General Anime/Manga Discussion 15: The Beach Episode

[Ibrinar]

Yeah if one doesn't like villain protagonists overlord isn't a good choice but aside from that despite being an isekai with an utterly OP MC (though his minions are on a similar level) it has decent writing.

Re:Zero honestly I lost interest at some point partly because I don't care about the characters all that much but I think it is worth checking out. It has an actual story and the characters have personalities which you sadly can't say about all isekai.

Youjo Senki is definitely the best of the three though.

[GloatingSwine]

I dropped Overlord when it took two thirds of an episode to explain the rules of a made up video game in order to try and convince me that the boring invincible protagonist-kun might actually encounter some actual stakes for the rest of the season.

On the other hand the stars are finally Right and the sleeper in the pyramid has awakened. By which I mean that the latest eight month hiatus is over and a new issue of Berserk is out in two weeks.

So if you want some actual dark fantasy you don’t need any of the imitations.

[Aotrs Commander]

Really must get around to watching Overlord, maybe getting the DVDs, really sounds like its entirely up my alley.

[Rynjin]

I dropped Overlord when it took two thirds of an episode to explain the rules of a made up video game in order to try and convince me that the boring invincible protagonist-kun might actually encounter some actual stakes for the rest of the season.

On the other hand the stars are finally Right and the sleeper in the pyramid has awakened. By which I mean that the latest eight month hiatus is over and a new issue of Berserk is out in two weeks.

So if you want some actual dark fantasy you don’t need any of the imitations.

Oh boy, can't wait for another 10 pages of Griffith posing before the next hiatus!

[Prime32]

I dropped Overlord when it took two thirds of an episode to explain the rules of a made up video game in order to try and convince me that the boring invincible protagonist-kun might actually encounter some actual stakes for the rest of the season.

The stakes of Overlord are "If a man is both invincible and detached from humanity, how long will it take him to become a monster". It's even the lyrics of the theme song.

The "will the protagonist survive" kind of stakes only show up once the series starts flipping between perspectives, using normal people as viewpoint characters and Nazerick as the villains.

[GloatingSwine]

Oh boy, can't wait for another 10 pages of Griffith posing before the next hiatus!

But it’ll be magnificently detailed posing!

[Kitten Champion]

The stakes of Overlord are "If a man is both invincible and detached from humanity, how long will it take him to become a monster".

Which would be cool if the protagonist could make ethical decisions of his own volition, that regardless of what role he might be playing in the game he's still an Otaku-Everyman and he has to live with the consequences of his actions.

However, the writer undermined the capacity for the story to have that kind of moral complexity via magical fiat, with the world itself determining that he should be Lawful Evil because that's the character he rolled and literally draining him of things like compassion and guilt to make him the kind of bad-ass anti-hero archetype without a character arc to justify it or make it compelling.

[GloatingSwine]

My problem with the “he’s so powerful he becomes a monster” is that, well, Saitama exists.

A character who is genuinely that powerful can’t get any greater satisfaction out of being a monster than a hero, because there are still no challenges and so no reason to act.

When we see those characters actually examined, in the form of Saitama or Doctor Manhattan we see them withdrawing from life. Saitama lives in a cruddy apartment and lives out of coupon magazines because he’s lost any desire due to his power.

Overlord never sold me on the idea that protagonist-kun was on any kind of arc due to his power. Stuff just happened.

[Rynjin]

He is on an arc...just a downward one.

He starts off as "Otaku-Everyman" thrust into this situation, and plays the role he's been given while maintaining an undercurrent of compassion.

By mid season 2, he has been entirely consumed by his role of evil overlord, so I stopped watching.

[ellenate]

But it’ll be magnificently detailed posing!

...which will later be rendered in anime, with the same cgi technology that existed when the manga first came out.

[Aotrs Commander]

A character who is genuinely that powerful can’t get any greater satisfaction out of being a monster than a hero, because there are still no challenges and so no reason to act.

Um, isn't this guy supposed to be, like, Evil? Or am I entirely misreading what the manga/anime is about?

Because if you're evil, "challenge" isn't the point, if you indeed interested in ruling/controlling (which I would sort of assume is implied by "overlord"). Assured victory is. A "challenge" might mean you might lose. Watching your enemies try everything they possible can, and watching their despair when they realise that nothing they do MATTERS and how completely screwed they are? And in that moment, THEN, when you kill them? That's where you get your satisfaction. (And no, that never gets old.)

You're not, essentially the equivilent of Saitama playing competative multiplayer and bemoaning you're the best at, I dunno, Starcraft or something (One-Zerg Man?) and you can't get a decent game, you're Bleakbane playing EUIV on Easy. (And potentially gravitating into, like, Tropico or something.)

(You probably have to be Evil to appreciate that, though.)

[Rynjin]

Um, isn't this guy supposed to be, like, Evil? Or am I entirely misreading what the manga/anime is about?

Because if you're evil, "challenge" isn't the point, if you indeed interested in ruling/controlling (which I would sort of assume is implied by "overlord"). Assured victory is. A "challenge" might mean you might lose. Watching your enemies try everything they possible can, and watching their despair when they realise that nothing they do MATTERS and how completely screwed they are? And in that moment, THEN, when you kill them? That's where you get your satisfaction. (And no, that never gets old.)

You're not, essentially the equivilent of Saitama playing competative multiplayer and bemoaning you're the best at, I dunno, Starcraft or something (One-Zerg Man?) and you can't get a decent game, you're Bleakbane playing EUIV on Easy. (And potentially gravitating into, like, Tropico or something.)

(You probably have to be Evil to appreciate that, though.)

The issue is it's not very interesting to watch after a while. One Punch man subverts the "no challenge" dilemma with great comedy and character work, as do most successful power fantasy series; they make it interesting to watch because you're rooting for the characters and don't care that they inevitably win.

Overlord shoots itself in the foot by introducing a lot of very interesting, detailed, sympathetic, and nuanced characters...AS GOOD GUYS who are crushed, slaughtered, and broken by the protagonist's forces.

It's like a reverse PGtE, where instead of rooting for Cat because the "Good" guys are hypocrites and can forgive some of the asspulls she comes up with because it's entertaining to read, you're rooting for the good guys because they're exactly what Above says they are except they're destined to lose because the protagonist is on the opposite side. Ains loses all of his personality (literally, it's a plot point) over the course of the series so you don't even get the good quips and stuff any more. There's no long lasting characters to draw me back and the plot is "all these characters you like die", so why watch it?

[GloatingSwine]

...which will later be rendered in anime, with the same cgi technology that existed when the manga first came out.

In about 2035, give or take.

[Ibrinar]

Um, isn't this guy supposed to be, like, Evil? Or am I entirely misreading what the manga/anime is about?

He is a random gamer who played an evil character, the new body conveniently suppresses his emotions and apparently the alignment set in the game has an effect too iirc, at the beginning the evil stuff comes more from his subordinates and he plays along but he does plenty bad stuff without the need to keep up his identity. He is evil by what he does but doesn't really have the mind of the evil overlord he portrays.

By mid season 2, he has been entirely consumed by his role of evil overlord, so I stopped watching.

Yeah I stopped because I rarely enjoy reading about MCs that constantly do evil stuff. (Unless they are funny.)

[Rynjin]

The lizardfolk arc straight up broke me off that series. It was the exact point he went from "Evil TM" to "this is disturbingly close to real life atrocities".

[Spacewolf]

I think Overlord does get some mileage out of Villains act heroes react trope as Momo does get the chance build his own little empire. But suffers in most other ways compared to One Punch Man mainly in that while some of the side characters are interesting the Level bosses are too into Momo to give the potentially interesting subplot of them backstabbing him and the human ones just arn't powerful enough to drive the plot in any meaningful way (Not to mention alot of them get fairly unsatisfying ends).

Also as people have stated the plot of him being an average working joe being driven into evil suffers when the world itself is forcing the change on him rather than him either using his past experience as a cog to dehumanise the people he kills or him having repressed desires that lead him to enjoy his role as the bad guy. I'm not sure if him being kind of incompetent is a good or bad thing since it does give some humour but again means he doesn't have to take full responsibility for the actions of his subordinates since he's just a yes man to Demiurges plans.

It's decent enough that I watch it though.

[GloatingSwine]

Because if you're evil, "challenge" isn't the point, if you indeed interested in ruling/controlling (which I would sort of assume is implied by "overlord"). Assured victory is.)

If victory is genuinely assured, there's no difference between action and inaction.

If no possible force can prevent you from succeeding, you will have the same emotional experience from the attempt as you would from sitting inert.

[ellenate]

If victory is genuinely assured, there's no difference between action and inaction.

If no possible force can prevent you from succeeding, you will have the same emotional experience from the attempt as you would from sitting inert.

Unless you're a sadist written by Reki Kawahara. Accel world was good up until the second season... All of his villains make my skin crawl.

[Rodin]

If victory is genuinely assured, there's no difference between action and inaction.

If no possible force can prevent you from succeeding, you will have the same emotional experience from the attempt as you would from sitting inert.

It depends on what you want out of it.

Saitama is somebody that loves fighting, and desperately wants to have a real challenge to alleviate his boredom. He lives in a cruddy apartment mainly because he doesn't really have the desire to interact with the world outside of fighting.

If instead you're interested in ruling, in amassing political power and taking over nations so you can have slaves waiting on you hand and foot...what do you care about how HARD the fight is? You want an opulent palace with servants kowtowing to your every whim, so you go out and crush people until that happens.

Now, I can certainly see this only being true up to a certain point. If you're an omnipotent ruler that's been around for millenia and material wealth no longer holds any meaning for you, then you might start looking into other options. Or if you're at Dr Manhattan or Q levels of "basically a God", the trivial wants of a human may not matter any more and studying the internal make-up of a star might be more interesting.

But just "so powerful nobody can possibly defeat you"? There can be many motivations to put that to use whether it's challenging or not.

[Aotrs Commander]

The issue is it's not very interesting to watch after a while. One Punch man subverts the "no challenge" dilemma with great comedy and character work, as do most successful power fantasy series; they make it interesting to watch because you're rooting for the characters and don't care that they inevitably win.

It's like a reverse PGtE, where instead of rooting for Cat because the "Good" guys are hypocrites and can forgive some of the asspulls she comes up with because it's entertaining to read, you're rooting for the good guys because they're exactly what Above says they are except they're destined to lose because the protagonist is on the opposite side.

But I am rooting for Cat and Black because they were Lawful Evil. That "Good" there is actually Evil with a fancy hat made me dislike "good" more, granted but I would never have been rooting for the good guys, even if they were, like actually Good. (And, for the record, I cheer her asspulls; that bit at the end of book two in the temple (those of you who know it know what I mean), in particular had me in stiches.)

Hell, I don't do that in STAR WARS, where the bad guys are the antagonists and you're not really supposed to.

Overlord shoots itself in the foot by introducing a lot of very interesting, detailed, sympathetic, and nuanced characters...AS GOOD GUYS who are crushed, slaughtered, and broken by the protagonist's forces.

Which doesn't sound actually bad to me at all.

I mean... Isn't like, the ENTIRE slasher movie (supposed to be), like, based around this premise? I can never fathom why "unambitious monster murders random humans in silly ways because they're there" is apparently fine, but "overlord and minions conquer enemies" apparently isn't.

Yeah I stopped because I rarely enjoy reading about MCs that constantly do evil stuff. (Unless they are funny.)

Whereas I would literally kill for something where the Evil guys are actually allowed to be successful protagonists, without actually trying to make it all grey and stuff. (Heck, much as I love PGtE - and I really, REALLY do, my Lichemaster, ACTUAL CHARACTERS I CAN IDENTIFY WITH, I had honestly resigned myself to that never, ever happening - that is still sort of "making the other side worse.")

I'm sorry, but sometimes I just want Wile E Coyote to eat the Roadrunner, Dastardly to finally splorch that sodding pidgeon, Grand Admiral Thrawn to crush the rebel scum under his boot or Madara Uchiha, I dunno, to actually win (and in that last one, I DO actually really like all the good guys). Sometimes. Not all the time. Just for FRACKING ONCE.

At the moment, the best I have ever done in that regard is Mortal Kombat Conquest, and literally the ONLY thing about that, in hindsight, that I even remembered and wasn't crap when re-looked in the reviews by Phelous was the fact that the bad guys actually WON at the end. (Seriously, just-barely pre-Lich Bleakbane was so excited, he had to watch something else despite the late hour, because he was so damn pumped that someone had actually done it, with the sheer audacity of killing basically the entire cast off, off-screen in the last five minutes.)

(I hold high hopes fo PGtE, though.)

He is a random gamer who played an evil character, the new body conveniently suppresses his emotions and apparently the alignment set in the game has an effect too iirc, at the beginning the evil stuff comes more from his subordinates and he plays along but he does plenty bad stuff without the need to keep up his identity. He is evil by what he does but doesn't really have the mind of the evil overlord he portrays.

Ains loses all of his personality (literally, it's a plot point) over the course of the series so you don't even get the good quips and stuff any more.

See, now, THAT is a more-offputting argument. Unreactive, "too cool for school" (sic) protagonists are boring, regardless of alignment, as is the whole softening of Evil by making it not really be his fault or choice, since he's literally under mind-control.

(Actually, no, I think "nominally good" unreactive protagonists are actually worse than Evil ones, but...)

As, of course, the thing you can note about all of the bad guys noted above is that they were all entertaining to watch.

If victory is genuinely assured, there's no difference between action and inaction.

If no possible force can prevent you from succeeding, you will have the same emotional experience from the attempt as you would from sitting inert.

Which is why I clearly don't ever enjoy computer games ever, given that I play on the easy difficulties and save-scam and use walkthroughs and reload and otherwise make it absolutely impossible for me to lose; after all, sitting and staring into space for dozens of hours on end gives me exactly the same emotional experience.

And I never, in fact, rage-quit a game I can't win.

Some of us don't give a monkey's about "challenge," remember.

[GloatingSwine]

Which is why I clearly don't ever enjoy computer games ever, given that I play on the easy difficulties and save-scam and use walkthroughs and reload and otherwise make it absolutely impossible for me to lose; after all, sitting and staring into space for dozens of hours on end gives me exactly the same emotional experience.

And I never, in fact, rage-quit a game I can't win.

Some of us don't give a monkey's about "challenge," remember.

I want you to think about the physical processes you went through to type this reply.

Did the act of clicking on the reply button give you satisfaction?

Was there joy in the process of holding shift to produce a capital letter.

Imagine that anything you could ever do was as trivial as that. That nothing could ever rise above the level of those miniscule actions.

That's the life of the overpowered protagonist. A series of nothings that are accomplished with less than no effort. Good and evil cannot begin to make sense from that perspective, all action is as none.

[Rynjin]

Which doesn't sound actually bad to me at all.

I mean... Isn't like, the ENTIRE slasher movie (supposed to be), like, based around this premise? I can never fathom why "unambitious monster murders random humans in silly ways because they're there" is apparently fine, but "overlord and minions conquer enemies" apparently isn't.

Slasher movies are universally trash, and are at best guilty pleasures for most people, so bad comparison. Especially since there are few (if any) slasher movies told from the perspective of the slasher, and specific effort is put into making most of the victims unlikeable. So the comparison is even worse than I'd thought when I started typing this sentence.

It's doubly poor in this case since Ains isn't conquering his enemies by the time I stopped watching, he's slaughtering and enslaving innocent people that have no stake whatsoever in the primary conflict. They're innocent bystanders he wants to force to be his cannon fodder in said conflict.

Aside, I think your character acting could use a little consistency tuning, given your hatred of Scar. If you don't like Scar killing his enemies in FMA '03 for his own reasons, why is it acceptable for others to do so? Either murder is evil and thus pleasing, or it is not.

[Ibrinar]

Whereas I would literally kill for something where the Evil guys are actually allowed to be successful protagonists, without actually trying to make it all grey and stuff. (Heck, much as I love PGtE - and I really, REALLY do, my Lichemaster, ACTUAL CHARACTERS I CAN IDENTIFY WITH, I had honestly resigned myself to that never, ever happening - that is still sort of "making the other side worse.")

I'm sorry, but sometimes I just want Wile E Coyote to eat the Roadrunner, Dastardly to finally splorch that sodding pidgeon, Grand Admiral Thrawn to crush the rebel scum under his boot or Madara Uchiha, I dunno, to actually win (and in that last one, I DO actually really like all the good guys). Sometimes. Not all the time. Just for FRACKING ONCE.

At the moment, the best I have ever done in that regard is Mortal Kombat Conquest, and literally the ONLY thing about that, in hindsight, that I even remembered and wasn't crap when re-looked in the reviews by Phelous was the fact that the bad guys actually WON at the end. (Seriously, just-barely pre-Lich Bleakbane was so excited, he had to watch something else despite the late hour, because he was so damn pumped that someone had actually done it, with the sheer audacity of killing basically the entire cast off, off-screen in the last five minutes.)

(I hold high hopes fo PGtE, though.)

Have you tried re:monster? Though I suppose that is more of a case of protagonist centered morality since it kinda reads like the story wants me to believe he isn't scum. Also it isn't very good. Hmm what was that manga that reads like a hentai plot (and not a consensual one) where the mc is an ******* mage that gets a monster army… Can't remember the name but I read enough to tell that the protagonist is a piece of **** and gets what he wants. Ah google says Maou No Hajimekata. There are definitely stories where the protagonists are evil scum and they get what they want.

Or do you want the hammy overlord kind of evil? Hmm can't remember something for that kind atm.

I want you to think about the physical processes you went through to type this reply.

Did the act of clicking on the reply button give you satisfaction?

Was there joy in the process of holding shift to produce a capital letter.

Imagine that anything you could ever do was as trivial as that. That nothing could ever rise above the level of those miniscule actions.

That's the life of the overpowered protagonist. A series of nothings that are accomplished with less than no effort. Good and evil cannot begin to make sense from that perspective, all action is as none.

Some people play loads of idle games you know. Anyway would you stop liking great food if you got it for free? There is no challenge to listening to music or reading a book are you unable to enjoy either? Can you think of nothing you want beside overcoming one challenge or another? Otherwise you have motivations that don't require a challenge.

[Prime32]

Ains loses all of his personality (literally, it's a plot point) over the course of the series so you don't even get the good quips and stuff any more.

The disturbing part is that he loses perspective but his personality stays the same. It's just that in the middle of his goofy salaryman monologues he's casually murdering people.

In one of the later books, Ainz gets a rare chance to have a casual conversation with a VIP from another country - they relate to each others' problems, and Ainz even manages to convince them that he lacks the inherent hatred of the living found in lesser undead. Then he cracks a joke and his sense of humour is so creepy that it instantly breaks the moment.

Whereas I would literally kill for something where the Evil guys are actually allowed to be successful protagonists, without actually trying to make it all grey and stuff. (Heck, much as I love PGtE - and I really, REALLY do, my Lichemaster, ACTUAL CHARACTERS I CAN IDENTIFY WITH, I had honestly resigned myself to that never, ever happening - that is still sort of "making the other side worse.")

I'm sorry, but sometimes I just want Wile E Coyote to eat the Roadrunner, Dastardly to finally splorch that sodding pidgeon, Grand Admiral Thrawn to crush the rebel scum under his boot or Madara Uchiha, I dunno, to actually win (and in that last one, I DO actually really like all the good guys). Sometimes. Not all the time. Just for FRACKING ONCE.

At the moment, the best I have ever done in that regard is Mortal Kombat Conquest, and literally the ONLY thing about that, in hindsight, that I even remembered and wasn't crap when re-looked in the reviews by Phelous was the fact that the bad guys actually WON at the end. (Seriously, just-barely pre-Lich Bleakbane was so excited, he had to watch something else despite the late hour, because he was so damn pumped that someone had actually done it, with the sheer audacity of killing basically the entire cast off, off-screen in the last five minutes.)

This is literally the motivation of Garou from One Punch Man.

[Aotrs Commander]

Have you tried re:monster? Though I suppose that is more of a case of protagonist centered morality since it kinda reads like the story wants me to believe he isn't scum. Also it isn't very good. Hmm what was that manga that reads like a hentai plot (and not a consensual one) where the mc is an ******* mage that gets a monster army… Can't remember the name but I read enough to tell that the protagonist is a piece of **** and gets what he wants. Ah google says Maou No Hajimekata. There are definitely stories where the protagonists are evil scum and they get what they want.

Or do you want the hammy overlord kind of evil? Hmm can't remember something for that kind atm.

Gotta say, neither of those sound appealing? "Not very good" and "non-consensual hentai" are not exactly enticing. Especially that last one, because there is at least ONE standard I hold to.

I'll take hammy overlord Evil happily (at least SOMEONE tends to be enjoying themselves) because that's usually all I'll get (and I'll always take funny over not-funny), but something done more seriously (but not devoid of humour, because things devoid of humour are almost always bad, at least in my perspective) for once - just fracking once - done at beyond a personal level (by which I mean, not just effectively an aforementioned slasher movies, which I don't, if you hadn't gathered from the way I'd described them, find interesting) would be even better.

The disturbing part is that he loses perspective but his personality stays the same. It's just that in the middle of his goofy salaryman monologues he's casually murdering people.

Okay, now I'm even more confused. 'Cos that, again... sounds hilarious, to be honest.

Slasher movies are universally trash, and are at best guilty pleasures for most people, so bad comparison. Especially since there are few (if any) slasher movies told from the perspective of the slasher, and specific effort is put into making most of the victims unlikeable. So the comparison is even worse than I'd thought when I started typing this sentence.

It's doubly poor in this case since Ains isn't conquering his enemies by the time I stopped watching, he's slaughtering and enslaving innocent people that have no stake whatsoever in the primary conflict. They're innocent bystanders he wants to force to be his cannon fodder in said conflict.

Aside, I think your character acting could use a little consistency tuning, given your hatred of Scar. If you don't like Scar killing his enemies in FMA '03 for his own reasons, why is it acceptable for others to do so? Either murder is evil and thus pleasing, or it is not.

No, I hate '03 Scar because he's a religious nut-job hypocrite. Notice how I have never bothered to say a word on Kinley? Who cheerfully slaughters innocents because he can? Or Barry? Or there's Lust, who I HAVE been actively saying was a good character who has killed far more innocent people than '03 Scar?

I abide Grey Pilgrim from the aforementioned Practical Guide to Evil even less than Scar.

No, what I cannot stand is characters trying to absolve responsibilty for their behind excuses and lies to tell themselves, especially because they say something else told them to do it. Actually, I often find religous or pesudo-religious (mortal, immortal or actual divinites) antagonists to be incredibly aggrevating and they almost always automatically get on my bad side immediately. See also Pain and Hidan in Naruto, the Ori from Stargate SG-1 or Above and Below (and especially Above's little puppets) in PGtE. Or the Jedi. Or Miko, even. (I laughed so fracking hard when she died.) You can even point directly at the most loathed of all, Gladiator from the Shi'ar empire and note how his fervour is equivilent to religious.

Plus Scar has no redeeming character traits that make him interesting to watch. Trust me, if Scar went about his business with Madara Uchiha's attitude, I'd have been much more forgiving.



(Notice how pretty much all the aforementioned except Hidan take themselves so deadly seriously as well and are treated deadly seriously by everything? That fundementally annoys me as well.)

I want you to think about the physical processes you went through to type this reply.

Did the act of clicking on the reply button give you satisfaction?

Was there joy in the process of holding shift to produce a capital letter.

Imagine that anything you could ever do was as trivial as that. That nothing could ever rise above the level of those miniscule actions.

That's the life of the overpowered protagonist. A series of nothings that are accomplished with less than no effort. Good and evil cannot begin to make sense from that perspective, all action is as none.

If you can't find ways to amuse yourself, the problem lies with you, not with whatever power you do or don't wield.

Some people play loads of idle games you know. Anyway would you stop liking great food if you got it for free? There is no challenge to listening to music or reading a book are you unable to enjoy either? Can you think of nothing you want beside overcoming one challenge or another? Otherwise you have motivations that don't require a challenge.

EXACTLY.



I would like to note the irony here that this particular discussion is principally taking place now because I don't feel like I want the "challenge" of firing up Hearts of Iron IV again (because it so damn hard) and so I'm basically killing time until I can go watch Brotherhood.

[Ramza00]

so I'm basically killing time until I can go watch Brotherhood.

Remind me why are you pausing on Brotherhood?

[Aotrs Commander]

Remind me why are you pausing on Brotherhood?

Because I need the telly?

Which as I type this, is now free for me to go just that.



Edit Six episodes later (to part 2 episode 12):

So Ed's Dad shows up for an evening, does nothing aside from inadvertently lead Ed to discover that what they summoned wasn't their Mum and Al was stuck in there for a moment and then buggers off to be evil again.

Right, okay, sure.

Havoc's paralysed. Bugger. Ed may be linked to Al's possibly intact body in... Truth-space, which might explains why Ed's short. (The freeze for a moment before Ed admit this held long enough I honestly thought the stream had glitched or something!)

And Scar's back. Got to admit, using yourself as bait is pretty ballsey. Good job you have Ling and Lan Fan along to help.

Except for Bradley showing up as well.

Oops.

Speaking of ballsey, Lan Fan gets all the "you fracking did WHAT" points for cutting her arm off to be a distraction. Sure, they do it all the time in Naruto, but they treat eyeballs like slotted items in an RPG inventory and the human body as being able to function with foot-wide whole in it, so it's a little more impressive in a show that is very slightly tonally less over-the-top. Eh, she'll be reet, she'll literally just get a badass automail arm, probably that shoots rockets or something.

Dang it, Winry doesn't shoot Scar when it is revealed to her he murdered her parents.

That said, his face when he goes "oh [expletive], I'm Kinley!" was actually kinda worth it. Ya little [expletive].

(Sadly means he'll probably be on the redemption thing now.)

May Chang is all kinds of awesome, to be fair.

So, the Fuerer's secret's kind of out. That's... Surprising.

So, Envy has Marco captured, and in forcing him to help them tells him that they AREN'T trying to use Amestris and conquests to form a giant transmutation circle to create a philospher's stone. Huh. Okay, that was my first guess, too.

Well done guys, you manage to capture Gluttony and then manage to set him off before you can interrogate him and UNHOLY CRAP THE FRACK DID THAT COME FROM.

...

Yeah, okay, the homunculous are a lot different (and getting more and better screen time) this time around.

So Edward Ling got swallowed along with Envy (hah!), while Mustang goes to try and drum up support if he can and deal with Bradley.

Gluttony's stomach is a pocket realm, which doesn't actually surprise me.

Envy was the one who deliberately shot the kid. wow, Envy, I really don't think bragging about it is gonna help your situation there.

(But, frankly, given the previous conversation, I tip my hat to your moustache twirling. And, I have to say, you're... not WRONG about humans, honestly...)

Wait, snap, I missed all the implications of Envy being dense because his (?) natural form is much largUNHOLY FRACKING CRAP ON A CRAPSTICK!!!

...

Okay, show. Touché again. I did NOT see that coming.



Meanwhile Mustang discovers... All of the military, even the supposed nice due he checekd to see was a nice dude are, in fact all in on whatever the hell is going on here and have been since the formation of Amestris.

Well. Again. I did not see THAT coming, either.

Hawkeye will now be right next to Bradley, so Mustang daren't do much because oh crap.

Meanwhile meanwhile, Al is getting Gluttony to take him to the "father" who is in central and is quite painfully obviously going to be Al's dad.



Um, I'm a little concerned we're only 40% of the way into the show and pretty much stuff is moving out into the open as this just means its going to get crazier from here, oh my Lichemaster.

[Metahuman1]

Alright, I'm a few episodes into the Netflix Ultraman series. I see what people mean about the animation budget being reserved to a rather extensive degree for the fight scene's.

I, gotta say though. It, feels less like Ironman or Ultraman, and more like an Upbeat Kamen Rider/Spiderman Hybrid, with a dash of Sci-fi flavored Hellboy for seasoning.

[Ramza00]

Um, I'm a little concerned we're only 40% of the way into the show and pretty much stuff is moving out into the open as this just means its going to get crazier from here, oh my Lichemaster.

I told you the protagonist in Brotherhood have agency unlike the 2003 show. 😉 👁️

[Ibrinar]

Aotrs don't read this, brotherhood spoilers

Spoiler

Show

Meanwhile meanwhile, Al is getting Gluttony to take him to the "father" who is in central and is quite painfully obviously going to be Al's dad.

It has been a while when does it become clear that they are different people?