I was ready to not be impressed by this anime, and not let the hype get into my head.
I failed.
Miserably.
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, along with Attack on Titan and Death Note, is one of the most positively and highly praised anime of all time. I had already watched Attack on Titan and Death Note, and now I was left with this one.
The first few episodes didn't really impress me all that much. That is, considering I had such high standards due to the immense amount of praise this anime gets. In the back of my head, I thought, this will not be anywhere near as good as Attack on Titan, for example. It's lackluster. I had this thought process, but it didn't last long, and it changed once I saw the episode which showed the potential horrors of alchemy by having a little girl and a dog become one being. It was disturbing and emotional, but at this point, I was captivated, and sensed the show was only beginning to get dark.
I watched the upcoming episodes with more of an open mind, waiting to be blown away, and indeed I was. We slowly get introduced to the main players of the show, and get teased of the overall conflict yet to come.
The seven deadly sins are represented through 7 of the antagonists of the show, and each represented their trope fairly well and were interesting to watch. My least favorite out of all the personalities was Sloth, whom I often overlooked and even forgot he was one of the deadly sins. I thoroughly enjoyed his fight against the Armstrong siblings though.
Lust, I feel could've gotten a little bit more development and maybe a couple more episodes for her to shine. I felt she was killed off a bit early, especially considering there were many teases of her mysterious and vindictive character through out the first 20 episodes or so. She could've been an even bigger villain, but in terms of her actual send off episode, I have no complaints. In fact, that same episode is where I was most convinced that this anime was pretty freaking good, and it's probably gonna get better. That was my favorite episode at the time, and it was just so perfectly crafted and epic. The way Roy Mustang, one of the best characters in the show, handled Lust was so disturbing yet encaptivating, which is why I loved it.
From this point forward, things were getting better indeed. Envy, in my opinion, was one of the most, if not, the most evil sin in this anime. I just found too many moments where he was absolutely ruthless and lacked any general sympathetic emotions towards anyone. He was the one that pulled the trigger on the little kid, and smiled about it after all. If you rewatch the anime, or you may know already, some of his lines are brutal and cold, and might make you shutter a bit. He's that evil. I mean, they all are in their own ways, but him more than anyone in my opinion.
Gluttony was a very humorous addition, and he didn't really give much else other than that, but I enjoyed his character. Greed was just cool at first, but he got even cooler once Ling got involved with his body. I liked the internal battle happening between the two characters inside the body. Of course, by the end, he had a very emotional send off, seemingly learning more to himself than just being selfish and greedy, as his name suggests. The development up to that point, was absolutely beautiful.
Then there was Wrath. A character that many love, myself included. He was calm, yet his presence always made me think, yup, something's gonna go down. The more deeper into the show I got, the more his true self came to light; a true bad***. One plot twist that came about, was the fact that his "son" turned out to be a homunculus himself, Pride. I must say, this kid was annoying. I mean, really annoying. There were so many instances where I thought he'd finally be gone and killed, but they managed to keep him alive every time. I will applaud the creators and writers though, because they truly made me hate an antagonist and root for the heroes, which is typically very hard to do considering these days, people wanna root for the villain instead.
Those were only the seven deadly sins. There were of course many other characters, too many to count, but they were all unique and each had their own purpose to be fulfilled through out the show. I loved Winry especially for her down to earth personality and how she really cared for Edward and Alphonse. It was quite funny every time Edward had to crawl back to her to fix his arm. Speaking of which, their relationship was cute. It added another layer between both of their characters, and gave the audience something to root for that didn't involve all of the conflict with alchemy or any of that chaotic world. I also loved though, how she eventually found her way to the main plot, and was face to face with Scar, who killed her parents.
The anime did a very well job positioning Edward and Aphonse as the main characters with a story that went beyond them just being brothers fighting for the military. Edward wanted to help Alphonse get his body back, after being bonded to the suit of armor. The anime was able to perfectly craft a story around that, amongst all of the other chaotic subplots and terror between the deadly sins and possibly the end of the world. Every time Edward entered the portal, we got new details of the possibility of Alphonse obtaining his body. It lead up to the amazing scene where alphonse entered and saw his own fragile body. It was quite powerful seeing him reject it in favor of saving others before he essentially saved himself. This was towards the end, which helped Edward in his final battle against "God" himself. Speaking of the end...
Wow, what a phenomenal climax to this anime. It was a climax that lasted a good 20-25 episodes or so, starting from when the "Promised Day" was mentioned. At this point in the story, everything was coming together and each plot point perfectly found its way to an incoming solution. The fights, the emotions, everything was woven together for the climax. Father and Hohenheim came to a head, Scar and the Fuhrer had the fight I had been anticipating for a while, the deaths of the homunculi with each one having its own meaning and power to it, and then of course, father becoming God. Holy crap, I have never seen any show even attempt something like this in my life, but it was perfect. The moment everyone's body fell to the ground, and the entire city was under the transmutation circle, was the moment I knew things were gonna get even more real than they already were. Not only that, but I couldn't make out in my head how exactly the protagonists would triumph over this and find a way to "victory," in a sense. Also, I knew, this anime was one of my favorites at this point, and was greatly contemplating if it indeed was my all time favorite.
As you can tell by this review, this anime is a pure work of art and was a thrill to watch. I got attached to the characters, I was rooting for the protagonists, I was filled with emotions from even the "bad guys" themselves, and overall, was left with the impression: Holy Sh*t. If I could describe it, the anime was so tense, once I finished with the very last episode, I felt I could finally breathe and relax my muscles. I was that much glued and invested.
Fullmetal Alchemist gets a solid 11 out of 10 possible points by me, that's for sure. Though, with all of this positivity in the air, it still remains my second most favorite anime. I considered it for the top spot, but I just couldn't. What's my number one? Hmmm.....
Until next time! Thank you for reading! :)
I failed.
Miserably.
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood, along with Attack on Titan and Death Note, is one of the most positively and highly praised anime of all time. I had already watched Attack on Titan and Death Note, and now I was left with this one.
The first few episodes didn't really impress me all that much. That is, considering I had such high standards due to the immense amount of praise this anime gets. In the back of my head, I thought, this will not be anywhere near as good as Attack on Titan, for example. It's lackluster. I had this thought process, but it didn't last long, and it changed once I saw the episode which showed the potential horrors of alchemy by having a little girl and a dog become one being. It was disturbing and emotional, but at this point, I was captivated, and sensed the show was only beginning to get dark.
I watched the upcoming episodes with more of an open mind, waiting to be blown away, and indeed I was. We slowly get introduced to the main players of the show, and get teased of the overall conflict yet to come.
The seven deadly sins are represented through 7 of the antagonists of the show, and each represented their trope fairly well and were interesting to watch. My least favorite out of all the personalities was Sloth, whom I often overlooked and even forgot he was one of the deadly sins. I thoroughly enjoyed his fight against the Armstrong siblings though.
Lust, I feel could've gotten a little bit more development and maybe a couple more episodes for her to shine. I felt she was killed off a bit early, especially considering there were many teases of her mysterious and vindictive character through out the first 20 episodes or so. She could've been an even bigger villain, but in terms of her actual send off episode, I have no complaints. In fact, that same episode is where I was most convinced that this anime was pretty freaking good, and it's probably gonna get better. That was my favorite episode at the time, and it was just so perfectly crafted and epic. The way Roy Mustang, one of the best characters in the show, handled Lust was so disturbing yet encaptivating, which is why I loved it.
From this point forward, things were getting better indeed. Envy, in my opinion, was one of the most, if not, the most evil sin in this anime. I just found too many moments where he was absolutely ruthless and lacked any general sympathetic emotions towards anyone. He was the one that pulled the trigger on the little kid, and smiled about it after all. If you rewatch the anime, or you may know already, some of his lines are brutal and cold, and might make you shutter a bit. He's that evil. I mean, they all are in their own ways, but him more than anyone in my opinion.
Gluttony was a very humorous addition, and he didn't really give much else other than that, but I enjoyed his character. Greed was just cool at first, but he got even cooler once Ling got involved with his body. I liked the internal battle happening between the two characters inside the body. Of course, by the end, he had a very emotional send off, seemingly learning more to himself than just being selfish and greedy, as his name suggests. The development up to that point, was absolutely beautiful.
Then there was Wrath. A character that many love, myself included. He was calm, yet his presence always made me think, yup, something's gonna go down. The more deeper into the show I got, the more his true self came to light; a true bad***. One plot twist that came about, was the fact that his "son" turned out to be a homunculus himself, Pride. I must say, this kid was annoying. I mean, really annoying. There were so many instances where I thought he'd finally be gone and killed, but they managed to keep him alive every time. I will applaud the creators and writers though, because they truly made me hate an antagonist and root for the heroes, which is typically very hard to do considering these days, people wanna root for the villain instead.
Those were only the seven deadly sins. There were of course many other characters, too many to count, but they were all unique and each had their own purpose to be fulfilled through out the show. I loved Winry especially for her down to earth personality and how she really cared for Edward and Alphonse. It was quite funny every time Edward had to crawl back to her to fix his arm. Speaking of which, their relationship was cute. It added another layer between both of their characters, and gave the audience something to root for that didn't involve all of the conflict with alchemy or any of that chaotic world. I also loved though, how she eventually found her way to the main plot, and was face to face with Scar, who killed her parents.
The anime did a very well job positioning Edward and Aphonse as the main characters with a story that went beyond them just being brothers fighting for the military. Edward wanted to help Alphonse get his body back, after being bonded to the suit of armor. The anime was able to perfectly craft a story around that, amongst all of the other chaotic subplots and terror between the deadly sins and possibly the end of the world. Every time Edward entered the portal, we got new details of the possibility of Alphonse obtaining his body. It lead up to the amazing scene where alphonse entered and saw his own fragile body. It was quite powerful seeing him reject it in favor of saving others before he essentially saved himself. This was towards the end, which helped Edward in his final battle against "God" himself. Speaking of the end...
Wow, what a phenomenal climax to this anime. It was a climax that lasted a good 20-25 episodes or so, starting from when the "Promised Day" was mentioned. At this point in the story, everything was coming together and each plot point perfectly found its way to an incoming solution. The fights, the emotions, everything was woven together for the climax. Father and Hohenheim came to a head, Scar and the Fuhrer had the fight I had been anticipating for a while, the deaths of the homunculi with each one having its own meaning and power to it, and then of course, father becoming God. Holy crap, I have never seen any show even attempt something like this in my life, but it was perfect. The moment everyone's body fell to the ground, and the entire city was under the transmutation circle, was the moment I knew things were gonna get even more real than they already were. Not only that, but I couldn't make out in my head how exactly the protagonists would triumph over this and find a way to "victory," in a sense. Also, I knew, this anime was one of my favorites at this point, and was greatly contemplating if it indeed was my all time favorite.
As you can tell by this review, this anime is a pure work of art and was a thrill to watch. I got attached to the characters, I was rooting for the protagonists, I was filled with emotions from even the "bad guys" themselves, and overall, was left with the impression: Holy Sh*t. If I could describe it, the anime was so tense, once I finished with the very last episode, I felt I could finally breathe and relax my muscles. I was that much glued and invested.
Fullmetal Alchemist gets a solid 11 out of 10 possible points by me, that's for sure. Though, with all of this positivity in the air, it still remains my second most favorite anime. I considered it for the top spot, but I just couldn't. What's my number one? Hmmm.....
Until next time! Thank you for reading! :)
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