This was my intro to anime at 30yo and I just need to word vomit about how much I love FMA03.
So I very recently started watching anime and reading Manga, because I am a huge fantasy/sci-fi/horror fan and I got to the point where I felt like I’d watched/read everything in those genres from western media and I was so tired of C-list crap to fill the void.
Apparently I’ve been missing out on like so much good fucking shit.
Anyway, I picked FMA03 to watch h first because I’d seen so many references to Shou Tucker and Nina. I wasn’t sure if I should do 03 first or Brotherhood, and just picked the older one.
Guys.
This altered my brain lmao. I love this show and story so much. I watched Brotherhood immediately after and it’s good, but it’s just not the same for me.
TBH, I don’t really care about the battles and think that part is boring (but I’ve always thought that, in LOTR and ASOIAF etc, battles are just blah blah blah to me too), so I was really only interested in the characters, the worldbuilding, and the story.
Ed and Al are fantastic characters. I was immediately attached to them and invested in whatever was to come for them.
I didn’t realise Shamballa was a thing and when I thought that Ed and Al ended up in separate universes and that was just…the end I literally cried so hard I threw up and that’s never happened to me before hahaha. I was not okay.
I can’t really explain exactly why I like 03 so much more than brotherhood, maybe it’s just the overall tone and gravity/maturity, but I just think that it was such an interesting and beautiful piece of art and storytelling.
I get so frustrated with the main sub because it feels like you can’t say that you prefer 03. Someone told me to be careful watching 03 fist because I might get confused about what is canon. Why can’t they just be 2 different stories with 2 different canons?
Since finishing both versions of FMA, I’ve watched Castlevania, Devilman Crybaby, AOT, and DanDaDan; and I also started reading manga, I’ve read Fire Punch, Dorohedoro, Chainsawman, and Berserk. My faves are: Berserk, AOT, Dorohedoro, and FMA03. If anyone has recs based on these please lmk!!