Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood BLURAY Part 4

Events in the North come to a head when Ed's group and Kimblee finally clash, but before the final blow can fall Kimblee gets new orders: carve the crest of blood at Briggs. The nationwide transmutation circle is almost complete and the new turn of events soon has "Father"'s staunchest opponents, Ed and Al, separated. With every soldier in Amestris on their tails, the two, along with a few unlikely allies, must make their separate ways to Central and to the heart of the evil that threatens their nation. They're not alone. Olivier Armstrong and Roy Mustang both have plans for Amestris's capital, and neither plan is particularly beneficial to the powers that be, King Bradley and Father included. The coup is on, and Central will burn.


If you want a demonstration of what a shonen adventure is like when it's done exactly right, you can't go wrong with Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. Especially now. It has always, at least since its somewhat rushed opening episodes, been a funny, exciting, occasionally wrenching action series of epic scope and deceptive depth. But it's here during the opening strains of its nearly twenty-episode climax that it opens the throttle all the way and really comes into its own.

Of course, this being the show's penultimate set, it isn't all climactic acceleration. There's a good deal of maneuvering to be done and secrets to be revealed before the show can wind up for its final blow-out. It's in this period that we finally learn Hohenheim's past, and Father's. That Ed and Al go their separate ways, create their separate alliances, and demonstrate their separate strengths. That Dr. Marcoh settles his score with Envy, and Greed breaks with his homunculi brethren. That the boys reconcile with their father and make their final preparations for the Promised Day. There's humor along the way (most memorably during Ed and Winry's ill-timed reunion), and intrigue, and poignancy (most strongly in Al's return to Liore). Brotherhood navigates this all with the same loose-jointed ease with which it has navigated nearly all of its many plot turns and mood shifts, plunking us almost carelessly down right on the brink of the siege of Central.