| “ | That's right. I'll let you hear my new appointment speech. ...My old man tried to control the world with money. It seems to have been working. The population thought that Shinra would protect them. Work at Shinra, get your pay. If a terrorist attacks, the Shinra army will help you. It looks perfect on the outside. But, I do things differently. I'll control the world with fear. It takes too much to do it like my old man. A little fear will control the minds of the common people. There's no reason to waste money on them. | „ |
| ~ Rufus’ Shinra’s declaration upon becoming president. |
| “ | The Lifestream courses through our planet back and forth across the borders of life and death. If that cycle is the very truth of life, then history, too, will inevitably repeat itself. So go on; bring your Jenovas and your Sephiroths. It won't matter. We'll do as life dictates and stop you every single time. | „ |
| ~ Rufus’ Shinra’s Declaration to Kadaj. |
| “ | A good son would have known. | „ |
| ~ Rufus taunting Kadaj before tossing Jenova' head off the roof. |
Rufus Shinra (in Japanese: ルーファウス神羅, Rūfausu Shinra) is a major antagonist in Final Fantasy VII. He also appears in Before Crisis -Final Fantasy VII- and Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, and is mentioned in Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII-.
He is the son of President Shinra and served as the vice president of Shinra Inc., up until his father's death at the hands of Sephiroth. Following this, he assumed full control of the company and sought out to reclaim the world, and eliminate both AVALANCE and Sephiroth.
In Japanese, he is voiced by Tōru Ōkawa in all appearances. In English, he is voiced by Wally Wingert in Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children and Josh Bowman in Final Fantasy VII Remake.
Biography[]
Background[]
Rufus Shinra born the son of President Shinra as his sole legitimate heir. He had lost his mother at a young age and lacked love from his Father who he became obsessed with impressing. One day when he was 5 years old his father would in a rare act of interacting with his son share with him the blueprints for the President's office. Rufus would ask his father why there was no escape route, worrying for his father's safety. While annoyed by his son's concern and mocking him for it he decided to have an escape chute installed into the office however he claimed he would never use it himself and that it would be for Rufus. He would mark the button for this escape route with an L for loser to mock his son if he ever tried to use it. Eventually Rufus would become Vice President of the Shinra Electric Company and would grow to hate his father and seek to overthrow him
Time with Avalanche[]
In a scheme to usurp his father Rufus would act as the informant and funder of the Echo Terrorist Origination, Avalanche. He would support them to use them to weaken his father's image and authority via an attack on Midgar, an attempted assassination of his father and attempting to trick his father into thinking Verdot, the leader of the Turks was the mole for Avalanche . Rufus would then conspire with Avalanche to sacrifice their base in Wutai to fake the deaths of all the Avalanche's leader's so they could continue their plans in secret. Rufus would then have the Rocket launch in Rocket Town sabotaged to make his father look bad and state he would better fit to lead to begin swaying the council to his side. However, he would eventually be caught by the Turk's in Corel and betrayed by Avalanche and forced under house arrest for his treason against his father. He would remain in this state for 4 years until Verdot betrayed Shinra to rescue his Daughter Elfe, the leader of Avalanche . Seeing the value in the remaining Turk's he would make a deal with Tseng (Remake) In return for telling him where Verdot was and allowing them to save him and the world they would swear loyalty to him exclusively to him. Rufus would then be released and would ensure the Turk's would not be executed for treason by his father ensuring they would be able to serve him
Ascendancy and Sephiroth[]
Upon his father' assassination at the hands of Sephiroth (Final Fantasy) Rufus would arrive via Helicopter and confront Cloud and the new Avalanche. After proclaiming his desire to fulfill his father's dream yet surpass him by ruling the world through fear rather than money he would do battle with Cloud before escaping via his Helicopter. Rufus would then be officially inaugurated as the company's new President at his Coronation Ceremony in Junon. After that he would use the Highwind to travel to Rocket Town to use Cid's Tiny Bronco to track down Sephiroth although it would end up being Stolen by Avalanche. Despite this he would end up reaching the Northern Crater thinking it was the Promised Land only to be told by Professor Hojo that it was not the Promised Land and would witness Cloud giving Sephiroth the Black Materia and the Weapon's being unleashed. He would then flee with Avalanche on the Highwind requesting them to tell him what was going on. After some days of having his forces fight of the Weapons and seeing the Meteor approach the Planet, he decided to arrange a public execution of Barret and Tifa to calm the populace down. Said execution would be interrupted however by the arrival of the Sapphire Weapon in Junon which forced Rufus to use the Sister Ray cannon to destroy it, although it caused Barret and TIfa to escape in the chaos. Rufus would then plot a plan to destroy the Meteor and Sephiroth attempting to gather Huge Materia and put in a Rocket Ship and ram it into the Meteor to destroy it. This plan would fail however thanks to Avalanche's interference forcing Rufus to move to Plan B, kill Sephiroth. He had the Sister Ray Cannon moved to Midgar to have the Make reactors their power the cannon up enough to give it enough juice to fire at the Northern Crater and kill Sephiroth. The Cannon would fire and would successfully destroy Diamond Weapon and the Barrier at the Northern Crater. However, before it was destroyed the Diamond Weapon fired off one last barrage that hit the Shinra Building Rufus was in, blowing it up.
Near death Experience and Geostigma[]
Rufus would escape the building before it blew up thanks the escape chute his father had installed for him all those years ago allowing him to land in a safety room which he would get out of thanks to putting in the correct password, his birthday. He would then be rescued by his Turks and taken to Kalm to recover from his injuries. After Meteor's and Sephiroth's destruction Rufus would plan on helping rebuild the world but on a day his Turks were not present he was attacked by a mob led by an ex-military man named Mutten. Rufus would be able to bargain for his life by pointing out this man had not plan to ensure the future of his people and only he had the plans and means to keep people safe and form a reconstruction plan which had the mob take him prisoner instead of killing him. Rufus would keep himself alive by only giving select info away, but things would go south when in a disagreement Mutten would be killed by one of his own men before that man was killed by a doctor named Kilmister who would capture Rufus and bring him to secluded cave treating victims of the Geostigma disease. Rufus would discover this man used to work for Professor Hojo and wanted to use Rufus to find Jenova. He also found out upon seeing dying old woman named Pamela suffering and asking that Killmister give her his medicine that he had no cure and rather he was using drugs to ease the pain but was also keeping drugs for himself to use any abuse. Disgusted but seeing a chance to manipulate the evil Doctor Rufus offered to give him access to more Drugs if he entered contact with the Turks, which would allow for Rufus' rescue. This would work and Killmister would leave however he would be gone for a week and the cave would begin to flood. Rufus desperate to keep himself and the patients alive formed makeshift rafts to keep them afloat so they could survive until help came. However, Rufus came close to death as the Cave flooded Rufus would give into despair as he thought he would die allowing the Geostigmga virus to infect him. Rufus and two other patients, Judd and Pamela would survive and be rescued by the returning Killmister. Much to their Shock the old woman Pamlea would be killed by Killmister though he would then be choked out by the arriving Turks.
Rufus would then prevent Judd from killing Killmister for the time being as he needed him and relocated to a lodge, he made into a treatment center for people suffering from the virus like himself and had Killmister research a cure. He would then a Monument constructed in the new city Edge supposably honoring the planet fighting back against Meteor though secretly using it to have Shinra make a stake to claim the city for themselves and maintain power. After two years Killmister had made no progress on a cure but had deduced remnants of Sephiroth were responsible for the disease and were searching for his legacy. When Killmister made it clear he wanted to find Jenova's remains not to cure anyone but to fuel his own mad designs Rufus had him killed by Judd, the patient upset by the death of the old lady. Rufus would then task Tseng and the Turks with finding Jenova's remains to keep it from falling out of the wrong hands. He would then name the Lodge he was staying at Healen Lodge to emphasize his desire to heal the world.
Family Reunion and Advent Children[]
Rufus would be informed by Reno (Final Fantasy VII Remake) that he had a half-brother named Evan Townshend. Rufus would then have the Turks bring him to the lodge mainly so Reno would stop bringing up the fact he had a half-brother. Upon meeting him Rufus would be amused to learn they were similar in certain ways before and explosion went off from Evan's friends arriving to free a friend of theirs who stole medicine. Rufus realizing the Turks would kill them all decided to subtly push his brother into taking him as a hostage to ensure he and his friends got away before giving him his gun to ensure his safety. Later on, Rufus would find out that Evan and his friend Kyrie's path to find Evan's mother would lead them to potentially finding Jenova so he ordered the Turks to accompany them to find Jenova. He would find out about the remnants known as Kadaj and how he too was searching for Sephiroth. Eventually he would locate Jenova's head at the northern Crater and have Elena and Tseng retrieve it although they would come under attack by Kadaj, Loz, and Yazoo, the remnants of Sephiroth which resulted in two's capture and Rufus, Reno, and Rude barely escaping with their lives. Rufus would then take advantage of faking the degree of his illness by staying wheelchair bound on purpose and hiding the Jenova Head under his chair. He would then confront Cloud at Heathen Lodge and attempt to convince him to help them defeat the Remnants and explained to him that the Geostigma was Sephiroth's doing beyond the grave and that he was doing all this to help heal the world. Rufus nearly got Cloud to help him by bringing up how Cloud wanted the children of this city to smile again but this was ruined by Reno who brought up restoring Shinra causing Cloud to leave much to Rufus' annoyance. Rufus would then come under attack by Kadaj who wanted to know where Jenova was with Rufus lying that he had lost her while he was trying to get away in the Helicopter. Kadaj would then reveal he had tortured Tseng and Elena much the displeasure of Rufus and revealed his plan to bring about a true Reunion using Jenova to bring back Sephiroth. Rufus would then be brought to the City of Edge where Kadaj falsely believing Jenova to be hidden in the monument Rufus made. The two would then debate the nature of life with Rufus declaring that he will ensure they stop Kadaj because it is what life dictates. After Kadaj summoned Bahamut SIN during his moment of triumph Rufus would get up out of his chair and reveal he had the head of Jenova the whole time before chucking the head off the building. He would then Dodge Kadaj's attempt to kill him by jumping off the roof and shot the canister holding the head in midair damaging it. He was saved by the returning Tseng and Elena who along with the rest of the Turks he ordered to back up Cloud in defeating Kadaj. Rufus would then be seen being healed from his Geostigma by Aerith's magic rain after Kadaj and Sephiroth were defeated.
Aftermath and World Regenesis Organization[]
Afterwards he would get an invitation to his brother Evan's birthday but would decline saying he was busy but did remark he did not envy his brother at all, echoing his own brothers' words about him. He is implied to have secretly helped fund Reeve's World Regenesis Organization to continue to heal the world even after Geostigma was cured.
Other Media[]
Super Smash Bros.[]
In Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Rufus Shinra appears in a spirit (alongside the Turks) introduced in Sephiroth's DLC spirit board. An Ace-level Support-type spirit, it grants the user a "trade-off ability" on use. In their spirit battle, the player must fight one Mii Brawler, one Mii Swordfighter, two Mii Gunners, and one Robin on the Battlefield form of Fourside, with explosive items spawning often and Robin starting off the fight with a Steel Diver.
Trivia[]
- The name "Shinra" was, according to game director Yoshinori Kitase, derived from the Japanese word for "myth" (神話, shinwa) as it reflected Shinra's desire to control everything and become god. "Rufus" was a name originating from Latin which roughly translated to "red-haired".
External Links[]
- Rufus Shinra on the Final Fantasy Wiki
- Rufus Shinra on the Magnificent Baddie Wiki
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 Villains
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