Final Fantasy: 25 Greatest Summons

Alexander the Great was anything but holy, given that the Macedonian general conquered almost the entire extent of the world known to him in the third century BC, but his name has prevailed across the millennia since and has been bestowed on everybody from the writer of this article to Final Fantasy’s iconic holy elemental summon.

Depicted as a robotic fortress in all of his appearances, Alexander was the last of the series’ ‘core’ summons to show up, first appearing in VI before recurring in VII and VIII, standing out in each of these for a summon sequence comparable only to his most upper echelon counterparts in terms of its destructiveness.

Few scenes in the entire series can top the epic encounter between Alexander, emerging as the protector of Alexandria when called upon by Garnet and Eiko, and the Kuja-controlled Bahamut in IX.

Emerging as the Kingdom’s castle, complete with angelic wings, Alexander’s appearance is nothing less than incredible and his demise (meaning that he can never actually be summoned in battle as a result) is tragic and lives long in the memory.

Alexander’s appearances have been somewhat sporadic in the main series since, appearing as either a summon (XI, XIII), a raid boss (XIV) or not at all (X, XV), though he did crop up in a memorable role in Type-0 to remind players of why his holy judgment is so renowned.