The Marvels Director Used Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children as a Reference When Pitching

Fans of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, The Marvels director Nia DaCosta isn’t only among you – she used the computer-animated film as inspiration.

Speaking to IGN at a recent press junket, DaCosta revealed that she used “a couple of scenes” as a reference when she was pitching The Marvels, which hits theaters on Nov. 10.

“It’s just an amazing, amazing movie, and has really great fight scenes and has a really great ending sequence with the main character being thrown into the sky by all the other characters,” she explained. 

The Marvels Director Nia DeCosta loves Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and used it as a reference when pitching #TheMarvels pic.twitter.com/NERqWsoOtS

— IGN (@IGN) November 7, 2023

Square Enix released Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children on DVD back in 2005 and, while it got some mixed reviews at the time, it’s remained a favorite among fans of the series. As IGN wrote in our 8/10 review at the time: “There is no way around it: Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is fan service. Glorious, beautiful, well-executed fan service.”

DaCosta went on to say that she didn’t really want The Marvels “to look like a video game in the sense of what you think of when you think of a video game.” Still, as a big gamer herself (she talked about her love of Skyrim elsewhere in the interview, and most recently finished The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild), she wanted to bring the best of the medium into The Marvels.

“It’s just an amazing, amazing movie, and has really great fight scenes and has a really great ending sequence.

“Like, think about The Last of Us cutscenes, or Horizon Zero Dawn cutscenes, but it’s a very different style,” she went on. “So, for me, it was from the best kinds of games, the best sort of stories that you get, that sort of inspires me to play and I think inspires people to watch movies like this.” 

More and more news on The Marvels has continued to trickle out in the lead-up to the next entry in the MCU, with a final trailer on Monday confirming the appearance of a major character (which we won’t spoil here, but you can read the story/watch the trailer to find out). DaCosta has also commented on The Marvels being the shortest movie in the MCU, as well as the reports that she left the film during post-production.

Alex Stedman is a Senior News Editor with IGN, overseeing entertainment reporting. When she’s not writing or editing, you can find her reading fantasy novels or playing Dungeons & Dragons.