#fma criticism

[randombook4idk]

ever had that piece of media you like but as you go back and engage with it again, it starts leaving an odd taste in your mouth?

you don't hate it, you still like it...but you don't look at it the same way you used to.

[mostredactedbracket]

BIGGEST RISK TO NATIONAL SECURITY BRACKET FINAL ROUND

Ed Elric- child soldier uncovers national conspiracy and aids rebellion/government takeover

Jester Lavorre- involved in several wars on the side of herself and her friends, started a cult, tricked fairytale tricksters

Monkey D Luffy- pirate captain tries to find world government's biggest secret and exposes/stops all their bullshit along the way

[purpledemonlilyposting]

Anyway now that Curly has had their dopamine hit back to Lily

Lily the original Fullmetal Alchemist manga was written and drawn by Hiromu Arakawa, a woman, and features many strong, well-written, heroic female characters.

Riza Hawkeye

Izumi Curtis

Winry Rockbell

Pinako Rockbell

Mei Chang

Paninya

and of course Olivier Mira fuckin' Armstrong

But yeah maybe you should stick to your shows for 4 year olds like Hamtaro instead.

[tourneys-by-me]

Round 4 - Pyromancy (fire) 1/2

Propaganda under the cut (beware of potential spoilers!!)

Caleb:

*slaps roof of Bren "Caleb Widowgast" Aldric Ermendrud* this bad boy can fit so much trauma inside. He became a child soldier, was forced to burn his parents alive, and then got stranded in a mental institution for a decade or so. He still has PTSD when killing people with fire. Does that keep Caleb from ever using fire magic again? By the Traveller, I wish it would. He's... very good with it.

Roy:

He is also called the Flame Alchemist and fire is his big thing. While he can do other alchemy as well I only remember him doing that once and it pales in comparison to his fire. He technically doesn’t manipulate fire directly, but rather the air, however, he seems to exclusively use this to turn the air flammable and set things (and people) on fire. It is the only way we ever see him use that power. Frankly, I think that makes him much more of a pyromancer than an aeromancer. After all, he is called the Flame Alchemist, not the Air Alchemist and reliant on fire to the point where he is callled useless on rainy days. Now onto the fire itself (Warning, some spoilers for Fullmetal Alchemist, particularly Brotherhood and the manga) Mustang has a ludicrous amount of power and a terrifying level of control. He is capable of setting a regenerating monster on fire until it is unable to regenerate anymore and actually dies. And he doesn’t do this just once, but twice. Additionally, he has incredible tight control over his fire, to the point where he can literally burn someones tongue out or make their eyeballs boil. Mustangs fire is terrifying and as long as he has a circle to manipulate the air and something to create a spark with he is perhaps THE most dangerous alchemist, only rivaled by those using philosophers stones to enhance their alchemy. Even flooding a room with water won’t stop him, as he simply turns the water into hydrogen gas and then throws a spark in to turn everything in that room into a charred smear on the ground. This doesn’t work with rain, but regular water? Doom. Fire is Mustangs signature move and he is, fortunately, the only one who knows how to do it. So, vote for the Guy who incinerates immortal monsters with a snap of his fingers.

[smalltowncryptidfucker]

I was…… scrolling through pinterest, and my brain made a connection that changed me as a person.

Edward and Little My are the exact same character, but in different fonts. They are both tiny, high energy, like committing acts of dubious morality/legality, and they have a softspoken younger brother who is taller than them. Bless 🙏

[sickviking-fr]

With the attention Disney is getting recently, a resurgence of posts bemoaning their live action remakes and a return of The Muppet Post, I feel the time is right to share again my idea for a Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood live action remake featuring:

Lust, played by Miss Piggy

Envy, played by Pepe the Prawn

Pride, played by Fozzie Bear

Greed, played by Rizzo the Rat

Father (and Van Hohenheim) played by Sam the Eagle

Gluttony, played by The Swedish Chef

Sloth, played by Sweetums

Wrath, aka Fuhrer King Bradley played by Liam Neeson

[goodoldfashionedengineer]

I'm watching FMA and FMA:B for the first time. Yes, simultaneously.

I watched both of their first two episodes already and just started FMA:B's third episode and... not gonna lie... I am not particularly fond just judging from those first five minutes

THAT'S Rose?? What happened to her?!

In FMA she was really nice, and her joke about Edward growing taller if he'd pray was just that, a joke. Here she just comes across as wanting to convert them? Not to mention that she seems to have much less emotions all around

And in FMA, Edward sought out Rose AFTER he found out she was grieving her boyfriend. The meeting was personal, coming from shared experiences.

In FMA:B, the church scene is their first interaction. The warning was turned into a lecture

Maybe some will see this completely different than me and that's fine. Those are just my thoughts and opinions

[bibibbon]

This TikTok (https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP817aCJt/) makes me realize that MHA is the anti-FMA.

The authors themselves are proof of that.

-How they treat their MCs

-How they write discrimination

-How they write disabilities

-How they write women

-How they write corrupted governments

-How they write sympathetic villains

-How they write atonement arcs

I have just started reading the full metal alchemist manga. Iam just on chapter 6 right now and I absolutely love Edward's attitude and overall character really sticks to me and I love it.

I have watched the tiktok and its gotten me even more hyped to continue reading the FMA manga.

I don't think I can give you a detailed response just because I haven't fully read fma but just from watching the tiktok I can very much tell that mha and fma are very different.

I remember scrolling on the mha critical tag and i remember someone saying that the mha finale is a cheap tip off version of the fma finale and these two manga pages were used.

[its-to-the-death]

Mod’s Crush Competition Finals

Welcome to final round! You all have chosen the top two from my batch of fictional crushes so let me introduce them…

One is a genius inventor who maybe accidentally made a deal with a demon while seeking revenge on those who murdered his family. It’s Vox Machina’s very own gunslinger…

Percy de Rolo!

The other is an alchemist who committed the ultimate taboo alongside his brother and is working to restore both of their bodies…

Edward Elric!

Mod comment:

They both have so many problems…

You all picked two guys who are really going through it.

[katharinedraws00]

Hi I’m here again this time for a funny meme that’s going around twitter/x about that Steven universe comic thingy (idk what it’s called-) fting your comfort characters so here’s Caleb widogast and Edward elric because other than my own dnd characters they bring me a lot of comfort:>

[andromeda3116]

Propaganda:

1. No one has managed this yet at this point in the story. The Homunculi are always listening, always knowing what the heroes are up to, always one step ahead. The only thing that has surprised them is Roy killing Lust, but that was only because she got cocky and left him to die instead of killing him outright. Olivier, in the middle of a massive attack on her fort by a creature behind her comprehension, finds a way to get the truth from Ed -- who has refused to tell her on the basis of Bradley's threat to Winry, and who we all know is a stubborn little bastard. She gets the answers, and she gets them without the Homunculi or the high brass guessing that she now knows their entire plan, and is high enough in the hierarchy of power to seriously damage them. For once, she puts the heroes a step ahead of the Homunculi.

2. Note that this is not Ling holding his own against Bradley (that's not underrated at all) -- this is the compassion and loyalty to his people that leads him to severely hinder his own escape because his servant is critically injured and he absolutely will not, under any circumstances, leave her behind. "A king is no king without his people", indeed.

3. Like Olivier above, Riza manages what has up to now been nearly impossible from right under Bradley's nose. She devises a perfect code with every name she needs and knows how to make sure Roy is getting it. Her intelligence and ingenuity absolutely shine, and she manages to also put them a step ahead of the Homunculi, from right under their thumbs.

4. Winry is a teenager who hasn't seen any medicine beyond what it takes to attach automail in years, but she draws on the textbooks she read -- which, aside, she was reading, comprehending, and remembering medical textbooks as a child -- delivering a healthy baby with no complications, alone.

5. Gluttony's belly is supposed to be inescapable, an entirely different plane of reality, and Ed looks at all of this surrounding him, says "I'm not dying here" and concocts a wild plan to get them out by repeating the ultimate taboo and throwing himself back through the Gate of Truth -- and it works.

6. Scar's brother is a scholar who has lived his entire life in a culture that despises alchemy. He knows only what he's read of it, and he not only recognizes that Amestris is a massive transmutation circle but also devises a circle that will counteract it, and hides that behind layers of code and the physical shape of the papers, so that only his brother can find it.

7. Riza cannot speak. She can barely breathe. She is bleeding to death. And she still refuses to allow Roy to betray himself. No words, no breath, no reason to believe she may yet live -- but she tells him do not save me at the cost of your principles.

8. Like Ling above, Roy's loyalty to his own people drives and commands and powers him. He never forgets about Jean, and the first chance he gets, he sends someone to heal him, even if it means staying blind for longer. There was no need to wait, except that he refused to put his people second to himself.

[randombook4idk]

yes, i like edward elric (03)

no, i don't like edward elric (mangahood)

[p2ii]

'we need more stories with complex and nunaced themes and world building that doesn't exist in black and white/where no one is uniquely good or bad' y'all can't even handle the freedom fighter trope when they use 2% violence in their own liberation

[gayleviticus]

the way fma 03s female characters are such an interesting nuanced exploration of all kinds of gendered tropes like how sloth is a mother who feels forced into and constrained by that identity, lust is a sexy femme fatale but this identity is literally erasing her cultural roots and whitewashing her into dantes little pet, winry is the childhood friend on the sidelines who uses this as an opportunity to live her own life and build her own relationships and goals independent of the protagonists, izumis complicated relationship ,w motherhood and wrath and the elrics, dante as abusive matriarch/cult leader of the homunculi family who objectifies women of colour (rose, lust)

and I'm not even criticising mangahood itself here, but the subtlety and nuance does feel like a marked contrast to the kindve girl boss feminism a lot of fans spout when they talk about how fmabs female cast are some of the best in anime (because they're cool and beat people up and aren't fanservice fodder, which to be sure are good things but seriously feels like grading on a curve)

[homunculusalphonse]

thank you fullmetal alchemist 2003 for not turning winry into another trisha who has to keep waiting for her husband to come home

[rin-hanarin]

I've been watching FMA 03 videos recently because October I guess, and one thing I think a lot about is the Gate and how the way it was presented in 03 disturbs me to this day. It doesn't have a voice, it doesn't talk or give the audience any exposition, we just see Ed talking and responding to it in complete silence. Ed is desperately banging on the doors, asking to show him the knowledge one more time, then he pauses like the Gate tells him something and asks, "Payment for entrance?", and in the very next scene he's screaming and bleeding out. The silence of the Gate is really indifferent and oppressive and its nature is incomprehensible, which really adds to the horror of the situation, and you don't need to be told that it's "God" or "The Truth" after seeing what just happened.

The Truth meanwhile is some funky little exposition dude and it's not even a horrifying scene, it talks to Ed and its bizarre behaviour played for laughs to juxtapose the same limb tearing scene I guess. The "God" having a form of whoever enters the Gate and talking to them directly really doesn't do anything to show its nature, it explains itself to the audience and has too much of a defined personality instead of a presence. I'm not sure what tone this sequence was supposed to have in the manga, but in Brotherhood with its over-exaggerated presentation of the entire sequence the Truth is kinda jarring.