Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood - Episode 46 Review

Episode 46, "The Creeping Shadow"

*****SPOILERS*****

Synopsis: Time passes, and the time of the Risembool Sheep Festival arrives. A military train is at the train station, and Miles is among soldiers there. Winry is escorted secretly back to her house, where she encounters Edward, Greedling, and the chimeras. Winry tells Ed that Alphonse is in the train, but Ed decides is safer not to go visit him. Winry adjusts Ed's automail and tells him about Lior's recovery and that she knows about "the promised day". Ed and his group leave at night for Kanama, to meet up with Hohenheim. In Lior, Scar and Marcoh meet with the other chimeras, and they all meet up with a group of Ishbalans. More time passes, and in the East, the training excercises between the East and the North are being overseen by Fuhrer King Bradley. This concerns General Grumman and Miles who try to come up with a plan to get rid of him. Alphonse wanders out of the train and is chased by Gluttony and Pride, who eventually capture him. In Central, Roy pays Olivier a visit and passes along what he knows about Selim. General Hakuro informs Bradley of the information he gathered about a coup attempt about to be made with the help of the Ishbalans, leading Bradley to take a train home, which is destroyed by soldiers working for Mustang and Grumman. In Central, Olivier considers making her move, but Father arrives with Sloth.

Comments:

How time has passed! No, not since the series started. I mean in the timeline of the story. Compare the way Edward and Winry looked at the beginning of the series when compared to now. Edward has certainly grown up over time, especially from the time between his injury at the mine and his reappearance after recovery. Winry especially looks a bit like Riza Hawkeye with her hair down now (if you recall, her long hair is the reason why Riza decided to grow hers long to begin with). In fact, their relationship is somewhat like the Roy/Riza relationship, though Winry is a bit more on the sidelines.

In the first series, Edward as he first appeared and as he last appeared weren't all that different. Sure, you saw a little grown, especially with the time skip at the end to how Edward was getting along in our world, but it wasn't as dramatic, or rather, was more subtle. One wonders how much time passed in the first series compared to this one. Of course, by the time of the movie, Edward was around 17 or 18, so of course he looked a bit older by then, plus the art of the movie was much richer and detailed.

For EdwardxWin shippers, this must have been a delightful episode. For me, I couldn't care less, since I think the "childhood friend love interest" is overplayed and is frankly beneath Arakawa's talents.

We have a lot of power jockying in this episode, with General Grumman springing his plan to remove Bradley/Wrath from the equation. It worked fairly well, since he probably had information leaked to Hakuro on purpose, which led him to tip off the Fuhrer, who took the train, which was then blown up. Whether an exploding train and a fall from high tracks is enough to kill Wrath will remain to be seen by you folks who haven't read the manga. (Protip: Don't count on it.) Grumman is quite a nasty guy when he wants to be. Remember, here's a guy who openly admitted he had high ambitions.

Speaking of ambition, we have Olivier trying to decide whether to make a move in Central yet or not. However, things turn complicated when Father and Sloth show up. So now Father and Sloth are in Central, Pride and Gluttony are East, Greed's with Edward, and Wrath is... eh, kablooey. Maybe. Anyway, it looks like Olivier will have to find another way to take advantage of her position. Don't count her out yet.

And Roy is about to make his move, too, with Riza, Fuery, and Breda already at the ready. Falman, I believe, is with Miles, or is with another group of Briggs soldiers preparing to seize Central.

Unfortunately for Alphonse, he's now the captive of Pride, who is a particularly douchey homunculus on par, if not beyond the level of fucknuttery of Envy. And with Edward on his way to see Hohenheim, things are about to get more interesting if Al's going to be used as a hostage in front of them.

Overall Score: 3 out of 5