Darknives Anime & Manga Blog

A Messenger From The East

Scar goes for another State Alchemist. I didn’t remember almost anything of this fight. I was expecting the Silver Alchemist to be more evil lol. It’s just that penguin shaped characters in animes give me the chills lol (in a good way). Yep, it’s Cowboy Bebop’s fault. After the quick intro, it’s OP time. Not much of a fan of the music, still okay with it. Anyway, AWESOME OP lol, the fights are really good. Fullmetal always had excellently animated fights in OPs, counting with the first anime. Still, this one is easily my favorite.

The first "messenger" from the east to appear is May Chang. She appears to none other than Scar who doesn’t look very pleased to have a little girl with a "panda". And really, wtf is up with that panda? lol She has come looking for eternal life. Believing alchemy is her answer, and for that purpose, trying to find the legendary alchemist.. Ed.. :) We also learn of another form of "Alchemy" from the east, Renten-jutsu. Even though similar at core, they have been developed through separate paths and are used differently, for different purposes.

Meanwhile, the escaped, Barry The Chopper, finds his next victim but, he’s out of luck, well more or less. He find Riza and she doesn’t waste time attacking him first. He gets in love with her for being strong. Seeing how is body is, the conversation about souls and philosophers stone obviously comes up. Riza brings Barry to Mustang and they lock him up. I was a little disappointed with this scene. Being this one of my favorite arcs from the manga, I remember it well and some stuff was cut out. Riza and Barry had some more interesting funny moments concerning the "love" Barry has for her. I hope they start taking the manga with ease, they got all their time now.. Hope there’s not some budget or episode number limitation that’s still forcing them to run through the story too quickly.

Back to Rush Valley, Al picks up another stray "cat", although this cat is a little different from usal. So, they end up meeting Ling Yao. He’s from Xing and we finally get a look at the world map. So, basically, there’s Amestris, where the story has been taking place. Then there’s two larger countries, Xing which is separated from Amestris by a desert where once stood Xerxes, one of the greatest civilizations (but, I’ll guess that will come with time), and Drachma which is bound to have war with Amestris, just didn’t start yet because of Briggs Mountain where Armstrong’s sister leads the strongest military in Amestris (hence the fact that Drachma hasn’t attacked yet).

Ling is searching for eternal life too but, unlike May, he already knows about the Philosopher’s Stone. His two "bodyguards" Lan-Fan and Fu start a fight with Ed and Al when they refuse to give them information. They really go overboard destroying the town, and really, just the fact that they are forcing information out of people is bad enough. Still, there’s no way they can be seen as bad guys, and everything is quite funny, specially due to Ling’s spaced out personality. My favorite character since Greed is out. Interesting how those two have something similar :) (that will come with time too lol).

After things calm down and Ling explains his reasons, everyone "agrees" to go to Central. Ed and the others don’t know about Hughes yet though.. The last scene shows Scar going to Central, he shares some cool cultural info about the Ishbalan’s and furthers shows his will to follow the path of vengeance.

Awesome episode, action and humor packed. The next one seems to deal with Ed and company finding out about Hughes. It will probably also show some plot development, probably something related to Hughes death.

• Next Episode: Footprints Of A Comrade In Arms