*shrugs* Doctor visit for her health issues?
Regardless, it's neat because Izumi and Sig mentioned meeting Hohenheim in Central, and there she is.
Top Level Canon Reviews - relaunched!
- Thread starter Leila Hann
- Start date
- Review
Regardless, it's neat because Izumi and Sig mentioned meeting Hohenheim in Central, and there she is.
Mao Mao: Heroes of Pure Heart S1E1: I Love You Mao Mao
- Location
- Patriarchova
This review was commissioned by @Alitur.
Never heard of this show. Just know that it's a western toon with the most cutesy animesque title ever, the specifics of which suggest that it's about a cat. Each episode is relatively short, so this should be a quick-ish review. Let's give it a go!
Intro is extremely fast and extremely energetic. I can barely even see what's going on, but my impression is of an anthropomorphic black cat in a red cape and samurai-esque armor dragging a pair of other anthros (one of which is a cyborg, I think? Chainsaw grafted onto one wrist?) out of a living room door and into a series of over the top fight scenes. The three of them are also flying around on a motorcycle-like aircraft through the clouds intermixed with the battles. So nineties SatAm, much nostalgia, very Leila's childhood, wow.
The title screen finally has the three main characters holding still long enough to get a get look at the other two besides the cat (who I assume is the titular "Mao Mao"). They're a hulking badger/bear type thing that may or may not have a rectractable chainsaw arm, and a tiny blue...kitten? Squirrel? I think I saw it flying on its own power during the fighting, so maybe a bat? Daaaaw, bat. :3
The name "Parker Simmons" rang a bell with me, so I paused and googled it. He's an animator who's been involved in a lot of well regarded western cartoons over the last twenty years or so, but the only other show I recognized whose development he had a leadership position in is..."OK KO: Let's Be Heroes."
-_-
Well, at the time, I did acknowledge that I might have just seen an exceptionally bad episode. I'll give the guy another chance.
The pilot opens on three sickeningly cute little anthro babbies sprawled on a blanket watching the clouds. Doreen and Slippy are interpreting the shape of the clouds as cute things. Fidget alienates them by instead seeing the shapes of threatening monsters in need of slaying.
He's a bat with a peg leg. What the heck did you EXPECT me to name him?
Doreen and Slippy tell Fidget that he's weird and messed up, and leave him alone to stare at the sky and sulk by himself. He complains to himself about how nothing ever happens in this place, and he just can't help but imagine something more dramatic and meaningful than idle cuteness.
The camera pans up into the sky, and I fully expected it to turn out that the giant monster he saw isn't just a cloud at all and for it to swoop down at us. But no, instead we spot the flying motorcycle thing from the OP, with Caturai and Mechabadger riding forth, both clad in motorcycle helmets.
Mechabadger is telling Caturai to slow the fuck down, or let him drive. Mao retorts that Mechabadger drives like an old lady, and is promptly told to not be so dismissive of old ladies' driving. As they bicker, their craft approaches a large, intimidating airship, which they identify as the pirate vessel they've been pursuing. Caturai's voice is surprisingly "adult human male" in a way that doesn't really match the show's aesthetic, or the voices of the other characters we've heard so far. Odd.
They hook their craft onto the pirates' outer hull, and Caturai tinkers with Mechabadger's cyborg arm until it extends the grappling hook he was trying to toggle on. Guess that arm has an omnitool type deal going on. As they climb up toward the deck, Mechabadger says that he's not sure about this mission. These pirates seem like they could be deadly opposition, pointing to the ship's decoration scheme as evidence.
Lol.
Caturai says that that's exactly why they're here. They're out for fame and fortune, and to get the fame part of that they need to score some legendary victories, and you need a serious enemy for that. Well, fair enough. Mechabadger then correctly guesses that Caturai is having "that fantasy again" where his family all respects and looks up to him, and he's super buff and posing in a heavenly realm, which is amusing.
They reach the upper deck, on which the pirates (including scurvy dogs, but also other assorted creatures ) are assembled. The captain, who is either a cobra riding an orangutan or an orangutan who carries a cobra around to do the talking for him, is announcing that he's located their next target. The mythical Pure Heart Valley, home to some sort of magic ruby that he wants to steal and then use for world-domination purposes.
As this is going on, Caturai and Mechabadger start scuffling over which tool on the latter's arm they should use here, which leads to them revealing themselves.
To Cobrangutan's credit, he turns out to be the genteel sort of pirate captain, responding with bemusement at first rather than hostility. Once the infiltrators start (erratically) shooting laser guns, though, he orders his men to return fire quickly enough. There's a chaotic firefight. Nobody gets hit, but one of the ship's balancing thrusters is damaged in the crossfire, setting the deck ablaze and causing the ship to list dangerously to one side. Several pirates fall overboard.
It's kind of refreshing to see that the captain seems earnestly saddened by the loss of some of his crew. He runs (rides?) to the edge of the deck and calls desperately after one of them. This would be Steelwing, a crocodile in a metallic dragon outfit, who WOULD fly back aboard but those heavy metal wings of his are apparently weighing him down.
I'm not sure if the implication is that he could fly without them, calling their utility very much into question, but either way I lol'd. Although...I'll be sort of discombobulated if this turns out to be a show with permadeath, in which case this comedic sendoff for a character who another major character actually seems to care about would be, well. Dissonant? I suppose we'll see.
Caturai and Mechabadger flee the damaged, slowly sinking airship aboard their flycycle, cackling in triumph. We have a brief shot of Fidget, still on the ground, watching the aerial spectacle while a holographic shimmer flickers through the air between them. Huh? A moment later, this mystery resolves itself when the heroic duo crash into an invisible, crystalline object, cracking it and causing the holographic bubble that had been hiding the civilization below to shut down.
That huge spherical polygon on top of the castle is the thing they crashed into, and cracking it revealed the urbanized hilltop below.
Alright. Cloaked civilization. I wonder if this is connected to that Pure Heart Valley place that the pirates were planning to attack? Well, seems like the cloaking device is out of commission, at least for the time being. Off in the nearby forest, some kind of dragon monster looks up at the now-visible city, and glowers.
After crashing into the crystal projector thingy, Caturai and Mechabadger tumble to the ground hundreds of feet below, and are just cartoonishly dazed. Okay, that probably means Steelwing and Co are fine too, no weird tonal problems here. They are greeted by more sickeningly cute, child-like chibi anthros, who I'm beginning to think make up the entire population of this place.
Seems kinda meta, honestly. Like, there's a secret enclave of Hello Kitty type characters in the middle of a Ducktales-esque setting.
The local animal babbies run up to glomp the newcomers, to Caturai's chagrin. Fidget perches on a nearby post and watches the violent and adventurous foreigners in shy adulation. Dawww, bat. :3
It would have been better if they actually had him hang upside down. Ah well. :3 :3 :3 :3
Caturai is saved by the bell. Or, rather, by the dragon creature we saw glaring at the newly revealed civilization a minute ago, as it comes tearing its way in and begins rampaging. Fortunately for the locals, Caturai and Mechabadger are pretty effective fighters when they're on the same page, and this situation is uncomplicated enough to ensure that they are.
The dragon is quickly driven off. The locals are simultaneously awed and frightened by the visitors' display of aggression and martial ability. With that immediate crisis taken care of, Caturai (who has now been named as Mao Mao as I assumed) wants to go track down that damaged pirate ship and make sure it's out of commission for good. Before he and his badger friend can do so, however, they are accosted by Fidget, who hyperactively raves about how amazing they were and tells Mao Mao he wants to be just like him.
Not like Mechabadger? He did part of the work you know, Fidget! I guess Mao Mao's appearance and moveset are just showier, and thus got his attention more.
Fidget wants to join the party, but while the attention-addicted Mao Mao clearly likes the adoration, he's not about to bring a little kid into battle. Come to think of it, the residents seem to ALL be little kids, leading him to ask where the heck all the adults are. On cue, the nearby fountain reveals a hidden elevator, and the leader of the place, an extremely un-predatory looking lion named King Snugglymane the twenty-fifth, comes up to explain.
As I suspected before, these aren't children, per se, but just innately childlike creatures that belong in a different and far less violent and dramatic setting. Pure Heart Valley has long depended on the invisibility granted by the "pure heart ruby" balanced on top of the castle in order to let the inhabitants remain as carefree and innocent as they are in a world full of hungry predators and nomadic raiders. It isn't explained how they came to possess and use the ruby, but now that Mao Mao and Mechabadger damaged it they're in a very bad spot. If they can repair the ruby at all, it's implied that it will take quite a dangerously long while.
I'd normally be wondering how an accident like this never could have happened until now, but the leadup to this scene did a good job of justifying it. Captain Cobrangutan was specifically searching for Pure Heart Valley in order to steal the ruby (presumably to use as a cloaking device for his ship), and had discovered a map leading to its approximate location. So, it's quite possible that there just wasn't any air traffic in the area until the pirates and their pursuers were led here.
Mao Mao is torn. On one hand, he hates this place and almost everyone in it. On the other, despite his narcissism, he aspires to be a hero in more than just the Homeric sense, and leaving these innocents in peril after he flew into their invisibility projector isn't something he can do. So, though he dreads the prospect, he determines to remain in Pure Heart Valley and serve as its new means of defense.
Fidget is predictably worshipful of this. Mechabadger just wants to try the local baked goods.
Just then, the pirate airship reappears overhead. They've managed to fix their damaged thruster, and with Pure Heart Valley now visible (wait, if it's called Pure Heart Valley how come it's a mountain?) they've closed in. Cobrangutan and his crew begin lowering the cranes to seize the giant crystal sphere and carry it off. It's bigger than their damned ship, but maybe its lighter than it looks idk. Anyway, Mao Mao and Mechabadger mount their own airbike again (which is surprisingly undamaged, considering the fact that they just crashed...) and rise to the defense. Fidget tries to come with, but they refuse to let him.
Mechabadger takes the wheel ("Make your grandma proud!") and performs evasive maneuvers to keep the pirates' weapon battery occupied, while dropping Mao Mao onto their deck again. The pirates quickly surround him, but despite being told not to it turns out that Fidget flew up after them, and does a surprisingly good job distracting the mooks so that Mao Mao can duel the captain. Fortunate, given that the two (three? Is the cobra actually acting as the "brain" for the orangutan's body while it fights, or is the ape using skills of its own? Not clear) are evenly matched.
During a pause in the melee, Cobrangutan monologues about his purpose here. Stealing this legendary artifact from the nigh-mythical Pure Heart Valley won't just give them/him...I'll just say him for now...a cloaking device; it will also make him the most well known and feared pirate in the world. Like Mao Mao, he's motivated primarily by a desire for fame, he's just less ethical about how he gets it.
That gives Mao Mao a new perspective on the situation. If Pure Heart Valley and its treasures are legendary, then being their protector might actually be a pretty good path to heroic renown after all. Cue fantasy about posing in a heavenly realm among his family again. Mechabadger tries to toss Mao Mao a grenade, but Cobrangutan intercepts it...only for Fidget to fly up behind him, grab it out of his hand, and drop it in the ship's Mister Fusion.
The ship loses thrust, and this time we see it crash and burn against the hills near Pure Heart Valley (I guess it's a good thing it spiraled a bit before hitting the ground, or it would have crushed part of the city). Mao Mao leaps back off onto the back of the airbike just in time.
They receive their decorations from King Snugglymane (by they, I mean Fidget and Mao Mao. Mechabadger's medal is appropriated by the king himself, apropos of nothing, but the badger's been given enough baked goods to only be mildly annoyed at this). Mao Mao is now the official sheriff of Pure Heart Valley, and Mechabadger and Fidget are deputies. The episode ends with them hearing another monster roaring, and heading off to deal with it.
So, that's the pilot.
I'm a little biased here. Mao Mao premiered just last year, just after we moved out of the era of eighties nostalgia and into the era of nineties nostalgia. So, I'm vulnerable to this. This is basically Tailspin (a favorite from my own childhood) with some anime influences and a bit of meta humor. That said, even without the cheap nostalgia factor, I think this pilot did a lot of things right in a way that many cartoons - even otherwise good ones - don't.
The flawed heroic leads were well balanced, with Mao Mao in particular treading the line of unlikeability without ever crossing it. The bad guys were a good example of how you can have your villains be indisputably evil, but still people (or...animal people. Whatever) with nuance and likable traits to them. It also had a pretty good message, with the whole thing about true respect being earned via responsibility and integrity (it's very important that Mao only learned this after he'd already gone back to the pirate ship anyway, rather than returning because he realized there would be a reward). Also, it had a bat. Most cartoons, even anthro cartoons, don't have bats in them. This show is superior because of that.
So, if I was a parent, I'd be happy to show this to my kids, and unlike MLP I think I'd actively enjoy watching it with them. Quality family entertainment.
<3
Never heard of this show. Just know that it's a western toon with the most cutesy animesque title ever, the specifics of which suggest that it's about a cat. Each episode is relatively short, so this should be a quick-ish review. Let's give it a go!
Intro is extremely fast and extremely energetic. I can barely even see what's going on, but my impression is of an anthropomorphic black cat in a red cape and samurai-esque armor dragging a pair of other anthros (one of which is a cyborg, I think? Chainsaw grafted onto one wrist?) out of a living room door and into a series of over the top fight scenes. The three of them are also flying around on a motorcycle-like aircraft through the clouds intermixed with the battles. So nineties SatAm, much nostalgia, very Leila's childhood, wow.
The title screen finally has the three main characters holding still long enough to get a get look at the other two besides the cat (who I assume is the titular "Mao Mao"). They're a hulking badger/bear type thing that may or may not have a rectractable chainsaw arm, and a tiny blue...kitten? Squirrel? I think I saw it flying on its own power during the fighting, so maybe a bat? Daaaaw, bat. :3
The name "Parker Simmons" rang a bell with me, so I paused and googled it. He's an animator who's been involved in a lot of well regarded western cartoons over the last twenty years or so, but the only other show I recognized whose development he had a leadership position in is..."OK KO: Let's Be Heroes."
-_-
Well, at the time, I did acknowledge that I might have just seen an exceptionally bad episode. I'll give the guy another chance.
The pilot opens on three sickeningly cute little anthro babbies sprawled on a blanket watching the clouds. Doreen and Slippy are interpreting the shape of the clouds as cute things. Fidget alienates them by instead seeing the shapes of threatening monsters in need of slaying.
He's a bat with a peg leg. What the heck did you EXPECT me to name him?
Doreen and Slippy tell Fidget that he's weird and messed up, and leave him alone to stare at the sky and sulk by himself. He complains to himself about how nothing ever happens in this place, and he just can't help but imagine something more dramatic and meaningful than idle cuteness.
The camera pans up into the sky, and I fully expected it to turn out that the giant monster he saw isn't just a cloud at all and for it to swoop down at us. But no, instead we spot the flying motorcycle thing from the OP, with Caturai and Mechabadger riding forth, both clad in motorcycle helmets.
Mechabadger is telling Caturai to slow the fuck down, or let him drive. Mao retorts that Mechabadger drives like an old lady, and is promptly told to not be so dismissive of old ladies' driving. As they bicker, their craft approaches a large, intimidating airship, which they identify as the pirate vessel they've been pursuing. Caturai's voice is surprisingly "adult human male" in a way that doesn't really match the show's aesthetic, or the voices of the other characters we've heard so far. Odd.
They hook their craft onto the pirates' outer hull, and Caturai tinkers with Mechabadger's cyborg arm until it extends the grappling hook he was trying to toggle on. Guess that arm has an omnitool type deal going on. As they climb up toward the deck, Mechabadger says that he's not sure about this mission. These pirates seem like they could be deadly opposition, pointing to the ship's decoration scheme as evidence.
Lol.
Caturai says that that's exactly why they're here. They're out for fame and fortune, and to get the fame part of that they need to score some legendary victories, and you need a serious enemy for that. Well, fair enough. Mechabadger then correctly guesses that Caturai is having "that fantasy again" where his family all respects and looks up to him, and he's super buff and posing in a heavenly realm, which is amusing.
They reach the upper deck, on which the pirates (including scurvy dogs, but also other assorted creatures
) are assembled. The captain, who is either a cobra riding an orangutan or an orangutan who carries a cobra around to do the talking for him, is announcing that he's located their next target. The mythical Pure Heart Valley, home to some sort of magic ruby that he wants to steal and then use for world-domination purposes.As this is going on, Caturai and Mechabadger start scuffling over which tool on the latter's arm they should use here, which leads to them revealing themselves.
To Cobrangutan's credit, he turns out to be the genteel sort of pirate captain, responding with bemusement at first rather than hostility. Once the infiltrators start (erratically) shooting laser guns, though, he orders his men to return fire quickly enough. There's a chaotic firefight. Nobody gets hit, but one of the ship's balancing thrusters is damaged in the crossfire, setting the deck ablaze and causing the ship to list dangerously to one side. Several pirates fall overboard.
It's kind of refreshing to see that the captain seems earnestly saddened by the loss of some of his crew. He runs (rides?) to the edge of the deck and calls desperately after one of them. This would be Steelwing, a crocodile in a metallic dragon outfit, who WOULD fly back aboard but those heavy metal wings of his are apparently weighing him down.
I'm not sure if the implication is that he could fly without them, calling their utility very much into question, but either way I lol'd. Although...I'll be sort of discombobulated if this turns out to be a show with permadeath, in which case this comedic sendoff for a character who another major character actually seems to care about would be, well. Dissonant? I suppose we'll see.
Caturai and Mechabadger flee the damaged, slowly sinking airship aboard their flycycle, cackling in triumph. We have a brief shot of Fidget, still on the ground, watching the aerial spectacle while a holographic shimmer flickers through the air between them. Huh? A moment later, this mystery resolves itself when the heroic duo crash into an invisible, crystalline object, cracking it and causing the holographic bubble that had been hiding the civilization below to shut down.
That huge spherical polygon on top of the castle is the thing they crashed into, and cracking it revealed the urbanized hilltop below.
Alright. Cloaked civilization. I wonder if this is connected to that Pure Heart Valley place that the pirates were planning to attack? Well, seems like the cloaking device is out of commission, at least for the time being. Off in the nearby forest, some kind of dragon monster looks up at the now-visible city, and glowers.
After crashing into the crystal projector thingy, Caturai and Mechabadger tumble to the ground hundreds of feet below, and are just cartoonishly dazed. Okay, that probably means Steelwing and Co are fine too, no weird tonal problems here. They are greeted by more sickeningly cute, child-like chibi anthros, who I'm beginning to think make up the entire population of this place.
Seems kinda meta, honestly. Like, there's a secret enclave of Hello Kitty type characters in the middle of a Ducktales-esque setting.
The local animal babbies run up to glomp the newcomers, to Caturai's chagrin. Fidget perches on a nearby post and watches the violent and adventurous foreigners in shy adulation. Dawww, bat. :3
It would have been better if they actually had him hang upside down. Ah well. :3 :3 :3 :3
The dragon is quickly driven off. The locals are simultaneously awed and frightened by the visitors' display of aggression and martial ability. With that immediate crisis taken care of, Caturai (who has now been named as Mao Mao as I assumed) wants to go track down that damaged pirate ship and make sure it's out of commission for good. Before he and his badger friend can do so, however, they are accosted by Fidget, who hyperactively raves about how amazing they were and tells Mao Mao he wants to be just like him.
Not like Mechabadger? He did part of the work you know, Fidget! I guess Mao Mao's appearance and moveset are just showier, and thus got his attention more.
Fidget wants to join the party, but while the attention-addicted Mao Mao clearly likes the adoration, he's not about to bring a little kid into battle. Come to think of it, the residents seem to ALL be little kids, leading him to ask where the heck all the adults are. On cue, the nearby fountain reveals a hidden elevator, and the leader of the place, an extremely un-predatory looking lion named King Snugglymane the twenty-fifth, comes up to explain.
As I suspected before, these aren't children, per se, but just innately childlike creatures that belong in a different and far less violent and dramatic setting. Pure Heart Valley has long depended on the invisibility granted by the "pure heart ruby" balanced on top of the castle in order to let the inhabitants remain as carefree and innocent as they are in a world full of hungry predators and nomadic raiders. It isn't explained how they came to possess and use the ruby, but now that Mao Mao and Mechabadger damaged it they're in a very bad spot. If they can repair the ruby at all, it's implied that it will take quite a dangerously long while.
I'd normally be wondering how an accident like this never could have happened until now, but the leadup to this scene did a good job of justifying it. Captain Cobrangutan was specifically searching for Pure Heart Valley in order to steal the ruby (presumably to use as a cloaking device for his ship), and had discovered a map leading to its approximate location. So, it's quite possible that there just wasn't any air traffic in the area until the pirates and their pursuers were led here.
Mao Mao is torn. On one hand, he hates this place and almost everyone in it. On the other, despite his narcissism, he aspires to be a hero in more than just the Homeric sense, and leaving these innocents in peril after he flew into their invisibility projector isn't something he can do. So, though he dreads the prospect, he determines to remain in Pure Heart Valley and serve as its new means of defense.
Fidget is predictably worshipful of this. Mechabadger just wants to try the local baked goods.
Just then, the pirate airship reappears overhead. They've managed to fix their damaged thruster, and with Pure Heart Valley now visible (wait, if it's called Pure Heart Valley how come it's a mountain?) they've closed in. Cobrangutan and his crew begin lowering the cranes to seize the giant crystal sphere and carry it off. It's bigger than their damned ship, but maybe its lighter than it looks idk. Anyway, Mao Mao and Mechabadger mount their own airbike again (which is surprisingly undamaged, considering the fact that they just crashed...) and rise to the defense. Fidget tries to come with, but they refuse to let him.
Mechabadger takes the wheel ("Make your grandma proud!") and performs evasive maneuvers to keep the pirates' weapon battery occupied, while dropping Mao Mao onto their deck again. The pirates quickly surround him, but despite being told not to it turns out that Fidget flew up after them, and does a surprisingly good job distracting the mooks so that Mao Mao can duel the captain. Fortunate, given that the two (three? Is the cobra actually acting as the "brain" for the orangutan's body while it fights, or is the ape using skills of its own? Not clear) are evenly matched.
During a pause in the melee, Cobrangutan monologues about his purpose here. Stealing this legendary artifact from the nigh-mythical Pure Heart Valley won't just give them/him...I'll just say him for now...a cloaking device; it will also make him the most well known and feared pirate in the world. Like Mao Mao, he's motivated primarily by a desire for fame, he's just less ethical about how he gets it.
That gives Mao Mao a new perspective on the situation. If Pure Heart Valley and its treasures are legendary, then being their protector might actually be a pretty good path to heroic renown after all. Cue fantasy about posing in a heavenly realm among his family again. Mechabadger tries to toss Mao Mao a grenade, but Cobrangutan intercepts it...only for Fidget to fly up behind him, grab it out of his hand, and drop it in the ship's Mister Fusion.
The ship loses thrust, and this time we see it crash and burn against the hills near Pure Heart Valley (I guess it's a good thing it spiraled a bit before hitting the ground, or it would have crushed part of the city). Mao Mao leaps back off onto the back of the airbike just in time.
They receive their decorations from King Snugglymane (by they, I mean Fidget and Mao Mao. Mechabadger's medal is appropriated by the king himself, apropos of nothing, but the badger's been given enough baked goods to only be mildly annoyed at this). Mao Mao is now the official sheriff of Pure Heart Valley, and Mechabadger and Fidget are deputies. The episode ends with them hearing another monster roaring, and heading off to deal with it.
So, that's the pilot.
I'm a little biased here. Mao Mao premiered just last year, just after we moved out of the era of eighties nostalgia and into the era of nineties nostalgia. So, I'm vulnerable to this. This is basically Tailspin (a favorite from my own childhood) with some anime influences and a bit of meta humor. That said, even without the cheap nostalgia factor, I think this pilot did a lot of things right in a way that many cartoons - even otherwise good ones - don't.
The flawed heroic leads were well balanced, with Mao Mao in particular treading the line of unlikeability without ever crossing it. The bad guys were a good example of how you can have your villains be indisputably evil, but still people (or...animal people. Whatever) with nuance and likable traits to them. It also had a pretty good message, with the whole thing about true respect being earned via responsibility and integrity (it's very important that Mao only learned this after he'd already gone back to the pirate ship anyway, rather than returning because he realized there would be a reward). Also, it had a bat. Most cartoons, even anthro cartoons, don't have bats in them. This show is superior because of that.
So, if I was a parent, I'd be happy to show this to my kids, and unlike MLP I think I'd actively enjoy watching it with them. Quality family entertainment.
<3
Omegahugger
Inattentive Idiot
To throw off the people searching for it.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Mao Mao's intro is one of my favorites. Its quick yet establishes the premise in full, its dynamic and revs you up for the show proper. I'd recommend watching it on youtube with the speed set to 0.25 so you can actually make sense of all it shows, because its a beauty.
The season premiere is a good episode. Unfortunately, if you think that a show like MLP lacks sufficient depth, you will likely be disappointed by Mao Mao. That said when the show is on its game, it can be pretty solid, mixing humor, action, and cuteness. I finished most of the season in one weekend, so something about it must have been catchy. It just feels disappointing because they had the building blocks to make something more out of it, but most of the time Mao Mao seems to have zero ambition to be anything other than a dumb saturday morning kid's cartoon. It's a real headscratcher:
While we're on the topic Adorabat is a she not a he. Something you would know all too well if you were to check the accursed realm of google image search. 'shivers'
The season premiere is a good episode. Unfortunately, if you think that a show like MLP lacks sufficient depth, you will likely be disappointed by Mao Mao. That said when the show is on its game, it can be pretty solid, mixing humor, action, and cuteness. I finished most of the season in one weekend, so something about it must have been catchy. It just feels disappointing because they had the building blocks to make something more out of it, but most of the time Mao Mao seems to have zero ambition to be anything other than a dumb saturday morning kid's cartoon. It's a real headscratcher:
While we're on the topic Adorabat is a she not a he. Something you would know all too well if you were to check the accursed realm of google image search. 'shivers'
Last edited:
- Location
- Patriarchova
Mao Mao's intro is one of my favorites. Its quick yet establishes the premise in full, its dynamic and revs you up for the show proper. I'd recommend watching it on youtube with the speed set to 0.25 so you can actually make sense of all it shows, because its a beauty.
The season premiere is a good episode. Unfortunately, if you think that a show like MLP lacks sufficient depth, you will likely be disappointed by Mao Mao. That said when the show is on its game, it can be pretty solid, mixing humor, action, and cuteness. I finished most of the season in one weekend, so something about it must have been catchy. It just feels disappointing because they had the building blocks to make something more out of it, but most of the time Mao Mao seems to have zero ambition to be anything other than a dumb saturday morning kid's cartoon. It's a real headscratcher:
While we're on the topic Adorabat is a she not a he. Something you would know all too well if you were to check the accursed realm of google image search. 'shivers'
What I've seen of MLP plays with stuff like historical narratives and social order, so I have certain expectations.
Maybe Mao Mao does too, but not in the pilot. Less ambitious, so I don't expect as much.
tankdrop24
Tread First into Hell
- Location
- The Center of the Universe: Toronto, Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Wait a second, the main character is a cat person with dreams of grandeur. And one of their sidekicks is called Adorabat.
Adora...bat.
The twist better not be that this is just Catra in purgatory and/or a bad trip.
Adora...bat.
The twist better not be that this is just Catra in purgatory and/or a bad trip.
- Location
- Canada
She'd need to at least watch the first 3 or 4 episodes to get the gist of the show, unfortunately, due to the weird production decisions they made in the first one.
Alert: Only you can prevent SPOILERS!
Fullmetal Alchemist S1E16: Footsteps of a Comrade-in-Arms
- Location
- Patriarchova
From that title, it sounds like the brothers are going to return to Central and investigate Hughes' death while Yao annoys them from the background and Winry annoys me from the foreground. So, let's sit back, relax, watch "Again" on Youtube, and then skip past "Hologram" on Netflix!
Episode opens with Edward, Alphonse, and Winry getting off the train at Central, and the two ninjas who've been perched on the roof of the car asking them if they saw where the guy whose body they're supposed to be guarding is, he disappeared on them during the ride.
I'm trying to decide who I feel worse for in this situation. The Elrics, or Yao's longsuffering goons who have the misfortune of being too honorable to just slit their prick boss' throat, go to ground in Amestris, and become mercenaries or baristas or something.
Team Protag takes the opportunity to put these shmucks behind themselves and get whatever head start they can while the ninjas spread out and call out for Yao. Cut to the elusive prince posed atop a random building, monologuing to himself about how there's something weird about Amestris. Normally, I'd attribute this to Not!Chinese aristocratic chauvinism and xenophobia, but despite being a general douche Yao seems to be well traveled and used to foreign lands with foreign ways, so I doubt it's just that. I suspect he's picking up on some subtle indications of Father's activities, though he hadn't put his finger on it yet. I guess we can add "observant" to his list of positive traits, though I suppose it's possible that any foreigner who's paying attention might be getting those lich-y vibes.
Title card. Then, we cut to some blonde guy visiting some old guy's apartment to give him a gift basket and tell him he's doing a fine job. Great work, old guy! You've earned yourself those goodies alright! The gift basket is shortly revealed to be from Mustang, and these two men as a pair of his hand-picked transfers from the eastern province in plainclothes. The older man has apparently been tasked with keeping Barry the Chopper bound and unseen in his apartment, and Mustang appreciates him going that extra mile.
Huh, wouldn't have taken Barry for a chess guy. Who knew?
Barry begs them to let him go chop some lady up, he promises he'll come back, or at least bring Hawkeye back in so he can stare at her creepily while fantasizing about chopping her up, but no dice. Man, maybe Mustang actually is a fascist after all, this cruel deprivation of prisoners is nothing short of atrocious! The man tasked with guarding Barry is officially on medical leave, so he can stay home and babysit the undead serial killer full time. Yeah, he's earned that gift basket.
Granted, said basket also comes with a dire warning about what will happen to him if he lets anyone find out about this, but I think that might not actually be a threat on Mustang's part so much as...well...a warning. If they get found out, Mustang isn't going to have to punish the indiscretion, because they'll all be promptly extrajudicial'd anyway. In other news though, blonde guy says he has a girlfriend now, so that's cool.
Cut back to Yao, who has collapsed in the middle of the sidewalk and is being prodded at by some metropolitan police. He begs them for food, muttering weakly that he's a helpless foreigner. They arrest him for not having a visa.
Did he seriously not have a fake visa made for himself? And then call attention to that fact while dealing with cops? Fucking hell, Xing hasn't made the best impression so far but it still can't possibly deserve this clown as emperor.
While Yao's poor schmuck ninjas look for him, the Elric brothers and Winry split up, the former heading to HQ to report in, and the latter going to the Hughes residence to pay her respects. The tone and framing makes it obvious that she meant "pay her respects" as in "make a courtesy call" as she doesn't yet know about his death, and that the show is doing some cruel irony here. I suspect that this is a piece of wordplay that works more naturally in Japanese. The boys heedlessly pass by the very phone booth where Hughes was shot as they make their way to the office.
We then have a surprise cut to Sheska the adorkable book lady, now in uniform as a military archivist, futzing around with one of her new coworkers. She keeps said coworker out of the room with the replicated Marcoh documents, and then enters it herself to reveal why. Mustang has cloistered himself in there, and is spending days pouring over Sheska's replications for more clues. To the point of falling asleep in there, and nearly missing an important meeting until Sheska wakes him up. She tells him he's working too hard, and he predictably ignores her.
I admire his dedication, but Mustang's self-destructive work ethic feels like more machismo as well. Dude definitely has some masculinity related issues, but I guess that goes without saying for someone who thinks he can solve fascism by becoming the new fuhrer.
Another officer creeps up as Sheska worriedly sees Mustang off, and asks what the hell is going on. She's forced to convince him that Mustang was extorting sex from his female underling in the archive storeroom, letting the officer think he's gotten some dirt on a potential rival. Nice going Sheska, always make your lies something that the other person wants to believe. To be clear, the officer suspected this on his own initiative, but Sheska caught the drift and played along masterfully with only momentary indecision, so still, well played gurl, you've got more moxie than I thought. Maybe I should ship you with Edward after all.
Still, Captain Rando does pry a bit further into what Mustang was doing in this vicinity in the first place, and she's forced to admit that it has something to do with Hughes' death. Then, while Rando is departing, he catches a glimpse of someone who looks exactly like himself wearing a copy of his uniform passing him in the hall. He does a double take, but by the time he looks back around it looks like someone else.
A moment later, he stops by Sheska's office and greets her, to her confusion.
Ah, I see. Captain Rando wasn't departing when he passed Envy in the hallway there, he was arriving. Envy came to his office a few minutes early, caught Sheska and Mustang being all secretive in what was supposed to be Mustang's off duty time, and got her to spill just enough to confirm Envy's suspicions about him investigating this despite Wrath's orders. The real Captain Rando arrived just in time to catch a glimpse of his doppelganger in the hallway before Envy changed again. Ah well. You still performed well Sheska; there's no shame in losing a contest of intrigue to a shapeshifting superspy with hundreds of years of experience.
This does leave the question of what Father's going to do about the situation. As a Colonel who oversees the prestigious State Alchemist agency who's risen through the ranks at a young age, Mustang has got to be a pretty high profile character. He might be unpopular outside of his circle of co-conspirators, but still, Hughes' assassination caused enough of a stir already. I doubt they could hush up an even bigger...
...oh. Of course.
Mustang is a high profile State Alchemist who served in the Ishval campaign. Scar has just resumed his killing spree. If Father decides that Mustang needs to go, he'll have Lust leave his half-disintegrated body on a street somewhere and let everyone jump to the most obvious conclusion.
I doubt Sin Inc will jump to that solution immediately, though. They want to preserve as many State Alchemists as possible for Father's sacrificial ritual, and they've already lost a good number thanks to Scar's actual attacks, so they'll be reluctant to waste another. So, I predict that they're going to make another attempt to stall or misdirect Mustang, and then resort to framing Scar for his death if that fails.
On a metafictional note, this also explains why Scar has continued occupying so much narrative focus. The pieces are coming together.
Armstrong runs into Mustang in the restroom, displaying the bandages over his Cow injuries a little more prominently than he has to. When Mustang gets the hint and asks about this, Armstrong tells him that he was injured in a policing operation in the south province, and that he also ran into the Elrics there. Mustang also asks him if he informed the brothers about Hughes' death, and Armstrong tells him that he didn't have the heart, and Mustang infers from this that Armstrong knows they'll feel responsible when they they learn that the fallout from the Lab 5 raid led to it. The two caution each other again to be careful, and Armstrong leaves without actually using the restroom.
Edward and Alphonse meet Mustang and Hawkeye when they arrive, and ask if either of them have talked to Hughes since last time they were in Central. Mustang...
...
...
...Mustang replies that Hughes decided to take an early retirement, and moved his family out to his ancestral home in the countryside.
Hawkey is giving him the same look she gave him when he tried to use firebending in a rainstorm. And he deserves it at least as much as he did then.
Congratulations, dumbass. Now the Elrics not only won't take reasonable precautions to defend themselves based on this knowledge, but they'll also become convinced that you're working with Sin Inc the instant they inevitably hear about Hughes' death from someone else or just read about it in last week's news, thereby sabotaging your own AND their own investigations and likely getting you, them, or both killed. And all because you're afraid of hurting their feelings, which you've notably never given a fuck about before to the point where they already dislike and distrust you.
Mustang just undid most of the goodwill he earned in the last few episodes. Riza, just toss him to Scar yourself at this point, seriously. #HawkeyeforFuhrer.
They part ways. Hawkeye asks him WTF. Mustang tells her that, basically, if Armstrong didn't break it to them, then he's not going to second guess him, and also that the brothers can't afford that kind of emotional distraction right now. Hawkeye tells him that he's being a total moron. And, at the same time that they're having this conversation, literally thirty seconds after Mustang lied to them, the Elrics learn the truth from one of the dummies who was guarding them back before Lab 5.
Thirty seconds. That's how long it took Mustang's laughable attempt at "protecting" them lasted before falling apart and making them sure that Mustang is part of the enemy conspiracy. Thirty. Fucking. Seconds.
I look forward to Edward getting Mustang alone and beating the absolute shit out of him while demanding information that Mustang doesn't possess. I bet Mustang's going to cry like a little bitch too.
Edward does, in fact, blame himself for getting Hughes involved in the investigation that led to his death. What immediately follows is a scene of him running through the streets of Central while tearing up as he realizes. This scene would be way more powerful if it didn't have this derpy over-the-top tragedy music playing over it and wasn't intercut with a bunch of random clips of Hughes being nice and having a family with an adorable little blonde girl and stuff. Like, does the show seriously think that I'll forget to be said about the protagonist losing a friend if it doesn't do this? Does it have so little faith in its own ability to build investment that it feels like it needs the tragedy equivalent of a laugh track?
...
This honestly bothers me a lot more than the melodramatic music and family photo zoom-in during Hughes' actual death scene. In that case, I felt like the show was trying too hard to compensate for not giving Hughes enough pathos before then. Which is annoying, sure, but it's also a common misstep in minor character deaths, especially in adaptations where some of the fond moments with that character might have been left on the cutting room floor. But the emotional focus of THIS scene is Edward. We're supposed to be sad here because of Edward's emotional suffering.
And. Like. We're a quarter of the way through the show. If you haven't made me care about your main protagonist by this point, then it's a lost cause. I'd have stopped watching a long time ago.
This is starting to feel like a systemic problem in shonen anime. JJBA also did this a bunch of times. It's like there's this weird paranoia about the audience not being invested enough to feel for the main characters' substance, and so it wildly overdoes the set dressing in the hopes that we'll be effected by a sufficiently large amount of style. It's pretty condescending, and it makes the storyteller come across like a con artist trying to razzle dazzle me away from some critical flaw that would ruin everything if I noticed it.
...
The brothers meet up in front of Hughes' apartment building, and briefly argue about whether it should just be Edward who goes in and admits partial culpability for what happened to Hughes, or both of them. Alphonse gets a rare moment to advance as a character when he reminds his brother that both of them decided to raid Lab 5 together, both of them cultivated Hughes' investment, and - going further than I expected, that if their search for alchemical power keeps getting other people killed, then Alphonse feels that restoring his own body isn't worth it.
Of course they weren't exactly searching for a way to restore themselves when they raided that lab so much as they were investigating a tangentially related criminal conspiracy. But still, it was an outgrowth of their search for the Philosopher's Stone, and Alphonse volunteering any sort of strong opinions about that connection at all rather than just mirroring his brother's is an improvement for him.
They knock on the Hughes' door, and find Winry already there talking to Maes' widow, who they fill in on what they believe to be the hows and whys of her late husband's death.
She tells Edward and Alphonse pretty much exactly what they need to hear in this situation. That while Maes' meddling, selfless nature definitely led to his downfall, it was still his own choice to assist the brothers and follow up on their operation, and that if he died fighting for it as he appears to have then he must have considered it very important. Now, she says, the Elrics must honor him by making sure his death wasn't in vain; uncover what he sought to uncover, and avenge him if possible.
Of course, there is a bit of irony in this talk of how he died trying to help the brothers. The discovery of his that made Lust and Envy silence him was made while looking at a bunch of incidents around Amestris' borders, with a map of the country open in front of him at the time. I find it very likely that he'd figured out that Amestris is being turned into a sacrificial altar, and that this is what he was trying to tell Mustang about when Envy caught up to him. So, at that point, he would have been acting at least as much in self interest as he was in the Elrics, even if he was just doing them a favor to start with. What he discovered looked like just as imminent a threat to himself and his own family as to anyone else.
Cue another, longer montage of the brothers and Winry being sad while over-dramatic music plays. Also, just to piss me off even more, Edward and Winry hold hands.
Yes, obviously I knew this was coming. No, that's not going to keep me from ineffectually whinging about it.
Cut to what I think is another room of Father's secret base under Central, where Lust and Gluttony are feeding some human chimeras in cages. Not clear if these ones have their minds like Greed's minions, or if they're more like Alexina. They're being treated worse than either should be, whatever the case. Wonder what their purpose is? Did Greed rescue his henchmen from here themselves, or where they from an unrelated military research program not directly related to Father's operations? Curiouser and curiouser. Envy enters and reports what she learned about Mustang continuing to probe into Hughes' final research.
Lust foresaw this possibility, which is why she had Mustang transferred to Central where they can monitor him more easily (presumably, it's easier to have him nearby and under watch than it would be to identify any agents of his who he'd covertly send to research the crime scenes from the east). That said, there's still the question of what to do about it. As I suspected earlier, Lust is reluctant to throw away a State Alchemist over this unless there's no other option. And, unfortunately, her own attempts to gather information about Mustang's activities by stringing along one of his hand-picked transfers hasn't borne fruit.
Oh. The blonde guy with the new girlfriend.
*snerk*
For some reason, the concept of this powerful centuries-old magitech gynoid playing honey trap for some random doofus security guard is hilarious to me. True, I suppose its high time that Lust did something actually succubus-like to go with her name and character design, but...it's just so pedestrian, for her. It actually comes across as cute as much as foreboding or menacing.
Back to Sin Inc's dilemma, Lust isn't sure what to do about Mustang, but then Envy says she has an idea. Is it just me, or is Envy constantly bailing her sister out? Lust's puppet cult leader who she's been grooming screws up? Envy impersonates him to do the job instead. Lust lets Hughes get away after attacking him in his office? Envy has to chase him down and kill him in a much riskier public place, with literally only seconds to spare. Lust can't get any intel by seducing Mustang's agent? Envy tricks it out of Sheska. And now that they have the intel, Lust isn't sure how to act on it, but Envy has an idea.
Maybe I was wrong about Lust being the competent one. Really, the one thing she seems to be particularly good at is playing the sane woman to her siblings' more difficult personalities. More like Hohenheim's PA than an actual leader. Which I suppose might be her main intended purpose, but still, it's kind of jarring after how the early episodes built her up.
Anyway, the plan is a pretty obvious one in retrospect. Lieutenant Ross, the dummy who the brothers talked to earlier this episode, was the last person who Hughes talked to before he left to use the phone booth, and Envy was using her form when she killed him. So, they have Ross arrested as a suspect in Hughes' death. Mustang may or may not buy this, but even if he doesn't, it will hopefully distract him long enough for Sin Inc to complete its work and enable Father's ritual. And, sure enough, Mustang seems confused and unsure of what to think when he gets the news.
The episode ends with blonde soldier guy, Jean, meeting his new gf Solaris for a date. "Solaris" ("relating to the sun") could have something to do with the sun god cult that she co-opted in Liore, or it could be an allusion to the scifi novel of that title which features an alien who can create illusory loved ones to manipulate its human opponents. More likely the latter.
Is there an FMA coffee shop AU where these two are frequent patrons? Like, every other character is recast except them, who have the exact same personalities, roles, relationships, etc as in the original, and this is the coffee shop they go to? Is this a thing? It should really be a thing.
Also, that dress looks awful on Lust, but I guess that may just be a little way of showing her contempt for him without him realizing. End episode.
I feel like this was FMA:B at its best and FMA:B at its worst all put together. Phenomenal substance marred by sometimes tacky and tone-deaf style, with too much time spent on cheap melodrama instead of the more interesting intrigue and character development. An enjoyable episode, but it did try my patience at times.
Episode opens with Edward, Alphonse, and Winry getting off the train at Central, and the two ninjas who've been perched on the roof of the car asking them if they saw where the guy whose body they're supposed to be guarding is, he disappeared on them during the ride.
I'm trying to decide who I feel worse for in this situation. The Elrics, or Yao's longsuffering goons who have the misfortune of being too honorable to just slit their prick boss' throat, go to ground in Amestris, and become mercenaries or baristas or something.
Team Protag takes the opportunity to put these shmucks behind themselves and get whatever head start they can while the ninjas spread out and call out for Yao. Cut to the elusive prince posed atop a random building, monologuing to himself about how there's something weird about Amestris. Normally, I'd attribute this to Not!Chinese aristocratic chauvinism and xenophobia, but despite being a general douche Yao seems to be well traveled and used to foreign lands with foreign ways, so I doubt it's just that. I suspect he's picking up on some subtle indications of Father's activities, though he hadn't put his finger on it yet. I guess we can add "observant" to his list of positive traits, though I suppose it's possible that any foreigner who's paying attention might be getting those lich-y vibes.
Title card. Then, we cut to some blonde guy visiting some old guy's apartment to give him a gift basket and tell him he's doing a fine job. Great work, old guy! You've earned yourself those goodies alright! The gift basket is shortly revealed to be from Mustang, and these two men as a pair of his hand-picked transfers from the eastern province in plainclothes. The older man has apparently been tasked with keeping Barry the Chopper bound and unseen in his apartment, and Mustang appreciates him going that extra mile.
Huh, wouldn't have taken Barry for a chess guy. Who knew?
Barry begs them to let him go chop some lady up, he promises he'll come back, or at least bring Hawkeye back in so he can stare at her creepily while fantasizing about chopping her up, but no dice. Man, maybe Mustang actually is a fascist after all, this cruel deprivation of prisoners is nothing short of atrocious! The man tasked with guarding Barry is officially on medical leave, so he can stay home and babysit the undead serial killer full time. Yeah, he's earned that gift basket.
Granted, said basket also comes with a dire warning about what will happen to him if he lets anyone find out about this, but I think that might not actually be a threat on Mustang's part so much as...well...a warning. If they get found out, Mustang isn't going to have to punish the indiscretion, because they'll all be promptly extrajudicial'd anyway. In other news though, blonde guy says he has a girlfriend now, so that's cool.
Cut back to Yao, who has collapsed in the middle of the sidewalk and is being prodded at by some metropolitan police. He begs them for food, muttering weakly that he's a helpless foreigner. They arrest him for not having a visa.
Did he seriously not have a fake visa made for himself? And then call attention to that fact while dealing with cops? Fucking hell, Xing hasn't made the best impression so far but it still can't possibly deserve this clown as emperor.
While Yao's poor schmuck ninjas look for him, the Elric brothers and Winry split up, the former heading to HQ to report in, and the latter going to the Hughes residence to pay her respects. The tone and framing makes it obvious that she meant "pay her respects" as in "make a courtesy call" as she doesn't yet know about his death, and that the show is doing some cruel irony here. I suspect that this is a piece of wordplay that works more naturally in Japanese. The boys heedlessly pass by the very phone booth where Hughes was shot as they make their way to the office.
We then have a surprise cut to Sheska the adorkable book lady, now in uniform as a military archivist, futzing around with one of her new coworkers. She keeps said coworker out of the room with the replicated Marcoh documents, and then enters it herself to reveal why. Mustang has cloistered himself in there, and is spending days pouring over Sheska's replications for more clues. To the point of falling asleep in there, and nearly missing an important meeting until Sheska wakes him up. She tells him he's working too hard, and he predictably ignores her.
I admire his dedication, but Mustang's self-destructive work ethic feels like more machismo as well. Dude definitely has some masculinity related issues, but I guess that goes without saying for someone who thinks he can solve fascism by becoming the new fuhrer.
Another officer creeps up as Sheska worriedly sees Mustang off, and asks what the hell is going on. She's forced to convince him that Mustang was extorting sex from his female underling in the archive storeroom, letting the officer think he's gotten some dirt on a potential rival. Nice going Sheska, always make your lies something that the other person wants to believe. To be clear, the officer suspected this on his own initiative, but Sheska caught the drift and played along masterfully with only momentary indecision, so still, well played gurl, you've got more moxie than I thought. Maybe I should ship you with Edward after all.
Still, Captain Rando does pry a bit further into what Mustang was doing in this vicinity in the first place, and she's forced to admit that it has something to do with Hughes' death. Then, while Rando is departing, he catches a glimpse of someone who looks exactly like himself wearing a copy of his uniform passing him in the hall. He does a double take, but by the time he looks back around it looks like someone else.
A moment later, he stops by Sheska's office and greets her, to her confusion.
Ah, I see. Captain Rando wasn't departing when he passed Envy in the hallway there, he was arriving. Envy came to his office a few minutes early, caught Sheska and Mustang being all secretive in what was supposed to be Mustang's off duty time, and got her to spill just enough to confirm Envy's suspicions about him investigating this despite Wrath's orders. The real Captain Rando arrived just in time to catch a glimpse of his doppelganger in the hallway before Envy changed again. Ah well. You still performed well Sheska; there's no shame in losing a contest of intrigue to a shapeshifting superspy with hundreds of years of experience.
This does leave the question of what Father's going to do about the situation. As a Colonel who oversees the prestigious State Alchemist agency who's risen through the ranks at a young age, Mustang has got to be a pretty high profile character. He might be unpopular outside of his circle of co-conspirators, but still, Hughes' assassination caused enough of a stir already. I doubt they could hush up an even bigger...
...oh. Of course.
Mustang is a high profile State Alchemist who served in the Ishval campaign. Scar has just resumed his killing spree. If Father decides that Mustang needs to go, he'll have Lust leave his half-disintegrated body on a street somewhere and let everyone jump to the most obvious conclusion.
I doubt Sin Inc will jump to that solution immediately, though. They want to preserve as many State Alchemists as possible for Father's sacrificial ritual, and they've already lost a good number thanks to Scar's actual attacks, so they'll be reluctant to waste another. So, I predict that they're going to make another attempt to stall or misdirect Mustang, and then resort to framing Scar for his death if that fails.
On a metafictional note, this also explains why Scar has continued occupying so much narrative focus. The pieces are coming together.
Armstrong runs into Mustang in the restroom, displaying the bandages over his Cow injuries a little more prominently than he has to. When Mustang gets the hint and asks about this, Armstrong tells him that he was injured in a policing operation in the south province, and that he also ran into the Elrics there. Mustang also asks him if he informed the brothers about Hughes' death, and Armstrong tells him that he didn't have the heart, and Mustang infers from this that Armstrong knows they'll feel responsible when they they learn that the fallout from the Lab 5 raid led to it. The two caution each other again to be careful, and Armstrong leaves without actually using the restroom.
Edward and Alphonse meet Mustang and Hawkeye when they arrive, and ask if either of them have talked to Hughes since last time they were in Central. Mustang...
...
...
...Mustang replies that Hughes decided to take an early retirement, and moved his family out to his ancestral home in the countryside.
Hawkey is giving him the same look she gave him when he tried to use firebending in a rainstorm. And he deserves it at least as much as he did then.
Congratulations, dumbass. Now the Elrics not only won't take reasonable precautions to defend themselves based on this knowledge, but they'll also become convinced that you're working with Sin Inc the instant they inevitably hear about Hughes' death from someone else or just read about it in last week's news, thereby sabotaging your own AND their own investigations and likely getting you, them, or both killed. And all because you're afraid of hurting their feelings, which you've notably never given a fuck about before to the point where they already dislike and distrust you.
Mustang just undid most of the goodwill he earned in the last few episodes. Riza, just toss him to Scar yourself at this point, seriously. #HawkeyeforFuhrer.
They part ways. Hawkeye asks him WTF. Mustang tells her that, basically, if Armstrong didn't break it to them, then he's not going to second guess him, and also that the brothers can't afford that kind of emotional distraction right now. Hawkeye tells him that he's being a total moron. And, at the same time that they're having this conversation, literally thirty seconds after Mustang lied to them, the Elrics learn the truth from one of the dummies who was guarding them back before Lab 5.
Thirty seconds. That's how long it took Mustang's laughable attempt at "protecting" them lasted before falling apart and making them sure that Mustang is part of the enemy conspiracy. Thirty. Fucking. Seconds.
I look forward to Edward getting Mustang alone and beating the absolute shit out of him while demanding information that Mustang doesn't possess. I bet Mustang's going to cry like a little bitch too.
Edward does, in fact, blame himself for getting Hughes involved in the investigation that led to his death. What immediately follows is a scene of him running through the streets of Central while tearing up as he realizes. This scene would be way more powerful if it didn't have this derpy over-the-top tragedy music playing over it and wasn't intercut with a bunch of random clips of Hughes being nice and having a family with an adorable little blonde girl and stuff. Like, does the show seriously think that I'll forget to be said about the protagonist losing a friend if it doesn't do this? Does it have so little faith in its own ability to build investment that it feels like it needs the tragedy equivalent of a laugh track?
...
This honestly bothers me a lot more than the melodramatic music and family photo zoom-in during Hughes' actual death scene. In that case, I felt like the show was trying too hard to compensate for not giving Hughes enough pathos before then. Which is annoying, sure, but it's also a common misstep in minor character deaths, especially in adaptations where some of the fond moments with that character might have been left on the cutting room floor. But the emotional focus of THIS scene is Edward. We're supposed to be sad here because of Edward's emotional suffering.
And. Like. We're a quarter of the way through the show. If you haven't made me care about your main protagonist by this point, then it's a lost cause. I'd have stopped watching a long time ago.
This is starting to feel like a systemic problem in shonen anime. JJBA also did this a bunch of times. It's like there's this weird paranoia about the audience not being invested enough to feel for the main characters' substance, and so it wildly overdoes the set dressing in the hopes that we'll be effected by a sufficiently large amount of style. It's pretty condescending, and it makes the storyteller come across like a con artist trying to razzle dazzle me away from some critical flaw that would ruin everything if I noticed it.
...
The brothers meet up in front of Hughes' apartment building, and briefly argue about whether it should just be Edward who goes in and admits partial culpability for what happened to Hughes, or both of them. Alphonse gets a rare moment to advance as a character when he reminds his brother that both of them decided to raid Lab 5 together, both of them cultivated Hughes' investment, and - going further than I expected, that if their search for alchemical power keeps getting other people killed, then Alphonse feels that restoring his own body isn't worth it.
Of course they weren't exactly searching for a way to restore themselves when they raided that lab so much as they were investigating a tangentially related criminal conspiracy. But still, it was an outgrowth of their search for the Philosopher's Stone, and Alphonse volunteering any sort of strong opinions about that connection at all rather than just mirroring his brother's is an improvement for him.
They knock on the Hughes' door, and find Winry already there talking to Maes' widow, who they fill in on what they believe to be the hows and whys of her late husband's death.
She tells Edward and Alphonse pretty much exactly what they need to hear in this situation. That while Maes' meddling, selfless nature definitely led to his downfall, it was still his own choice to assist the brothers and follow up on their operation, and that if he died fighting for it as he appears to have then he must have considered it very important. Now, she says, the Elrics must honor him by making sure his death wasn't in vain; uncover what he sought to uncover, and avenge him if possible.
Of course, there is a bit of irony in this talk of how he died trying to help the brothers. The discovery of his that made Lust and Envy silence him was made while looking at a bunch of incidents around Amestris' borders, with a map of the country open in front of him at the time. I find it very likely that he'd figured out that Amestris is being turned into a sacrificial altar, and that this is what he was trying to tell Mustang about when Envy caught up to him. So, at that point, he would have been acting at least as much in self interest as he was in the Elrics, even if he was just doing them a favor to start with. What he discovered looked like just as imminent a threat to himself and his own family as to anyone else.
Cue another, longer montage of the brothers and Winry being sad while over-dramatic music plays. Also, just to piss me off even more, Edward and Winry hold hands.
Yes, obviously I knew this was coming. No, that's not going to keep me from ineffectually whinging about it.
Cut to what I think is another room of Father's secret base under Central, where Lust and Gluttony are feeding some human chimeras in cages. Not clear if these ones have their minds like Greed's minions, or if they're more like Alexina. They're being treated worse than either should be, whatever the case. Wonder what their purpose is? Did Greed rescue his henchmen from here themselves, or where they from an unrelated military research program not directly related to Father's operations? Curiouser and curiouser. Envy enters and reports what she learned about Mustang continuing to probe into Hughes' final research.
Lust foresaw this possibility, which is why she had Mustang transferred to Central where they can monitor him more easily (presumably, it's easier to have him nearby and under watch than it would be to identify any agents of his who he'd covertly send to research the crime scenes from the east). That said, there's still the question of what to do about it. As I suspected earlier, Lust is reluctant to throw away a State Alchemist over this unless there's no other option. And, unfortunately, her own attempts to gather information about Mustang's activities by stringing along one of his hand-picked transfers hasn't borne fruit.
Oh. The blonde guy with the new girlfriend.
*snerk*
For some reason, the concept of this powerful centuries-old magitech gynoid playing honey trap for some random doofus security guard is hilarious to me. True, I suppose its high time that Lust did something actually succubus-like to go with her name and character design, but...it's just so pedestrian, for her. It actually comes across as cute as much as foreboding or menacing.
Back to Sin Inc's dilemma, Lust isn't sure what to do about Mustang, but then Envy says she has an idea. Is it just me, or is Envy constantly bailing her sister out? Lust's puppet cult leader who she's been grooming screws up? Envy impersonates him to do the job instead. Lust lets Hughes get away after attacking him in his office? Envy has to chase him down and kill him in a much riskier public place, with literally only seconds to spare. Lust can't get any intel by seducing Mustang's agent? Envy tricks it out of Sheska. And now that they have the intel, Lust isn't sure how to act on it, but Envy has an idea.
Maybe I was wrong about Lust being the competent one. Really, the one thing she seems to be particularly good at is playing the sane woman to her siblings' more difficult personalities. More like Hohenheim's PA than an actual leader. Which I suppose might be her main intended purpose, but still, it's kind of jarring after how the early episodes built her up.
Anyway, the plan is a pretty obvious one in retrospect. Lieutenant Ross, the dummy who the brothers talked to earlier this episode, was the last person who Hughes talked to before he left to use the phone booth, and Envy was using her form when she killed him. So, they have Ross arrested as a suspect in Hughes' death. Mustang may or may not buy this, but even if he doesn't, it will hopefully distract him long enough for Sin Inc to complete its work and enable Father's ritual. And, sure enough, Mustang seems confused and unsure of what to think when he gets the news.
The episode ends with blonde soldier guy, Jean, meeting his new gf Solaris for a date. "Solaris" ("relating to the sun") could have something to do with the sun god cult that she co-opted in Liore, or it could be an allusion to the scifi novel of that title which features an alien who can create illusory loved ones to manipulate its human opponents. More likely the latter.
Is there an FMA coffee shop AU where these two are frequent patrons? Like, every other character is recast except them, who have the exact same personalities, roles, relationships, etc as in the original, and this is the coffee shop they go to? Is this a thing? It should really be a thing.
Also, that dress looks awful on Lust, but I guess that may just be a little way of showing her contempt for him without him realizing. End episode.
I feel like this was FMA:B at its best and FMA:B at its worst all put together. Phenomenal substance marred by sometimes tacky and tone-deaf style, with too much time spent on cheap melodrama instead of the more interesting intrigue and character development. An enjoyable episode, but it did try my patience at times.
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FMAB S1E16: Addendum
- Location
- Patriarchova
I already saw the walnuts thing. Sorry, memeposters.
AmbarGriss
Totally not four rats in a trench coat
- Location
- Brazil
I have several questions.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
While there are some noticeable changes from the manga, they're either structural things that rearrange order of events and thus can't be discussed until later episodes, or conversations that have had significant parts cut out that makes them a spoiler. For a non-spoiler example, in the manga Edward finds out about Hughes when he reads a newspaper talking about Maria Ross being arrested, rather then finding out from her in person, because the timing of events is a a little different. Honestly I'm beginning to wonder I'm going to have to backtrack on the suggestion to read the manga... given that the anime makes some reveals happen much earlier and others much later simply reading the manga is effectively a spoiler on the anime, though I guess it depends on how you judge what is the proper Full Metal Alchemist experience if any.
The main thing I can say is that the manga does not have the pointless flashbacks, and it obviously doesn't have the sappy music either. It comes off even worse given the context that they cut other scenes which actually advanced the plot or built characterization, but made room for unnecessary flashbacks. To be fair, manga Hawkeye is noticeably more generous to Mustang being an idiot than anime Hawkeye is, so the anime does have some improvements. Note that pointless Hughes flashbacks are separate from the issue of the anime breaking up pointful flashbacks... having all the Elric and Izumi backstories all at once would require having a full-on 2 episode flashback, which would be a bit much.
I guess that frees me to talk about the substance more. For starters I think Mustang is in denial. I think he didn't tell the brothers because admitting Hughes is dead to them would only make the death feel more real to him. This is also why he never planned an answer to give them beforehand and was caught flatfooted. His "I'm sparing their feelings and helping them focus on their work" is obviously a flimsy ex post facto attempt to rationalize his behavior as the manipulative and cunning acts Mustang is normally able to do, rather than there being a Hughes shaped hole in Roy's psyche.
Regarding the roles of the sins, to be fair Envy's shapeshifting powers are incredibly useful for a clandestine organization, whereas Lust's femme fatalons that can pierce the heavens are… not. Heck even Gluttony is more useful than that, as his eat all the things schtick can be used to remove evidence, like when he gobbled up Cornello's underling entirely in like a minute. So far it would seem to be as you say, that Lust's main job is to be the sane one that wrangles Gluttony and Envy, presumably Greed too before he defected.
The main thing I can say is that the manga does not have the pointless flashbacks, and it obviously doesn't have the sappy music either. It comes off even worse given the context that they cut other scenes which actually advanced the plot or built characterization, but made room for unnecessary flashbacks. To be fair, manga Hawkeye is noticeably more generous to Mustang being an idiot than anime Hawkeye is, so the anime does have some improvements. Note that pointless Hughes flashbacks are separate from the issue of the anime breaking up pointful flashbacks... having all the Elric and Izumi backstories all at once would require having a full-on 2 episode flashback, which would be a bit much.
I guess that frees me to talk about the substance more. For starters I think Mustang is in denial. I think he didn't tell the brothers because admitting Hughes is dead to them would only make the death feel more real to him. This is also why he never planned an answer to give them beforehand and was caught flatfooted. His "I'm sparing their feelings and helping them focus on their work" is obviously a flimsy ex post facto attempt to rationalize his behavior as the manipulative and cunning acts Mustang is normally able to do, rather than there being a Hughes shaped hole in Roy's psyche.
Regarding the roles of the sins, to be fair Envy's shapeshifting powers are incredibly useful for a clandestine organization, whereas Lust's femme fatalons that can pierce the heavens are… not. Heck even Gluttony is more useful than that, as his eat all the things schtick can be used to remove evidence, like when he gobbled up Cornello's underling entirely in like a minute. So far it would seem to be as you say, that Lust's main job is to be the sane one that wrangles Gluttony and Envy, presumably Greed too before he defected.
- Location
- Patriarchova
AmbarGriss
Totally not four rats in a trench coat
- Location
- Brazil
That answers many questions... and raises some new ones.Actual Hiromu Arakawa omake for this issue of the manga:
- Pronouns
- He/Him
On that note, here is an actual quote from Hiromu Arakawa, on the subject of character Design: "Men should be Muscular, and Women should be Va-Va-Voom!"Actual Hiromu Arakawa omake for this issue of the manga:
(Technically it's from her author avatar in an omake. )
- Location
- Patriarchova
Good point on Mustang's behavior here. That doesn't make it any less stupid, but it's a realistic kind of stupidity.
I think Gluttony's most important use for the group is his sense of smell. He was able to locate Scar by scent, without ever having met him before, across a densely inhabited major city. Removing murder evidence is fairly easy in a world where alchemical disintegration is a thing. That kind of tracking ability, much less so.
On a related note, it's a bit of a headscratcher that the haemonculus with the most publicly visible role is also one of the least capable of passing for human. I'd assume that Wrath was just the least bad option for the job since Envy and Lust were needed elsewhere, but it was stated that Wrath was PURPOSE BUILT for this role, so...what the hell was Hohenheim thinking?
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- Pronouns
- He/Him
I forget, how is Wrath the Least Capable?
- Location
- Patriarchova
Not THE least capable, but one of them.
I guess he could say that he had to get his prosthetic eye from some Rush Valley loony who puts creepy symbols on everything in a moment of desperation, but it still gets much more attention, raises more questions, and is harder to hide than a skin marking that could pass for a tattoo.
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- Pronouns
- He/Him
I mean, I presume the common public doesn't know he has an eye under the patch. Has he showed it off where Someone who wasn't an enemy could see it?
CV12Hornet
Riter.
- Location
- Tacoma, Washington
I blame the fact that the shonen battle manga (and thus the anime that are adapted from them) got their start as a genre with Kinnikuman, which evolved into a professional wrestling manga. Wrestling tropes can be found throughout shonen battle manga and the basic plot structures are often eerily similar.
In this case, this definitely feels like a bit wrestling promo, because pro wrestling has never known an ounce of subtlety or restraint in its existence.
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I'm sorry. I had no idea you were afflicted with the terrible condition that is shit taste
(really enjoying the review btw)
- Location
- Patriarchova
What if it comes off?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Do Eye patches have a habit of doing that?