[wisteria233]

Originally Posted by LunarMoon

To be honest, I was only aware of the comment at the end, in which I mentioned that FMA 2003, established pathos via tragedy, while I wasn’t affected by Brotherhood’s pathos at all. Originally, I was going to simply end that sentence with the word “pathos”, but I felt that I needed to mention the method through which it actually establishes pathos, so it was changed to “pathos via tragedy”. There are definitely other ways to establish pathos other than tragedy, such as the pathos established by wanting to see Rocky win the boxing championship, or by anything marked as a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming, but I don’t believe that Brotherhood really established any pathos well enough for me to be emotionally effected. For the reason mentioned above, the entire flame war came off to me, as similar to an excerpt from the Boondocks-

MLK: …although our movement may come off as extremely liberal to some-
O’ Reilly: Do you love America?
MLK: I’m sorry-
O’ Reilly: Why can’t liberals ever answer that question? Say you love America! Say it!

And the entire discussion becomes based around something that amounted to a throwaway comment.

Knowing that I actually did speak about Brotherhood’s lighthearted atmosphere does inform me that someone could have actually misinterpreted the post, in a manner that doesn’t involve doing so intentionally in order to start a flame war or in order to troll bait, though I don’t agree with basing the entire debate around three sentences, as if there isn’t any possible, logical reason to prefer FMA 2003 to Brotherhood. Originally, I created those three sentences as a response to the multiple people who regularly dismiss Full Metal Alchemist, and similar anime, as being “emo” or for “forcing drama”. My argument was that the tragedy in FMA 2003 wasn’t some sort of horrific flaw, but that, if anything, it provided a refreshing change from the shows that shy away from it.

No, that was why bolded your comments, your comments were not implying what you thought of quality of the work. Just what you thought of it based on the tone. You keep on implying that the 2003 series is better for being dark, instead of actually judging the series by execution.

Also if you think that anime using drama and tragedy to invoke a sense of pathos is anything new then you haven't much anime, heck you haven't read much at all. Again you aren't even considering how well that drama and tragedy fit in, with the over all narrative. Which is why I continued to ask you the what the point was to all of that drama none of which you've actually been able to answer, instead all you've done is just summarize the event, as though I've never seen the series before. As though saying it again will make it have a point. That is the reason why people call the drama and angst in the 2003 series emo, because it was simply pointless. Its ironic that you call the 2003 realistic (which I've notice that you've stopped doing so) because of its dark drama, because it simply isn't.

The debate was over the argument that for every depressing ending, that there are 15 happy endings. Obviously there are a few bittersweet endings, or we wouldn't be having this debate over Full Metal Alchemist, but overall they're pretty rare when you look into the greater whole.

Again having a sad ending should not be the criteria that one uses to judge the overall quality of a series. And even then you're comparing western media to eastern media, which are inherently different. In eastern media having some sort of bittersweet endings is not uncommon, different people, different culture, different tastes. If you were to say that it is not uncommon for western media to have happy happy endings then okay, but not for eastern media. Western media =/= eastern media.

On the internet, you can't infer opinions. There's no body language to non-verbally read preferences with. Most of the time you can't even tell whether someone's being sarcastic or not, so figuring out someone's opinion on a complex idea, without reading it directly, just can't be done.

You can infer a lot through words, which is why you must choose them carefully.

I like to put things into little boxes, and I’m very clinical with how I rank things. Every work has a theme. The ideals, moral beliefs, and biases of the author will seep into a work, whether they’re aware of it or not, though some themes are more complex, more original, or better developed than others. The Godfather’s theme is, arguably, more complex and more applicable to reality than that of Rambo’s, for instance. And those three factors are generally what I’ll use to rank a work on a scale from dull, to entertaining , to great, which is a work that may or may not actually entertaining but which nonetheless expands upon important, universally human ideas. Often a great work is also a classic work that has stood the test of time for several decades. It’s not an objective or scientific scale by any means, but it is vaguely consistent.

FMA 2003 is an “entertaining” work, in my eyes, though it’s higher on the scale than many others. The ideas that it presents are used far less often than many others and, in my opinion, are developed very well, even if I can’t see it being relevant enough to become a part of human literary canon in one hundred years. FMA Brotherhood is also an “entertaining” work though I rank it lower than FMA 2003, because I find the ideas that it explores to be more commonly used. Of course, how I rank something on this scale has little to do with how much I actually enjoy it. I don’t agree with many facets of Objectivism, at all, but I still rank Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugs, as higher than the majority of the stuff that I do actually like, due to how insanely influential it’s ideas have been over the last few decades.

That’s also why I ranked the first three episodes of Fate Zero below FMA 2003. So far, it’s one of the most entertaining shows I’ve ever seen. It’s also the only one that I’m currently following and I typically catch it within thirty minutes of its NicoNico release. But it hasn’t presented its main idea yet, so I can’t fairly rate it on the scale, especially considering the fact that it’s 24 episode series and only four episodes have been released, so it wouldn’t be logical to rate the series as whole. I’m also a Type Moon fan, so I place an extra degree of work into not overrating it or allowing my biases to influence the ranking. Of course, as critically acclaimed as it is, even by Type Moon noobies, I think it’s safe to say that it really is as good as I think it is.

Spoiler for Tangent Comparison Between Fate Zero and FMA 2003:

Also, Fate Zero is actually much darker than FMA 2003. Amestris is actually livable. Without starting a political debate, a few people have drawn comparisons between its policies and those of the U.S., and as long as you live in Amestris, you have access to the resources of a first-world country with a strong emphasis on science and free thought, which is rare for a militaristic state. The existence of skilled alchemists benefits the common people both economically and defensively. The same can’t be said about magi in Fate Zero’s world, where most of them appear to be sociopaths, who, according to Tokiomi, aren’t even bound by laws or legal limitation, since no one can assumedly challenge their power. Being a Japanese muggle in the Nasuverse sucks, since it means that you can easily become an experimental guinea pig or a casualty in one of the magi battles. And yet no one will do anything about it to stop people such as Kiritsugu from blowing up planes, or people such as Ryuunosuke from slaughtering your kind like cattle, as no one seemingly can. As long as you live in Amestris, though, being a non-alchemist in the FMA 2003 world is actually pretty nice.

Again how are not implying that a series being dark is what makes it better to you? You didn't like Fate/Zero until you realized that it was a dark series, what that tells me is that, a series's tone and the dark elements it implements is what you use to decide its worth not its execution of those tones and elements. You claim that you're not doing it, but then you turn around and say that that's the criteria that you use to judge a series.

Yes, and that’s what I was asking about. I don’t see why you kept using the words “juvenile” or “childish” to describe FMA 2003, when you claimed to not care that a series is juvenile.

The reason why I said that in regards to the 2003 series was that it is a series, that is pretending to be deep and philosophical. It tries too hard to be mature, and only ends up seeming like a child who trying to come off as an adult. I don't mind childish series, so long as they are executed well.

And that would be how I feel about Brotherhood. For whatever reason, I found it difficult to care about whether Ed and Al obtained their bodies again and was actually far more interested in watching Ling attempt to gain the imperial throne and unite the various clans of Xing. Ling and Mei just communicated the idea that they wanted to win their little war more than the brothers wanted their bodies, so I was ultimately more interested in their struggle. Of course, Ling’s ascension was only focused on again in a scene at the end of the anime, without really elaborating on what happened from there, so the plot point that could have inspired some sort of emotional reaction in me, pretty much went cold.

Well that's your opinion and your welcome to have it, just like how I say that I didn't like Ed at all in the 2003 anime, because he came off as more annoying than anything else. Also I find it funny that you say Ed and Al getting back their bodies didn't hold your interest when that's all that the 2003 series was about. Also they did show Ling a lot but it was a reoccurring sideplot. Ling outright said he needed the philosophers stone in order to become emperor, meaning that once he got the stone he would become emperor (this was outright stated). Ling's journey to find the stone was more about his own emotional growth to have the disposition of a king who actually cared about all of his subjects, rather than just his own clan.

Ed was actually really competent. Far more so than most teenage protagonists such as Fate Route Shirou Emiya or Loyd Irving, but I do agree that Alphonse and Dante kept passing around the idiot ball as if it was a sport. The only decision that Al made independently in that series was extremely idiotic, and involved him trusting a child killer with his well-being. After this, he then proceeded help another villain, albeit one that looked like his mother, almost murder his brother. He immediately followed this by getting himself kidnapped. You'd also think that someone such as Dante, who had lived for over 400 years, would have come up with a better security system, as you'd expect, simply by probability, that someone other than Ed and Roy would have figured out the same thing that they did and infiltrated her hideout. But as long as I view the other assets of the series as being strrong, I can generally suspend my disbelief past comparatively minor points such this, especially since Ed's hypercompetence makes up for Al's incompetence.

Racism doesn't have to be blatant, but I do prefer not to refer to it unless I'm absolutely sure that it's there. Implications aren't enough, because calling a series, movie, or book, racist weakens that claim in the long run. There are a few people who will actually try to tell you that racism doesn't exist anymore, and they'll often do so by bringing up instances of the Race Card to dismiss acts of really blatant racism, and I'd rather not aid them by unintentionally crying wolf.

Actually, implications are enough, racism is racism is racism, it doesn't have blatant, but then again in real life racism isn't always blatant. And no calling a series, racist doesn't weaken a claim in the long run, if anything it only makes it more obvious. Example Gone with the Wind, still very much considered racist years after people first pointed it out; Song of the South still considered very much racist. Japan in itself is a very racist country 2. People who claim that racism no longer exists are living in a fantasy world. And even then what do they have to do with what we're talking about?

Gantz was racist. There was only one black character to appear throughout the entire run, and the entire motif around his character was that he wanted to rape a supporting character. X-Men First Class was also pretty questionable, in that it presented one black character and he was the only one to be killed off, while the remainder of white cast remained untouched. But saying that FMA 2003 is racist seems like a bit of a stretch.

Your examples are that of blatant racism, and like I said the minute you treat someone differently from yourself, due to race then it is racism. They had Roy beat himself up about killing two civilian doctors of his own race, but not over killing hundreds of civilians of a different race, tell me again, how is that not racist?

I cared about Rose because she had two entire episodes dedicated to her development, and it's obvious that she was a good person. I also cared about Roco from the Cowboy Bebop episode, Waltz For Venus, because he had one episode dedicated to him and it was also obvious that he was a fundamentally good person.

But why should I? Like I said before Rose hadn't been around for over 20 episodes, she was only there for episodes one and two, and there was no effort made in those 20 episodes to make her an important character to the Elric brothers. So again I'm asking you what was the point to using her?

On the other hand, Envy, in FMA Brotherhood, was given a sympathetic death, complete with sad music, and a series of physical fumbles, but it was very difficult to be sympathetic towards him. The guy had murdered God knows how many people, so it's difficult to feel sorry for him because he's jealous of humanity's concept of friendship. I was actually more sympathetic to Nagato of Fushigi Yuugi, a notoriously poorly done Sympathetic Villain, because he had a genuine Freudian Excuse. Also, I agree with you about Al being an accessory, and that’s one of the things that Brotherhood does better than FMA 2003. He was much more capable of making his own decisions in Brotherhood, though in terms of screen time, Al appeared about as much as Ed, in the 2003 series, and it’s thematically focused on their relationship, which is why I say that the show focused on both of the brothers.

Good, your actually not supposed to feel bad for Envy. They made it clear that Envy was a heartless killer, who you shouldn't have a lick of sympathy for him. Or are you forgetting the fact that the reason why they had such a hard time deciding on which of them should kill Envy was because they all wanted to kill him, for what he did. His death is supposed to feel satisfying.

Spoiler for Grave of the Fireflies:

I just watched the ending of the English dub again to make sure. His last line is that, “the next morning, I put some of Setsuko’s ashes into the candy tin. I never went back to the shelter”. Unless it’s different in the Sub, that doesn’t seem as if he had forgotten about her at all, nor would you really expect him to. The movie then ends with their spirits reuniting in the afterlife, which would make a line such as that all the stranger.

This movie is an autobiography so I wonder how the heck their souls reunited in the after life, when he goes to the post office and finds out that his father died. You do realize that the person this series was based on is also still alive, right?

I've brought up numerous examples of dark series, such as Basilisk, that I dislike and light works of fiction, such as Superman, that I do like. It's just that multiple people have assumed that I'm lying about my own opinion or that I don't know what I like.

Because you outright that a series being dark is the criteria that you judge it by, not its execution, that is why people have been calling you out on it.