Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood - 04 April 26
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Summary:
Somewhere in Central one night, the Iron Blood Alchemist Basque Gran gets attacked by a man with a scar on his forehead. Gran manages to trap the man inside a metal enclosure by using alchemy, but he gets too close to it and is killed when the man breaks free. Hughes and Armstrong are part of the team that finds Gran’s body afterward, and they’re eventually joined by King Bradley who makes it clear that any rebels must be taken down. Ed and Al meanwhile return to headquarters and tell Mustang about what happened in Lior. They’re interested in the chimera that Cornello created, so Mustang sends them to Shou Tucker, the Sewing-Life Alchemist. Tucker became a State Alchemist after creating a chimera two years ago that understood human speech, however the only thing that chimera said was that it wanted to die. It died shortly thereafter of self-starvation.
At Tucker’s house, Ed gets ambushed by Tucker’s dog Alexander and daughter Nina, and it turns out that Tucker’s wife had left him. Tucker wants to know why Ed and Al interested in transmuting living things, so Ed tells him the story of their past. Tucker decides to give them access to his lab and library, and the two brothers spend the entire day reading. The only break they take is to play with Nina and Alexander, and soon it’s time to go. Jean Havoc comes to pick them up, and before leaving, he reminds Tucker that assessment day is coming up soon. This means that Tucker will have to report the results of his research, and it weighs heavily on him because he already did poorly last year. Failing again this year would mean losing his State Alchemist title.
The next day, Ed and Al learn from Nina that Tucker’s wife left him two years ago. Nina’s loneliness reminds the brothers of the distance they had with their own father, so they opt to play with her some more. Tucker reveals later that life before he took the State Alchemist exam was hard, and his wife couldn’t put up with it, so she left him. He doesn’t want to return to those days ever again, and he offers to play with his daughter, making her quite happy. When Ed and Al arrive the next day, they find that Tucker has successfully created another talking chimera. Ed is at first amazed, but after it calls him onii-chan (brother), he realizes that this chimera is actually a transmutation of Nina and Alexander. What’s more, it now makes sense that Tucker transmuted his wife two years ago in order to pass his exam.
Ed is furious at Tucker, but Tucker tries to defend his actions by claiming that mankind’s advancements come from human experimentation. When Ed tries to lecture him on playing with a person’s life, Tucker points out that Ed once did the same thing. This leads to Ed punching Tucker, and he keeps doing so because Tucker keeps saying that they’re the same. Al eventually stops his brother, and since they can’t do anything for Nina and Alexander, Al apologizes to the chimera that wants to play. The two report back to Mustang, and Mustang thinks that as State Alchemists, there will be times when they have to take lives, so what Tucker did isn’t too different from their position. He feels that, since something like this will likely happen again where Ed will have to get his own hands dirty, Ed can’t let it get to him like this. What frustrates Ed is that he’s just a human who couldn’t even save a single girl.
With Tucker’s house now under guard, Tucker is stuck inside with the chimera form of Nina. He is soon paid a visit, however, by the man with the scar on his forehead who has already killed the guards and is now after him. After killing Tucker, the man observes the crying chimera and decides to kill it as well since it can’t be changed back. As he leaves the house, he says a prayer for the two souls.
Preview
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So a lot of the basic elements are the same as the first series, but the context of story is quite different. Here, Ed and Al aren’t preparing for the exam anymore and are instead doing research, and that allowed them to keep it all in one episode. Basque Gran also shows up at the beginning and is promptly killed off by Scar, which I guess served as Scar’s introduction. The fact that Tucker is killed by Scar at the end is different as well, but it’s probably for the better since I never really liked Tucker’s character anyway. Overall, they set this episode up to have plenty of emotional impact with everything that Nina says/does after the transmutation and all of Ed’s frustrations, but having seen the original series and knowing what would happen kind of took away some of that away. It might be nostalgia talking, but I remember the first series having more impact. That doesn’t mean though that this episode isn’t worth watching. If nothing else, it’s interesting to see how the manga story was developed differently compared to the first anime, and it looks like next week will have a battle between the Elric brothers and Scar.
flappy at 5:31 am on April 26th, 2009
YAY full metal rocks!!!
7updnL at 5:31 am on April 26th, 2009
oh shit..epic
LJ at 5:32 am on April 26th, 2009
Hmm it’s the best that they made this ep this way
the other series made me feel awkward that tucker didn’t die
Skye at 5:32 am on April 26th, 2009
Is it me or it seems that the whole series seems “squeezed”?
Unknown Voice at 5:38 am on April 26th, 2009
@Skye
Its just you.
———
Overall, great episode.
CS at 5:40 am on April 26th, 2009
Best episode of the 4 that aired till now.
penguintruth at 5:40 am on April 26th, 2009
Definitely the best episode of the series thus far. Almost an ABSOLUTE adaptation of chapter 5 of the manga, with some added material with Scar and Basque Gran. I was very impressed.
Still, I sort of liked the first show’s take on this material. Especially Tucker’s fate. Show Spoiler ▼
I’m starting to like the soundtrack a little better now, though.
bgi at 5:45 am on April 26th, 2009
@Skye - unless they wanted to make this 200 episodes series, they have to do things fast. however, they are doing something that seems to be a standard when making manga adaptations - one chapter into one episode. only difference is that FMA chapters are twice as long as many of the mangas out there. in my opinion it’s good, because this series won’t be so slow. also, from that i see - they included everything that was there to be included in this episode. maybe it seems squuzed compared to first series, since tucker arc was broken down into two episodes there.
Angous at 5:48 am on April 26th, 2009
Tucker die in the manga.
The fifth labo is very VERY different you will see.
Paud at 5:54 am on April 26th, 2009
agrees with bgi
Ryan at 5:59 am on April 26th, 2009
Wow I think I am going to have to start reading the manga along with watching this. Just so I can keep pace with whats going on. Alot of changes vs the first series.
Yufan-kun at 6:16 am on April 26th, 2009
Hmmm, they mentioned Yoki in the beginning. Guess that means they wont add a youswell episode later, as its already ‘happened’ now. Not a terrible loss I guess, but will just mentioning him and showing his file for a split second work as an introduction for his character to new viewers?
Regardless, excellent episode, the best one so far. Liked the addition the showdown between Scar and Gran. Looking forward to the next episode.
VinceC9 at 6:17 am on April 26th, 2009
Wow looks awesome! Thanks for blogging.
Good Luck for your exams too!
vin-nii at 6:19 am on April 26th, 2009
@bgi
yes, they still have at 3-4+ episodes to go before the diversion I reckon. But heck, they spared us the flashback childhood stuff.
LoL at 6:22 am on April 26th, 2009
@Ryan
This definetly is sticking to the manga. If you want to know more of this storyline I suggest to read it if you hadn’t. For me it was better than the original anime, it’s more complex storyline with good characters that didn’t showed up in the anime (ling yao it’s the best fma character for me)
Minnie at 6:25 am on April 26th, 2009
This episode… T__T It’s here~ Oh well. I can’t wait to watch it!
http://heysayanime.kokidokom.net
Px at 6:27 am on April 26th, 2009
It’ll only feel squeezed if you are still nostalgic of all the filler the first series added to these arcs along with their own adjustments to the story. There’s a lot of new material to be animated so they can’t afford to do that anymore.
bgi at 6:35 am on April 26th, 2009
@Yufan-kun - there is a possibility that they will show short flashbacks of Youswell when Yoki will be properly introduced later. for now, just mentioning Yoki is good enough, he’s not important enough to have full episode about him.
@vin-nii - i think that childhood flashbacks will be shown later, when Show Spoiler ▼
tomtom at 6:43 am on April 26th, 2009
so tucker is definitely dead?
he won’t appear as a chimera?
that’s a big change!
desho? at 7:26 am on April 26th, 2009
DOES ANYONE KNOW HOW MANY EPISODES FMA:B WILL HAVE?! D: