Rather than blacking out half the page, I will just tell you now: This is written for those who have already seen the original Fullmetal Alchemist anime. It is mostly a comparison of the two, though I am giving away as little as possible of Brotherhood, because it is too awesome for me to do that.
The anime is over, but I am not quite willing to give up my squealing fandom yet, while it still runs in English. I haven't read the manga, either, or Viz Media's novels, but they are on my list somewhere. I read parts of the manga as I was watching Brotherhood, though, so I am somewhat aware of it. I just haven't sat down and read it critically, yet.
I think it's unfortunate that the first part of the show is so much like the other show, but that is how the manga runs, too. Trouble is, the first FMA came out so early in the manga that they had to improvise, so everything after the fifth laboratory is completely different. They planned ahead for the improvisation, adding a key character in, and they did a really fantastic job. They cooked up a really wonderful show, which cannot and should not be compared to the manga or to Brotherhood. They came up with their own story and ran with it, and it should not be said that Brotherhood has a better story, better graphics, or better voices or characterization. It is just a different show.
I've heard all of these complaints, and I am going to sit here and address them. I am going to refer to the first anime as FMA and Brotherhood as itself:
The story is not better than FMA's, nor does it make the other pale or dull. Brotherhood is shiny, and new, and you didn't see it coming. We felt the same way about FMA. That's why we loved it so much, is it not? Yes Brotherhood has a slow start, but that's because you've seen it before. I was bored, too, but that is long forgotten in light of the rest of the show. I do like how, in FMA, the consequences of Ed and Al's actions in Lior come back to kick their butts later on, with epic results.
This is debatable, but I will give it to you as it appears to me: the graphics in Brotherhood are different. Ever so subtly, it strikes me as having a higher contrast, and perhaps a slight difference in the artistic style, due to probably having different people from before working on the project. It resembles the manga a little more. The colors are different. There is just something about, particularly, the way Ed is drawn. His age is more transitional, and less like a really immature sixteen-year-old. He is about sixteen, but there are scenes where you look at him, and he looks more like he's fourteen. He looks like a kid, and you get sort of reminded that he is one. There are also shots where he carries himself as an adult, or dresses in normal clothes, and he looks older, and seems more his age, or maybe even a little grown up, and you can sort of project what he'll look like when he's older. I didn't get that feeling from FMA. He just seemed rather eternally Ed. Even when he was on the other side of the gate and wearing different clothes, he was still just Ed to me.
Voices. Please stop whining about the voices. I don't even want to talk about it, subtitles vs dubbing and Japanese vs English. I don't want to. So let's not. Let us agree, for this one moment, that we are probably not going to agree. Neither is better than the other and I'm not going to go into that.
Now, that being said, Al has two different voices between the two shows, at least in English, and I like them both. Ed's voice is still Mignogna's, and it's just as well, for several reasons. Ling's voice, on the other hand, surprised me. It was deeper in Japanese, and I was rather dismayed to hear his English voice squeaking forth from his lips, and I will admit that I cringed. That's okay, though, because after much YouTube searching, and much of watching the same opening Ling Yao (Lin Yao) scenes over and over because . . . well your guess is probably better than mine as to why people keep posting the same stuff. In any case I sought the actor's ability to portray more than one voice. Ling Yao, throughout the series, has three different tones in his voice, and after a single and painfully short clip, I was able to determine that, yes, Todd Haberkorn (Death the Kid in Soul Eater) can in fact potentially pull off the three distinctive and very important tones of Ling Yao. He had better be able to, or the character is lost. (After closer inspection . . . well watch episode 25 below, then go to Adult Swim (URL provided below) and watch clips from the same episode in English. I kinda wanna see what it would sound like if they had used Troy Baker.)
Interestingly enough, May Chang is voiced by Monica Rial, the same woman who did Lyra/Dante in FMA, as well as Hello Kitty, Tsubaki Nakatsukasa from Soul Eater, several voices in Saiyuki, and the far less irritating version of Momiji Fujimiya in Blue Seed Beyond (which I'm only pointing out because it makes my day. No offense to the Lee's, but I do wish they had replace Jason and not Amanda. :p But anyhow, that's another ramble for another day.) Trina Nishimura, who does Lan Fan (Ran Fan) is also a Soul Eater voice (Arisa and Mizune; watching English Brotherhood is going to be like watching Soul Eater), as well as Tiz from Jyu-Oh-Sei, which is pretty cool. (FYI Troy Baker, who was Frank Archer in FMA (and was totally awesome at AWA 15!), is Excalibur and White Star in Soul Eater. Yes, I have just discovered the true power of Anime News Network.)
Anywaaaaay. . . .
On to characterization. I have one complaint, and that is Wrath. Just the one complaint, and I can only complain so much since Brotherhood went with the manga. But seriously, how much Wrath do we really see from Bradley? Sloth was cool, and Greed was awesomeawesomeawesome, Pride was creepy and even Lust, Envy, and Gluttony had a few surprises. Wrath? He showed wrath when he became a homunculus, and again later on when he says something about getting angry when he's going into battle, but really, that's about it. He doesn't even fight like a Wrath. There's no anger or vengeance in the way he fights, no violent erraticism, he's pretty much got it together the whole time.
As to the rest of the characters and the show, I will say this: it was shocking to see Yoki come back, since he figured so little in FMA, but he played an important role and turned out to be a rather funny and likable character, unlike his FMA counterpart who was merely bitter and rather annoying. I like the story behind Van Hohenheim, and it was fun to get to know him better as a more rounded character, because he gets to have some really awesome moments that FMA's story really didn't allow for. I missed Gluttony's sick, nasty death in Conquerer of Shambala, but I think there are some scenes with several of the homunculi in Brotherhood that make up for the sickness that was left behind in FMA. The only thing I really didn't like about FMA was the end. I was okay with it, it was conclusive and all, but Ed staying in our world and leaving Winry and Al in Shambala? I rather do like the end of Brotherhood a lot better. It is very conclusive and immensely satisfying.
In FMA, I liked the plot twist with the gate leading to another world. I like how they took things like a person becoming a philosopher's stone and the whole Truth of the gate, and Marco's note about the truth behind truth or whatever it was all still being in Brotherhood. The writers of FMA took their own really cool spin on events that occurred in the manga. It was cool to watch Brotherhood and see the little parallels between the shows, and to think how much effort it must have taken to write the script for FMA in order to make it what it is.
I like how in Brotherhood we get to find out more about the land of Amestris (historically the wife of Xerxes I of Persia, how interesting is that!), and we get to see a map of it. They even talk about the lands bordering them, including Xing in the east and Drachma in the north, which figures immensely for a good many very cold, white, dramatic episodes.
Last but not least, I have to mention all of the following: the one-on-one battles in Brotherhood, the relationship between Edward Elric and Winry Rockbell, the other half of the relationship between Riza Hawkeye and Roy Mustang, Havoc's girlfriend, Shao May and May Chang (which is an aromatherapy oil), the great disappearing/reappearing Fu, Zampano, Jerso, Darius, Heinkel (my favorite of the four of them), Buccaneer, Miles, and the awesome power that is Olivier Mira Armstrong. This (should I call it an article? I didn't mean to go on like that!) simply would not be complete without their mention because they're awesome, and they're not in FMA.
Episode 25 (which has now been released in English on Adult Swim)
Go to the show on YouTube.com or FUNimation's site
Adult Swim's Brothehood page
