The first images of Shuyin drew my attention since the moment I saw them. His appearance raised a lot of questions; mainly due to his similarity with Tidus. Indeed, at first the blond haired guy shown with Yuna was thought to be Tidus, without a shadow of doubt. Once it was discovered he wasn’t actually Tidus, new questions popped up: was Shuyin a clone, was he a dream of Yuna, why Shuyin and Tidus were so alike and so on. Shuyin seemed to be an intriguing character right from the start.

While I usually prefer the bad guys over the good ones, with the various Final Fantasies things has always been different. Save for Seifer Almasy of Final Fantasy VIII, the Turks of Final Fantasy VII and maybe Kuja of Final Fantasy IX, I didn’t like any of the Final Fantasy villains. First of all, Shuyin’s background story is a lot deeper than the story of the other Final Fantasy villains (see Necron or Ultimecia). Actually Shuyin is probably the most tragic villain out of all the various Final Fantasy villains to the extent that it is possible to sympathize with him. While he is an antagonist, it is so touching when he and Lenne are finally reunited. After he went through one thousand years of sufferings, it was good to see him happy again, together with the person he cared the most for.

People usually try to save evil characters by passing them at misunderstood. I wouldn’t normally do that since I like villains precisely because of their deviated behaviour, but Shuyin *is* actually misunderstood.

Pre-war Shuyin was a successful blitzball player, deeply in love with Lenne. With the arrival of the war, he couldn’t accept her approaching death and tried to save her. After their death, all his actions were driven by his desire to be with Lenne. Shuyin never stopped looking for Lenne and his plan to blow up Spira was only his last hope to reunite with her. Luckily, thanks to Yuna’s intervention, Lenne was able to talk with Shuyin before the situation worsened and the two of them were finally able to be together.