#fmab critical

[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]

i just love fma 03 for like, making us question our love for the "good" guys

ed is pretty much racist and ignorant, which is called out by multiple characters (and him "not seeing color" isn't a virtue cough cough). he eventually admits his prejudice and works to improve that.

although we see how goofy hughes and team mustang can be, we also see mustang nearly attempting suicide twice both for killing ishbalans and for killing the rockbells - and not in the same episode! and i also like that the soldiers' perspectives don't overshadow the ishbalans' nor the liorans'

probably my favorite thing about this adaptation is that the homunculi aren't the source of the problem. like they were always there, infiltrating in the shadows, but the military has always caused destruction and pain without rlly needing the homunculi. they don't rlly control anything, despite the fact pride and sloth are the führer and his secretary respectively. like history always repeats itself as scar realizes the military is persecuting liorans the same way they did the ishbalans. so the problem was never truly the homunculi. their role is rather small in the grand scheme of things.

and finally you see hughes as a nazi in the parallel world (which is rlly ours). so many ppl hate that, they can't accept that a nice goofy dad could ever take part of such an awful cause. but the amestrian military was always nazist. i mean. their leader is THE FÜHRER. that is consistent with all fma adaptations. it's just that fma 03 actually makes us confront that. they show us the reality of things. hughes is still complicit in genocide, even if he avoids the conflict. he's as guilty as mustang.

and i think everyone forgets that nazis can be rlly anyone, mostly common ppl. that's how hitler ruled germany with the crisis and ignorance spreading. that's what fma 03 wanted to show. not everything is sunshine and rainbows and not everything will be solved once the "good" guy tries to rule an already corrupted system. it will just be the same.

[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.

[mashedcontroller]

I'm feeling spicy, time to list everything I think BH outclassed 03 on. And by that, prepare yourself for the most backhanded, hyper specific or wildly vague, and strings-attached compliments you've heard in your fucking life. But actually, the reason I'm doing this is because I think 03 is better than BH in every way that matters. The majority of common points people give BH over 03 typically come down to attempts to make subjective taste sound objective since a lot of shit is really just a difference in priorities and/or genre rather than an objective flaw in the other show.

And, to be clear, 03 is the better show. It has a really strong thematic core and just says a lot of shit that I rarely see other stuff have the gall to say. 03 tackles heavy topics and tackles them well. It left me with a lot to think about, even years after my first viewing. It's a political piece of art that remains relevant 20 years after the fact. On some levels, it was designed to do this. 03 is a character drama that deconstructs a lot of the elements that make up the shonen genre, and it also very clearly had something to say. 03 has very few weak points and has some of the strongest moments I've seen from any piece of media that I've interacted with. I think a lot of its bad reputation comes from people failing to engage with the show on its own terms. I can only speculate on what's going through other people's heads, but expecting it to act as supplementary material for BH is a fundamentally wrong assumption to make about the show. These two shows are trying to accomplish very different things, so judging 03 on its ability to be BH is a boldfaced stupid lens to view the show through.

BH, however, is still a well-made show. Like, I'm more than happy to shit on it, but BH is by no means a bad anime. It's just not as ambitious as people claim it to be. And if it really is one of the best things Shonun has to offer, then that says pretty mediocre things about the genre imo. It's far from a bad show. I think it accomplishes the role of "fun action series" really well, but it also has gaping flaws the moment you decide to engage with the work critically. That's not necessarily an issue that I'll take with its fanbase. The show's got a lot of elements that make it good for cultivating one. Stuff like large casts, likeable characters, emphasizing its worldbuilding, prioritizing action over character work, etc. are all traits that are great for cultivating fandom, and they're all traits that BH has that 03 revokes. But yeah, BH does fall apart once you look at it critically. My biggest issues with it come down to the fact that the show baits you into thinking that it's deeper than it actually is. So, I'll take the bait and look for the deeper stuff and then find nothing, which is where my negative perception of the show comes from, which isn't helped by how common it is for people to take the bait without really looking.

So, yeah, in short, I have a mountain of good things to say about 03. It's an incredible piece of art with so much shit to look into. In my opinion, you're doing the show a disservice to watch it and not put serious analytical thought into what you're consuming. Meanwhile I have a lot of mixed opinions about BH. It's a great show to watch, it's just a terrible show to consume critically. This isn't even me calling people who prefer BH dumb or anything. The show's are just so fundamentally different from one-another that your preference truly does just come down to a mix of personal tastes and how you prefer to interact with media, especially if you're a more casual viewer of either/both shows. The part that makes me angry is how disrespected 03 is in the majority of FMA circles.

The animation and sound design of Roy's snap is really fucking good in BH.

While 03 may have an overall better art direction and visuals than BH, I do really like how juicy the BH animators and sound designers made Roy's fire attack. The fire itself is just so fucking juicy and satisfying. The BH team did a really good job at making that attack iconic. There's no "but actually" here. The BH team just fucking nailed this one aspect.

In general, BH has better special effects than 03. This is absolutely a difference in available technology at the time each show was animated. And while I do have respect for special effects animation; it's often the difference between animations looking really stiff vs getting across their intended atmospheres, especially in the realm of video games. Using a human body as an analogy, the special effects are more like the hair than the skin, fat, muscle, nerves, or bones. Both important but somewhat expendable.

BH's alchemy is much more logically consistent than 03's.

So, there are a lot of reasons for this difference. The two main ones are the BH and 03 can barely if even be considered the same genre of anime. BH is a fun fights-heavy action series with some intrigue plot, while 03 is a really critical deconstruction the genre BH embraces that's more of a character drama with a heavily knit thematic core than anything else.

And their commitments to their genres translate to each show's relationship with alchemy. In 03, Alchemy's rules are much more metaphoric than literal. Equivalent Exchange is the shit because it's representative of the philosophy that Edward clings to; that life is fundamentally fair, that there is some universal justification for everything that happens. And 03 is about tearing that belief into itty bitty pieces. In fact, we learn that Equivalent Exchange isn't even true. Everything about Alchemy in 03 is bound by the magic's metaphorical meaning. Thus, when it comes to fights, characters really just need to be able to loosely justify how their alchemy functions for the audience to go "oh ok." And, in 03, alchemy is fundamentally powered by taking the life force of something and using that energy to do something else. So, you get stuff like the ability to extract alchemical energy from plants in order to amplify your alchemy much later, Edward being able to turn his automail into a gun, Dante's alchemic dragon thing, Scar's arm being the Philosopher's Stone, etc. The point is that you're sort of meant to accept that "yeah thats a thing that can happen." In other words, the fights exist purely for spectacle and the logic behind them is low priority at best. So, the way 03 frames it's combat is that it has to establish rules that exist within their own space and work with those rules. So, it can't circumvent stuff like "Roy can't use his gloves if they're wet" because there's no reason to and giving a talk about how H2O has Oxygen in it would have been horribly distracting in the one scene where Roy does get fucking soaked. Especially since him being crafty in a fight is sold by him just using Havoc's matches + Armstrongs rocks to make frag bombs. Tldr, the way 03 is structured allows if not flat out encourages characters to bullshit during fights. I think the fast and loose usage of alchemy's principles in the earlier parts of the show also make the later parts of the show, where those principals turn out to be false, feel more believable.

Meanwhile, BH's alchemy is operating on a much more literal framework, so the writing has more room and necessity for creative and engaging combat sequences. In a way, the fights in BH are puzzles and alchemy is the tools the characters are given to solve those puzzles, so the fights become engaging because you want to see how the characters solve the puzzles. It's very gamey. That said, I do have to say that I dislike how the homunculi are fit into this system. Their lose condition is having their stones exhausted, which just translates into "they have more HP." Which is very bullshit. The homunculi in BH die when the story tells them to, at least, that's how their lose condition makes it feel.

Both shows heavily rely on the usage of gimmicks to make their fights interesting. For example, Roy uses exclusively fire, which he creates by snapping. Like, I really like how Roy's combat gimmick gets explored in this fight specifically.

I like how Ed ducks into a crowd in an attempt to dissuade him, and Roy's like "you think I care about collateral damage lmao." I like how Ed thinks he won the fight by slicing Roy's glove, but then Roy just ruins his day by revealing that he has two hands and therefore another glove. I really like how Roy's not taking this very seriously and Ed only wins because of Roy getting a flashback. This fight is just an excellent display of character for both of them and I love it.

Anyways, there are a lot of other character gimmicks. Honestly, 03 is so much better with its character gimmicks during fights than BH is. Like, I could list a ton of cool moments where the character gimmicks get played with. And part of how it does this is that every character plays by their own rules. No character will ever break their own rules, but the universal rules governing what is and isn't acceptable for a fight isn't very consistent. This does fit into 03s themes about how there is no universal truth. But yeah, that's how 03 structures its fights and why characters will sometimes just blatantly ignore the laws of alchemy.

Anyways, in BH, the rules are much less person-by-person and are more like "Alchemists can do XYZ," "Homunculi can do ABC," "Alkahestrists can do UWV," "Chimeras can do RST," etc. So, everyone has similar rules that they have to play by. Which also makes it so much more jarring when someone blatantly breaks those rules. Like, when Edward gets impaled and uses alchemy to not die, it's super jarring because that breaks the laws of human frailty and it doesn't really make sense. It's even worse when Edward fucks with Pride's Stone. Compare that to some of the blatant bullshitting in 03, like where Edward uses concrete to turn his broken automail into a gun. He shouldn't be able to decide when the shots are fired and where's the ammo coming from? But part of the reason it isn't jarring is because him turning his automail into a gun isn't a big deal or even particularly important to the scene he does that in. Or take bullshitting that is more relevant, like Alphonse performing a successful human transmutation. At this point, it's been clearly established that Alchemy's laws aren't true. So, Alphonse breaking them doesn't break audience suspense. Instead, the fundamental logic behind it actually working is tied to the story's central themes.

But yeah, BH's alchemy is a bit more logically consistent than 03's, but there's a very good reason for 03's alchemy to have some logical inconsistencies, which results in BH being much worse at breaking its own rules than 03 is.

A lot of the characters are just easier to get behind and digest in BH.

The entire point of 03 is that these characters are nazis and morally grey as fuck. Meanwhile, the characters in BH are primarily meant to be fun characters that you could comfortably fantasize about being or being friends with. The characters in BH are much simpler than in 03 and the show tends to gloss over their war crimes. Even when it addresses them, there's a billion asterisks and variations of "they're still the good guys." Compared to 03, where everyone is just messy and fucked up.

For example, BH Roy is easier to root for than 03 Roy, but that's because BH Roy is a fundamentally different type of character than 03 Roy. BH Roy is firmly a protagonist while with 03 Roy, he's much more antagonistic and complex. He doesn't solidly fit into the categorization of protagonist or antagonist because he's a bit of both.

And to be clear, I'm not calling the characters in BH simplistic in a derogatory way. A major benefit to simplicity is that you know who to root for and don't have to do a ton of heavy thinking to enjoy the story. That said, I don't think this style of character is necessarily appropriate for a story where the majority of the protagonists committed racial genocide and serve in the military for a fascist dictatorship. BH's characterization would've been a lot better if the story wasn't also trying to cover ridiculously heavy topics.

I've been using Roy as my go-to example since he's the only character to be one of my favorites in both shows, but I think the character who benefits the most from this point is Izumi. In BH, she's iconic. She's a slapstick oriented character who's just a joy to have on screen. In 03, her character writing gives me a lot of mixed messages. She's still very slap stick, but it's just weird in 03 since a lot of similar stuff gets unpacked, but Izumi being outright physically abusive to the Elrics at times just isn't. She's also much softer in 03; most characters are. And I'm mostly just left confused on how to feel about her. She has some great scenes, especially with Wrath, but the character feels a bit disjointed. In BH, she really benefits from being a nonparticipant in Ishval. The writing doesn't have to worry about her being sympathetic in spite of her committing genocide, so she gets to be divorced from the massive fuck up that was that section of the story.

BH has a larger cast than 03. Also, a lot of BH exclusive characters are more likeable than the 03 exclusive characters.

There's a lot of things to unpack here.

So, first thing that's kinda an obvious point is that BH prioritizes making its characters easily likeable to the detriment of its larger themes, 03 makes its characters likeable in service of those themes. So, it's a lot easier to get behind BH Mustang than 03 Mustang because Mustang's warcrimes just aren't that important in BH while they're the most important part of the character in 03. A lot of a character's likeability in BH hinges on the audience's ability to simply ignore the Ishval subplot, which was already a poorly handled subplot. While in 03, their likeability is intentionally contrasted with their war crimes to make a point. That's the primary reason why the characters in BH are more likeable than in 03.

And this also extends to the casts that are either version exclusive or unrecognizable between the two. Kimbly is a perfect example. In BH, he's designed primarily as a fun and bombastic antagonist who blows shit up because it's fun. They also made him extremely fashionable. Meanwhile, in 03 he's genuinely fucked up and views the lives of people as little more than tools to use to further his own goals, which is made interesting by Kimbly not being a top dog (like most villains running with that mindset are). He's at the bottom of the food chain and yet he still thrives under that mindset. BH Kimbly is the more fun character, but that's because BH Kimbly and 03 Kimbly are fundamentally different types of antagonist.

A lot of this comes down to tone. 03 is a much more somber show than BH. Unlike BH, it takes the premise of "child soldier works for a fascist government that partook in genocide a few years back because he wants to fix a mistake that made him and his brother permanently disabled" as a sign that the story is meant to be dark and a little fucked up. Meanwhile, BH tends to gloss over the fucked up shit in favor of selling the power-fantasy aspect of the story. This just results in BH's characters being a lot more fun. The surface level shit is the only thing that really matters to them when looking at BH since the deeper shit is simply shit and not really worth calling attention to.

The cast sizes also exist to further both show's individual goals. BH being about action and badass people being badass benefits from a larger cast because you get to see more flavors of badassery. It lets fights cycle between different styles of combat, which helps keep things interesting. 03 is a character drama. This benefits from having a smaller cast because it allows the show to spend more time unpacking a handful of characters.

There are a lot more badass female characters in BH compared to 03

I'll give BH a "you did the bare minimum" award for being an action show with female characters who are not just eye candy. That doesn't make the show revolutionary. It just says bad things about the genre that this isn't considered the bare minimum. But yeah, in both shows, most of the female characters are subordinate to their male peers. Hawkeye is defined as Roy's henchman. Winry is defined as Ed's love interest/childhood friend, Izumi is defined as Ed's mentor. In some aspects, this is fine. Like, the main characters are Edward and Alphonse, they don't need to draw attention away from them in favor of their own bullshit. But how badass a character is doesn't exactly translate into whether they're feminist.

Like, again, the reason you see more badass female characters in BH than 03 is the same reason you see more badass characters in BH than 03; BH is an action show, 03 is a character drama with some amount of action on the side. They're both guilty of employing sexist tropes. BH tends mix those tropes with badassery, while 03 tends to mix those tropes with character nuance. Doesn't change the existence of the tropes. It's sort of just something that you gotta accept about either show. That doesn't mean that its female characters don't have good moments in either show. Just that they're working from a sexist baseline. Neither show is particularly feminist, but they're also far from the worst offenders out there.

There are a few characters where I prefer their BH incarnations over their 03 versions.

The reason someone might prefer one version's character over another is a bit more nuanced than just which character was written better. The vast majority of overlapping characters fulfill different narrative niches in each story. For example, comparing 03 Lust and BH Lust has always felt disingenuous to me because while it's true that 03 Lust is the more compelling character, a major reason for that fact is that BH Lust was never designed with being compelling in mind. A more apt comparison would be 03 Lust to BH Greed, as those two characters do share the same niche of being an antagonist that makes the audience question the nature of the homunculi and eventually splits off from them. I'd also say that BH Lust and 03 Greed fulfill similar narrative niches as being a minor antagonist that establishes exactly what the main villains are all about and who's death is used as a tool by the authors to reveal exactly what the protagonist slaying them is all about. That's why BH Lust's death and 03 Greed's Deaths are both pointed to as highlighting points in their respective series. They both execute on their niches quite well.

This also accounts for the primary reason why someone may like a character in one show but dislike them in another. BH Mustang fulfills the niche of a secondary protagonist. In 03, he fulfills the role of a pseudo-antagonist / morally ambiguous major character. I happen to really like both versions of Mustang, but it's for very different reasons. In BH, I just think he's funny and has a lot of good banter. That's more or less exactly what he's meant to accomplish there. You're supposed to go "haha funny" and/or "haha awesome" with this guy. BH Mustang falls apart when you critically analyze him because the Ishval plot was mishandled, but his surface level traits are so good that I can just be like "I saw nothing." Meanwhile, 03 Mustang is a character who you sort of have to engage with critically to get the most out of. He's a complicated character and his relationship with the audience isn't a static variable. And there's merit to both approaches of character writing. There's as much value to a character where it's not worth overanalyzing them as there is to a character who doesn't really come into their own until you pull out the tweezers.

So, in case anyone's curious, which characters do I prefer their BH incarnations to over their 03 incarnations? Well, I prefer Barry the Chopper and Izumi Curtis in BH vs their 03 counterparts. Like I said, there's a lot more nuance than "this character was written better in one anime than the other" when regarding personal preferences. So, the reason I prefer BH Izumi over 03 Izumi is that I thought BH Izumi was funny and cool while I just got a lot of mixed messages about 03 Izumi. So, in this case, I think BH Izumi fulfilled her narrative purpose really well, while I have much more mixed opinions on 03 Izumi. As for Barry, it's a similar case where I thought he was really funny in BH, while I think he fell short as a more serious antagonist in 03. In Izumi's case, the failings I have for her in 03 are that I don't think her treatment of the Elrics is put under the same scrutiny that every other character is given. Like, in BH, her being physically violent towards them is played off for comedy. It's the same case in 03, but it doesn't work as well in this context because 03 is the show that turned the short jokes into an important metaphor, so it's really weird that Izumi's slapstick wasn't given the same treatment. And I found that really off-putting. Meanwhile, my main issue with BH Izumi is that the stuff around her failed human transmutation was extremely underexplored, which doesn't stick out as much as the slapstick issue in 03 because Izumi is ultimately a minor character in BH while she takes the mantle of a more major character in 03. Though, personal bias is a huge factor in why I prefer BH Izumi over 03 Izumi, since her specific plot about being unable to bear children just happens to be so alien to my personal life, as someone who's both never had a failed pregnancy, has zero interest in bearing children, and would happily make a magic "goodbye pussy" circle. It's not that this type of conflict can't still be compelling to someone like me, but it's going to require more narrative work than a conflict that I can more closely relate to. Hence, why it's personal bias. Meanwhile, in the case of Barry the Chopper, my preference towards BH's version is a fair bit less subjectively biased. He just fits really awkwardly into the role 03 tries to assign him. The issue is that he jumps back and forth between trying to be fucked up and scary to being a comedic antagonist, which just undermines both aspects of him.

Like, the antagonist for this scene, should end up looking completely alien to the version of Barry the Chopper seen in BH, but that version of Barry is played relatively similar to BH Barry in Lab 5, resulting in the 03 Barry being inconsistent.

And for every character where I prefer their BH version, there are plenty more characters where I prefer their 03 versions. And a lot of that will come down to personal preference.

Armstrong's a great example of a character who on a surface level isn't that far off between 03 and BH, but he just works so much better in 03 than in BH because of the different character niches he fulfills in both shows. In 03, he's a minor character, while in BH, he's a major character. So, in 03, he's not particularly developed. He's mainly a funny guy who has a few shots where he's sad over Ishbal, and then he ends up supporting Mustang in overthrowing the government, which he mostly does in a comedic fashion. That's a pretty apt description for both his 03 and BH incarnations, but I only take issue with his performance in BH. The reason for this is that he's a more important character in BH, so I expect the show to disclose more information about him, which doesn't happen. Like, in BH, I want to know more about how his refusal to fight in Ishval affected him, his relationships, his status, etc. But BH only addresses that through off-handed scenes where Olivier calls him a pussy, which don't really go anywhere. Meanwhile, in 03, first of all, Armstrong did kill people in Ishbal, so the massive question of "how did his time in Ishbal affect him" can be supplemented by other characters confronting similar questions. Thus, the minor amounts of information we are given about Armstrong alongside information we see from other characters who were soldiers in Ishbal like Marcoh and Mustang are more than enough to get across the general picture. Secondly, we actually do get hints at how Armstrong's goofier attitude and kinder disposition impact his career. Mainly during the raid in Dublith where Envy disguised as Bradly says "this is why you never get a promotion." As a minor character in 03, he's allowed to have the nuances of his character be heavily carried by implication. But I can't really give a major character like BH Armstrong that same affordance, especially when those hints are barely given. It doesn't help that Armstrong's backstory in BH very heavily leaned into the story's insistence that the soldiers didn't mean it when they slaughtered Ishval.

Edward is more of a Badass in BH than 03

Ngl, I'm cheating a little with this point because it's like "I agree with this point but I also couldn't give less of a shit about it." Which, that response is, at least, 85% personal preference coming into the equation. I'm not going to say that badass characters never resonate with me, but it's really uncommon because the badass character has to be someone I personally can somewhat relate to, which is a rare flavor of character in popular media. My own experiences with the two characters are that I find BH Edward to be kinda boring as a character while 03 Edward is the most interesting character in the show (as he should be given everything I said about what 03 is trying to accomplish). But it's a lot of the same stuff my general thesis has been; BH Ed is more badass than 03 Ed because BH Ed was written to be a badass while 03 Ed was written to be a compelling character.

The actual reason I wanted to bring up this point is because it's a common enough point I've seen people make when comparing the two shows and I find this point rather bothersome. Maybe that's because I take issue with consistently seeing a rather mediocre character being placed on a pedestal over one of the best protagonists I've ever seen. But it's also more the explanations that bug me than anything. Like, I cannot take anyone seriously who uses calling a character "whiny" as a critique. Maybe it's because you're looking for an action hero who can shrug off shit that would normally be traumatizing, in which case, you're in the wrong genre. Maybe you take some issue with characters being emotional in a vulnerable sort of way. 03 features a lot of characters displaying emotions in a dysfunctional sort of way. Characters are allowed to hurt in a way that doesn't fuel anything other than more hurt. Characters will repress their feelings and that will bite them in the ass. Characters are allowed to be depressed, not in a "waiting for the heroic do shit speech" sort of way but in the genuine "existing is painful, no energy, depression" kinda way.

And this is the point that rubs me the wrong way about the majority of complaints thrown at 03 Ed. It's not that wallowing in your own misery makes for good entertainment, but it's an important part of 03's themes and its point. I can also, just, relate more to this unproductive sense of pain. I have depression, that is what depression looks and feels like. It's unproductive, it's painful, it can't be fixed by someone just walking up to you and giving a dramatic speech. And that's why the way 03 expresses hurt resonates with me in a way that BH's just doesn't. It's low octane, and that's the point. That's what makes it good.

BH's Ending is a lot more Straight-Forwards than 03's Ending

I think that's the best way I can put it without saying something I flat out disagree with. BH, in general, is much more straight-forwards than 03, and the endings of both show embody that. BH is, ultimately, a fun show where the heroes have to take a bunch of twists and turns to come out victorious. Meanwhile, 03 is an extremely messy show about characters being put in fucked up situations and no one coming out of it unscathed. It's about decisions that will haunt you for the rest of your life. It's about situations where the right answer is the one you least want to accept. It's a show about how the people will create doctrines to shield themselves from the truth. And it's a show about human selfishness. The endings of both shows are exactly how their shows should have ended. BH was never going to have a bad ending and 03 was never going to have a completely satisfactory ending. If 03 had a happy ending, the show would've been worse off for it.

So, yeah, BH's ending is a lot more straight-forward. It's a happy ending where everyone gets what they want more or less. Narrative knots are tied. All that shit. I personally thought the ending was nothing special. Like, it's another happy ending. I can't fault people for enjoying it for that, but it's not the type of thing that's going to stand out in my brain.

Meanwhile, 03's ending does a lot of nontraditional things. There's arguably multiple major plot twists that come out of nowhere and are more of a "fuck you" to the audience than anything else. The protagonists end the series arguably off worse than where they started. Wrath and Gluttony are still alive and haven't had their arcs concluded in any satisfying way. There's no guarantee that the setting or the characters in it will continue to be okay after the series ends. And that's okay. The ending of 03 is very messy because it's meant to be messy because the point that the show is making is that the world is neither straightforward nor fair, which is why you gotta keep doing the best you can to improve it. That's why the ending is uplifting. Even though Edward's in arguably the worst position he's been in throughout the series, having literally lost everything, he hasn't given up, so you, the viewer, shouldn't give up either. Life doesn't end until it ends, so you should live.

And yeah, the ways that 03's and BH's ending function are fundamentally different. I can totally see why one ending would pass someone by. Like I already said, I didn't feel anything watching BH's ending but 03's ending felt very significant to me, and I could totally understand the inverse being true for some people.

Conclusion

People give BH too much credit and shit too much on 03. Like, 03 is just the better show. It's just that 03 isn't designed to be a comfortable watch in the same way BH is. You're meant to leave BH feeling good, you're meant to leave 03 with a lot to think about. If 03 makes you uncomfortable, that's a feature, not a bug. Many of the fan advertised strengths and weaknesses of each show is really just differences in genre.

And while I've repeatedly conveyed that 03 is the better show, that's not because BH is bad; 03 is just really fucking good. It's like comparing Elden Ring to Dark Souls 1; sure they're made by the same developers and have a lot of surface level similarities, but they're so fundamentally different experiences that viewing them through the same lens isn't fair to either. There are a lot of things that BH does well, and there are a lot of things that 03 does well. But it's not fair to say "BH does X thing better than 03 therefore it's better" (or the occasions where the inverse claim is made) because both shows are trying to paint very different pictures, to the point where I don't consider them to be parts of the same genre. There may be similar components, but the way those components are used is very different from one-another. Comparing the two shows makes for interesting analysis, but it's bad for the purposes of actually criticizing either show.

[fairyprince7]

I'm sorry but I cannot STAND that final photo in brotherhood showing the gang post-series

it does not make any sense to me and feels incredibly out of character, and also their perceived ages in the photo make every event that's happened since ep 64 feel extremely rushed, like the events all happened one after another. especially on the Ed and Winry side of things

(also I have no idea if this photo is a thing brotherhood made up or was in the manga too. I haven't ever finished the manga. also I don't care to get the photo. y'all know the one I'm talking about I hope)

spoilers:

you're telling me that this nomad. this traveler. who was shown leaving on another trip IMMEDIATELY after coming home to see winry with al in the final episode

you're telling me that he came home from his trip to I think it was another country, decided to SETTLE DOWN??? married Winry. and immediately had two kids one after another

you guys may disagree with me but. this doesn't feel like Ed. the Ed I know is a nomad. he wouldn't settle. he has his whole life ahead of him and so many places he hasn't explored and I feel like in his youth he would want to see as many sights and travel as much as possible. and settle when he's older. Winry was even lecturing him at the train station for travelling again because he doesn't take care of his automail. she knows Ed doesn't settle down for anything like self care or maintenance

----

I don't think him still being so young in that photo with two tiny kids very close in age (idk if they're twins or not) feels very much like Ed to me

also if the photo afterwards of him smiling at a train station is implying that he has kids and still goes on long trips. I'm sorry. I don't see him doing that. that's exactly what he hated Hohenheim for doing and I cannot see him inflicting absent travelling dad on his own kids.

----

To look at this from Winry's perspective... She's a career girly. I don't think she would want to give up her mechanic work to have kids. And I don't think a mechanic's workshop is a safe place to raise children at all.

And to go back to the travelling Edward point again... There's absolutely no way she'd be ok with him leaving so often while she's at home raising their kids. She wouldn't stand for that all

----

I just don't think someone who wants to travel and someone who focuses on their work are very compatible with children at all. Especially so young

[tumblingxelian]

I was thinking about how much I hate FMAB’s tendency to overlay comedy on serious moments and why its not bothering me in RWBVY V9 and realized why. 

I think its mostly letting the serious moments be serious and the fun moments be fun. With the crossover coming when someone is having an existential crisis in the background, but the others are unaware of it or don't know how to respond. Which just serves to throw it into stark contrast, rather than comedy overwhelming a serious moment.

[gwaaaaar]

fma word vomit!1! Mostly a rant bc i have been rewatching it and thinking about things. Fma critical but i am ranting from a place of i genuinely want better for a media i like. I am a person of color and these are my thoughts personally, feel free to disagree.

Iirc, hiromu arakawa wanted fma to be a criticism on ainu colonization as she had ainu family and wanted to pay her respects to them. Which is Awesome in concept, i think its important to want to make something out of compassion and respect for others. I think she had good intentions when creating the base morals of her story.

(Edit, apparently shes yamato and not ainu, i only heard that she was distant ainu from an interview or something but yeah thats probably wrong so sorry abt that)

Heres where the problem kicks in.

Sometimes she does it poorly, really poorly. "Ignorance isnt a sin" but what happens when that ignorance hurts people?

Fma is in the end a story about redemption and humanity. It is a very idealistic /optimistic view of the world. And sometimes that wide-eyed optimism is blind to reality.

Enter the entirety of the amestrian government. One thing i HATE HATE HATE, is the fact that the white characters are given more sympathy than scar, a colored man who had his race brutally genocided by those characters. Roy and gang do feel bad for what theyd done, theyd felt bad about their war crimes their murders their sins everything. He himself says scar was justified in his violence. And edward, a 15 yo twerp was like "thAts nO exCuSe."

This is where the optimism comes in. "Murder is murder! All murder is bad!" Thats a genocide victim. Of course when scar goes after literal children and decides to solve all his problems with violence, thats when hes losing it. That should be disconnected from the whole government corruption bit.

And then winry. Winry comes in, cries her eyes out and shes the victim. Scar went through worse quite literally. And we dont see him get afforded that. And in a way, it feels like white woman tears. I can understand why winrys upset but jesus have some empathy would ya?

The main problem i think, is how little ishvalan characters there are, there isnt enough to have a full story. There isnt enough to see their pov. Its just roy and the gang and armstrong. And doesnt olivier get mad at alex at one point for not participating in the genocide? Stan alex for not wanting to kill people and backing out, wish other characters could say the same huh?

Maes. Maes. Grips him. Maes.

He doesnt give a shit about the ishvalans, what he was a loving dad but does he ever care abt his literal war crimes? Probably not. He only cares about roy.

In the end its an idealistic world where cops would actually work against the system. There always was something unsettling about the way the goverment worked and i think its because it follows the lines of "not all cops are bad!" Which, which isnt true.

Cops are bad because they promote and enable a system that was corrupt in the first place.

FMA technically goes against the grain with that, because the "cop" characters do go against the government. I think its important to have an ideal to work towards. I think its important to have positive examples, and fiction is a playground. Its a literal fantasy to get a corrupt government overthrown. But having that hope somewhere, may be good. Because at least we can hope for a better future. Roy and his gang work towards a future where they would get sentenced guilty which is a good thing i wont deny. I think its good that they fight for that.

Im not here to talk about that.

This combined with the fact that only white characters have a truly active presence in overthrowing the government (besides scar vs bradley that was awesome and very good), it just feels, unsettling.

Its like making a movie abt the civil war only to have white people star in it ignoring the black people that did work for their liberation.

(If thats an uncalled for comparison let me know ^^ i can edit it, its just the closest i can think of)

White characters and their emotions are always getting prioritized over colored ones and its alarming.

Then theres the whole if you work hard youll get something in exchange.

Hahahahha if only it really was like that for the majority of minorities hm? The world really would be a better place. 2003 fma you actually did something with that.

I dont think fma is entirely bad, it does good things sometimes! And i appreciate the message it tries to portray, i just think it has its priorities askew sometimes...

[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

[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:>

[gayleviticus]

how do you feel about how Trisha was handled in 2003 vs brotherhood?

ooh good question. with the disclaimer that once again i dont have enough interest in brotherhood to devote much of my mind to remembering finicky details - i think generally it's kinda just a case of 'she serves the role she was cut out for perfectly fine in fmab, but 03 adds enough wrinkles to make her 10x more interesting'

ofc trisha herself is more or less the same in both versions; poor sweet mother who dies tragically and kicks off the plot. a bit cliche, feeding a bit into some gendered tropes but i don't think it counts as like, a fridging or anything.

but then obviously with sloth we have a really interesting twist on her character ripe with drama and tragedy and all sorts of implications. trisha's role in the narrative is to be the Dead Mother, and that basically eats up her entire personality. but sloth rebels against that. unlike lust, for whom her human life represents a love and life she was brutally cut off from, Sloth sees Trisha's life as a prison. and the worst part of all is the fact she could see herself coming to like it - "In time, I might even come to love you two, and how can I allow that? I should always hate you for creating me."

and so we see the sin of sloth reflected in three ways: trisha's sloth as she wastes away before her death, distant from the world, her only joy her children. then we have ed's sloth, first when he refuses to move on with his life and tries to reclaim what was lost by breaking alchemy's greatest taboo, and then later on when he ignores and suppresses the truth about what he's done. and finally Sloth's... well, sloth, of wanting the easy way out; she doesn't want to deal with these conflicted feelings around who she versus who Trisha was, so the solution is to kill Trisha's children. But also... that's exactly what Ed wants to do to her too!

and i think that's just inherently compelling material to work with! and i think probably the most telling scene about the differences between 03 and brotherhood tonally and interest-wise is the fact that digging up Trisha's grave in FMAB is a moment of relief, whereas in 03 it's a moment of horror. FMAB uses it to reassure the Elrics that however badly they fucked up, they didn't rebirth their mother into the world as some horrifying creation; in 03 that's exactly the case, and digging up her grave marks Ed's decision to destroy his own creation.

even sloth aside, i think there are a few more interesting touches to Trisha in 03 than fmab, although again, not really to do with her specifically. but the fact that 03 hoenheim is a well-meaning but genuinely shitty guy running away from the consequences of his own actions, for instance, puts a much more melancholy spin on Trisha before her death. here she was wasting away and eventually dying always waiting for her husband to come back. i think you could say there's something poignant, almost noble about Trisha's love for Hoenheim in FMAB; in 03 I think it's just a bit sad all around. the fmab scene where he and her reunite in the afterlife would ring v hollow in 03 i think

[homunculusalphonse]

i just rlly prefer the fma homunculi being failed human transmutations in 03 than them being completely detached from humanity as they are in mangahood.

like yeah, the homunculi are technically "superior" to humans in a lot of aspects, but i like that fma 03 shows how deep and flawed they rlly are. in fact, they actually WANT to be human, and yet they all have different motivations - like lust and sloth, one wants her old life back, and the other wants to reject her memories.

and not only that, but the 03 homunculi are direct consequences of humanity's actions. in mangahood though, i feel like they're too shallow (with the exception of greed), and they pose themselves as "oh we're way better than humanity". even envy's dilemma with "envying humanity deep down" doesn't feel honest. but in 03, the homunculi's motivations are a lot more personal, and their leader is ALSO human, not some random guy who wants to be god.

i can only remember that scene in 03 where ed questions lust why she even wants to be human, and she compares it to him wanting al to be human again. al is pretty much equated to the homunculi in this adaptation. the homunculi are representations of the human characters' sins (sloth -> ed, wrath -> al, pride -> mustang, so on and so forth). it's the kind of nuance that i felt was missing in mangahood.

[futuristicparadiseblizzard]

Some left-wing RWBY "critics" that I can think of include people such as Twiins Iink, Judgmental Critter, Unicorn of War, Hbomberguy, Anime Slushie, and some RWDE posters. Some right-wing RWBY "critics" that I can think of include people such as Adel Aka, Vexed Viewer, EruptionFang, Hero Hei, CaptainPrice and some of the members of r/RWBYcritics.

Both Twiins Iink and EruptionFang have called Blake Belladonna and Yang Xiao Long killing Adam Taurus in self-defense (after telling him to leave them alone) "murder".

Adel Aka, EruptionFang and Vexed Viewer are all misogynistic anti-LGBT bigots.

adel aka - YouTube

eruptionfang - YouTube

vexed viewer - YouTube

Unicorn of War went as far as to state that he wished the hound would "kill everyone at the Schnee manor, with the exception of Penny and Whitley", and agreed with a post from one of his insane fans stating that the origins of humans and faunus in Remnant was akin to "Nazi Propaganda", and stated that the white voice actors of RWBY "should be fired and replaced with nonwhite voice actors", etc.

The Judgmental Critter (Twiins Iinks equally batshit insane sister) stated that Ruby was wrong/evil for cutting off Tyrian's stinger in self-defense (after he tried to kill her uncle and kidnap her), and that she should have felt bad/"reflected on it", because she has a sister (Yang) who had a limb chopped off.

RWBY Villains : The "Hero's" - YouTube

Let's Talk About Tyrian's Tail I Guess? - YouTube

[weezardthewizard]

I'm seeing a lot of crossover fanart of royai in the spy × family outfits. And while it's a neat idea, we all know that mission is completely unrealistic because Roy would not survive that dress