There are plenty of memorable events that have happened in the Final Fantasy series. What makes them memorable are the characters that make it happen. Whether they’re saving their friends, confronting their enemies, or just goofing around, there are things fans remember.
But Final Fantasy isn’t without its dark and disturbing moments. Some heroes find out there are some dark secrets in their pasts that make them doubt themselves. The villains are evil, but the stories behind some of them are sometimes tragic and show that not all heroes are exactly heroic. If anything, these disturbing things that happen make the games all the more memorable.
10 Prompto Finds Out The Truth About Himself
Episode Prompto delved deep into Prompto’s past and revealed his origins, which left the hero pretty disturbed and having an existential crisis. He learned that he was created in a lab and a clone of Verstael Besithia, his creator. Prompto finds out that MTs are created from daemonified human clones. Naturally, Prompto was horrified to learn that he was not only a clone but also created to destroy Lucis and be an enemy of his best friend Noctis.
Seeing the clones was pretty disturbing and a little reminiscent of Final Fantasy 7’s JENOVA experiments. Plus, Verstael might remind some fans of Professor Hojo from Final Fantasy 7, but with the aesthetic of Garland from Final Fantasy 9.
9 Kefka Poisons An Entire Town
Kefka is a pretty disturbing individual and one of the most terrifying villains in the Final Fantasy series. He poisoned the water system running through the Doma Kingdom, which resulted in almost killing all of Doma’s people. Among the ones that died from this were Cyan’s wife and young son.
The insane clown felt no remorse and poisoned the town as a means to an easy victory even though he was ordered not to do anything inhumane. Before putting the poison in the river, Kefka even laughed and told Sabin and Shadow that nothing is better than "music composed of hundreds of voices screaming in unison."
8 Don Corneo Picking A "Bride"
Final Fantasy 7 has plenty of disturbing moments throughout the entire series, but Don Corneo is in a league of his own. He has women throughout Midgar collected every night to audition to be his “bride” for the night. Any bride that is too defiant towards him gets fed to the monsters that he keeps as pets. Though he doesn’t seem to mind a little defiance as shown if he selects Cloud as his bride.
He’s willing to kidnap women as shown when he managed to kidnap both Elena and Yuffie in Wutai. He might not be the evilest villain in Final Fantasy 7, but his overall character is still pretty disturbing.
7 The Whole JENOVA Project
Fans of Final Fantasy 7 could tell Sephiroth was pretty special early on due to his insane strength and being the strongest SOLDIER. However, Sephiroth learned what exactly made him special and the truth is pretty disturbing. Lucrecia Crescent, his birth mother, volunteered for Hojo's experiment and was injected with Jenova Cells while he was a fetus. Upon learning the truth of his origins, Sephiroth went on a rampage and burned down the village of Nibelheim.
The whole project began as a way for Shinra to find more mako and believed Hojo’s experiments would be the key to finding it through Sephiroth. Overall, it’s disturbing that various people, including Zack Fair and Cloud Strife, suffered through experiments that Hojo put them through. One of the more disturbing experiments is the Makonoids, who were once human but mutated from the high concentrations of mako energy that Hojo exposed them to.
6 Ardyn's Backstory Showed He Was A Sacrificial Lamb To The Gods
It’s pretty easy to hate Ardyn if fans only played Final Fantasy 15, but Episode Ardyn showed that he wasn’t always a bad guy. He is the firstborn son of his family and was destined to be the first Lucian king. His brother Somnus learned that Ardyn would be king so he persecuted and painted him as a monster that was unfit to rule. When the Crystal rejected Ardyn because of the Starscourge in his body, Somnus executed him.
Near the end of Episode Ardyn, he learns that his purpose is to cover the world in darkness just so Noctis can kill him and bring light to the world. If he tries to reject his fate, he is tortured by Bahamut to submit. It’s sad that his life took a tragic turn, but disturbing to know that the Astrals played a huge part in it. Players got to see Ardyn go from an optimistic and idealistic man to becoming a broken man full of hatred for the Lucis bloodline, the world, and the gods.
5 Zidane's Preordained Life
Zidane Tribal stands out as one of the most cheerful main heroes in the Final Fantasy series, but this almost wasn’t the case. He was created by Garland to be an Angel of Death much like the main antagonist, Kuja. The goal was for Zidane to take Kuja’s place and incite war on Gaia so Garland could harvest the souls. Garland purposely created Zidane as a baby so he could learn complex emotions and gain the power of Trance just so Zidane could cause destruction.
It's disturbing to know that Garland was grooming a young Zidane to become his perfect Angel of Death. Luckily for fans, Kuja deposited a four-year-old Zidane on Gaia and he was found by Baku and raised in a tough, but loving family. Still, it’s unnerving to know that Zidane could’ve easily been an even greater threat than Kuja.
4 Edge's Parents Are Turned Into Chimeras
They don’t appear for long, but fans of Final Fantasy 4 know about the disturbing tragedy that is Edge’s parents. The King and Queen of Eblan were captured by Dr. Lugae and experimented on by him. This resulted in both of them turning into horrific chimera monsters that attacked Edge and the party. Both of them regain their senses and use their final moments to tell Edge and the group that they have to kill themselves so they don’t die as monsters.
It’s sad and disturbing to think that their last moments as full humans were most likely full of pain and suffering because of the experiments they went through. Dr. Lugae enjoyed seeing his victims suffer so much that even Rubicante found him disturbing and was disgusted with his experiments.
3 The Lies And Hypocrisy Of Yevon Revealed
Yevon is the most popular religion in the world of Spira, and it’s pretty strict in its teachings. Machina is banned, which causes most of Spira to outcast the Al Bhed and call them heretics, some even believing that they’re the cause of Sin’s creation. The religion itself is almost cult-like and believes their way of life is the only way to live.
Tidus and the others eventually learn of the secrets Yevon had behind closed doors and how corrupted it was. Even after the corruption was revealed, New Yevon in Final Fantasy 10-2 continued concealing secrets like Vegnagun from the world.
2 Squall's Interrogation
If seeing Squall get impaled by Edea’s Ice Strike wasn’t enough to make fans want to look away, then his interrogation will. After the fight with Edea, Squall and the party are taken prisoner and placed in D-District Prison. Squall is separated from the group and he’s tortured by Seifer, who is being manipulated by Edea (who is being controlled by Ultimecia).
Seifer and Squall already had a rivalry and literally scarred each other from it, but this was a little too far. Watching Seifer willingly torture Squall was pretty dark and disturbing to witness. It’s even more disturbing to watch when fans remember that Squall and Seifer are still technically teenagers, being 17 and 18, and are quite young.
1 The Events At The Den Of Woe
One of the most disturbing events to ever happen in the series. The Den of Woe was the place where Shuyin’s spirit stayed for 1,000 years after he was killed along with his lover, Lenne. Because he is unsent, his spirit infected the pyreflies with his anger. During the final test for the Crimson Squad, Shuyin possesses the candidates and makes them kill each other.
The only survivors were Nooj, Baralai, Gippal, and Paine, but Shuyin secretly hid inside Nooj after this. He forced Nooj to shoot his allies after all of them managed to escape. What made this disturbing was Shuyin’s lack of remorse for causing others to kill each other and even seemed to enjoy it.