Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood

Seems to be a lot of criticism of Naruto, Bleach, etc. due to their length.

I'd actually defend them in a way. Naruto has (imo) a decent plot and good characters. If you watch the anime and its gazillion (80-90) episodes of filler, I suspect it would be pretty bad, but if you ignore the filler, it's quite good. As long as it doesn't draw on over the 600 chapter mark, it'll be OK.

And people say how Bleach was good in teh beginning. I admit it was better than it is, but it is pretty entertaining. The anime did the same mistake as with Naruto in that they put in some really terrible filler. The manga is some 400 chapters, but that's only because Kubo (the mangaka) draws out scenes shot by shot, which gives a ncie effect, but means very little happens each chapter.

07-Ghost anime was good, although I hear it deviated from the manga quite a bit.

Joyfulldreams wrote:I just finished watching FMA Brotherhood. It was INDEED FREAKING AWESOME. Gah, which anime to watch now...Cowboy Bebop, Evangelion, more of shugo chara, Kuroshitsuji, finish watching Mai-HiME finally...?

You haven't watched Evangelion yet?
Geez man. That's like the most important anime to watch. Though if you're a young teenager, I wouldn't recommend it. It's definitely not meant to be appreciated by children. It's also very sexual, violent, and psychological. There's a very high shock value, and it's as ambitious as a work of art can ever be.

woah, one day and the comments here increased by a page.<A<

well, I would disagree to a certain extent about what you said. (oh and btw the video was fine, I've seen worse) I wouldn't agree that the characters had no development. (looking further into the story, you'll see how characters have matured in the series, like how maka puts down her pride to work with black star. How crona overcomes her fear for medusa and decides to fight for the sake of maka. Fear is the main theme of the soul eater, and the most significant growth would therefore be the courage the character gained from their "journey". If flaws is what you are talking about. I would say that there is a big difference as to what is a flaw and what is a trait, even though a flaw could also be a trait of theirs. Death the kid's flaw for example(his ocd), it isn't something that you necessarily have to change from, but something used to entertain and let people remember you for. It is similar to edward's "flaw", his sensitivity at people when height is mentioned. It's not a flaw that necessarily has to be changed, and it hasn't as well throughout the series. The flaw that has to be changed in the character, what the character learns in his journey, is more important. And in most good animes you would see it. And you see it in soul eater as well. I can't really remember what happened in the first 6 episodes (it's been a while since I last watched it), but the first 3 episodes are dedicated as introductions to the character, which could be the reason why you did not see much development.

Well, I don't really really get what you mean my formulaic. If you wanna talk about formulas and structures, fma, evangelion, drrr!!, soul eater, ouran etc etc they all have it. I think the problem with bleach and naruto is not the fact that they were formulaic, but because they lost track of their goals and purposes and dragged on for too long. (I've dropped both series so I'm only saying from what I heard from friends and teachers etc) Bleach dragged on by spending too long on fighting aizen and naruto lost track of his own goals as it progressed from hokage to sasuke to stop sasuke from destroying konoha(not sure about this part). In other words, too much sidetracking to the point that the initial goal was lost. I dropped naruto because it was too draggy for my tastes. And reborn to me is going downhill with all its sidetracks and convenient storylines that has lots of unneeded sci-fi bits. And to think I quite liked that series in the past, it's kinda disappointing and sad to see the author losing sight of her own story and deciding to focus on pretty images and fanservice instead... gurren lagann is on the top of my to watch list, definitely checking it out during the hols.

And I've watched the ova~ well the story is pretty okay I guess... felt like there is gonna be a sequel and all, judging by the cliffhanger and suchXDD Animation was pretty cool too~ I've already got the whole ova downloaded in my computer so that I can watch it frame by frame during the holidays. There are lots of scenes where I would love to learn about for the animation. (fight scenes especially, though they were mostly keyframes, with a little more in betweens they are gonna look real cool)
random add on: Animation style for the digimon 02 movie, diaboromon strikes back, is also one of my fave. Simple, but effective. He also directed the short film "comedy" as well as "kung fu love", in which he displayed a more distinguishable style in the later 2. And like previously mentioned, gotta love the animation for soul eater and ouran, I felt like I'm in love with cartoony animation styles lol.

Aki11 wrote:
well, I would disagree to a certain extent about what you said. (oh and btw the video was fine, I've seen worse) I wouldn't agree that the characters had no development. (looking further into the story, you'll see how characters have matured in the series, like how maka puts down her pride to work with black star. How crona overcomes her fear for medusa and decides to fight for the sake of maka. Fear is the main theme of the soul eater, and the most significant growth would therefore be the courage the character gained from their "journey". If flaws is what you are talking about. I would say that there is a big difference as to what is a flaw and what is a trait, even though a flaw could also be a trait of theirs. Death the kid's flaw for example(his ocd), it isn't something that you necessarily have to change from, but something used to entertain and let people remember you for. It is similar to edward's "flaw", his sensitivity at people when height is mentioned. It's not a flaw that necessarily has to be changed, and it hasn't as well throughout the series. The flaw that has to be changed in the character, what the character learns in his journey, is more important. And in most good animes you would see it. And you see it in soul eater as well. I can't really remember what happened in the first 6 episodes (it's been a while since I last watched it), but the first 3 episodes are dedicated as introductions to the character, which could be the reason why you did not see much development.

Well, I don't really really get what you mean my formulaic. If you wanna talk about formulas and structures, fma, evangelion, drrr!!, soul eater, ouran etc etc they all have it. I think the problem with bleach and naruto is not the fact that they were formulaic, but because they lost track of their goals and purposes and dragged on for too long. (I've dropped both series so I'm only saying from what I heard from friends and teachers etc) Bleach dragged on by spending too long on fighting aizen and naruto lost track of his own goals as it progressed from hokage to sasuke to stop sasuke from destroying konoha(not sure about this part). In other words, too much sidetracking to the point that the initial goal was lost. I dropped naruto because it was too draggy for my tastes. And reborn to me is going downhill with all its sidetracks and convenient storylines that has lots of unneeded sci-fi bits. And to think I quite liked that series in the past, it's kinda disappointing and sad to see the author losing sight of her own story and deciding to focus on pretty images and fanservice instead... gurren lagann is on the top of my to watch list, definitely checking it out during the hols.

Man, you're lucky I'm patient enough to read that much. lol
I don't believe that you understand my opinions exactly, but you have a very down to earth opinion yourself. I know that what you said about Naruto and Bleach is true, they did stray from their purposes and they did drag out way too long. I certainly acknowledge them as works that had potential. But the main thing that I have a problem with is not the story itself, it's the fact that they are so popular when they clearly don't deserve this much attention. It's a crime as far as I'm concerned, that such literary failures could be some of the most successful franchises. Exactly why is Gundam 00 one of the most popular gundam shows when it's virtually the worst one? Heck, I know that in Poland, Gundam 00 is like the most popular show ever, and nobody there even knows a thing about any other Gundam series', but they act like idiots every time the word is brought up and pretend that they know everything about Gundam. It makes me kinda sick actually...

But anyway, you've established yourself as someone who is not a complete idiot in my eyes. Though I don't see any justified reasoning behind your statement that you hated the first FMA anime, and I think perhaps your analysis simply wasn't thorough enough, or you were simply looking for the wrong things, or you were expecting something that wasn't there...

Either way, you're okay. Here's a winking cat for your reassurance.

eh I'm sorry did I say the first fma anime suck?O_O I dun remember saying that.. I actually quite liked the first season and it was what that got me into fma in the first place. Tho I very much preferred brotherhood for it's epicness (especially later in the series)

if I did... *too lazy to check* then serves me right for trying to type out a coherent debate 4am in the morning on a weekday.

It's just like the hetalia explosion in the previous year then. It was like my whole school was into it (even my clique of friends), except for me. I'm sorry but I tend to have a more individualistic point of view. I don't completely diss a series before checking them out but after reading and watching it, I was convinced that it certainly ain't worth the attention it was getting. (it was a policy of mine to try not to judge before seeing it for myself, though sometimes I still do that.. orz) For a period of time I was getting pissed over the popularity of it and seeing so many people just blindly following and going along with the popularity wave without an opinion of their own just pissed me to no ends. Managed to keep my opinions to myself and now that the waves calmed down I'm so glad this boom was over. It had an interesting concept yes, but totally not developed properly in my opinon...

and that gundam 00 is probably (I didn't even bother watching it) popular due to pretty art and fanservice, as with most of the anime during the recent years.

jdahdjshdjah okay I'm so sorry that I tried to debate over all these when I barely slept 4 hours a day throughout this week... (I know nothing I said made much sense, and there are tons of sentences I wrote that are too vague to express what I really want to say... well, maybe tomorrow, since it's a weekend and I can sleep in... oh look 3am. *hits the sack*)

XD I only saw the first episode of Gundam 00. No matter how good it is, my favorite will always be Gundam SEED and SEED Destiny. (Although, Destiny didn't go as good a job as the original. 0o) Granted, I've only seen little tidbits of the original Gundam series. I should probably take the time to watch them after I'm done with the Macross Series. (Macross Fronteir FTW!)

Macross is like Gundam but BETTER, man! It's got Pop idols and intense love triangles!! XDDD Such awesome music....aimo, aimo...

OMFG I love CCS. XD TRC and Holic too. CLAMP pwns. I saw Princess Tutu, I have the whole thing on my computer!! God, a magical girl anime has never made me cry so hard!! *sob sob* And I can't hate Drosselmyer because he's so funny! DX

.....I like too many anime....I've seen like over 80 and I've only really hated, like, 20 of them. XD

Aki11 wrote:eh I'm sorry did I say the first fma anime suck?O_O I dun remember saying that.. I actually quite liked the first season and it was what that got me into fma in the first place. Tho I very much preferred brotherhood for it's epicness (especially later in the series)

I'll admit when I've made a mistake... I got you mixed up with somebody else. Sorry... lol

Joyfulldreams wrote:XD I only saw the first episode of Gundam 00. No matter how good it is, my favorite will always be Gundam SEED and SEED Destiny. (Although, Destiny didn't go as good a job as the original. 0o) Granted, I've only seen little tidbits of the original Gundam series. I should probably take the time to watch them after I'm done with the Macross Series. (Macross Fronteir FTW!)

Mobile Suit Gundam is the best Gundam series. It's the original, so it makes sense that it would be. 08th Team is also one of the best, and it has a very different style to it compared to other Gundam shows. Also, Gundam Wing is good.

I'm watching Evangelion right now. The opening song is sooooo catchy! 'Zankoku na tenshi no you ni, shounen yo shinwa ni nareeeeeee~'

Joyfulldreams wrote:I'm watching Evangelion right now. The opening song is sooooo catchy! 'Zankoku na tenshi no you ni, shounen yo shinwa ni nareeeeeee~'

More like the opening is the entire show in a nutshell.
Absolutely everything you see in that opening video is what that show is about. There's TONS of symbolism.

More like the opening is the entire show in a nutshell.
Absolutely everything you see in that opening video is what that show is about. There's TONS of symbolism.

The above is so true... (OH THE SYMBOLISIM!!!)
And Joy, everyone ends up loving that music~ I think in the end for me, the music was the best part of the series. (The ending was just too 'WT..F?' for me. Plus the fact I first saw one the movies when I was only about 12 gave me mental scars for years... Evangeleon is pretty darn good though.)

Oh~ Gundam Wing~ Hearing that name takes me way back~ ^//^ I never really got to see all of it (the video store I rented it from was missing a few critical volumes) but that series was great fun~ The newer Gundams are okay, but they lack that same... 'rough' quality that the older series had.

CLAMP and Sunrise both make awesome stuff~ I finally got around to buying CodeGeass.LoR resently, and boy, I'd forgotten a lot about how gripping it is~ ...The un-nessersary murder in the series still makes me get really upset though... T~T;

Lol~ I own too many anime Dvds... My friends tend to treat my house as if it's a museum to anime. ^^;
I still love collecting them though~ <3
...I still gotta complete some series though... I'm still missing a few volumes of Moon Phase and Azu Manga Dioh. Getting volume 5 of Chobits, and finally buying Maromantic would be nice too... *Cries over not having a complete collection*

This thread needs reviving so I'm gonna do it and no one can stop me. ^_^

First off, FMA ROCKS! (That adjective isn't used enough anymore)
I honestly prefer the manga, as the first anime is something never to be watched once you've read the manga or watched the second anime. NEVER.
But I got into FMA when I was browsing my local waterstones. Read the blurb of the 1st volume and sat down and read it all the way through. Hooked.
Bought 5 volumes that day. ^^

lol, interesting. I heard about FMA from my brother some time (he was considering buying it, but didn't) and then it turned up on that random channel that appeared for like a year, animecentral. So I watched it. Then I discovered the world of reading (illegal) manga scanlations online and read the manga ... through to the end. And I watched the anime as it came out. It's so awesome, although I always get the feeling everyone's faces look really strange in it . . .

So yah, FMA rocks. But it still isn;t my favourite :p

Supernova wrote:lol, interesting. I heard about FMA from my brother some time (he was considering buying it, but didn't) and then it turned up on that random channel that appeared for like a year, animecentral. So I watched it. Then I discovered the world of reading (illegal) manga scanlations online and read the manga ... through to the end. And I watched the anime as it came out. It's so awesome, although I always get the feeling everyone's faces look really strange in it . . .

So yah, FMA rocks. But it still isn;t my favourite :p

I too, concede that it is indeed an absolute masterpiece. But needless to say, it's not my favorite either.

To all who read this thread who love FMA to bits, you'll be pleased to hear that a short chapter called FMA Gaiden is out! It's just a short story taking place after the ending but before the epilogue. Hard not to put spoilers here though so here's the link!