Muhkat Lomorki
Draconic Sorcerer
What about HxH?
Top Level Canon Reviews - relaunched!
- Thread starter Leila Hann
- Start date
- Review
Just watch Part Seven, everybody knows that's when Jojo finally gets good. Ignore the fact that we told Leila that for every part until she quit, and clearly quit RIGHT before that part got good, honest, just gotta keep watching it gets good I promise.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Ah damn, Leila almost got to part 5 also first post yahoo.
Whiteeyes
Crazy Pacifist Genius v3.9
- Location
- Pennsylvania, USA
The first 100% Explosion was not impactufl for one simple reason: it explains what the building percentage is leading up to. Now that the viewers know that it means he can no longer suppress him emotions and lashes out as an incarnation of a SINGLE EMOTION things have the potential to go really wrong. The rising percentage is no longer a "what happens when it hits 100%?" mystery. Now that we know the only use for the rising percentage is for tension.
- Location
- Patriarchova
Except that him lashing out resulted in him doing exactly what he does normally, only with more metal special effect.
WorthyAlchemist?
100% certifiably without-a-doubt mediocre
- Location
- That place...yeah that one
I mean...you joke but that actually is when (in my opinion) Araki peaked.
boo600
Ego sum egredietur tempestas.
- Location
- Texas
- Pronouns
- He/Him/Hungry
I haven't actually watched M100, or read it, but I note that you didn't state, at any point, that he reached 100. Just 92.
Maybe Mob works by "venting," and the rage-break reset the stress (even though that isn't quite how humans work, this is a different universe)? From what little I do know of the show, it shows a flashing 100 whenever he Limit Breaks, or whatever it's called.
No clue what sort of super-demon whatever thing happens when he does go there, but I don't think it happened here just because the meter went down.
Maybe Mob works by "venting," and the rage-break reset the stress (even though that isn't quite how humans work, this is a different universe)? From what little I do know of the show, it shows a flashing 100 whenever he Limit Breaks, or whatever it's called.
No clue what sort of super-demon whatever thing happens when he does go there, but I don't think it happened here just because the meter went down.
Entropy Judge
Recurring Bouts of Misanthropy
Uh, she did?
At least, that reads like, "Mob reached 100%," to me.
- Location
- Patriarchova
I thought it was clear from context, but in retrospect I can see how it might not have been.
He explicitly reached 100.
Bernkastel
The Witch of Miracles
- Location
- United Kingdom
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Episode 3 basically serves to show roughly what will happen when Mob hits 100% pent up emotion/stress. In this case, as noted by others, the rage state caused by Dimple messing around with him caused Mob to act more aggressive than he normally ever would, plus had an effect on his powers. I'd say the combination is what is important. It both amps up his powers and makes Mob have, for a person like him, a extreme emotional outburst. Given his strategy is normally to repress that stuff, I doubt he has much control over it. In this case, he fortunately had Dimple as something that could be targeted with his rage outburst.
- Pronouns
- She/Her
dragonx99
Actually Satan
Oh thank you.
And ok, yea that is a lot less emoting than I put into the word sneer and I now see perfectly why Leila was disappointed by it. The guy is still being as deadpan as ever, and the only real differences I see from what I recall are that his hair is doing the super saiyan thing and he is arguably being a bit cruel in not just going straight for the kill shot like he did the previous 'fights.'
boo600
Ego sum egredietur tempestas.
- Location
- Texas
- Pronouns
- He/Him/Hungry
So... an Exalted Limit Break fits completely, then.
Seeing how he was apparently careful with the humans, that's a bit more... controlled... than I was expecting. I can see the issue, here.
I suppose he's less focused without something to torment... right?
Seeing how he was apparently careful with the humans, that's a bit more... controlled... than I was expecting. I can see the issue, here.
I suppose he's less focused without something to torment... right?
- Pronouns
- She/Her
They translated the emotion as "rage" when the fans translated it as "anger". Which is the big difference IMO. "Rage" implies some level of uncontrollability. Mob was just angry at Dimple.
Mob Psycho 100 S1E4: Idiots Only Event ~Kin~
- Location
- Patriarchova
This episode opens on an altercation between two gangs of really dramatic juvenile delinquents from rival middle schools. The group from Salt Middle School, which Mob attends, are the clear victors despite their opponents being both more numerous and more armed.
Then, the next thing we see is the salties laying on the ground unconscious, if not worse. The leader of their gang is crumpled below a big crater that's just been blown in the cement wall they were fighting near. The local toughs of Black Vinegar Middle School thank a kid named Teru for saving the day. Teru basks in their gratitude, and makes an internal villain speech about how he's indebting everyone he knows to himself as part of a master plan. In a dark echo of what Arataka told Mob at the end of the previous episode about being the protagonist of your own life, Teru is a classic narcissist who thinks he's the protagonist of everyone's life.
Roll OP. Then we return to Mob's bedroom as his mother shouts from downstairs to wake him up to get ready for school. To Mob's dismay, the diminutive remnants of Dimple are still haunting his room, and seem to think that they're his friend now or something.
After beating the spirit up a little to make sure he's not dreaming (lol), Mob asks it if it's come here so he can finish putting it out of its misery. Dimple insists that this is not the case; rather, he wishes to join forces with Mob. Together, he believes, the two of them can achieve world domination using Mob's psychic might and his own empathic influence and people skills.
Mob isn't having it, and asks Dimple if he has any last words while reaching toward him with a really eerily blank expression and cold voice.
He manages to convince Mob not to kill him, and promises not to cause any more trouble until Mob has consulted Arataka about what to do next. Mob gets dressed, and Dimple schemes to himself about how he just needs to wait for a good opportunity to possess Mob and use his psychic powers for himself, just as he presumably did to Miyamoto.
Meanwhile, Mob's brother Ritsu stops by and asks who Mob was just talking to. Mob manages to convince him it was just a phone conversation with a friend. Did we already know Mob had a brother? I'm not sure, it's been a while since I saw the first two eps. Dimple complements Mob on his brother (wuh???) and also refers to him in the feminine (WUH???) which just leads to Mob threatening him with disintegration again.
Mob heads to school, and Dimple spends the day trailing invisibly around after him, watching and trying to figure him out. He hopes that he can learn enough about Mob to gain his trust, which will presumably make it easier to possess him. This continues throughout Mob's classes and weightlifting session, before we flash over to his brother Ritsu leaving school and being approached by the newspaper girl who Mob rescued the other day.
She's approaching Ritsu, rather than Mob himself. Curious.
He asks her if she's sure she isn't looking for his little bro to ask him about his powers. There's definitely an undercurrent of envy and resentment in his voice there, though he seems to be trying to keep it under control (Mob's emotional and social problems are likely a mitigating factor). Mezato responds by handing him a notebook that presumably contains something related to recent events.
Then, we cut to Arataka's office. Mob will presumably be arriving soon to ask him for advice on how to handle the weakened Dimple. For now though, Arataka is using another of his special powers to remove a frightful apparition from a haunted photograph a customer gave him.
No comment necessary.
Mob and Dimple arrive, and Dimple immediately figures out what's going on. He senses no spiritual power from Arataka at all, and notable Arataka doesn't react to his presence until Mob mentions him, at which point he starts making bullshit excuses for himself that Mob buys as always. He considers telling Mob that Arataka is a fraud, but then decides that he can use this status quo to his advantage.
Cut back to Ritsu talking with Mezato. He tells her that there was no inciting incident to his brother's powers; as far as anyone in their family can tell, Mob was born with them. As children, Mob was always happy to show off his powers, and aside from having them he was a pretty normal kid. Then a change came over him; he stopped displaying his powers to other people, and he just went into emotionless zombie mode. Ritsu misses his brother, but has sort of resigned himself to things being this way now.
...
This hits a bit close to home for me. Not that close, but just one address removed. This was pretty much exactly what happened to a sibling of someone I know closely, minus the psychic powers part. She just seemed to lose her personality at some point in childhood, and their parents were too deep in denial about the problem to get her help. She's only just now starting to get treatment, twenty years later.
...
Anyway, she informs him that Mob has displayed his powers publicly at least once since then, and that it's had quite the impact.
Outside, Mob and Dimple find another of these posters. Dimple is excited by the potential here. Mob is not.
Back to Mezato and Ritsu. She asks him for a full interview about Mob and his powers from an intimate family perspective, and Ritsu refuses, saying that Mob isn't some sideshow to be commodified (by the school newspaper, lol). He leaves. Mezato recounts her notes about Ritsu; top of his class, attractive, popular, athletic. He's got everything that Mob doesn't, except the powers.
We then go to Ritsu, sitting in his room looking exhausted after that meeting. It turns out that he's not Mob's older brother like I thought, but his younger brother. He's just taller and more mature-looking. He reminisces about his childhood. With Mob as an older brother, psychic powers were just part of his expectations about what growing up would entail. When he discovered that he would never have them, well...he never really got over it.
I wonder how much of his desire to keep Mob out of the spotlight is genuinely for Mob's sake, and how much is down to him having come to envy Mob's powers (despite being happier and more successful in life in general).
The next morning, Ritsu joins Mob on the walk to school. This is unusual, as Ritsu usually goes in earlier for student council stuff. Dimple is still just hovering along by Mob's head. As they walk, Ritsu starts asking Mob some long-held questions.
Mob explains (over Dimple's over-the-top objections) that his powers aren't really any good for getting him the things he actually wants. Muscles. Social skills. Maturity and wisdom. Dimple screams in his ear that if he just makes himself a celebrity or cult leader he won't need any of those things to get adoration and love, but Mob just ignores him. Later that day, in class, Mob muses that his powers can't even do something as simple as solve a math equation, and Dimple despairs at Mob's lack of vision in not realizing that he doesn't need to live anything like a middle schooler life at all.
After class, the beaten and battered Salt Middle School thugs (who fortunately seem to at least not be dead) express an interest in joining the bodybuilding club. The weightlifters aren't receptive to the likes of them joining, though, as they know they'll just use their improved strength to get into even more street fights.
The delinquents get pushy, and the bodybuilders literally shove them off. Though not before the leader of the former group notices the one member of the team who isn't yet musclebound and imposing, and seems to be plotting something.
Dimple keeps whining at Mob about how this is all a waste of his time. Mob's psisplosion meter rises to 28%.
We briefly see that creepy Teru kid at home, preparing for a rainy day. Then, we go back to the Salt Delinquents, who are trying to figure out how they can get their school's bodybuilders to beat up the rival school's delinquents, especially Teru (who may or may not be telekinetic himself; we didn't see exactly what he did when he beat them bloody earlier). They start having a stupid argument about all the words their leader is misusing from their recent history classes as he tries to apply them to strategy talk, and this leads to him beating one of his already-beaten-up lackeys up with his flurry of "demon punches" or whatever (it's just normal schoolyard punches). I love how these dumbass kids think they're actually in a shonen battle manga.
The next day, Mob finds a love letter in his locker. Or, maybe a hate letter. It's written like a love letter, and is inviting him to meet the writer at a certain time and a certain place, but it also says that they "abhor" him. Either it's a sarcastic hate letter, or the writer misspelled "adore." Also, Dimple points out that this handwriting looks distinctly unfeminine, and advises Mob to dismiss this as someone with really bad spelling trying to play a prank on him. He also tells Mob that he's too wooden and unlikable for any girl to ever REALLY send him a love letter, and that he needs to use his powers to build a personality cult that will attract women. So, I guess it's good that Mob won't be falling for this thanks to him, but he's not exactly helping him either.
Meanwhile, the leader of the Black Vinegar delinquents gets a written challenge from his opposite number, challenging them to a rematch at the same time and place Mob was invited to. Also, he tried to call them "rat bastards" but misspelled it as "rice," because he's shit at words.
Cut to the Salt Typo Guy being all smug about his "perfect" plan.
Why does he look like Josuke?
One of his underlings asks if he's sure Mob will fall for it. He insists that he will; he did, after all, include the words "I am a girl" in the letter, and drew a heart next to it. Flawless.
Mob does end up going to the park, it turns out, despite Dimple's urgings not to. Just on the off chance that there actually is a girl, so that he doesn't keep her waiting. If someone is waiting to beat him up or something, that's not a problem for him. If he's just being stood up, eh, it's not like he had much better to do right now.
The Black Vinegar punks approach him, and ask if he goes to Salt. He answers in the affirmative. Crap.
Meanwhile, a third misspelled letter has been left where the bodybuilders can find it, telling them that "we have Mob" and giving the same location. So, the plan is for the Vinegars to beat up Mob, and then for the muscle guys to catch them in the act and beat them up. This counts on a lot of timing working out, but it's been established that this particular criminal mastermind isn't the sharpest.
Then, we cut to Teru and some extremely tiny girl who he's on a date with. Teru gets a text message, and frowns at its contents. Then, we go back to Mob, who has allowed himself to be tied up and brought to the enemy base. Maybe he's just into that.
And um. One of the boys actually licks Mob's cheek. I guess if he's digging this, he isn't the only one. :I
Hmm. Maybe there is a bit more significance to him having levitated all those cultists, then.
Anyway, news arrives that some ridiculously overmuscled Salt students have shown up demanding Mob's release, and that they've effortlessly flattened the handful of Vinegarettes who tried to interdict them. So, the remaining hundreds of Vinegarettes (is every single member of this junior high part of its gang scene?) go out to confront them, as the predicted rainstorm begins to roll in overhead and lightning flashes.
The bodybuilders demand that Mob be released. Mob, who apparently wasn't tied to that chair but just had his arms tied to his body for some reason, walks out from the throng on his own power. The Vinegarettes realize that they've been had; these guys have nothing to do with Josuke and his gang. Unfortunately, just like Dimple said, they also are too image-obsessed to let this go now.
It doesn't go too well for them, as the bodybuilders whittle through them with superhero-like drama and visual embellishment.
I don't know if ONE just can't do non-superhuman fight scenes, or if he's just deliberately crossing those wires here for intentional lols. If the latter, it's successful.
Unfortunately, Teru has been on the way this whole time ever since receiving that text message. He arrives on scene, performatively beats down the old Lord High Vinegaroon while declaring himself the new boss, and tells the bodybuilders that he's not going to allow them to leave. It's pretty clear that he sees beating them up as his big opportunity to cement his claimed leadership status.
Okay, maybe this is just me seeing JoJo everywhere after having spent a year and change writing fanfic of it, but...between the one kid's Josuke haircut and coat, and now Teru's talking and acting almost exactly like kid!Dio while also sharing his bushy blond hair and purple jacket, I'm having trouble not seeing this as deliberate.
The bodybuilders tell Dio they don't want to fight. He megalomonologues at them for a bit, and then sends them all flying.
Josuke, who's been watching all this from hiding, charges Dio while his back is turned and starts raining punches on him...but none of them have any effect. It looks like they're not actually landing; like Dio is using some sort of point blank telekinesis to block each impact. Then Dio backhand slaps him so hard he goes flying across the playground with the cloth and skin torn off of his forearm where he tried to block.
The bodybuilders pick themselves up and complement Dio on his strength, especially for someone so slender looking. He just mocks them, and cruelly beats them all down again. This time, we see him doing this from Mob's perspective, which means we can perceive the sheaths of energy surrounding Dio's fists. He isn't actually touching anyone when he fights; he's using that same short-ranged telekinesis to do damage as well as absorb it.
Is this another evil spirit in disguise, or have we actually met another real human psychic this time? Well, Mob seems to think it's the latter as he speaks up.
Dio asks him what he's talking about. Mob tells him that he knows exactly what he means, and then uses his own TK to unbind himself.
The two stare each other down beneath the storming sky. End episode.
Definitely more entertaining than the previous episode, and a return to form as far as ONE's style of heavy-handed satire is concerned. It's also stronger as far as story and character development goes, now that Mob has a human enemy who could potentially stick around for a long time, and that he's being faced with a conflict in his own ethics in having to deal with him. The hilariously stupid delinquents, hilariously heroic and powerful weightlifters, and scenery-chewing Dio-esque villainy of Teru all made great sideshows for this actually pretty solid and impactful character development.
After beating the spirit up a little to make sure he's not dreaming (lol), Mob asks it if it's come here so he can finish putting it out of its misery. Dimple insists that this is not the case; rather, he wishes to join forces with Mob. Together, he believes, the two of them can achieve world domination using Mob's psychic might and his own empathic influence and people skills.
Mob isn't having it, and asks Dimple if he has any last words while reaching toward him with a really eerily blank expression and cold voice.
Meanwhile, Mob's brother Ritsu stops by and asks who Mob was just talking to. Mob manages to convince him it was just a phone conversation with a friend. Did we already know Mob had a brother? I'm not sure, it's been a while since I saw the first two eps. Dimple complements Mob on his brother (wuh???) and also refers to him in the feminine (WUH???) which just leads to Mob threatening him with disintegration again.
Mob heads to school, and Dimple spends the day trailing invisibly around after him, watching and trying to figure him out. He hopes that he can learn enough about Mob to gain his trust, which will presumably make it easier to possess him. This continues throughout Mob's classes and weightlifting session, before we flash over to his brother Ritsu leaving school and being approached by the newspaper girl who Mob rescued the other day.
He asks her if she's sure she isn't looking for his little bro to ask him about his powers. There's definitely an undercurrent of envy and resentment in his voice there, though he seems to be trying to keep it under control (Mob's emotional and social problems are likely a mitigating factor). Mezato responds by handing him a notebook that presumably contains something related to recent events.
Then, we cut to Arataka's office. Mob will presumably be arriving soon to ask him for advice on how to handle the weakened Dimple. For now though, Arataka is using another of his special powers to remove a frightful apparition from a haunted photograph a customer gave him.
No comment necessary.
Cut back to Ritsu talking with Mezato. He tells her that there was no inciting incident to his brother's powers; as far as anyone in their family can tell, Mob was born with them. As children, Mob was always happy to show off his powers, and aside from having them he was a pretty normal kid. Then a change came over him; he stopped displaying his powers to other people, and he just went into emotionless zombie mode. Ritsu misses his brother, but has sort of resigned himself to things being this way now.
...
This hits a bit close to home for me. Not that close, but just one address removed. This was pretty much exactly what happened to a sibling of someone I know closely, minus the psychic powers part. She just seemed to lose her personality at some point in childhood, and their parents were too deep in denial about the problem to get her help. She's only just now starting to get treatment, twenty years later.
...
Anyway, she informs him that Mob has displayed his powers publicly at least once since then, and that it's had quite the impact.
Back to Mezato and Ritsu. She asks him for a full interview about Mob and his powers from an intimate family perspective, and Ritsu refuses, saying that Mob isn't some sideshow to be commodified (by the school newspaper, lol). He leaves. Mezato recounts her notes about Ritsu; top of his class, attractive, popular, athletic. He's got everything that Mob doesn't, except the powers.
We then go to Ritsu, sitting in his room looking exhausted after that meeting. It turns out that he's not Mob's older brother like I thought, but his younger brother. He's just taller and more mature-looking. He reminisces about his childhood. With Mob as an older brother, psychic powers were just part of his expectations about what growing up would entail. When he discovered that he would never have them, well...he never really got over it.
The next morning, Ritsu joins Mob on the walk to school. This is unusual, as Ritsu usually goes in earlier for student council stuff. Dimple is still just hovering along by Mob's head. As they walk, Ritsu starts asking Mob some long-held questions.
After class, the beaten and battered Salt Middle School thugs (who fortunately seem to at least not be dead) express an interest in joining the bodybuilding club. The weightlifters aren't receptive to the likes of them joining, though, as they know they'll just use their improved strength to get into even more street fights.
Dimple keeps whining at Mob about how this is all a waste of his time. Mob's psisplosion meter rises to 28%.
We briefly see that creepy Teru kid at home, preparing for a rainy day. Then, we go back to the Salt Delinquents, who are trying to figure out how they can get their school's bodybuilders to beat up the rival school's delinquents, especially Teru (who may or may not be telekinetic himself; we didn't see exactly what he did when he beat them bloody earlier). They start having a stupid argument about all the words their leader is misusing from their recent history classes as he tries to apply them to strategy talk, and this leads to him beating one of his already-beaten-up lackeys up with his flurry of "demon punches" or whatever (it's just normal schoolyard punches). I love how these dumbass kids think they're actually in a shonen battle manga.
The next day, Mob finds a love letter in his locker. Or, maybe a hate letter. It's written like a love letter, and is inviting him to meet the writer at a certain time and a certain place, but it also says that they "abhor" him. Either it's a sarcastic hate letter, or the writer misspelled "adore." Also, Dimple points out that this handwriting looks distinctly unfeminine, and advises Mob to dismiss this as someone with really bad spelling trying to play a prank on him. He also tells Mob that he's too wooden and unlikable for any girl to ever REALLY send him a love letter, and that he needs to use his powers to build a personality cult that will attract women. So, I guess it's good that Mob won't be falling for this thanks to him, but he's not exactly helping him either.
Meanwhile, the leader of the Black Vinegar delinquents gets a written challenge from his opposite number, challenging them to a rematch at the same time and place Mob was invited to. Also, he tried to call them "rat bastards" but misspelled it as "rice," because he's shit at words.
Cut to the Salt Typo Guy being all smug about his "perfect" plan.
Why does he look like Josuke?
Mob does end up going to the park, it turns out, despite Dimple's urgings not to. Just on the off chance that there actually is a girl, so that he doesn't keep her waiting. If someone is waiting to beat him up or something, that's not a problem for him. If he's just being stood up, eh, it's not like he had much better to do right now.
The Black Vinegar punks approach him, and ask if he goes to Salt. He answers in the affirmative. Crap.
Then, we cut to Teru and some extremely tiny girl who he's on a date with. Teru gets a text message, and frowns at its contents. Then, we go back to Mob, who has allowed himself to be tied up and brought to the enemy base. Maybe he's just into that.
Dimple tells him that thugs, politicians, and others of his own ilk are very image conscious, so Mob should use his powers at the perfect moment to cause maximum humiliation as opposed to mere efficiency of escape. Mob contends that he's been told not to use his powers against humans, and that he won't do so unless absolutely forced.Hmm. Maybe there is a bit more significance to him having levitated all those cultists, then.
Anyway, news arrives that some ridiculously overmuscled Salt students have shown up demanding Mob's release, and that they've effortlessly flattened the handful of Vinegarettes who tried to interdict them. So, the remaining hundreds of Vinegarettes (is every single member of this junior high part of its gang scene?) go out to confront them, as the predicted rainstorm begins to roll in overhead and lightning flashes.
It doesn't go too well for them, as the bodybuilders whittle through them with superhero-like drama and visual embellishment.
Unfortunately, Teru has been on the way this whole time ever since receiving that text message. He arrives on scene, performatively beats down the old Lord High Vinegaroon while declaring himself the new boss, and tells the bodybuilders that he's not going to allow them to leave. It's pretty clear that he sees beating them up as his big opportunity to cement his claimed leadership status.
The bodybuilders tell Dio they don't want to fight. He megalomonologues at them for a bit, and then sends them all flying.
The bodybuilders pick themselves up and complement Dio on his strength, especially for someone so slender looking. He just mocks them, and cruelly beats them all down again. This time, we see him doing this from Mob's perspective, which means we can perceive the sheaths of energy surrounding Dio's fists. He isn't actually touching anyone when he fights; he's using that same short-ranged telekinesis to do damage as well as absorb it.
Is this another evil spirit in disguise, or have we actually met another real human psychic this time? Well, Mob seems to think it's the latter as he speaks up.
The two stare each other down beneath the storming sky. End episode.
Definitely more entertaining than the previous episode, and a return to form as far as ONE's style of heavy-handed satire is concerned. It's also stronger as far as story and character development goes, now that Mob has a human enemy who could potentially stick around for a long time, and that he's being faced with a conflict in his own ethics in having to deal with him. The hilariously stupid delinquents, hilariously heroic and powerful weightlifters, and scenery-chewing Dio-esque villainy of Teru all made great sideshows for this actually pretty solid and impactful character development.
Khona Moshr
Pink Flamingo Cabal Healer(they/them)
- Location
- Alabama
- Pronouns
- They/Them
we saw him during a dinner scene where Mob bent a spoon I believe.
- Location
- Georgia, US
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Very interesting, before this I was solidly putting Mob Psycho in the "not worth watching category". Maybe that was a mistake.
- Location
- Canada
It's the hair
Pompadours were the fashion for Japanese delinquents for a time, this is no longer the case today, but it's still become a stereotypical hairstyle for delinquents and thugs in popular culture
Usually blown up to comical and improbable proportions for exaggerated effect
You've said you don't care about Jojo spoilers anymore, so as an aside it's somewhat interesting that Josuke's personality does not actually fit the stereotypical image that the hairstyle represents
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- Location
- France
So long as you don't insult his hair, that is.
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood S2E7: The Northern Wall of Briggs
- Location
- Patriarchova
You know, thanks to the OP's visuals, I'd been sure that this episode's title referred to an actual, literal wall that fortified the Amestrian border. We see the soldiers, including the general who Armstrong is probably related to, standing on this gigantic armored wall that runs along the Briggs Mountains.
But, I guess that's the nickname of the officer rather than the fortress. Alright then!
We start out considerably southwest of there, with Kimblee and his squad investigating the most likely place along the mountainside tracks for Scar and Dr. Marcoh to have jumped off that train. As he looks out over the valley below and thinks, Kimblee is approached by some returning scouts. One claims that a local fisherman told him that a rowboat went missing around the right timeframe. Another heard about two unidentified men moving past the village further west. Kimblee, for his own part, is curious about an old logging road that heads north, supposedly abandoned due to frequent avalanches.
As he muses on the possibilities, we have this lovely high angled view of the western mountains and forests, with serene music to accompany it. As if to throw the banal, bureaucratic evil of Amestris and the scrabbling, greedy evil of its hidden masters into relief. And perhaps, going back to "Interlude Party," point out how little humans and human nations matter, given the sheer scope of the lands they claim as "theirs."
It's not just an ironic and pessimistic thing though, I don't think. Looking at the mountain ranges, Father and his spawn don't look any bigger or more in control themselves. And, fittingly, these mountains are allowing their foes to elude them.
Kimblee decides to have a look at that old logging trail, and follows it to the first avalanche site. It's pretty clear why the trail was abandoned, as the pile of rocks covering it and the nearby patch of forest is easily large enough to have crushed a whole fleet of logging trucks when it fell, and it blocks off the entire road an then some. However, Kimblee notices something off. The marks left by rainwater accumulating around the rocks doesn't align with where the rocks actually are.
He investigates the dirt and pebbles, and a predatory grin comes over him as he finds what he's looking for. A duo with Scar and Dr. Marcoh's capabilities, he explains, could easily blast these rockpiles out of their way and then leave new ones behind them. And, sure enough, some of these rocks have the gridlike texture left by a hasty transmutation. He orders his men to head north.
Kimblee might be unstable and self-defeatingly reckless, but he's clearly not stupid.
Title card. Then Edward and Alphonse excitedly hurry out of a train station somewhere in the northern province to see their first really serious snow covering. Apparently, they only ever get a little bit of it in Resembool and Central.
I guess most of Amestris is at a warmer latitude than I thought. Though, given the great eastern desert that probably should have been obvious.
Edward immediately slips and falls on his ass, but other than that their first experience of North City is positive. It reminds them of one winter in their childhoods when the Resembool area got an unusually heavy blizzard, leaving it looking temporarily like this. In particular, they both remember that snowman that Edward transmuted, to the delight of the other local children.
Edward's artistic leanings don't seem to evolved much at all in the last 7-8 years.
This reminiscing goes on a bit too long and has some unduly sappy music playing over it, in a manner that makes me think they were just trying to fill time by dragging this very minor moment out and trying to make us think that it's emotional or something to justify it. The brothers then decide to wander around and explore the city a bit until its time to board their next train for Briggs.
Meanwhile, in the command center of that same city, Kimblee is receiving word that two suspicious individuals were seen sneaking aboard a cargo train headed further north, toward Briggs. So, he and the Elrics are both catching up to the target at around the same time. The soldiers ask if they should order the train to stop, but Kimblee figures that given Scar and Marcoh's proven history of leaping off of trains they should avoid giving them reason to suspect that this one's been compromised. Instead, they'll be overtaking it in a high speed military train of their own, and Kimblee alone will be taking point.
On one hand, he doesn't need anyone to see him using his protostones and asking questions. On the other, he's being juuuuust a tad overconfident here. However much power the protostone gives him, it's not going to make him any faster than he is without it, and speed is Scar's entire thing.
Cut to the freight train speeding across the wintery forest. Scar and Dr. Marcoh are stowed away in a half-empty boxcar, huddled together for warmth. Scar thinks he hears something amiss in the rumbling of the wheels over the tracks, and gets up to look out the door amid rapidly intensifying music. He sees nothing, and turns back around, but then seems to notice or remember something and does a double take. Looking outside again, he now spots Kimblee's train catching up to them on the parallel tracks, with the Amestrian lion-gryphon-thing proudly displayed on its armored nose. Cut to Kimblee instructing the civilian conductor to match the military train's speed and then leaping over.
Erm...Kimb? I'm not particularly invested in your continued presence in the show, but I still feel like I have to point out that this is not how you confront someone like Scar. You're counting on him to have not noticed the military train in order for you to sneak up (and even if he didn't, there's no guarantee that you'll spot him before the reverse). You're going to be engaging him in an enclosed environment that nullifies your range advantage, and where he has doors and shutters to hide behind and use his legendary speed in a surprise attack. And, since this is a speeding train, any attempts to blow up his cover from close range runs the risk of derailing or destroying the car and killing you as well.
I mean. I assume Kimblee is also fast. But is he Scar fast? If so, I feel like someone should have commented on this. Like, during Scar's attack in "Rain of Sorrows," Mustang or Hawkeye could have said "holy crap this guy's as fast as Kimblee!" As it is, the only exceptional thing that's been established about Kimblee in terms of abilities is that he's good at tracking and he has protostone, neither of which are likely to be much help here.
So, either Kimblee's been weirdly downplayed by the other characters until now, or this is just the reckless part of "smart, but reckless."
After jumping over, Kimblee then signals for his own ride to slow down and let the freight train speed on ahead, cutting himself off from any quick backup or escape. Kimblee what you doing? I get that you don't want anyone to see an obvious use of protostone, but this seems really excessive given the poor visibility that the soldiers would already have of this fight.
Kimblee happens on the cloaked and hooded Dr. Marcoh in one of the cars. Scar either didn't come back to him after spotting Kimblee's train, or he's using him as bait and is waiting to jump out. Kimblee orders Marcoh to surrender, and when he makes no attempt to flee he walks up and spins him around to..oh LOL.
I totally forgot about that guy. Figured Scar and May had just left him behind in Central or something. Granted, this could actually be Dr. Marcoh, if May regenerated his face to disguise him as Yoki, but looking at his body language and overall body shape I don't think so. So, Scar's been running around leading the Amestrians on a chase with Yoki this whole time. Presumably, the other mysterious hooded figure who we saw May traveling with was the real Dr. Marcoh.
And, just as I predicted, while Kimblee is staring at Yoki in confusion Scar comes swinging back in through the boxcar's side entrance and just barely misses his chance to end the fight before it begins as Kimblee jumps out of the way. Man, would that have been hilariously anticlimactic.
As they face each other, the moon comes out from behind the clouds and shines in through the door Scar just bursted in through, and the two men recognize each other. Scar remembers the man who maimed him and killed his entire family. Kimblee remembers a Tuesday. Cue Yoki fleeing to a different car as Scar blows this one's box cover to smithereens in a wild rage. But, I guess Kimblee is pretty speedy after all, because he managed to kneel down and pull off some sort of repulsion effect that kept the shrapnel away. Scar confirms his identity. Kimblee confirms his, asking if that was his family who he killed from that walltop in the city of Kanda.
So, that Ishvalan city has a name. Kanda. Sort of like Kandahar? Yeah, say what she might about the Ainu, I'm having trouble believing that Arakawa wasn't channeling a lot of Afghanistan into the Ishvalans.
When Kimblee mentions Brothar specifically ("the one who looked like you, but with glasses"), Scar makes the first strike. To Kimblee's credit he does about as good a job of evading Scar's attacks as Armstrong did. But, unlike Armstrong, he's a dumbass who distanced himself from his backup, so when Scar starts tiring him out he gets worried. Kimblee, did I not fucking tell you this would happen? I can almost hear Envy facepalming already. Kimblee attributes Scar's gaining the upper hand to himself being out of shape after these last couple of years in prison. Eh, maybe. He backs away from Scar onto some open traincar platforms and waits for him to charge, but Scar knows better than to run down an open, narrow corridor toward an area-of-effect specialist. Instead, he just throws a piece of metal debris at Kimblee and impales him right through the fucking stomach to the boxcar behind him.
Scar advances toward the gasping, writhing, and bleeding tactical supergenius, as the latter bemoans his failure to kill the same man twice over. Kimblee's only choice to avoid disintegration is to sever the link to the aft cars and leave Scar and Yoki behind while the front part of the train zooms on with himself pinned to the end like a grotesque hull ornament, bleeding and exposed to the frigid winter night.
Enjoy the ride to Briggs. Idiot.
Eventually, the conductors notice that they've lost their backmost cars. That military officer ordered them not to stop, but that cargo is their liability and they doubt he's going to stick his neck out for them that far, so they stop. Circling around the train, they find the very moron in question stapled to the new end of the train like a butterfly to a board, babbling a bunch of shit that barely makes sense about the nearness of death and the beauty of his own mortality. He also orders them to get the train moving again, because thanks to his galaxybrained idea of having his own men fall back that's literally his only chance of getting medical attention before he dies a slow, horrible death of hypothermia and blood loss.
Meanwhile, the citizens of Central look up in alarm at the anguished sound of a haemonculus slamming her head against a desk over and over again while screaming.
The next morning, along a different approach vector, May Chang and the real Dr. Marcoh are traveling by foot. We finally get a look at the aftereffects of what Scar and May did to his face, and...well, it's not only bad, but it also doesn't do a particularly good job of hiding his identity (at least from anyone who's seen him in person before).
May says she wishes she could make him heal faster than she already is, and he tells her that she's done enough for him. His new face suits him better than the previous one. I...can't really bring myself to disagree with that assessment. As they talk, they cross a hill and see the Briggs Mountains rising before them in the morning sunlight. The northern boundary of Amestris, with hostile Drachma beyond. I guess this is where Scar hid Brothar's research, but I'm not at all sure why. It must have been pretty far out of his way, no?
Meanwhile in Rush Valley, Winry tries to call the Elrics and is told they headed up to north on some mission or another. The guy she's apprenticing under, who is apparently an occasional transvestite, tells her - appropos of nothing - that they're going to die. What a pleasant work environment.
Cue the Elrics riding a horsecart from the town of Briggs itself to the border fortress' perimeter. Unfortunately, civilian traffic isn't allowed past this point, and military supply and personnel convoys only come through at specific intervals, so they'll have to take it on foot from here. And also be ready to prove that they're State Alchemists from a good distance away, or else they'll likely be shot on sight. Before leaving, their driver asks Alphonse if his suit is automail, and when he's told that it isn't he tells them that that's lucky, because you don't want to bring automail out here. He drives away before Edward (whose limbs he must not have had a chance to see) can ask what that's supposed to mean.
It couldn't just be the temperature he's warning them about. Surely, Edward would have picked up on any hazards of that sort by now?
In any case, they start up the foothill toward the fortress. Do they have a reason to go here specifically aside from Armstrong's request to deliver that letter? I feel like something might have been lost in translation, like them having picked up a detail about Scar and May being bound for the area around the border fort specifically. A surprise blizzard offers the mixed blessing of obscuring them from the sentinels' view and also blowing directly against them as they struggle to ascend.
Just as they're recounting what Izumi told them about the time she spent here doing survivalism as part of her own training and wondering if there are any bears around, they hear something massive approaching from behind. They turn around, ready for battle, but discover that the something is actually a someone. A very big and unfriendly someone in an Amestrian uniform with a combination chainsaw/autocannon grafted to one arm.
Well, this is actually pretty fortunate I think. Meeting a guard at close quarters like this means that they'll have a chance to explain themselves before getting shot at.
Unfortunately, Edward does the dumbest thing possible and refuses to surrender and be taken into custody. Thus convincing the soldier that they're either Drachman agents, or something just as bad. Cue totally unnecessary fight scene. I guess Kimblee isn't the only one who's fumbling his INT checks in this episode.
And, something - either just the extreme cold, or a more exotic effect - causes Edward's automail arm to slow down, allowing the soldier to seize it in a pair of clawlike extensions of his arm blade and hold it in place while the diamond saw gets to work. So, this guy's own automail is purpose built for catching and tearing apart enemy melee weapons. Clever design. Edward tries to transmute the armclaw (which the soldier identifies as an "M1913-A Crocodile." Surprised Edward doesn't know about this, if it's a standard design. He seems like the type to geek out over the latest weaponry), but it doesn't work. It seems to be made from an unusual alloy, specifically to thwart alchemists who are expecting steel. Again, clever. Alphonse is forced to wedge his own helmet in there to let Edward get his arm out before its sawed in half.
Also, the music for this pointless fight is way too dramatic. I think this might actually be the same theme that played for some of the haemonculus battles, lol.
They manage to start overwhelming the soldier, but by then they've been surrounded by a squad of riflemen who must have been following just behind him. Then, the blizzard dies down, and they realize that they've already marched right up to the fortress walls. No wonder they got jumped!
The woman who we know to be the "Northern Wall of Briggs" calls down from a scaffold and demands their surrender. When the brothers finally do so, she addresses their attacker as an unfortunately named "Captain Buccaneer," and he salutes her in turn as General Armstrong. Figured as much.
Apparently, Edward has already heard of an officer named Olivier Armstrong, and knows that she was the Major's older sister. He hadn't realized that she was quite as high ranking, or that she was stationed out here. Also, she doesn't look very much like him aside from the hair color. Maybe they're only half-siblings, or something.
Edward identifies himself as the Fullmetal Alchemist, and claims to be here on behalf of the younger Armstrong. Olivier is skeptical that a state alchemist on legitimate business would have come here unannounced and on foot, and tells her men to search them and keep them under guard until she can confirm their identities. Reasonable enough.
When a soldier finds her brother's letter and delivers it to her, though, she rips it apart and throws it away into the wind without even opening it. Even after recognizing his seal and his handwriting on the outside (wait, it says "Dear Sister" on it? How could the brothers have not noticed that? Fucking hell...). That's much less reasonable.
She orders them to be brought inside, and warns them that this godforsaken fortress is no place for the weak. I have a feeling that the base's internal culture has suffered from the insufficiently frequent rotations. These guys are coming across as almost cult-y. Also, unlike some of her troops, she seems unfazed by Alphonse obviously being an empty suit now that his helmet is off. Considering the most likely way for her to have become accustomed to the idea of golems like him existing, that's a very bad sign.
Edward does like the design of the fortress itself though, once the snow clears a little more and he gets a good view of it before being brought inside. I am again, though, surprised that he didn't already know about this fortress. It seems like a fairly important one.
Roll credits. The stinger shows Dr. Marcoh and May finding their way to the old broken-down cabin indicated on the map Scar gave them, just a little ways outside of the fortress' restricted zone. Digging up the floor, they find the hidden research notes.
I suppose we'll find out more about that alchemy/alkahestry fusion research, including the impressive-sounding universal constructor array that he never quite finished, in the coming episodes.
This one was...okay? It still seems like we're just getting the characters to the next actual plot point without much of interest or consequence happening in the meantime, at least until the last couple of minutes, and there were enough pointlessly drawn out scenes to make it feel filler-y. They should have condensed this down to fit more plot stuff into the episode instead of puffing it up to fill one. Edward also seems unusually daft in this episode, about things that he normally isn't.
Speaking of daft though, man was I right about Kimblee not seeming up to the task being set for him. Why did Envy think he was qualified for this job? To be fair, his recklessness might have gotten worse during his time in jail, and he did do some excellent work when it came to finding Scar, but...god, that train scene was just plain embarrassing for Sin Inc, and - while I know others disagree - I don't find Kimblee charismatic enough to enjoy watching him fail. The haemonculi set a very high bar when it comes to villainy, and this guy just doesn't measure up.
Anyway, it's not a bad episode, but it's not really a good one either. Hopefully things will actually start happening again now that destinations have been reached.
But, I guess that's the nickname of the officer rather than the fortress. Alright then!
We start out considerably southwest of there, with Kimblee and his squad investigating the most likely place along the mountainside tracks for Scar and Dr. Marcoh to have jumped off that train. As he looks out over the valley below and thinks, Kimblee is approached by some returning scouts. One claims that a local fisherman told him that a rowboat went missing around the right timeframe. Another heard about two unidentified men moving past the village further west. Kimblee, for his own part, is curious about an old logging road that heads north, supposedly abandoned due to frequent avalanches.
As he muses on the possibilities, we have this lovely high angled view of the western mountains and forests, with serene music to accompany it. As if to throw the banal, bureaucratic evil of Amestris and the scrabbling, greedy evil of its hidden masters into relief. And perhaps, going back to "Interlude Party," point out how little humans and human nations matter, given the sheer scope of the lands they claim as "theirs."
It's not just an ironic and pessimistic thing though, I don't think. Looking at the mountain ranges, Father and his spawn don't look any bigger or more in control themselves. And, fittingly, these mountains are allowing their foes to elude them.
Kimblee decides to have a look at that old logging trail, and follows it to the first avalanche site. It's pretty clear why the trail was abandoned, as the pile of rocks covering it and the nearby patch of forest is easily large enough to have crushed a whole fleet of logging trucks when it fell, and it blocks off the entire road an then some. However, Kimblee notices something off. The marks left by rainwater accumulating around the rocks doesn't align with where the rocks actually are.
He investigates the dirt and pebbles, and a predatory grin comes over him as he finds what he's looking for. A duo with Scar and Dr. Marcoh's capabilities, he explains, could easily blast these rockpiles out of their way and then leave new ones behind them. And, sure enough, some of these rocks have the gridlike texture left by a hasty transmutation. He orders his men to head north.
Kimblee might be unstable and self-defeatingly reckless, but he's clearly not stupid.
Title card. Then Edward and Alphonse excitedly hurry out of a train station somewhere in the northern province to see their first really serious snow covering. Apparently, they only ever get a little bit of it in Resembool and Central.
I guess most of Amestris is at a warmer latitude than I thought. Though, given the great eastern desert that probably should have been obvious.
Edward immediately slips and falls on his ass, but other than that their first experience of North City is positive. It reminds them of one winter in their childhoods when the Resembool area got an unusually heavy blizzard, leaving it looking temporarily like this. In particular, they both remember that snowman that Edward transmuted, to the delight of the other local children.
Edward's artistic leanings don't seem to evolved much at all in the last 7-8 years.
This reminiscing goes on a bit too long and has some unduly sappy music playing over it, in a manner that makes me think they were just trying to fill time by dragging this very minor moment out and trying to make us think that it's emotional or something to justify it. The brothers then decide to wander around and explore the city a bit until its time to board their next train for Briggs.
Meanwhile, in the command center of that same city, Kimblee is receiving word that two suspicious individuals were seen sneaking aboard a cargo train headed further north, toward Briggs. So, he and the Elrics are both catching up to the target at around the same time. The soldiers ask if they should order the train to stop, but Kimblee figures that given Scar and Marcoh's proven history of leaping off of trains they should avoid giving them reason to suspect that this one's been compromised. Instead, they'll be overtaking it in a high speed military train of their own, and Kimblee alone will be taking point.
On one hand, he doesn't need anyone to see him using his protostones and asking questions. On the other, he's being juuuuust a tad overconfident here. However much power the protostone gives him, it's not going to make him any faster than he is without it, and speed is Scar's entire thing.
Cut to the freight train speeding across the wintery forest. Scar and Dr. Marcoh are stowed away in a half-empty boxcar, huddled together for warmth. Scar thinks he hears something amiss in the rumbling of the wheels over the tracks, and gets up to look out the door amid rapidly intensifying music. He sees nothing, and turns back around, but then seems to notice or remember something and does a double take. Looking outside again, he now spots Kimblee's train catching up to them on the parallel tracks, with the Amestrian lion-gryphon-thing proudly displayed on its armored nose. Cut to Kimblee instructing the civilian conductor to match the military train's speed and then leaping over.
Erm...Kimb? I'm not particularly invested in your continued presence in the show, but I still feel like I have to point out that this is not how you confront someone like Scar. You're counting on him to have not noticed the military train in order for you to sneak up (and even if he didn't, there's no guarantee that you'll spot him before the reverse). You're going to be engaging him in an enclosed environment that nullifies your range advantage, and where he has doors and shutters to hide behind and use his legendary speed in a surprise attack. And, since this is a speeding train, any attempts to blow up his cover from close range runs the risk of derailing or destroying the car and killing you as well.
I mean. I assume Kimblee is also fast. But is he Scar fast? If so, I feel like someone should have commented on this. Like, during Scar's attack in "Rain of Sorrows," Mustang or Hawkeye could have said "holy crap this guy's as fast as Kimblee!" As it is, the only exceptional thing that's been established about Kimblee in terms of abilities is that he's good at tracking and he has protostone, neither of which are likely to be much help here.
So, either Kimblee's been weirdly downplayed by the other characters until now, or this is just the reckless part of "smart, but reckless."
After jumping over, Kimblee then signals for his own ride to slow down and let the freight train speed on ahead, cutting himself off from any quick backup or escape. Kimblee what you doing? I get that you don't want anyone to see an obvious use of protostone, but this seems really excessive given the poor visibility that the soldiers would already have of this fight.
Kimblee happens on the cloaked and hooded Dr. Marcoh in one of the cars. Scar either didn't come back to him after spotting Kimblee's train, or he's using him as bait and is waiting to jump out. Kimblee orders Marcoh to surrender, and when he makes no attempt to flee he walks up and spins him around to..oh LOL.
I totally forgot about that guy. Figured Scar and May had just left him behind in Central or something. Granted, this could actually be Dr. Marcoh, if May regenerated his face to disguise him as Yoki, but looking at his body language and overall body shape I don't think so. So, Scar's been running around leading the Amestrians on a chase with Yoki this whole time. Presumably, the other mysterious hooded figure who we saw May traveling with was the real Dr. Marcoh.
And, just as I predicted, while Kimblee is staring at Yoki in confusion Scar comes swinging back in through the boxcar's side entrance and just barely misses his chance to end the fight before it begins as Kimblee jumps out of the way. Man, would that have been hilariously anticlimactic.
As they face each other, the moon comes out from behind the clouds and shines in through the door Scar just bursted in through, and the two men recognize each other. Scar remembers the man who maimed him and killed his entire family. Kimblee remembers a Tuesday. Cue Yoki fleeing to a different car as Scar blows this one's box cover to smithereens in a wild rage. But, I guess Kimblee is pretty speedy after all, because he managed to kneel down and pull off some sort of repulsion effect that kept the shrapnel away. Scar confirms his identity. Kimblee confirms his, asking if that was his family who he killed from that walltop in the city of Kanda.
So, that Ishvalan city has a name. Kanda. Sort of like Kandahar? Yeah, say what she might about the Ainu, I'm having trouble believing that Arakawa wasn't channeling a lot of Afghanistan into the Ishvalans.
When Kimblee mentions Brothar specifically ("the one who looked like you, but with glasses"), Scar makes the first strike. To Kimblee's credit he does about as good a job of evading Scar's attacks as Armstrong did. But, unlike Armstrong, he's a dumbass who distanced himself from his backup, so when Scar starts tiring him out he gets worried. Kimblee, did I not fucking tell you this would happen? I can almost hear Envy facepalming already. Kimblee attributes Scar's gaining the upper hand to himself being out of shape after these last couple of years in prison. Eh, maybe. He backs away from Scar onto some open traincar platforms and waits for him to charge, but Scar knows better than to run down an open, narrow corridor toward an area-of-effect specialist. Instead, he just throws a piece of metal debris at Kimblee and impales him right through the fucking stomach to the boxcar behind him.
Scar advances toward the gasping, writhing, and bleeding tactical supergenius, as the latter bemoans his failure to kill the same man twice over. Kimblee's only choice to avoid disintegration is to sever the link to the aft cars and leave Scar and Yoki behind while the front part of the train zooms on with himself pinned to the end like a grotesque hull ornament, bleeding and exposed to the frigid winter night.
Enjoy the ride to Briggs. Idiot.
Eventually, the conductors notice that they've lost their backmost cars. That military officer ordered them not to stop, but that cargo is their liability and they doubt he's going to stick his neck out for them that far, so they stop. Circling around the train, they find the very moron in question stapled to the new end of the train like a butterfly to a board, babbling a bunch of shit that barely makes sense about the nearness of death and the beauty of his own mortality. He also orders them to get the train moving again, because thanks to his galaxybrained idea of having his own men fall back that's literally his only chance of getting medical attention before he dies a slow, horrible death of hypothermia and blood loss.
Meanwhile, the citizens of Central look up in alarm at the anguished sound of a haemonculus slamming her head against a desk over and over again while screaming.
The next morning, along a different approach vector, May Chang and the real Dr. Marcoh are traveling by foot. We finally get a look at the aftereffects of what Scar and May did to his face, and...well, it's not only bad, but it also doesn't do a particularly good job of hiding his identity (at least from anyone who's seen him in person before).
May says she wishes she could make him heal faster than she already is, and he tells her that she's done enough for him. His new face suits him better than the previous one. I...can't really bring myself to disagree with that assessment. As they talk, they cross a hill and see the Briggs Mountains rising before them in the morning sunlight. The northern boundary of Amestris, with hostile Drachma beyond. I guess this is where Scar hid Brothar's research, but I'm not at all sure why. It must have been pretty far out of his way, no?
Meanwhile in Rush Valley, Winry tries to call the Elrics and is told they headed up to north on some mission or another. The guy she's apprenticing under, who is apparently an occasional transvestite, tells her - appropos of nothing - that they're going to die. What a pleasant work environment.
Cue the Elrics riding a horsecart from the town of Briggs itself to the border fortress' perimeter. Unfortunately, civilian traffic isn't allowed past this point, and military supply and personnel convoys only come through at specific intervals, so they'll have to take it on foot from here. And also be ready to prove that they're State Alchemists from a good distance away, or else they'll likely be shot on sight. Before leaving, their driver asks Alphonse if his suit is automail, and when he's told that it isn't he tells them that that's lucky, because you don't want to bring automail out here. He drives away before Edward (whose limbs he must not have had a chance to see) can ask what that's supposed to mean.
It couldn't just be the temperature he's warning them about. Surely, Edward would have picked up on any hazards of that sort by now?
In any case, they start up the foothill toward the fortress. Do they have a reason to go here specifically aside from Armstrong's request to deliver that letter? I feel like something might have been lost in translation, like them having picked up a detail about Scar and May being bound for the area around the border fort specifically. A surprise blizzard offers the mixed blessing of obscuring them from the sentinels' view and also blowing directly against them as they struggle to ascend.
Just as they're recounting what Izumi told them about the time she spent here doing survivalism as part of her own training and wondering if there are any bears around, they hear something massive approaching from behind. They turn around, ready for battle, but discover that the something is actually a someone. A very big and unfriendly someone in an Amestrian uniform with a combination chainsaw/autocannon grafted to one arm.
Well, this is actually pretty fortunate I think. Meeting a guard at close quarters like this means that they'll have a chance to explain themselves before getting shot at.
Unfortunately, Edward does the dumbest thing possible and refuses to surrender and be taken into custody. Thus convincing the soldier that they're either Drachman agents, or something just as bad. Cue totally unnecessary fight scene. I guess Kimblee isn't the only one who's fumbling his INT checks in this episode.
And, something - either just the extreme cold, or a more exotic effect - causes Edward's automail arm to slow down, allowing the soldier to seize it in a pair of clawlike extensions of his arm blade and hold it in place while the diamond saw gets to work. So, this guy's own automail is purpose built for catching and tearing apart enemy melee weapons. Clever design. Edward tries to transmute the armclaw (which the soldier identifies as an "M1913-A Crocodile." Surprised Edward doesn't know about this, if it's a standard design. He seems like the type to geek out over the latest weaponry), but it doesn't work. It seems to be made from an unusual alloy, specifically to thwart alchemists who are expecting steel. Again, clever. Alphonse is forced to wedge his own helmet in there to let Edward get his arm out before its sawed in half.
Also, the music for this pointless fight is way too dramatic. I think this might actually be the same theme that played for some of the haemonculus battles, lol.
They manage to start overwhelming the soldier, but by then they've been surrounded by a squad of riflemen who must have been following just behind him. Then, the blizzard dies down, and they realize that they've already marched right up to the fortress walls. No wonder they got jumped!
The woman who we know to be the "Northern Wall of Briggs" calls down from a scaffold and demands their surrender. When the brothers finally do so, she addresses their attacker as an unfortunately named "Captain Buccaneer," and he salutes her in turn as General Armstrong. Figured as much.
Apparently, Edward has already heard of an officer named Olivier Armstrong, and knows that she was the Major's older sister. He hadn't realized that she was quite as high ranking, or that she was stationed out here. Also, she doesn't look very much like him aside from the hair color. Maybe they're only half-siblings, or something.
Edward identifies himself as the Fullmetal Alchemist, and claims to be here on behalf of the younger Armstrong. Olivier is skeptical that a state alchemist on legitimate business would have come here unannounced and on foot, and tells her men to search them and keep them under guard until she can confirm their identities. Reasonable enough.
When a soldier finds her brother's letter and delivers it to her, though, she rips it apart and throws it away into the wind without even opening it. Even after recognizing his seal and his handwriting on the outside (wait, it says "Dear Sister" on it? How could the brothers have not noticed that? Fucking hell...). That's much less reasonable.
She orders them to be brought inside, and warns them that this godforsaken fortress is no place for the weak. I have a feeling that the base's internal culture has suffered from the insufficiently frequent rotations. These guys are coming across as almost cult-y. Also, unlike some of her troops, she seems unfazed by Alphonse obviously being an empty suit now that his helmet is off. Considering the most likely way for her to have become accustomed to the idea of golems like him existing, that's a very bad sign.
Edward does like the design of the fortress itself though, once the snow clears a little more and he gets a good view of it before being brought inside. I am again, though, surprised that he didn't already know about this fortress. It seems like a fairly important one.
Roll credits. The stinger shows Dr. Marcoh and May finding their way to the old broken-down cabin indicated on the map Scar gave them, just a little ways outside of the fortress' restricted zone. Digging up the floor, they find the hidden research notes.
I suppose we'll find out more about that alchemy/alkahestry fusion research, including the impressive-sounding universal constructor array that he never quite finished, in the coming episodes.
This one was...okay? It still seems like we're just getting the characters to the next actual plot point without much of interest or consequence happening in the meantime, at least until the last couple of minutes, and there were enough pointlessly drawn out scenes to make it feel filler-y. They should have condensed this down to fit more plot stuff into the episode instead of puffing it up to fill one. Edward also seems unusually daft in this episode, about things that he normally isn't.
Speaking of daft though, man was I right about Kimblee not seeming up to the task being set for him. Why did Envy think he was qualified for this job? To be fair, his recklessness might have gotten worse during his time in jail, and he did do some excellent work when it came to finding Scar, but...god, that train scene was just plain embarrassing for Sin Inc, and - while I know others disagree - I don't find Kimblee charismatic enough to enjoy watching him fail. The haemonculi set a very high bar when it comes to villainy, and this guy just doesn't measure up.
Anyway, it's not a bad episode, but it's not really a good one either. Hopefully things will actually start happening again now that destinations have been reached.
- Location
- Spain
I think Kimblee just doesn't find opponents capable of fighting him one on one that often.
Understimating an oponent you have never seen in person isn't that hard an error to make, even if you have plenty of reports about how dangerous that foe is.
Puffy
HA↗HA↘HA↗HA↘HA↗HA↘HA↗HA↘HA↗HA!
He couldn't hear you over the noise of the trains!
It's actually a pretty decent reasoning.
They did make a point of mentioning that it very rarely snowed where they grew up, and their surprise at seeing so much snow for the first time in years. It was kind of the point of that scene, y'know?
ETA: And also the point of the shorter scene with Winry's boss going "They are going to die" + the man who gave them a ride towards the Wall of Briggs asking about Automail and neither of the brothers catching what he meant.
That was the point of them going there though. That letter wasn't really a message so much as a letter of introduction/recommendation on the Elric Brothers from Alex.
Not like she cared about her brother's letter anyway.
He's more an alchemy kinda guy. Automail is Winry's ballpark and she does enough geeking-out for all three of them.
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I think the fact that the Homonculi and Father in particular are actually not all-powerful is a major factor in this, reading over your reactions- Scar's been picking off fairly seasoned Alchemists and they need someone who's nuts enough to go after Scar deliberately, *and* someone who won't give a shit if Marco blabs. Kimblee fits both of those criteria.
Unfortunately for them, Kimblee is in fact kind of nuts and while dangerous he also pulls stupid shit like this.
Unfortunately for them, Kimblee is in fact kind of nuts and while dangerous he also pulls stupid shit like this.
- Location
- The Great Beyond
- Pronouns
- He/She/They
Personally I like the fact that Scar does a pretty solid job of outmaneuvering the state on both the tactical level of the one fight and the strategic level of not even being with Marcoh. It just fits to me that Dangerous Fugitive Vigilante man has lived this long by like, actually being pretty solid at covering his bases?