Story - 4: The story of Full Metal Alchemist is supposed to be about two tragic brothers going to search for the Philosopher's Stone that their father disappeared looking for. The laws of equivalent exchange are supposed to be really gruesome. Going out into the world and making discoveries is something really important to the Elric brothers. This impression was what made me love Full Metal Alchemist in the 2003 version. In Brotherhood, you do not get a big sense of any of this happening with the main characters because the first episodes that deal with these issues are terrible. They did this to save time, but it does not make sense considering that the beginning of an adventure is always the most important part to immersing yourself in the world.
Oddly enough, the majority of Brotherhood is based in creating its world while it somehow feels like just adding China to the equation made it a lot bigger. The oriental theme always feels disconnected from world-building and this was the same with Brotherhood even though it was detailed greatly and central to our two Asian characters. Ling was almost a decent character. It is definitely easy to like him, but his rather flat and plain character was simply hidden behind emotional storytelling cliches.
War seems far too encompassing in the story. It seems too mundane compared to what we should expect with alchemy. There are so few alchemy users that it is ridiculous and they do not know how to use their alchemy in new ways most of the time.
Toward the final battles of the series, everyone seems shallow and it would have been fine for most of the characters to die.
Art - 5: The art is good mainly because it is grounded in proper details and good lighting and such. The colors are done almost true to reality, which they were going for. The characters usually do not take up as much of the screen as your average anime and I felt that it was both effective and alienating. At worst, the environments are a bunch of empty, hallway-like rooms and darkness in much of the later parts of the anime. Cannon firing is over-used to make things look exciting. Expositions and waiting scenes are very common to allow for more cheaper art.
There is also the stupid rectangle effect with things getting obliterated or disappearing. It is quite detailed, but also not effective to conveying anything. Another annoying effect is Edward's alchemy, which is always spraying electricity and gray pillars rising out of the ground.
With the openings, the art was always annoyingly cliche-looking and it did not vary between seasons. Not only were they animated in an annoying or stereotypical way, but they conceptually did not form any good themes.
The first ending almost worked. The drawings were done nicely, but it thematically was pretty stupid to show as a children's drawing because no kid would think to draw these things except the Megaman-esque platform jumping part. The other endings were drawn very annoyingly, much more so than the openings.
Sound - 4: People love stupid orchestral music. A lot of this music was made to stay in the background and it sounds very dull and monochromatic. I honestly thought that there might have been only 6 songs. There actually are probably six songs they reuse in every episode because I remember getting really annoyed at hearing a few songs that were supposed to be sinister, but just sounded idiotically simple. The music department was just bare bones.
When it comes to the openings and endings, some of them could be considered the worst of all anime, but nobody would admit that. They all sound like Bleach or Naruto songs, but without half as many strong points. Anyway,
As for the sound effects, they are rather comprehensive. I would have rated the sound a 2 if the sound effects were just average, but they are definitely a step above almost any anime out there.
Character - 4: The characters are not explored enough to give you a sense of attachment. It feels like the war is the entire story most of the time. However, the developed characters are amazing. The villains are pretty terrible. This new (or orignail) rendition of Scar was one of the few awful protagonists compared to the 2003 anime. There is also Alphonse, who supposed to made deeper just because he finds a love interest. And, Edward is just a hopeless character. He has the same personality almost the whole time despite any supposed developments. This is mainly because the comedy feels like the only time Al and Ed could have shown what their personalities are, but everyone knows how bad the comedy is here. They are simply mired in conflict after conflict without being able to loosen up in a genuine way.
All of the sins are pretty bad, even Greed and Envy who get the most development. They pretty much fight and do not represent themselves with their simple to write personality traits. All that defines them as characters is combat skills and maybe some grief over what they have been doing. The Father is without character except in his background. He is pretty much a stereotypical bad guy. The somewhat tragic past of Alphonse and Edward seems to be the only thing that is supposed to carry deep negative emotion in this show, and they blew that part of the story off.
The voice actors are mismatched, making characters sound too stereotypical or too gruff (the Colonel definitely sounds too gruff) or just stupid (Lang and Greed to name two). However, I am basing it on an English dub and it is hard to really judge on voice acting because the Japanese could be loads better.
Enjoyment - 7: Despite many, many faults, it is possible to get engaged in this show and love it to some extent. Unlike other shows where you might compromise your beliefs and see bad aspects as good, you are prone to gloss over the bad aspects of this show because it is very enjoyable at times. As mentioned earlier, the storytelling can beat out the bland characters, which is very much like a movie. Despite the anime openings being weak and extremely generic, they are action-packed enough that you will be bound to enjoy them.
However, there is still the terrible comedy which always falls flat (and would even without so much repetition of the same junk). There are still lengthy scenes that seem to be going over the same details again or showing seemingly the same scenes you saw in other flashbacks and expositions.
Overall - 5: I wish it could be lower considering how annoyed I was by this show.
