Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

[aaron14]

IS it just a remake of FMA following the Manga more closely?

I just need to know if i should watch Fma before Fma brotherhood.

[mgangel1124]

Back before the first anime was made, the manga was pretty new and was getting really popular, so they decided to animate it. But the problem was that it was only about 1/4 of the way through. So instead of waiting on it to finish and risk it becoming unpopular in that time, they decided to use what they had of the manga and then split off with their own story that was different from the manga's after that. Years passed, and the manga still remained really popular, so they decided to go back and create a new series that's faithful to it. And thus, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood came to be. It's only similar to the first anime for about the first thirteen episodes or so before it leaves that plot almost completely for stuff that was never in the first one.

You don't have to watch the first series to understand Brotherhood, because they do speed through all the relevent information that was covered in the first anime. I do recommend that you watch the first anime at some point, because it's still a really good show, but it isn't required to follow the new one. Skip the movie though, because that thing just sucked royally.

[hawkflame]

Seriously, is there any reason why the answer to this question is not a sticky at the top of the page?

[Tierney]

This question makes me want to hit a child

[DreamTheater2112]

I put it back up their last week...I have no idea who unfloated it

*sigh*

[mgangel1124]

Just float this one.

[DreamTheater2112]

No, that would just make far too much sense

<_<

[ben0119]

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mgangel1124 wrote:

Just float this one.

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Or re-float the other one.  He... has... the power!

[Suikotsu]

You have that saved as a Word document or something, don't you?

[mgangel1124]

Got another post of it as a bookmark that I copy/paste it from at this point.

[C10ckw0rk]

Brotherhood is FMA with the actual manga storyline and more control/input from the creator.

I prefer the old series funny enough, It was...better, in more ways then one. I get bored watching brotherhood, and somehow the characters feel less relatable. It's also too happy compared to the first series. Didn't Hirusawa have input on the first anime series speaking of...

[hawkflame]

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C10ckw0rk wrote:

Brotherhood is FMA with the actual manga storyline and more control/input from the creator.

I prefer the old series funny enough, It was...better, in more ways then one. I get bored watching brotherhood, and somehow the characters feel less relatable. It's also too happy compared to the first series. Didn't Hirusawa have input on the first anime series speaking of...

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I can see where you're coming from with that, but I think that Brotherhood is in many ways much darker- maybe not emotionally dark like the first one, but certainly had an HP Lovecraft nightmare type quality to it. 

As for relatable characters, I disagree- I think that Brotherhood had more characters who actually got some amount of character development, unlike the first series where Ed, Al, and maybe Mustang got the lion's share of development. 

And who's Hirusawa?

[TheBigOFan72]

And to think that Hiromu Arakawa (The creator of the series) finished the manga just barely in time and they didn't end up having to put in a single filler to wait for her to finish her monthly series. Basically that is spot on so +1. Though this question keeps getting asked too much all over the internet.

[ben0119]

Okay, then how about this.  Why is it that Brotherhood's art quality isn't as good as the original series?  Why are everyone's faces just round?  Why is the grass lime green?!  Also, it's just me... but everything looks a bit flatter and less-detailed, and it seems like the colors are radioactive sometimes.

Why did Adult Swim call this "a gritty re-telling closer to the manga" when it doesn't even seem as 'gritty' or serious as the first series?

[Dark_Lord_Khrima]

And why the heck does Al sound like a girl?!

[SonjaJade]

dude... hang in there, it definitely gets much better than the 1st series.  Blows it out of the proverbial water.

[mgangel1124]

1. I actually think the art is better in Brotherhood than the original anime. It's just a matter of personal taste.

2. Keep watching. We've just hit the tip of the awesome iceberg.

3. Because he's voiced by a woman who's known for her little boy voice work. Honestly, she doesn't sound much different from Aaron Dismuke's Al in the first one.

[SonjaJade]

I saw the dubbed version of that chibi OVA after party thing, and it has deep voiced Al talking to Ed and Ed says, "What happened to your voice?" and Al says "It's called puberty, maybe it'll happen to you one day!"

XD  OMGROFL

[ben0119]

1. It might have some pretty smooth and sleek animation, but I think some of the character designs and art quality are lacking, and it doesn't seem to have as much detailing and shading, making it look flatter and plainer.  Look at Ed from the first series.  His face actually has some angles and realistic dimension to it.  Brotherhood Ed... the bottom of his face and chin is just a semi-circle (meaning he really doesn't have a chin...), as are many of of the other characters.  It's been bugging the hell out of me...

2. We shall see, it would be awesome if it really could do that, since I thought the first series was so great.  It does suck that we were cut off when it starting to get really good though.  I am still not happy that the first 13 episodes were poorly handled (and no, they didn't just "take out filler", they also rushed the hell out of it!), and they took out awesome episodes like the train episode, and the mine episode, which were actually in the Manga, as I understand.

3. I didn't ask that.  But yeah, it is a shame that other VA "grew up", haha.  It's too bad they couldn't get another little boy to play the part instead...

[mgangel1124]

2. Trust me, it gets much more awesome. There are 38 episodes left. There is so much more to come that will blow your mind all over the back of your chair.

Also, while the mine was in the manga, they glossed over that for Brotherhood because it was almost exactly the same in the first anime. The entire point of speeding through the first 13 episodes was to refresh old fans' memories and catch new fans up to what's going on. I actually don't remember if the train was in the manga, but if so then it was cut for the same reason.

[ben0119]

Well, I hope you are right.  Also... the brain thing sounded dirty! o.o

Yeah but still... those were good episodes, and the train episode was one of my favorites, especially.  And I actually heard that that wasn't the same because Hughes wasn't in that story in the Manga, or something.  And even it was the same, it was awesome... grr...

Nothing to say about the new Ed's simply-drawn round face?!  I think Mustangs face is drawn like that too.  And Hawkeye... And... you get the idea.  Seriously, wtf is up with that?  Why do their faces just go in a perfect circle like that?

[mgangel1124]

It's just the art style. You either like it or you don't.

[ben0119]

I see....

Well, I will have to deal with I guess.  It's not my favorite thing in the world, but at the same time, it's not like I'm having to look at Reign, or something like that.

[Suikotsu]

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SonjaJade wrote:

I saw the dubbed version of that chibi OVA after party thing, and it has deep voiced Al talking to Ed and Ed says, "What happened to your voice?" and Al says "It's called puberty, maybe it'll happen to you one day!"

XD  OMGROFL

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Burn.

[hawkflame]

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ben0119 wrote:

Okay, then how about this.  Why is it that Brotherhood's art quality isn't as good as the original series?  Why are everyone's faces just round?  Why is the grass lime green?!  Also, it's just me... but everything looks a bit flatter and less-detailed, and it seems like the colors are radioactive sometimes.

Why did Adult Swim call this "a gritty re-telling closer to the manga" when it doesn't even seem as 'gritty' or serious as the first series?

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I think that people tend to overstate the "grittiness" of the first series anyway.  I mean, the first series added things like the Indiana Jones style death traps to Lab 5, as well as the entirely comedic episode 37 (the "warehouse 13"/Havoc's blind date episode) in the middle of a fairly dark storyline.

Besides, who exactly said this was the "grittier" version?  Darker in a more nightmarish sense, possibly (you already saw some of that inside Gluttony and with Envy's true form) but not exactly "grittier".