The imperfect legacy of the first ‘Fullmetal Alchemist’ anime

Everyone who loves anime has almost certainly seen and loved Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood. The series has long reigned at the top of the MyAnimeList charts — save for the occasional coup, such as Frieren. It’s impossible to deny the appeal of Bones’ second attempt at adapting Hiromu Arakawa’s manga that ran for nearly a decade. It managed to stay true to her original plot, her characters, her themes, the scale of it, and its core philosophy. 

The first attempt was not as successful at those goals. Twenty years later, the memories of the first anime adaptation fades into obscurity. However, Fullmetal Alchemist still has its merits. 

Fullmetal Alchemist versus Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

There’s many things missing from 2003’s Fullmetal Alchemist. The nation of Xing and all of its supporting characters, Mustang and Hawkeye’s backstories, insight into the Ishval War, and the final antagonist to name a few. The reason for this is that at the time of initiating production, Hiromu Arakawa had only completed seven volumes of the manga. She would stress that after a certain point the anime adaptation ought to go its own way with the ending. 

The resulting anime established a lot of the audiovisual groundwork that Bones would use again in Brotherhood. However, these changed story elements transmute the original series and conclusive feature film into something uniquely smaller in scope and more personal for both the Elrics and myself.

The timing of Fullmetal Alchemist

In the winter of 2004, I was in middle school. Like many that age, I felt isolated and unsure of myself. One thing was for sure: I loved cartoons. As was true for many at the time, Toonami and Adult Swim on Saturdays were appointment TV.It was where I would fall in love with series like Naruto instantly and those like One Piece much later in life. 

But there was something unique about waiting until 12:30am to watch Fullmetal Alchemist. From the opening title I was hooked as Edward Elric descends an elevator into a subterranean city, and the guitar riff of Asian Kung-Fu Generation’s “Rewrite” drops, carried through the rest of the OP by Bones’ stellar and kinetic action animation. A lot of that quality animation was present in those early episodes I watched, which incidentally turned out to be the final ones of the series. I had zero idea of what was going on but based on vibes, music and animation quality alone, I was hooked. It spoke to my ever growing cynicism and searching for more mature content in tone and appearance.

Instantly hooked

I would then on a stormy winter vacation pick up the second volume of Arakawa’s manga, depicting Edward and Alphonse’s arrival in Central Amestris to prepare for Ed’s alchemy exam. I read the tragic encounter with Shau Tucker and his daughter and saw a devastating blow by the Ishvalan fugitive Scar, as the brothers are left broken into pieces and defeated in the rain.

From there, it was a game of circling back to the series’ rerun cycle. Beginning with the arc in Lior, and catching up episodes weekly. By this time, it’s spring, and the original, vibrant opening credits with L’arc-en-ciel’s iconic “Ready Steady Go”, and the series themes of renewal, will go on to forever indicate the coming of spring to me. That’s just one example of how this anime and I grew together. 

The Greatest Taboo

For a teenager with little footing in faith, Arakawa’s world of alchemy was meaningful. Having something that bridged the spiritual and the scientific was instrumental at my age. Fullmetal Alchemist put value on human life and showed consequences of ignoring the ethics of science as Edward Elric spouts poetic about the chemical makeup of a human being while haunted by his mistakes after arrogantly playing god to bring his mother back.

These are aspects that every version of Fullmetal Alchemist has; but the 2003 anime takes its time to develop this. Because the 2003 series would start with the same foundation but come to its own conclusions, themes remain the same, but the tone remains darker and more uncertain. This allows those moments of hope to stand out more as a beacon in a way that feels more melancholic than Brotherhood. Perhaps that is more of a marker of the time in which I watched it, deep in the throes of the Myspace and Fueled by Ramen soundscape of the early 2000’s.

Filler that matters

The series takes its time to sit with characters in its first few arcs for the same reasons. Despite being in the era where most series were rife with time wasting filler, the 52 episode Fullmetal Alchemist manages to make those filler episodes feel meaningful in the way it introduced new characters as foils to Edward and Alphonse.

This is expressly visible in the two parter “The Other Brothers Elric” and the fan favorite episodes “The Flame Alchemist, The Bachelor Lieutenant, and the Mystery of Warehouse 13”. The more careful pacing of the 2003 series also allowed viewers to spend more time with Maes Hughes As such,the circumstances of his assassination is a bit more impactful for the viewers and as for Edward as he endures the loss of a peer.

”Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return”

The history of war against Ishval and the disappearance of Xerxes are missing, leaving characters like Scar, Mustang, Hawkeye and Bradley a bit lacking comparatively. Instead, the 2003 series retains its focus on the drama of Edward and Alphonse reconciling with their mistakes. Bones achieves this through the changes in the villainous homunculi. Lust, Gluttony and Envy, remain rather consistent; if not devoid of their much better development from the back half of the manga. Greed, while more interestingly used in the manga and Brotherhood, has characterization that more deeply humanizes him to build up a final battle with Edward.of, This sets a precedent for all of the homunculi in the 2003 series. 

Homunculi like Sloth, Wrath, and Pride come across much differently than before to illustrate a more interpersonal focus. The narrative choice for using the homunculi for drama comes from a difference in origin. In the 2003 series, they are the result of failed attempts at Human transmutation. Therefore the homunculi are the mistakes of the most adept alchemists coming back to haunt them.

In the case of Ed and Al’s teacher Izumi, the child that she was unable to carry to term and attempted to resurrect through her alchemic taboo, would end up creating Wrath. This introduces these consequences to the Elric Brothers early on. Their own taboo circles back to haunt them later, as the 2003 series introduces Sloth late in the game as the image of their dead mother. While a controversial choice, it ties to the inciting incident of the series, and forces Edward and Alphonse to reconcile with their mistake before fixing things once and for all.

“To obtain, something of equal value must be lost.“

Another controversial choice is the main villain Dante, the mother of Envy and former lover of the Elrics’ father Hohenheim. Dante’s motivations are a bit dated, she puppeteers the homunculi to procure the true philosopher’s stone so she can obsessively continue to transmute her soul into different bodies to continue living alongside Hohenheim, who abandoned her ages ago. Hohenheim also changes, now, a living philosopher’s stone. While melodramatic, Dante’s plans to use Rose is a nice way to loop back the the beginning in Lior by giving her a bigger role in the ending.

The finale of Fullmetal Alchemist sees Edward restoring Al’s body after the final conflict and in exchange being taken by the Door of Truth. This version of the Door serves as a portal to a different universe resembling our own. Edward finds himself in post World War I Europe and unable to use Alchemy. Conversely, Alphonse is now in the position to practice alchemy at an expert level and sets out to bring his brother big home.While the series ends on a much more dour note, it leaves some room open for The Conqueror of Shamballa, a feature length conclusion. 

In the film,  Edward uses his wits to navigate a world without Alchemy, meet twists on familiar characters, and return to Amestris across the Door of Truth. Along this journey are some convoluted parallel universe shenanigans including Envy in the form of a Dragon, and dismantling a revolution led by some guy named Adolf Hitler. While nowhere near as satisfying or shonen-esque as the manga and Brotherhood counterparts, the e series and its movie focus on the magnetic connection between brothers and the sacrifices they make for one another and their friends; even across time and space.

Equivalent Exchange

The dueling aspects between Fullmetal Alchemist adaptations usually end up with Brotherhood dominating the conversation, deservedly so. However, there are many respects due to the original 2003 adaptation for not only establishing much of the groundwork, It’s a shame that unless you fork over an arm and a leg for the DVDs, there’s not a lot of great options for watching the original series since it disappeared off of Netflix and Funimation has been wasted away by Crunchyroll.

Thankfully, Crunchyroll does have Conqueror of Shamballa available to stream, but it doesn’t do much good without context of the fifty two episodes prior to its events. Fullmetal Alchemist is definitely not perfect. But unlike in the world of alchemy, we shouldn’t have to exchange the existence of one adaptation to enjoy one that’s better.

Fullmetal Alchemist: Conqueror of Shamballa is available on Crunchyroll.

Featured images © HIROMU ARAKAWA/SQUARE ENIX, MBS, ANX, BONES, dentsu 2004.
Critical archival of images by Zetalial