestream is pretty chill for an afterlife and she really wants Cloud to move on and be happy without her, I don't think that the message we're supposed to take there is "death is really OK :)." In the scene just following her death, Sephiroth tries to make that pitch of returning to the planet, promised land, blah blah and Cloud tells him to shove it. he says "Aeris will no longer talk, no longer laugh, cry...... or get angry......" Later, you get this bit:
Tifa "I wonder what Aerith felt... when she was on that altar...?"
Cloud "I'm sure she wanted to give her life for the planet..."
Tifa "Really? I wonder? I don't think that's it at all." "I think she didn't think she would die at all, but that she planned on coming back all along." "She always used to talk about the 'Next time'." "She talked about the future more that any of us..." (bawwwwwwwwwwww)
And then Aeris's novel (which has some of the parts I have trouble with, but I take it as about 60-70% canon) talks about how sad dying made Aeris. She wasn't ready! Not at all!
So in camp, while she has more time, she's going to squeeze every drop out of life that she can. Whether or not she can go back alive, she wants to have as much fun as possible. It's why she'll be a little sillier in camp than she even was in the game, why she'll be more physically forward with Zack and Cloud, and more likely to top people into doing dumb things with her. Aeris identifies as alive because she wants to and because she could never forgive herself for wasting a single day that she gets to be walking around and talking and laughing and getting angry. :(
The simplest (and also one of the less important) reasons is that simply that I've kind of been-there, done-that with a toppy hot murdered spiritualist identifying as dead. There are some major ways in which Mia is a similar character to Aeris, and I know that playing Mia as "dead" had made some things really hard for me (such as forming relationships and not kind of generally being a major downer), so since it could really go either way, that was a considerations.
Now, having her decide to see herself alive is definitely something that can be argued either way. The Aeris that is in camp right now is Aeris from around Advent Children. She's been dead a long time and has made her peace with that, buuuuuuuuut just because you're at peace with something doesn't mean you have to like it, and canon (even discounting the novel) makes it pretty explicitly clear that Aeris's death sucks. While, yeah, the Lifestream is pretty chill for an afterlife and she really wants Cloud to move on and be happy without her, I don't think that the message we're supposed to take there is "death is really OK :)." In the scene just following her death, Sephiroth tries to make that pitch of returning to the planet, promised land, blah blah and Cloud tells him to shove it. he says "Aeris will no longer talk, no longer laugh, cry...... or get
angry......" Later, you get this bit:
Tifa
"I wonder what Aerith felt... when she was on that altar...?"
Cloud
"I'm sure she wanted to give her life for the planet..."
Tifa
"Really? I wonder? I don't think that's it at all."
"I think she didn't think she would die at all, but that she
planned on coming back all along."
"She always used to talk about the 'Next time'."
"She talked about the future more that any of us..."
(bawwwwwwwwwwww)
And then Aeris's novel (which has some of the parts I have trouble with, but I take it as about 60-70% canon) talks about how sad dying made Aeris. She wasn't ready! Not at all!
So in camp, while she has more time, she's going to squeeze every drop out of life that she can. Whether or not she can go back alive, she wants to have as much fun as possible. It's why she'll be a little sillier in camp than she even was in the game, why she'll be more physically forward with Zack and Cloud, and more likely to top people into doing dumb things with her. Aeris identifies as alive because she wants to and because she could never forgive herself for wasting a single day that she gets to be walking around and talking and laughing and getting angry. :(
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