Story: If there is one thing I can definitely say about this series vs. the Brotherhood adaptation, it's that this has a much better beginning, while Brotherhood had a much better ending. The story itself is fine, and most of it builds up in a fairly satisfying way. One thing I really like about it is that episodes that feel like filler end up being important and coming back in a big way later on. The comedic episodes are actually funny (and both have plot-important parts), and the dramatic ones hit the right notes. Because the story goes in a different direction here, it does leave a couple things hanging, but most of the main story threads are resolved either at the end of the show or in the movie that follows the show. My only problem with the ending, and the reason I don't think it's as good as the Brotherhood ending, is mostly that it felt really anticlimactic. I won't give away anything here, but the last two episodes felt really rushed, there was no big fight at the climax (I don't require a big fight at the ending of every show, but it would have been nice for an action show to have one), and the way it was all resolved wasn't really explained until the movie (which I didn't actually watch until quite a while after I finished the show). Besides the ending, however, the story is really good.
Art: I really like the character design in this, and how every character looks distinct from each other. The backgrounds look pretty good, and the imagery is unique. The fight scenes aren't the best, and even seem a little slow at times, but overall, the animation does its job, and I don't have any major complaints about it.
Sound: I really like the music in this. It always sets the mood well, and some of it is very pretty. The voice acting - in both the Japanese and English, is great, and no one seems to have a weirdly dissonant/annoying voice actor. It's worth mentioning that this is one of the best English dubs I've ever seen/heard. Overall, it sounded great.
Characters: On the heroic side, protagonists, Ed, Al, and Roy are all great characters. I like how wide a range of personality and emotions we see from all three of them, from loud hammy comedy (Ed's reactions to being called short and the (in)famous "tiny miniskirts" line), to complete, crushing sadness (Ed's reaction to what happens to Nina is completely heartbreaking, as well as Roy's "it's raining" speech). The range of emotion keeps them from being one-note and is always well done and in-character.
The supporting characters are mostly enjoyable too, with a couple exceptions. I won't mention everyone here (there's too big a cast for that), but I will mention a couple of stand-outs. I like that everyone is plot-important, even if they aren't all likable or enjoyable. I do think that a couple were better done in the Brotherhood version (especially Hawkeye, Winry, and Hohenheim, although since their backstories/arcs weren't revealed in the manga when this came out, I can't fault this too much for not giving either of them as much to do.), but even with that said, they all felt like they needed to be there. I'm also not a huge fan of the anime-only characters, but more on that later.
On the antagonistic side, I have a little less love. I really liked Lust, Greed, and Scar, and thought they were all really well done antagonists with complexities and good arcs that ended on appropriate notes. Wrath and Sloth (both different here than in the manga/Brotherhood) had interesting, though somewhat similar backstories, but both ultimately had just enough weight in the story that I got invested in their arcs, and Gluttony and Envy are both somewhat one-note, but they do their job, and I can't complain too much about either of them. My problems come with the other villains. Now, I didn't find Father (the main antagonist in the manga/Brotherhood) all that interesting, but at least he had a good presence, and I did enjoy watching him. On the other hand, there's Dante, the main antagonist of this series. I can't get too deep into her role in the story without giving a ton of stuff away, but long story short, I don't like her very much as the big bad. She doesn't have enough presence to be enjoyably evil, she doesn't have enough focus to be complex, and she doesn't do enough cool stuff to be bada#%. Basically, she's boring. I kind of had the same problem with this version of Pride, although that was mostly due to a lack of focus and a really late reveal as to who he was (once again, can't say anymore without spoilers). The real standout here as far as bad villains was Frank Archer, an anime-only character. I think the point of him was that he was a warmongering villain, but we already have a couple of those in the story, so we don't really need another one. Much like with Dante, he's incredibly boring, and while Dante at least had a point in the story (she does get a lot done as the main villain), Archer doesn't do anything that couldn't have been done by someone else. Basically, he's boring and pointless, and the only character I don't either like or love to hate.
Overall, with a couple of exceptions, the characters are really good, and nearly all of them are plot-relevant.
Enjoyment: I really enjoyed the show. I'm honestly not sure what else to say here, but I was never tempted to stop watching it, so I did really like it. There were a couple of slow paced parts, and like I mentioned above, the ending wasn't all that great, but it was still good.
Overall: Like I said, not trying to compare this to Brotherhood, but I feel like this went less for the big, sprawling, action epic feel of Brotherhood and more for a smaller, more personal story that put more focus on Ed, Al, and their own quest to restore themselves, and I think that both angles work well. I do like Brotherhood a little bit better (not for artistic reasons, necessarily, more for personal taste reasons), but this version still stands on its own as a really good anime, and while it does have it's problems, I would definitely recommend it.
