The Hero of the game. A member of the Tantalus Theater Group, a group of entertainers-thieves. Also a bit of a playboy. At the beginning of the game, they were sent to Alexandria by Lindblum's Regent Cid Fabul IX on a mission to kidnap the princess, only to get entangled in the coming war. Zidane is aware of the fact that he's an orphan, and only remembers one thing about his past: a blue light. He's always wanted to find out where he came from, though it's not his all-consuming life goal. In contrast to his previous Final Fantasy heroes, he's quite carefree and cheerful, with very little angst or existential doubt.
Anti Antichrist: Created for the sole reason to destroy all life, but was left as an infant on the very same world that he was meant to destroy. Upon learning this horrible truth from his creator, as well as having his "soul" ripped out of him, becomes a massive Heroic BSOD for our hero. Cue the Power of Friendship.
Cannot Spit It Out: His true feelings, that is. By the time he's actually fallen for Garnet, he can't bring himself to tell her.
Can't Act Perverted Toward a Love Interest: Averted hard, he constantly flirts with Garnet throughout the game. He backs off slightly after Disk 2, when he realizes he loves her.
Chivalrous Pervert: His overworld sprites even has him turning his head in the direction of passing females!
Chronic Hero Syndrome: Somewhat deconstructed, he's so used to helping other people with their problems that he doesn't know how to accept help with his own, which is why after his Heroic BSOD he brushes off his allies and tries to continue on alone.
Cultured Warrior: Because he's not just a warrior, and no, he's not just a warrior and a thief either. He's a warrior, he's a thief, and he's quite a good actor! And possibly a musician as well, considering how much he knows about music.
"Yeah. She's cute, and she's in trouble. What do I need to think about?"
Establishing Character Moment: It doesn't happen until about an hour or two into the game, but one memorable moment (which, incidentally, took place during the first instance of Zidane's leitmotif playing in the BGM) firmly establishes that Zidane isn't just a Loveable Rogue, he's also something else as well...
"Ooo, soft..."
Expy: Cheerful personality? Monkey's tail? The Messiah? Was sent from another planet to destroy this one as a child, but never went through with it? Sometimes equips a Double Weapon that's really a bladed staff? Able to access a pretty rare and powerful transformation? Sounds similar to the protagonist of a certain series.
Kidanova: Zidane being sixteen years old, his sex drive isn't out of place at all, but people not used to the Super-Deformed art style thought he was much younger.
Kid Hero: Being sixteen years old, he's one of the youngest named heroes in Final Fantasy
Lightning Bruiser: Has the highest Agility among all the characters, and has the second highest Strength. Contrast with the Fragile Speedster status of Thieves in other Final Fantasy installments.
Stepford Smiler: He's actually very insecure and lonely, having no memories of his past and no real family. The reason he's so friendly and outgoing is to conceal the fact.
Weapon Twirling: When equipped with the double bladed spear... sword... things.
Wise Beyond Their Years: Despite being only 16 and younger than the majority of Final Fantasy heroes, he's very mature and intelligent. As well, while some of the other heroes are emotionally crippled due to their self-doubt and insecurities, Zidane copes with his by acting overly friendly and cheerful.
Sorrow:How do you prove that you exist? Maybe we don't exist...
First seen going to Alexandria to see the play "I Want to be Your Canary", he soon was literally caught in with the Tantalus' escape. Vivi, like Zidane, has no memories of his past, except for being raised by a Qu (who initially wanted to make him into his meal, but fortunately changed his mind before such a thing happened). He later learns that he is one of the Black Mages, the new soldiers of the Alexandrian military.
Berserk Button: A Black Waltz was unfortunate enough to push Vivi's: a senseless slaughter of fellow Black Mages.
Black Mage: Quintessential example in looks and skills, much less in character; to put it lightly, he's not aggressive in the slightest, and has to be put under serious threat to even think of using his powers at first.
Beware the Nice Ones: Innocent, shy, and more than a little bit naive... and entirely capable of incinerating you with a thought.
Child Mage: Is about nine years old physically anyway. Chronologically he's six months old at the start of the game, making him the youngest ever playable character in any Final Fantasy game.
Cutscene Power to the Max: What happens when the above Berserk Button gets pushed? Vivi lets off a fire spell much bigger than he has access to at that point in the game.
Gameplay and Story Integration: This happens just after the battle with said button-pusher, in which he starts in Trance. This makes the battle very easy.
Nice Hat: Every Black Mage has one, but his is much cooler. Becomes even cooler in Trance.
To the point the Italian official Playstation magazine that reviewed the game, back in the day it was released, introduced us to Vivi with the caption: "Nice hat".
Parental Substitute: Vivi's adoption by Master Quan leads the Qu to become a surrogate grandfather to him. Quan teaches Vivi about how the world works, and Vivi in turn refers to him as his "Grandpa".
Parting Words Regret: Inverted; Vivi is delivering the narration at the ending because he has finally expired. It's implied that he didn't live long enough to see Zidane come back.
Perpetual Frowner: He doesn't really have a face to express himself with, but it's implied.
Eiko: Why the long face?! Vivi: Oh, my face is always like this.
Phlebotinum Rebel: Born as the prototype of a series of heartless, mindless slaughter machines, goes on to fight against his creators and enslavers, becoming a hero in the process.
Playing with Fire: His very first spell is "Fire," and he uses it quite often outside of battle- for trying to scare off Alexandrian Guards, frying Black Waltz 3 to a crisp, for melting ice walls, for cooking...
The Smart Guy: He might not be very experienced, but Vivi is surprisingly knowledgable and eloquent for his age; apparently, Quan taught him much over the course of his education.
Unstoppable Rage: His response to Black Waltz 3 obliterating a group of Black Mages.
That was more of a Tranquil Fury, given his expressionless face... or lack thereof.
Adelbert Steiner
Dilemma:Having sworn fealty, must I spend my life in servitude?
He is the captain of the only male ranks of Alexandria's army, the Knights of Pluto, and a bodyguard of the royal family. Loyal to a fault, he only reluctantly teamed up with Zidane to rescue Garnet from the Evil Forest. However, he remained hostile towards the thief and his allies (making an exception for Vivi), while refusing to believe that Queen Brahne has finally lost her mind. He later has to accept the truth, and has also learned to see Zidane as an actual comrade and (almost) friend. Has a rocky relationship with General Beatrix, although it's known that the latter may be harboring feelings for him...
Failure Knight: Literally. His platoon is the laughingstock of the Alexandrian military, his attempts to help or protect the Princess are undermined by everyone else in the cast (including the Princess herself), and he eventually watches his own beloved Queen die, hoist by her own power-hungry petard. Fortunately, once he's hit rock bottom, things start to get better.
Honor Before Reason: He refuses to travel with thieves until ordered to by Garnet (despite the dangers of traveling alone) and he refuses to believe Brahne has turned evil until after even Beatrix has accepted it.
I Gave My Word: His oath of fealty is the source of his inner conflict after Brahne turns evil.
Inspector Javert: Has a reason why he couldn't trust Zidane, at first.
Knight in Shining Armor: Subverted in that his armor's actually pretty cheap and rusty. Zidane repeatedly teases him about it early on in the game.
The Lancer: To Zidane for the first half of the game, while Zidane is mature, laid back and open-minded, Steiner is loud, duty-driven and naive. Their relationships with Vivi and Garnet also contrast, Zidane being Vivi's Big Brother Mentor and flirting with Garnet while Steiner treats Vivi as his superior and Garnet as his charge. Ultimately however they both wish to protect Garnet, even if they have different ideas on how to do it, and of the first four party members Steiner is easily the most capable after Zidane, both in-battle and when it comes to thinking on his feet.
Hello, Insert Name Here: which is why he's the only character in the entire series that the player can ever change the surname.
Also done in-universe, as Brahne needs a moment to remember his name when she orders him and Beatrix to find Garnet at the very start of the game.
Lawful Stupid: Steiner believes in Black and White Morality, so he took any instance to thumb his nose upon any member of Tantalus (especially Zidane), and he remains bullheadedly determined to return Garnet to Alexandria despite the fact that this is not only against her wishes, but against overwhelming evidence that Queen Brahne has turned evil. However, it should be noted that during said time, nobody was 100% sure that Alexandria was behind everything. Most of his Character Development revolves around him getting over this
Let's Get Dangerous: He's generally depicted as a buffoon early on in the game, but when he gets into a real fight he's actually a pretty good swordsman.
The Knights of Pluto get an LGD moment as well during the attack on Alexandria, depending on how the player assigns them. With proper leadership and a knowledge of their strengths and traits, they can execute their duties quite well.
Mighty Glacier: He's slow in both mind and body, but his swords actually hit pretty hard.
My Country, Right or Wrong: Eventually realizes he can still act on duty if he changes that duty to following the Princess' orders, not the Queen's.
Overprotective Dad: Even though he's not actually Garnet's father, he still acts like the comedic version of this trope in regards to her. He even hates the bad boy she's fallen for.
Papa Wolf: Used comedically in regards to Garnet in the first two disks. It's played much more seriously in Disk 3 when he teams up with Beatrix.
Pet the Dog: We know he's not such a total jerk when he treats Vivi nicely, even calling him "Master."
"Master" being the old fashioned term of address used when addressing young men. It's the only time we see Steiner treat anyone aside from royalty with any respect for most of the first half of the game.
Devotion:Someday I will be Queen, but I will always be myself.
The female lead of the story, and Zidane's (eventual) Love Interest. She has been aware of her mother's slow descent into madness, and seeks a way to escape her. By coincidence, the best opportunity for her to get out of Alexandria happens to be there just to kidnap her! While on the run, Zidane suggests that Garnet drop her royal bearing, and adopt an alias, to which she chose "Dagger," after Zidane's knife. As it turns out later in the game, Garnet was just an adopted child of the royal family, and is actually one of the last Summoners (along with Eiko).
Battle Couple: She and Zidane are like this at the end of the game.
Blessed with Suck: Garnet's summoning powers were a serious liability in the first and second discs; not only did they result in Garnet being chased from one end of the Mist Continent to the other by Brahne's lackeys and almost being killed when her Ediolons were forcibly removed, but the MP costs were so intensive that she couldn't even use them.
Cassandra Truth: She'd spotted Kuja and suspected him of influencing Brahne's descent into madness well before the game's events... but nobody believed her.
Girly Run: More likely girly prance, which she does while holding her hands out to the side. Come on...
The Glomp: Sees usage during the Grand Finale when Garnet dives on Zidane. It's a Call Back to Zidane's Glomp Fail at the end of the Conde Petie wedding.
Heroic BSOD: After Alexandria's destruction. It's so severe that it renders her completely mute, and even interferes with her ability to use magic in battle. (See Temporary Scrappy below.)
I Have Many Names: Goes by the nickname Dagger in an effort to keep a low profile. Her real name, as in the one she had before she was adopted into the Alexandria Royal Family, is Sarah.
Important Haircut: After finally coming to terms with her grief, she cuts her hair to above shoulder-length, symbolically casting off her sorrow in the process.
It's All My Fault: She blames herself for a lot of the destruction and suffering that occurs, even when no sane assessment of it would hold her responsible.
Power Up Letdown: Her Trance is completely useless for the first half of the game. It powers up her summons, but she doesn't have any yet (unless the player does an insane amount of level grinding).
Plucky Girl: A variant in that a lot of her pain is self-inflicted, and a large part of her character growth is realizing that not everything is her fault and she shouldn't put so much pressure on herself.
Royals Who Actually Do Something: A part of her Character Development is that as much as she wants to be this trope, most everything that she tries to do turns out badly or only succeeds due to the assistance of other characters. She learns to stop feeling guilty about it through and become determined to be a strong queen for her people.
Samaritan Syndrome: Once again, she puts far more pressure and blame on herself than anyone would reasonably expect her to.
The Smart Girl: She has all the benefits of a royal education, including knowledge about many of the locales the party visits.
Temporary Scrappy: During disk Three, she loses her voice, meaning she has about a 50% chance of actually using her magic. However, if you equip her with the Healer skill, all her attacks will heal you for a decent amount of HP.
They Call Her Dagger: She chooses the name "Dagger" for herself when Zidane tells her they can't go around calling her "Garnet" everywhere.
A dragon knight from Burmecia, the kingdom to the north of Lindblum and west of Alexandria. She left her hometown five years ago to search for her lost love Sir Fratley, who set out to hone his skills but never returned. Moving to Lindblum, she befriended Zidane and lived in the city for several years while searching for Sir Fratley. When she learns that her kingdom is being invaded by an army of mysterious wizards wearing pointy hats, she returns to try and stop the invasion, with Zidane, Vivi (and possibly Quina) accompanying her. When she learns that the invasion is being orchestrated by Kuja through Alexandria, she joins Zidane's party to put a stop to his evil.
Action Girl: Your second female party member, and one of your primary heavy-hitters.
Trauma Conga Line: She loses her kingdom, the peaceful country Cleyra she was determined to protect after the refugees escaped from the invasion, and when she finally finds her love after being gone for so long, he doesn't remember her. Ouch.
Quina Quen
Indulgence:I do what I want! You have problem?
An apprentice gourmand and blue mage who dwells in the marshes north of Lindblum. S/he belongs to the Qu Clan, a race of chubby white-skinned beings with long pink tongues whose culture centers around cooking and eating, to the point where they almost ritualize it. Quina joins Zidane's party as a means of learning more about the different cuisines of the world and honing his/her culinary skills. S/he doesn't really seem to take much notice of the larger struggle going on, but proves a faithful and helpful ally... most of the time, anyway.
Ambiguous Gender: To such extent that the narration of the game itself refers to Quina as "him/her" and "s/he". If game mechanics are counted as Word Of God though, gender-specific equipment leans toward male; on the other hand, certain translations use female pronouns.
Cutscene Incompetence: Quina is at first presented as hopelessly inept in catching frogs. Of course, once the player takes over, that can change.
Also, Limit Glove. It can be gotten as soon as Quina enters your party on Disc 1, costs 10 MP to use, and does 9999 damage, every time. As long as Quina's HP is 1 when you use it, otherwise it does nothing.
Early-Bird Cameo: You can spy Quina in the Alexandria Castle kitchens right at the beginning of the game if you know where to look when controlling Steiner.
Extreme Omnivore: Defining character trait. It's even a gameplay mechanic, as the way s/he learns his/her Blue Magic spells is eating an opponent who knows the spell.
Flat Character: Quina's master tried sending him/her on a quest for Character Development, with little success. Turns out Quina never needed it in the first place, and it was the master who needed developing.
Genius Ditz: Quina is generally pretty clueless, but s/he is a master chef, like all Qus.
Kick the Dog: Though it could be argued s/he's just too dumb to realize what s/he's doing, Quina expresses interest in eating both chocobo eggs and moogles, which is pretty harsh consider they're the Series Mascots. The chocobo egg is particularly mean as it's being cared for by Black Mages who tell him/her its mother died, but Quina is undeterred and considers the idea ridiculous.
Let's Get Dangerous: Sure, Quina's a goof. But when s/he gets into an actual fight, s/he actually turns out to be pretty good at it. If you take the time to actually train him/her and learn his/her spells, s/he is just as effective in battle as any other party member — if not more so.
Lethal Joke Character: When you first get Quina, s/he has no usable skills, a random attack damage variable, and almost no purchasable weapons. Take the time to use him/her properly, and you can kill almost any enemy (and some bosses) in one turn. In the Very Definitely Final Dungeon, as you would expect there's a lot of Demonic Spiders, but it turns out most of them are not immune to status ailments, so Quina's Mustard Bomb and Frost attacks become One-Hit KO moves for as little as 8 MP.
Too Dumb to Live: Quina is eternally clueless even when the towns around the party are being destroyed and the people are fleeing in terror, yet somehow s/he endures. Her/his ability to inexplicably survive any disaster and somehow turn up later is almost a Running Gag in and of itself.
What Happened to the Mouse?: Quina has a peculiar knack for vanishing and reappearing at the oddest times. About halfway through Disc 2 s/he takes off after Mog to try and eat her, briefly reappears to help Eiko cook, then vanishes again until Disk 3, where s/he somehow ends up in Treno for a brief run-in with Eiko, then ends up washing up on the shores of Lindblum where s/he rejoins the party. There's also no telling how s/he survived Cleyra being blown up, but a short time later s/he's back in the marsh catching frogs.
Eiko Carol
Solitude:I don't wanna be alone anymore...
A six-year old girl who lives in the ruins of the village of Madain Sari with a group of moogles. She is apparently the last human survivor of the village, with no one but the moogles for company since her grandfather died. She is forced to steal food from the dwarven village of Conde Petie to survive, and otherwise lives a lonely existence with her moogle friends. When Zidane and company pass through Conde Petie while searching for Kuja, they meet Eiko, who joins them on their quest. She develops a major crush on Zidane, and sees herself as Garnet's rival for his affections. Spunky and outgoing, Eiko is actually pretty lonely and is eager to make new friends, which leads her to join Zidane's party permanently.
The Chew Toy: not as much as Vivi, but she does have a dangling-helplessly animation that gets reused quite a bit.
Clingy Jealous Girl: To Zidane, in regards to his relationship with Garnet/Dagger.
Competence Zone: Eiko is far more capable than a six-year-old has any right to be. She organizes a band of moogles, regularly raids food from a nearby village, regularly escapes from savage monsters on her own, is familiar enough with classic literature to quote it, is extremely versed in summoner history, customs, and lore, is disciplined enough to maintain a daily religious ritual, and is a damned good summoner in her own right. And if she's one of the party members that stays behind in the Desert Palace during That One Level, she instantly takes control and leads them out of danger. Even more improbable, she's actually surprisingly knowledgeable about romance. Her attempts to woo Zidane include cooking him dinner, quoting literature, writing poetry, showing interest in his life, attempting to rescue him, outright asking him about his feelings for Garnet, and finally, attempting to hook Zidane up with his true love when all else fails. Let's face it folks — if she were older, we'd be all looking at Zidane like he's crazy.
Gets lampshaded in disc 3, when Garnet and Steiner go into a combined Heroic BSOD and Zidane puts Eiko in charge.
Improbable Age: Even from a series where the average age of the cast is fifteen, she's six!
Improbable Weapon User: While the catapult rackets she shares with Garnet are believable enough (say what?), she also uses magic flutes in battle. She can actually whack the enemy with them, but she does better when she uses them to focus her magic.
Subverted. Eiko was raised by her grandfather until a year before the game's start, and she leads the Moogles by the time you meet her, not the other way around.
Arrogance:The only dependable thing about the future is uncertainty.
A bounty hunter hired by Queen Brahne to assassinate Vivi and retrieve Garnet's pendant. Amarant has a strange code of honor, which manifests when his partner on the job takes Eiko hostage to try and get the pendant back. This prompts Amarant to betray his partner and force Zidane to fight him to get the pendant back. Amarant is shocked when Zidane wins and lets him live. Unable to comprehend Zidane's mentality, Amarant joins his quest in an attempt to understand him. At first Amarant disdains Zidane's emphasis on teamwork, but later on comes to understand the benefits of cooperation.
Combat Medic: Half of Amarant's special abilities center around hurting his enemies. The other half center around reviving his fallen allies, healing them, or allowing them to revive after they're knocked out.
Comes Great Responsibility: When he confronts the Fire Guardian, Amarant realizes that he's been wasting his power by simply seeking out people to fight, instead of finding beneficial ways to use it.
The Comically Serious: Eiko (unintentionally) uses him as her hired muscle when the gang travels to Treno. It's a pretty great sequence altogether.
The Dreaded: Despite having a price on his head, Amarant is completely at ease walking through Treno. Judging by Alleyway Jack's reaction, this is probably because all of Treno's thieves, bounty hunters and lowlifes are too scared of him to try and claim the reward.
Dub Name Change: He's called Salamander in the Japanese version.
Even Evil Has Standards: Even though he has been hired to defeat the party and get Dagger's pendant, he tells that he doesn't work together with "hostage-taking scumbags" when she kidnaps Eiko to get said pedant because that isn't a fair fight.
Funny Afro: it's really a mass of dreads, but his in-game model looks more like this. The goatee and earrings don't really help.
Honor Before Reason: He demands that Zidane kill him after losing a one-on-one duel. Not to mention that he probably would have won if only he hadn't sent Lani away and threw away their hostage.
Pet the Dog: Invoked and subverted. At one point, a Bounty Hunter tries to capture Eiko, thinking she might serve as a weakness to Amarant, his target. Amarant wasn't even present when he attempts (and failed) the stunt, so we're not even sure of how Amarant would react. It's also played straight when Amarant turns on Lani at the end of Disk 2, claiming that he refuses to work with "hostage-taking scumbags."
Don't forget his cute vignettes with Eiko in Treno and giving Vivi advice on how to avoid airsickness.
The Power of Friendship: When Zidane risks his life to save Amarant for no personal gain, Amarant gets a better understanding of what friendship actually means, to the point where he actually gets an entirely new victory pose.
Rings Of Death: Unlike most Final Fantasy ninjas, who throw shurikens at their enemies, Amarant throws chakrams instead.
Static Character: He changes his way of life (working with friends and whatnot), but his personality stays the same through everything. Zidane lampshades it in the end: "That guy will never change."
"Bwahahaha! Kuja! So you finally decided to show your girly face here! You're all that stands between me and total domination! Gehehe!"
The queen of Alexandria, the greatest country of Gaia, and Garnet's mother. Soon after the game's beginning, she starts warring against her neighbours to take over all of the world, using powerful magic no one knew she had to accomplish her goals.
Brawn Hilda: her character design was clearly inspired by this trope, even if she's not the physical type.
Death Equals Redemption: When she's dying on the beaches of the Outer Continent, Brahne realizes that she is finally free of the terrible greed that was controlling her, and makes peace with Garnet before she dies.
Royals Who Actually Do Something: Brahne deserves special mention for showing up in person every time her army conquers another country, and carrying out the eidolon summons herself. Unlike most other examples, this led to her death.
"I once killed a hundred knights single-handedly... to me, you two are nothing more than insects."
The general of Alexandria's all-female armies, Beatrix is a fabled paladin who is feared and respected all throughout the continent. However, she has a honourable heart and dislikes her queen's violent conquests.
Timed Mission: She always has two good equipment pieces to steal, the catch is getting them before she decides to deal out a Total Party Kill to end the battle.
Karma Houdini: Takes part in various despicable actions throughout the first half of the game and doesn't even get a slap on the wrist for it.
It could be easier to tolerate knowing that Queen Brahne was forcing her to behave this way in order to be her perfect general. Seeing just how evil the queen was and what lines she was willing to cross made Beatrix come back to being herself again, and she did quite alot afterwards to redeem herself.
Redemption Demotion: Mostly averted. She doesn't have nearly as much HP as a guest party member compared to when you fight her, but she is still monstrously powerful.
Sarcastic Devotee: The first sign that she's not as bad as she seems is when she notices that the Queen shows her no gratitude and favors the Black Mages and Eidolons over her number one general.
"Peace is but a shadow of death, desperate to forget its painful past... Though we hope for promising years. After shedding a thousand tears, yesterday's sorrow constantly nears. And while the moon still shines blue, by dawn, it will turn to scarlet hue!"
An effeminate, vain sorcerer who supplies Queen Brahne with Black Mages and summon magic. When not advocating world conquest, he runs his auction house in Treno and watches opera. In truth, he's gathering power to usurp Garland and conquer both Gaia and Terra. He turns against Brahne the moment she loses her usefulness to him.
Anti Anti Christ: Arguably became one in the ending of the game, as Mikoto stated that, although what Kuja did was wrong, he did nonetheless bring hope in trying to prevent people from controlling others, and hints that she's going to spread around what Kuja fought for to everyone.
Big Bad: After spending most of the game in this role, it's revealed that he was just The Dragon to the real villain, Garland... right up until the end of disc three, when he backstabs Garland and becomes a realBig Bad.
By that, it means he eventually underwent some personality changes and ended up redeeming himself. Some FF villains, if they receive any development, usually grow worse as time passes, and in the case of Sephiroth, needed more than one game to develop.
Faux Affably Evil: As poetic, sophisticated and well-groomed as he acts, he's very cruel, selfish and cunning, and starts to show his true colors on Disc 3 when things don't go just as he wanted.
Flawed Prototype: Subverted. Garland ultimately admits that Kuja is vastly more effective than he'd ever thought possible.
Freudian Excuse: So you're one of an entire race of mindless drones that were created for only one purpose and are easy to discard and replace. Oh, except you were given individuality by accident, which you're only allowed to keep based upon how useful you prove. Just keep in mind that even if you succeed at your job, you're going to be discarded and replaced while an even better version of you does what you couldn't. Oh, and when that happens, you won't get to have a soul anymore as it will be cleansed and recycled for someone else to have long after you're gone. Yeah, who can blame Kuja for being evil? Heck, in the ending, even Zidane felt sympathy for him for his reasons and says he might have done the same thing in his place.
It's All About Me: His primary justification for his omnicidal tendencies from the end of disc 3 onwards.
Kick the Dog: Snapping at the sentient Black Mages he doesn't care what their numbers are, showing no regard for their individuality and treating them the same as the mindless ones. Later when Mog tries to protect Eiko, Kuja snaps for Zorn and Thorn to kill her.
Laughing Mad: His reaction immediately after Garland tells him beyond the grave that Kuja's time of living is short.
Meaningful Name: In Hindu cosmology, Kuja is the name of Mars, the red planet, and means "born of the earth" — Terra, shown as a red planet, is Latin for earth. Mars is also the Roman god of war. All in all, Kuja's name reflects exactly what he is — a Genome created by Garland and Terra to create war and destruction on Gaia.
Minor Injury Overreaction: But not for the typical reasons. After tanking a few blasts from Bahamut, Kuja smirks until he notices that he'd gotten a cut on his forehead... and then laughs, praising the dragon for actually managing to injure him slightly.
Kuja: Blood? Ahahah! Bahamut... power, mobility... You are truly the best! You even hurt me... a little.
Redemption Equals Death: He saves the heroes from Necron, and Zidane later goes back to return the favor. When the Iifa Tree collapses around the two of them, Kuja pushes Zidane out of the way, presumably killing himself.
Xanatos Speed Chess: Kuja is a master at this. A huge departure from other Final Fantasy villains is that he is not the Big Bad, nor is his betrayal of the real Big Bad sudden and unexpected. The truth is that Garland knew Kuja was going to betray him a long time ago, and took steps to prepare for it. This surprises and scares the hell out of Kuja when he realizes it, but he revises his scheme on the fly. He then revises it again when presented with knowledge he was unaware of.
"To live is to give life meaning, yet one must take others' lives to survive... Terra's souls will sleep until they forget such nonsense. They will begin a new life in a new dimension. It's a world in which life and death become one... That is the dimension in which we are meant to live, as beings that transcend life and death!"
A powerful warlock ruling over the ancient planet of Terra from his research facility in Castle Pandemonium. He was left behind by the Terran civilisation to guard their souls and seek out a vessel that could give them a chance at new life. He has been assimilating Gaia, the main planet of the game, for centuries (if not longer), and created Kuja, Zidane, and Mikoto to serve as his primary agents for the task of wrapping the process up with a world war or two.
Artificial Human: It's rather ambiguous, but it seems more probable that he's a construct created by the Terrans rather than one of the Terrans themselves.
The Assimilator: Garland's entire goal is to assimilate the soul-cycle of Gaia to restore Terra and its people, and it's implied that this isn't the first planet he's attacked, either...
The Chessmaster: Like Kuja, he's a master strategist; much more impressively, he's behind the plot Kuja was operating in the first and second discs.
Cool Airship: The Invincible, which Garland has used to destroy entire cities, and to convert Eidolons.
Cool Pet: The Silver Dragon, which Kuja apparently borrowed for his work on Gaia, and was evidently taken back after Kuja's attempt to claim Alexander. The Dragon itself shows up in a boss fight just prior to Garland's.
Curb-Stomp Battle: When using The Invincible, Garland usually only needs to fire one shot to win a battle; in the Battle of Alexandria, he fired two- the first to kill Alexander, the second to destroy the entire city.
Emperor Scientist: He's the de facto King of Terra, and has successfully created an entire species of soulless vessels for the Terrans to inhabit, three soul-bearing operatives to do his bidding, and The Iifa tree.
Face Death with Dignity: In his final words, he explains as much about the Crystal as he can, before calmly bidding farewell to Zidane.
Graceful Loser: After being defeated, he gracefully acknowledges that Zidane has fought well. Also, after Kuja murders him and destroys Terra, Garland returns to assist Zidane on his journey through Memoria, even though Zidane's interference made said destruction possible. It's still a sensible move, considering that if Zidane had failed to make his way through Memoria, Kuja would have destroyed the entire universe.
I Regret Nothing: Just before his spirit finally passes on, Garland announces that even though he was created with only one purpose in mind, he doesn't regret having lived his life in pursuit of this goal.
Long Game: Garland's scheme has been in action for millennia, slowly assimilating the souls of Gaia without anyone ever noticing- up until Kuja got the attention of the heroes.
Luke, I Am Your Father: Technically speaking. He did create Zidane and Kuja after all. Plus, his dialogue indicates that he sees Zidane as something of a son, and not just a weapon- particularly when he's guiding them through Memoria.
The Mentor: After his death, his spirit guides Zidane and company through most of Memoria, although only Zidane can hear him.
Mind Over Matter: One of his magical specialities is to telekinetically lift an opponent into the air and slam them back into the ground — a spell almost no other enemy in the game possesses.
Not My Driver: Garland pulls one of these on Kuja when he tries to summon the Invincible during the Battle of Alexandria. Cue massive Oh Crap moment as Kuja realises that the airship isn't on autopilot anymore.
Power Floats: While taking Zidane on a tour of Pandemonium, he casually hovers across the banks of machinery that Zidane has to climb over.
Prophet Eyes: A brief glimpse of his face during the boss fight shows that Garland has these kind of eyes.
Shout Out: A living shoutout to the character of the same name from Final Fantasy I. The offhand mention that he once tried "a more direct approach" to things makes it all the more obvious.
His general look seems inspired by Darth Vader from Star Wars.
Functionally, he's similar in respects to FuSoYa from Final Fantasy IV, only where FuSoYa's methods in the integration of his kind on another planet are peaceful, Garland's are aggressive.
Shut Up, Kirk!: Close to the end of the third disc, Zidane and the other three members of the group deliver a Patrick Stewart Speech to him; Garland then demands that they put their idealism to the test- and try to lecture him again when they're on the verge of death. He promptly sics the Silver Dragon on the four of them.
The Stoic: His dialogue is generally calm and unemotional for most of the game; in fact, it's not until the end of the third disc that we even see him use an exclamation mark in his speech.
Time Abyss: Garland's true age is uncertain, but it's known that he's been alive for more than five thousand years.
Brahne's twin clown assistants. They seem to be potent, if short, magicians. When they are defeated, Kuja reveals they were never even human to begin with, and that they aren't even really twins.
Fusion Dance: Technically, it's the inversion of this trope. Zorn and Thorn are two halves of the same being, and the boss Meltigemini is their true form.
Recurring Bosses: Yes, even though the second time they're on the field, Eiko wipes the floor with them; followed by a Fusion Dance into their true form of Meltigemini.
Ambiguous Gender: Black Waltz 2. It has womanly hips and something of a bust, and the robe does resemble a Pimped Out Dress, but there's no evidence the Black Mages even have genders...
An Ice Person: Black Waltz 1's main attack is Blizzard.
Fire, Ice, Lightning: Each of the Black Mages seem be more proficient with a different one of these: Black Waltz 1 with Ice, Black Waltz 2 with Fire, and Balck Waltz 3 with Lightning.
Oh Crap: Black Waltz 3 gives a beautiful one in South gate. It has to be seen to be believed.
And without having voice acting or, yes, a face.
Playing with Fire: While not as noticable as the other Black Waltz's elemental prefernces, Black Waltz 2's most powerful and common attack is Fira, the first time you see that spell, and the only time for a while.
Pimped Out Dress: Black Waltz 2, which not only hints at a gender but is so long that her feet are never seen.
Power Floats: Black Waltz 2 never touches down, ever. Unless you beat her, of course.
Rule of Three: Lampshaded after the first fight with No. 3 - when Steiner wonders how many Waltzes there are, Zidane points out that because of Meaningful Name being in effect, there aren't any more.
With Great Power Comes Great Insanity: Its implied that one of the reasons behind Black Waltz 3's breakdown is that his magical power became too much for him to handle.
Berserk Button: Lani starts out focusing her attacks on Dagger. If you physically attack her, though, she'll fly into a rage and shift her attacks to whoever struck her.
Enemy Scan: Lani is one of the rare enemies in the Final Fantasy series where she will use Scan on your party. She changes her tactics a bit after seeing info on a party member she scanned.
Foreshadowing: You can spot her name in the Business District inn guestbook, and later on the leaderboard during the Lindblum Hunting Festival in disc 1.
Graceful Loser: Necron doesn't really mind his defeat. After all, he is eternal...
Other Characters
Tantalus
A stage troupe on the surface, Tantalus is really a band of freelance mercenaries, hired to stage the daring kidnap of Princess Garnet during their feature presentation of the world famous play "I Want To Be Your Canary".
No Name Given: The musicians. (The box office guy in Alexandria does mention that Tantalus performs "with accompaniment by Lav Layderce", which could refer to the composer, the conductor, the whole band, anything.)
Petting Zoo People: Baku and some of the musicians. Benero & Zenero resemble the blue tapir civilians despite their masks.
The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: Other than the swashbuckling kidnapping attempt that kicks off the game and the performance at the end, Tantalus doesn't really seem to do much in the way of thieving or performing. They mostly loiter around various towns and occasionally show up to be useful to their old buddy Zidane.
To be fair, they spend the first half of the game trying to depetrify Blank, but still.
Does stealing from monsters even count? What was a Mu going to do with 157 gil and a bottle of Eye Drops?
Real Men Wear Pink: pay close attention, Baku has a bright red bow in his hair.
Arguably the entire premise of Tantalus as a theater group.
Running Gag: Baku sneezing loudly every time he appears. And not in the well-known anime context of someone talking behind his back, just... so he can sneeze loudly every time he appears, pretty much.
Satisfied Street Rat: If any member of Tantalus starts telling you a fascinating sob story about their tragic childhood, stay alert and watch your wallet. These guys make no bones about loving their lifestyle.
Vanity Licence Plate: Variant: the first FMV spends a lot of time around the Prima Vista's seated-mermaid bowsprit.
What Happened to the Mouse?: keep up with Mognet and you'll get letters from Ruby all the way back in Alexandria.
Regent Cid Fabul IX
"No amount of hardship can tear our two countries apart."
The monarch of Lindblum, the only country anywhere near as powerful as Alexandria, Cid is a peaceful but proactive ruler. He hires the Tantalus bandits to kidnap Garnet, which leads directly to the beginning of the game.
Badass Mustache: immune to any amount of transformation magic (see below).
Baleful Polymorph: Transformed into an oglop (by his wife Hilda), and later, after an unsuccessful attempt for a cure, a frog. Doesn't stop him from ruling his country, though.
Part of the plot involves getting him back into human form, because being an oglop, and later a frog, messes with his mind and keeps him from exercising his full potential as an airship engineer/designer.
Really Gets Around: It's hinted that he was always a womaniser, but his wife only found out of one of his mistresses.
Royals Who Actually Do Something: He accompanies Zidane and company for part of their journey, and he also designs the airship they travel on later in the game.
In fact, he actually rescues half of the party from a deathtrap during their imprisonment in Kuja's desert castle. Personally. While still in frog-form. Later on, he helps lead the armada of airships — almost all of which he designed and his country built — against the horde of silver dragons that Kuja sent after the party en route to the final dungeon.
A former loyal servant of Queen Brahne, Dr. Tot left Alexandria years ago to do research. The heroes meet up with him again in Treno, when they need a Supersoft and a way back to Alexandria.
Eccentric Mentor: Tot's a smart guy, but get him started on a subject that interests him, and he'll fly off into his own little world.
The Last DJ: Chose to leave Alexandria when Kuja started influencing Brahne's rule.
Mr. Exposition: He provides a lot of information on the backstory of the setting and some of the characters, including the the truth behind Garnet's adoption.
Parental Substitute: Dr. Tot provides both emotional support and material aid to Garnet during Disks 2 and 3. He also helps Eiko write a love letter to Zidane.
The Smart Guy: Dr. Tot tutored a young Garnet, and is also an accomplished writer, historian and astronomer. He also apparently has some medical training, given that he mixed a potion that was meant to cure Cid of his being turned into an oglop. In fact, all it did was turn him into a frog, but in Dr. Tot's defense he wasn't sure if the remedy was going to work anyway.
Puck
A bratty Burmecian kid who's known to pop up at the most random moments, his first act of significance was making Vivi his personal Butt Monkey. Secretly the prince of Burmecia.
A Dragon Knight of Burmecia and one of the few to match Freya's level, Fratley left Burmecia in search of greater challenges... but when Freya finally found him...
Badass: Very quickly demonstrated when he makes his...
The least apathetic of the Genomes of Bran Bal, Mikoto welcomes the heroes to Terra and shows them the way to Pandemonium, Garland's fortress. She was created to be a Grim Reaper replacement to Zidane, just as Zidane was made to replace Kuja. Thus, she's the third Genome to possess a soul, and the only one left at Bran Bal.
Emotionless Girl: The reasons why are a bit ambiguous. Either Garland was going to give her a soul but never got around to it (he was waiting for Kuja to die); or he gave her a soul, and therefore she's capable of emotions, but because she grew up exclusively around other Genomes, she has no clue how to use them.
Sugar and Ice Personality: Her personality flares up however when Zidane refers to her as his little sister.
Expy: She's pretty much Rei Ayanami with a dye job and a tail implant.
Ms Exposition: Her initial role when the gang first arrives in Bran Bal.
A minor celebrity of sorts among Moogles, Stiltzkin is on a worldwide backpacking trip, bringing him conveniently to the same locations as your heroes on occasion.
The Gump: the game seems to be setting him up as this.
Perpetual Poverty: hinted at; he'll offer you items for a price to fund his trip.
Little more than a small-time crook, Alleyway Jack relies on quick schemes and staying on the move for a living. There's more to him than that, of course...
Foreshadowing: His multiple arms are a rather subtle example, given his true identity
Kick the Dog: pickpockets your characters on at least one occasion.
Leeroy Jenkins: His tough-guy act is a response to his being bullied for having four arms. But an act is all it is-he nearly craps himself with fear when he realizes that he's trying to pick a fight with Amarant. Steiner and Quina, the comic relief characters, also intimidate him at different points during the game.
