Fullmetal Alchemist is a great anime with an amazing story. A fantastic job is done creating characters that feel human, protagonists have flaws and antagonists are more than beings of pure evil who can't know love, or whatever bullshit "bad guy" archetype you want to plug in there. It gets of to a slow start but not just because the show is building its world. The last 25 or so episodes have a clear goal and everything that is being done happens for a purpose. The first 25 or so episodes wander a little bit more. Ed and Al are traveling around a lot and a ton of different characters are introduced, with enough description to make you sympathize/empathize with them, and then they get whisked away for the the next episode and another character you're made to feel sorry for is given a brief spotlight.
In the end there are still new characters in nearly every episode, with characters from a single episode, 40 episodes ago, are brought back with the air of "hey remember us! We matter now!". It's a little convoluted but still fun and the message is clear.
Overall the characters a solid (only an 8 because of how *many* there are, it makes it impossible to appreciate all of them) and the story is amazing. Story and character are what makes FMA, FMA. It's as good as it is because the story and the characters are fully bought into and they feed off each other, each making the other stronger.
