1781

Right Stuf is having one of their occasional clearance sales: 10 DVDs for $50 or 25 DVDs for $100. I’ve skimmed the list: mostly older shows, lotta crap, but a few worthwhile titles; unfortunately, a lot of series are incomplete (i.e., only half the DVDs are available).

1782

I’m hating it. I just skipped through the latest two episodes. The most grating part is the complete lack of any kind of attempt to resolve the issue at hand.

1783

No kidding. You won’t find 25 items here worth buying unless you’re a fan of all things animated.

1784

And if you are, you probably already own most of this stuff and paid full price for it.

1785

I just finished the Fullmetal Alchemist movie. I had seen a couple of shows in the past, but didn’t follow the series. NOW I MUST WATCH THE ENTIRE SERIES!!!

I am however, confused is FMA Brotherhood just a retelling of the series that follows the manga more closely?

1786

Yes. The caveat to this is that the last half of the FMA TV series and the movie have absolutely nothing to do with what goes on in the manga after a certain point.

Brotherhood is more or less the result of the Japanese fans deciding that the manga of FMA was ultimately superior to the TV series. The American fans seem kind of meh about Brotherhood since over here the TV series is significantly more popular than the manga.

1787

Yes.

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is a re-telling of the story from the manga point of view.

I watched the entire old series and 7 episodes of brotherhood. I personally felt that the old series was better, but brotherhood was still pretty good. It is the same story though so kind of hard to stick with it when you know what is going to happen and it happened better in the other series. YMMV of course if you’re a die hard FMA manga fan you might feel differently than someone like me who only experienced the anime series and doesn’t care if the two are in sync as long as the one i’m watching is good.

1788

Which one to to watch…

1789

That’s a good question. Generally I recommend people check out the first anime series first since that’s what most people like. I’ll add the caveat that my personal preference is the manga and I find pretty much all of the FMA animation pretty mediocre by comparison. The manga makes an extremely strong use of its medium that the anime (obviously) can’t duplicate.

The second series won’t be done for about a year now so I don’t see any point in worrying about it if you’re just getting into FMA.

1790

Brotherhood is fairly similar to the original series, minus a couple filler episodes, up till about episode 13. Then at 15 it takes a huge turn and becomes completely different than the original. Having not read the manga, I found it pretty interesting and surprising.

1791

If you have to pick just one, go with Brotherhood. The beginning maybe 6 episodes of Brotherhood is not as good as the first series, but the rest is excellent so far. The first series took its time with the beginning stories, stretching them to…I don’t know, let’s say 12+ episodes. But it make use of the additional time very well, going into deeper characterisation etc. OTOH if you have watched series 1, then the beginning of Brotherhood is a blast.

1792

While i guess it is understandable if unlike the old series, brotherhood decides not to use the related characters again, watching brotherhood 2nd, i was strongly disappointed in the story arcs/scenes with Nina & Rose. They were just plain better in the old series and both of them seemed to make the characters grow, as well as leading up to a number of major plot points (which i’d assume brotherhood changes from the sounds of people’s reactions).

Original series was just slower and more detailed, taking time to get you attached to characters and make you wonder about their quest. Brotherhood… well, it is like if someone makes a remake of star wars: empire strikes back that starts off with them leaving hoth without a battle, then solo leaves, then vader says “oh yeah, i’m your father, see yas,” the end. This isn’t to say it is bad, but seeing the first series first, it is very hard not to compare similar scenes and wonder why brotherhood isn’t trying to make it emotionally engaging and attach the viewer to certain things. It really seemed like brotherhood was assuming people watched the old series and speeding along to get to “something.” Whether that “something” is worth the changes or not, i cannot say not having seen it.

But maybe it gets better on the 8th(+) episode so who knows.

1793

Yeah, in the manga Rose was a one-shot character who I don’t think ever appears again after the first story arc. She’s meant to make a statement about how faith can turn into stubborn, blind stupidity. I rather liked her that way, myself, but never expected any more from her.

The anime only re-used Rose since at the point in production when they had to start making up new story material, it would be much easier on the animators if they could just re-use characters who already had model sheets prepared. The alternative would’ve been designing whole new characters, which can be a stressful prospect when a show’s already at mid-season.

Original series was just slower and more detailed, taking time to get you attached to characters and make you wonder about their quest.

A lot of that is because the “adapted” half of FMA is nearly a panel-for-panel adaptation. They were clearly trying to stretch out the manga material produced to date as far as possible. Some manga arcs go into multiple episodes and there’s one (really silly) episode based on omake material.

Brotherhood is IIRC trying to speed through the same material as quick as possible since it’s already been animated once before, but can’t be disregarded entirely if you’re trying to do a more faithful adaptation of the manga.

As a final note, though, bear in mind that FMA2’s production team significantly differs from the original’s. In particular, FMA was directly by the talented vet Seiji Mizushima while Brotherhood is being handled by someone who I believe is a relative newcomer.

It really seemed like brotherhood was assuming people watched the old series and speeding along to get to “something.”

There’s an absolute ton of characters from the manga who ended up never appearing in the original animation, so I suspect Brotherhood is just trying to law groundwork quickly before letting them show up. I would actually bet the opportunity to merchandise the manga-only characters is the main reason why Brotherhood is even being bothered with.

I also imagine it’ll slow down a bit when it gets to parts of the story the anime inadvertently changed early on, to emphasize that it’s setting up Event A correctly this time so Event B can happen as intended later on down the line.

1794

Some of the changes in Brotherhood from about 10+ are really awesome. I’m enjoying it quite a bit because now it doesn’t feel like I’m watching the same series I’ve already seen before except in fast forward. It’s totally new material and really well-animated. Episode 15 also introduces some fairly interesting changes with the visitors from the east who use Alkahestry, their own form of healing-type alchemy – not present at all in the original FMA. It’s like a totally new show now.

1795

I kind of wonder if I’d even want to bother. One of the things that makes the first FMA series interesting to me now that I’ve read a lot of the manga is that it -does- diverge rather dramatically from the manga, making for a unique spin on the basic setup. Whereas it seems like Brotherhood wouldn’t be much more than the manga in motion with voice acting.

1796

I haven’t started yet. Maybe I should jump in at 10?

1797

That’s not a bad place to start. There still some material in 10 that was in the original but it might help you ease back in.

1798

Is there more Roy Mustang in Brotherhood? He, his buddies, the Fuhrer and Greed were pretty much the only characters I liked in the original.

1799

There is less Roy Mustang in Brotherhood…but let’s see what eps. 17 brings. Brotherhood hasn’t talked about Mustang’s back story very much (or at all?). OTOH the Fuhrer is fleshed out way, way more.

1800

I believe the Fuhrer also ends up being almost a totally different character in the manga before all’s said and done.