Animation - 8
Sound - 6
Characters - 7
Story - 8
Enjoyment - 9
all in all - 8
i watched the first series of FMA at least 4 times through, Brotherhood (BH) twice.
ANIMATION - the "quality" of animation in BH was fairly superior. they put more effort, time and money on it. they used better techniques, the coloring was very nicely done, the movements were far better, the shadows, the perspectives and pretty much everything...
except for "style"! i dare say the style they choose was very unfitting. shiny colors, bright polished skins and faces and so on. such style does fit an anime like Soul Eater rather good, but not FMA.
the style of the first series was exactly what FMA needed, "a master's touch" you could say - dull non shiny colors, sometimes with weak fading shadows, which gave a sad impression to the whole thing.
SOUND - it's funny that after all these years the weakest joint of every japanese anime is it's sound effects! movements, background voice, sometime characters' voices... . with some rather simple and easy work they would've made this series more enjoyable in all ways. FMA 1 was really good in terms of background "music", way better than BH. but in other aspects they were the same.
the japanese voice actors were better this time - the english voices were better in the first series.
CHARACTERS - such a rich story needs obviously many characters and of course at least a handful main ones. in the first series this was taken care of in a good way, the important characters were easily distinguishable, the way that one would easily remember them even after years. be it their physical appearance, their mentality or simply their position.
in BH it's a little too crowded. everywhere the brothers go and whatever they do, a bunch of guys just get involved with the story, now you can't just have them in the story out of the blue and with no roots. so the story has to spend some time explaining a little about each one of these characters. with limited numbers of episodes this makes the viewer loose the main line.
the obvious example was the very main character, Edward. his role in FMA 1, his aura and his character were really great, you could see an adult who's still a child and understand him and accept him that way. in BH he just appears as a child. he's no hero anymore, he's just good enough!
the worst part is, as it seems to have become a tradition in anime, the ending, where pretty much "every single" big and small character should be seen and get involved, just in the last arc (i was shocked when that didn't in gintama)! that like half of the homunculus die in only one last arc or that a lot of important things happen make these appearances just more confusing and illogical.
STORY - the first series was truly and thoroughly a great work, in terms of the story and how this story is being told, the characters and in general the whole atmosphere of the anime.
the strength of the whole story lies in the simple fact that the main idea is easily understandable and so near: we have 2 young brothers, who've lost their mother, while their father is gone. they're ready to do whatever they can to bring her back, be it breaking taboos (a resolve that anyone would come to).
now taking advantage of this strong point would only seem natural, as it's been done in the first series very nicely. the very good timed flash backs, the memories and the order these are being shown make the viewer to feel empathy with these rather fragile naive boys, like the simply perfect mother, hate that irresponsible father, despise that Tucker guy (who made a chimera out of his daughter) and so on. at the same time their powers, their guts and their devotion makes you like them even more. especially that a good taste of humor is mixed in. the problem with the first series was obviously that it was created too soon. so it didn't take too long before the story went ballistic! non matching characters, unneeded action and a rather weak added-story with an especially weak ending.
in BH the flow of the story was steady and good, for it followed the manga. the later characters were better matched together and to the story, there was more logic to the story, the actions, the scenes and the plot were nice and smooth. but this time they went too far in some other aspects. too much humor for a rather serious story, unclear history of some characters, especially the brothers and again a rather weak ending. there were fewer meaningful flash backs, the story didn't seemed really continuous and they were times that some main characters wouldn't show up for several episodes.
ENJOYMENT - FMA BH was indeed an enjoyable anime, one that every one should watch, but still it's not good enough to stop one from watching FMA 1. strong story, great animation quality, good characters and a production of high quality are enough to please any viewer. it would leave the viewer with great memories, that will remain with them for a long time.
as a friend once said, FMA tastes damn good! |