(Originally posted on 10-5-2010)
After watching the 2003 anime, I had to watch the epilogue movie and the OVA special. Indulge me.
FMA: Conqueror of Shamballa
Viewing Notes (Made slightly more coherent):
The movie starts with a flashback story of Ed and Al (back when he was armor), stopping some dude from creating some technology-based bomb because apparently scientific development that is not alchemy or gun based is NOT ALLOWED in Amestris.
Ed is relating this story to an Alfonse Heidrich, Al's "other world" self while driving down the roads of Munich. Lesson: Ed can't drive. He steers right off the road and the car is deadsies.
But OH NOES, they have to get to the carnival so German!Al can show off his new developments in rocket science so they hitch a ride on a buggy of SINGING gypsies. I tell no lies. These bitches started singing right before the opening credits. One of the gypsies is Rose's doppleganager and she's psychic. You think that plot point may come up again?
There's an opening like a show opening that has some cool clips from the show as well as stills and is over a L'arc en Ciel song. I guess they realized that L'arc en Ciel was the most well-known band they got for an opening and brought them back.
At the carnival Rose!gypsy, named Noah, was sold to some dude. Was that legal in 1920s/30s Germany? Either way, she runs away and Ed fights off the dudes chasing her with his fists (since no alchemy in DA REEL WORLD). Since his automail is ineffective he has fastened himself a new mechanical arm. I just wonder where he got the realistic looking skin covering stuff in the 20s. Rubber?
They book it and Ed lets Noah live with him. I think his landlady is Gracia, well, Gracia's doppleganger.
On the street they encounter Military Police Officer Hughes who is RACIST. *gasp* Oh "CoS" how you have warped my expectations! But, Hughes is a GOOD GUY!
*Lots of political talk about Weimer-era Germany.*
Ed nearly gets run over by King Bradley's car and thinks that Roy failed in his attempt to kill him forgetting he's in the "other world." Turns out, this King Bradley has a monacle and is JEWISH! OMG! [/sarcasm (for now)]
The rocket company German!Al works for is totally Aryan and they're making a rocket for some crazy woman named something Eckhart who is trying to reach some place called Shamballa with said rocket. She may be a little nazi.
Ed takes over as Bradley's driver and takes him to some castle place so Bradley can search for a giant snake/dragon/serpent that lives there. Spoiler: It's Envy.
ED PULLS OUT A LUGAR!
In an attempt to catch this thing, Ed and Bradley are captured by MP who stabbed and caught the dragon who is like, "Shit! It's Ed Elric!" and Ed's like, "Shit! It's Envy!"
The MP takes the Envy!dragon to the crazy lady's lair where she explains that Shamballa is the other side of the gate. Well, she doesn't know what the gate is but you get the picture. They wrap Envy's body around a transmutation circle she set up at the top of a cylindrical structure as one of the steps to opening the gate (sacrifice, I'm guessing).
BACK IN AMESTRIS.
In what I can only assume is the north since there's a fuckton of snow, Havoc and Breda are searching around and find Roy hiding under snow. Apparently he's been hiding out there and has been DEMOTED TO CORPORAL? (is that even possible? Ask Adam!). Was he demoted for his little murdering the fuhrer thing or did he demote himself? This just doesn't seem like something that could feasibly occur. He says he hasn't used alchemy since THAT DAY. Havoc and Breda talk about how Riza wouldn't come and see him and that Roy's not actually waiting for her . . . so what's he waiting for? And also, I bet if Riza did come, she could snap some sense into him. Havoc and Breda lack faith in the lieutenant.
Winry is talking to Sig and has stolen Riza's hairstyle and manner of dressing. She now wears her hair clipped up instead of in a ponytail and has forsaken her miniskirts and tank tops for jackets over nice tops, pants, and boots. Weird.
She goes to visit IZUMI'S GRAVE! Why did they randomly kill off Izumi in such a side-note-y way? Also Wrath is chilling in the graveyard trying to be as emo as possible and apparently not taking care of his automail.
Al is in the desert wearing Ed's coat and hair and apparently is only 13 years old because in this version he did not age beyond the gate. The hair looks really bad on him. It's also too dark.
Armstrong is using his stupidly large amounts of money to rebuild Lior and turn it someone into SUPERHAPPYFUNARMSTRONGLAND!
The gate is opened on the ground in Lior and armor soldiers run by the crazy lady come out. Al saves the day and sends them away and discovers that he can put a bit of his soul into them and possess them. Again, you think this may come up again?
Schezka, Kain, and Grumman are in CONGRESS? Actually, I think I'm more confused by the fact that Amestris has a ruling body since they are supposed to be a military dictatorship. I complained about this discrepancy at the end of the show.
Riza is shown working at Central Command with Maria and Denny. I think she's in charge of their little section.
The armor soldiers get sucked through the sky after Al beats them up. Al grabs onto one to follow it through the gate but Rose shakes him off. This may single-handedly be the smartest thing she does in the whole series.
BACK TO GERMANY
*More political talk*
After being arrested Ed is taken to the cylindrical room, command center of the antagonists, and Ed laughs at your occult! Wait, it's alchemy! Upon seeing the transmutation circle on the ground, Ed finishes chalking in the circle and activates it while the crazy lady is watching. This wasn't very smart but I guess Ed was homesick for some alchemy. This brought about the armor soldiers being sucked back into Germany.
Ed is 18 apparently (this is dropped kind of out of nowhere) and the people who work in this weird place try to catch him so he hides from the crazies in the pile of armor soldiers where he encounters Al!possessed armor. "OMG Brother!" moment followed by a SUPER RUNAWAY!
They chat in an attempt to figure out how this is possible but soon the Al-ness wears off and the armor is abandoned at the same time that Al in Amestris wakes up.
IN AMESTRIS
Roy calls Winry (since when have they even been on knowing-each-other terms let alone good terms?) and she reveals that Al and Wrath are gone.
IN GERMANY
Ed visits Bradley on a film set because apparently German!Bradley is Fritz Lang (yes, that Fritz Lang; Metropolis, M, etc.) and Lang wanted to film a real dragon for his movie. He also casually drops that he's thinking of moving to America (which the actual Fritz Lang does when the nazis started taking over; also, Bradley looks like Joseph Stalin, not Fritz Lang).
Lang's maid is Dante's doppleganger. It wigs Ed out a bit.
Lang tells Ed that it is said (in folklore or something) that whoever controls Shamballa controls the world. He also explains that the "Thule party", those people in the alchemy-lab place are established nazis who want to use "Shamballa" for armed revolt by gaining alchemy powers and bringing them back across the gate.
Lang's also mentions that his wife is a Hitler supporter (check Wiki!).
ANIME!HITLER! OMG SCARY!
The Thule party and the crazy lady want to open the gate again but this time she wants to go through with a rocket since the armor soldiers were just a test. Ed tells German!Al not to build the rocket. German!Al reveals that he is dying and wants to leave his mark in science before he goes so he refuses to stop building. Shit.
BACK TO AMESTRIS.
Roy emos at Hughes' grave. Note: He's back in Central. Winry and Schezka show up afterwards and think the flowers are from Elysia.
Al and Wrath go to the underground city. I guess Wrath showed him where it was or something as a hint to Al finding out where his brother is and what the hell is going on.
BACK TO GERMANY.
Noah has to leave with the Thule society guy who bought her. Hughes is now a full-fledged Nazi and had a part in returning her.
Crazy Drunk Nazis are going to beat up Ed in a bar for being too anti-Hitler or somehting but Fritz saves him.
Noah is the key to opening the gate to Shamballa (like how Rose was the Holy Mother, geddit?). She and Ed end up in the alchemy lab again.
AT THIS POINT THE MOVIE FLUCTUATES MORE RAPIDLY BETWEEN WORLDS.
Al tries to open the gate. He and Wrath are attacked by HUGE MONSTER GLUTTONY.
Noah says she wants to open the gate to get Ed home (she knows he belongs there because of a vision she had) and she wants to move there to avoid prejudice.
Wrath sacrifices himself on the transmutation circle Al made (he lets Gluttony gnaw on him) so Al can open the gate. In a weird, but-it-was-a-happy-death moment he meets Izumi at the Gate (WHOA, WAIT, so now there are two gates or something? The canon!Gate and the "other world" gate?). They embrace nakedly. I know they're mother and son but it's still awkward.
In Germany, Hohenheim was captured and fed to Envy who chomps him between his teeth after giving him some last words to Ed. Now there's been a sacrificial death to open gate on both sides.
Crazy lady rides German!Al's rocket into "Shamballa" while German!Al sets up Ed in another rocket and sends him through the gate with her. This opening causes an earthquake in Amestris.
After going through the portal, the crazy lady gets alchemy powers (a la Kimblee hands). I don't really know why this is. Maybe because she was associated with magic and science in Germany?
Ed's plane crashes in Amestris by Winry, Al, and Schezka. Ed and Winry hug and she gives him back his automail since it's better to fight with than his crappy mechanical invention (and can be fought with here).
CGI armor soldiers attack Amestris. I guess they came in right after? Mustang's Co. and Alex are on front line of attack.
Roy makes his triumphant return and has gotten over his not-using-alchemy thing. I guess this was what he was waiting for. A chance to save the day? He immediately starts giving orders again in spite of his crazy demotion and Riza says she's been waiting for him. Aw.
Crazy lady attacks Ed.
Roy orders a balloon to be made and leaves to fight. Riza is mad he didn't take her up in it too. He claimed it could only fit one and she essentially called bullshit.
Now it's crazy lady vs. Ed, Roy, and Al.
Her ship crashes and Ed goes on to fight one on one.
Crazy lady says people of Amestris are monsters. Ignorance!
She sicks more armor soldiers that she was hiding on her ship on Ed but Al had snuck onto the ship when she was distracted by fighting Ed and gave them all parts of his soul. He sicks them back on her.
Good guys win.
Ed sends Roy and Al away so he can go back to Germany. Roy is kind of hugging Al right now to keep him from running at Ed. LOL. Al says, "What about Winry?" Ed says, "Tell her thanks." EDWIN Fail.
The main ship goes back to Germany with Ed on it. The crazy lady has been consumed by her "magic" and looks like a black roach thing when she leaves the ship and Hughes shoots her thinking she's a monster. Irony.
In a SHOCKING TWIST, Al stowed away in a suit of armor on the ship so he could be with Ed in Germany. He got his memory back.
*cool gypsy music plays*
Fritz Lang has wise words.
Nazi!Hughes asks out Gracia.
Noah does a dances at German!Al's funeral.
Scar and Lust have gypsy dopplegangers.
Ed and Al go in search of a uranium bomb.
Clipshow that answers no questions!
That's it? Really? Wow. Very few questions answered and no satisfaction to that ending. I bet Ed/Winry fans were pissed. I don't even have the energy to complain about the lack of Roy/Riza. At least there was some nice steampunkness to it. And like the ending to the manga, Fullmetal is no longer an alchemist.
All in all, as a stand-alone movie it wasn't that bad (but I could be biased because of my love of WWII-era stuff and steampunk/disealpunk) but as a "Fullmetal Alchemist" product . . . yeah.
To sum up even better: "Conquerer of Shamballa in Five Minutes"
The Chibi Party OVA.
Insane.
Here's why:
* It's a meta-textual wrap-up party for the movie where all the characters are drawn as chibis.
* The armor soldiers bitch about their stunt work and comment on the fact that Roy and Riza should have had more screentime.
* Riza gets mad at Roy for abandoning her in the balloon and Roy tries to blame the director. Riza has a revenge smirk that scares him.
* Breda in a speedo is posing on a table while Maria whistles at him.
* Envy takes off his dragon costume and all the guys in the room get boners for his androgyny.
* Riza puts on a pink, girly dress, announces the beginning of the party, and dangles a microphone from a fishing line in front of the boys saying whoever gets it can say their piece on what happened in the movie.
* Ed and Al try to stop the insanity but Riza calls in a team of Black Hayates to stop the riot.
* Riza, in normal uniform, says she will speak first about her and Roy.
* Roy emerges from his emo corner saying, "Yes, Lieutenant! Tell them how our beautiful romance ended in tragic disappointment!" while ripping off his eyepatch.
* She says that if she was put in a pairing with Roy she would have abandoned the movie and that she wants to seek personal happiness. Everyone says she's cool. Roy breaks. Literally. I think this was her revenge. Oh, Riza.
* Scar and Lust, wearing tracksuits, emerge from inside armor soldier suits and are mad they didn't get more screentime. Scar throws his scar like a throwing star and it hits Gluttony!monster who eats them.
* While everyone cowers in fear, Riza plays with Hayate.
* Ed sees Heidrich and thanks him but he complains about always having to pay Ed's food and bar expenses. It is revealed that Al is talking for him because, well, same voice actor.
* Winry is HAMMERED and jealously interrogating Ed on who Noah is. She attacks him with tools.
I watched the English dub of it after and there's even more crazy.
* At the part where Roy is blaming the director he says, "I wanted to go with the original scene where we go into the ship together and we kiss but the director wanted subtle. You know I don't like subtle! How can I show my range when I'm so damn cool?" WINNNNNNN! Oh, Travis Willingham.
* Al went through puberty vocally but Ed didn't and Al mocks him for it.
* Havoc is talking in the background about how he has talent.
* When Riza grabs the mic she calls the event "The Fullmetal Alchemist Drink Too Much in Public And Complain Party!" WIN!!!!!
* (After the Black Hayate team enters)
Breda: "Why does it take ten dogs to play one on screen?"
Falman: "Why aren't you wearing any pants?"
* Riza's line when she disses Roy is even more harsh in English ("I want to thank the directors for how delicately they handled our STRICTLY PLATONIC relationship"). Also Roy's line before it is Willingham doing his Armstrong impression again.
* Scar and Lust were working as armored zombies to earn extra cash. Haha.
* Winry read about Noah in an anime fan magazine. "Why does this call her the NEW LOVE INTEREST?" "Here I am at home worried sick about you and you're carrying on with some hussy in a nightgown having a sexy kiss scene!" She sounds even drunker.
Okay. My head has exploded in the best way.
[/end rant]
THIS
ReplyDeleteamazing