I imagine we are intended to get more Tricia flashbacks as time progresses, particularly as we are being introduced to Hoho. And more of the horror of Ed's loss of Al too: you have to remember that they need to hold some things back when they revisit this territory in the future. Ed will revisit it, and of course there is the scene where Al finally remembers what happened: every time they go back, they will need to show new things otherwise it will just be a recap.
I agree with you that they will have to save some bits for later -- but the problem I saw wasn't that they didn't reveal enough of the storyline, but rather they didn't give the parts they did reveal the emotional weight it needed.
The love for their mom was the force driving their work for alchemy, yet I see this as a visual equivilant of telling rather than showing. We didn't get any powerful images of the three together -- no sense of the visceral need that they would need to be driven to do what they did. And this is not something that can be revealed later, it has to come in this episode, because this is the episode explaining why they lost their bodies. Without that this episode loses power.
For example, the image of Winry crying while being told her parents died is just so much stronger and more intense as an image than Winry sharing tea with Riza. Both give the same important backstory point: that Winry's parents died in the war. But one is gut wrenchingly poignent, and the other is emotionally muted and understated.
I just you just nailed while I've never been as fond of the manga as the anime (aside from terminal lack of Archer)...the anime first go around did do the human drama a bigger service. Like if you combined the engaging relationships in the anime with the manga storyline I'd be so so happy. But I guess they feel like they can't really do that this go around. :(
It is the reason why I don't have a preference between the anime and the Manga: Each gives me something I crave, but neither gives me all that I crave.
I really hoped that the second anime would combine the best of both: the emotional storytelling of the anime and the intelligent plotting of the manga.
The alterna-homunculi were one of my favorite things about the previous anime, for all that Wrath's explanation never made sense >>;; Tricia!Sloth was positively chilling when she appeared. Supposedly the homunculi-as-failed-transmutations bit was a change Arakawa herself was fond of, although I've only heard that secondhand and have never found any interviews to substantiate it.
Yeah, it could be just that this particular episode was one where the original Anime excelled (in fact it was my favorite episode in the entire series simply because of the power of it). I see it largely as a missed opportunity. Had I not seen the first Anime's handling, I probably would be hunky dory with this episode.
I think you hit the nail on the head for me. I think I liked and twitched at the same bits you did.
You really need more reason for Ed and Al to "want their mother back". You saw very little love and affection. Just the sequence with Winry's parents dying and Ed and Al running home to mom was very powerful in the original anime. This one lacked that emotional power. I do hope they show more of the boy's relationship with mom. It was one of the driving forces in the other anime. Here it's sort of a foot note.
Exactly. That scene you mentioned made it so clear why Ed and Al would go through this much effort.
In fact by the time Ed and Al got around to resurrecting their mom, she'd been dead for years -- the wound was old. We really need some reason for them to keep soldiering on.
I sort of figured they were skipping all that stuff because they wanted to avoid doing the same things and were looking for a darker edge to the show. It's not a sacrifice I'm fond of at all. Though in general, the bits they've done right for me are brilliant.
I was very pleased to see how well the got across the horror and pain of the Gate. I think they did that very well. But again they rushed bits here and there. Maybe, with Luck we'll get more flash backs to build up on it.
I agree with almost everything. Personally, I think that so far this anime looks like a really good fan-made video. It's all recap and no new stuff, except for the cheap flashing of Hughes, whom they're prolly gonna kill by Ep 5 anyhow, so why parade his already-dead body around for some cheap fan service? I don't like the animation because it's so pixelated around all the outlines, and it irks me that Ed's and Al's hair is outlined in BROWN, while even Winry's in in BLACK. ~_~ Ghey.
But you nailed all that other stuff right on the head.
I might be less harsh about the outlines and pixilation because I'm downloading, and therefore there is compression going on. I'm pretty used to that sort of thing. But I do appreciate the fluidity of movement, which is not a given in anime. I have several series which the art is fine as long as the characters don't move, but as soon as their is movement it becomes obvious they didn't put enough inbetween frames in, and it seems jerky.
I have to disagree with you about there not being new stuff -- unless you mean that they borrow too heavily from the Manga in the second episode. This was substantially different from the first anime. The first episode was entirely new material, so I have some hope that this won't just be a word for word transfer of the manga. It looks like they are holding pretty tightly to the manga version of the backstory, but they might diverge some in the actual story telling part.
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The love for their mom was the force driving their work for alchemy, yet I see this as a visual equivilant of telling rather than showing. We didn't get any powerful images of the three together -- no sense of the visceral need that they would need to be driven to do what they did. And this is not something that can be revealed later, it has to come in this episode, because this is the episode explaining why they lost their bodies. Without that this episode loses power.
For example, the image of Winry crying while being told her parents died is just so much stronger and more intense as an image than Winry sharing tea with Riza. Both give the same important backstory point: that Winry's parents died in the war. But one is gut wrenchingly poignent, and the other is emotionally muted and understated.
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It is the reason why I don't have a preference between the anime and the Manga: Each gives me something I crave, but neither gives me all that I crave.
I really hoped that the second anime would combine the best of both: the emotional storytelling of the anime and the intelligent plotting of the manga.
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It's also still early yet, maybe Brotherhood will get better about the emotional moments. Maybe.
Also I'm so going to miss Tricia as Sloth. To me that was incredibly powerful and amazing as a plot development.
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There are a lot of things that I like about it.
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You really need more reason for Ed and Al to "want their mother back". You saw very little love and affection. Just the sequence with Winry's parents dying and Ed and Al running home to mom was very powerful in the original anime. This one lacked that emotional power. I do hope they show more of the boy's relationship with mom. It was one of the driving forces in the other anime. Here it's sort of a foot note.
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In fact by the time Ed and Al got around to resurrecting their mom, she'd been dead for years -- the wound was old. We really need some reason for them to keep soldiering on.
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I sort of figured they were skipping all that stuff because they wanted to avoid doing the same things and were looking for a darker edge to the show. It's not a sacrifice I'm fond of at all. Though in general, the bits they've done right for me are brilliant.
I was very pleased to see how well the got across the horror and pain of the Gate. I think they did that very well. But again they rushed bits here and there. Maybe, with Luck we'll get more flash backs to build up on it.
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I agree with almost everything. Personally, I think that so far this anime looks like a really good fan-made video. It's all recap and no new stuff, except for the cheap flashing of Hughes, whom they're prolly gonna kill by Ep 5 anyhow, so why parade his already-dead body around for some cheap fan service? I don't like the animation because it's so pixelated around all the outlines, and it irks me that Ed's and Al's hair is outlined in BROWN, while even Winry's in in BLACK. ~_~ Ghey.
But you nailed all that other stuff right on the head.
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I have to disagree with you about there not being new stuff -- unless you mean that they borrow too heavily from the Manga in the second episode. This was substantially different from the first anime. The first episode was entirely new material, so I have some hope that this won't just be a word for word transfer of the manga. It looks like they are holding pretty tightly to the manga version of the backstory, but they might diverge some in the actual story telling part.
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