"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To obtain, something of equal value must be lost".Thought I would start my number 4 anime with a quote from it, something that is repeated in the anime every five seconds (well not really but I’m try to make this blog more interesting so bare with me). Anyway number 4 on my list is Hiromu Arakawa's Fullmetal Alchemist. Well it is a bit confusing that the series is called FMA Brotherhood (yes I am abbreviating now), the reason for this is that there are actual two versions of the anime. Fullmetal Alchemist is purely anime base, so the story from the manga is gone out the window (apart from some bits) and is basically a completely new story line. Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood fallows the story of the manga, which in my opinion is better but if you don’t read the manga not sure of the anime I would suggest watching FMA before watching FMA Brotherhood to get a feel for it.
Right now it’s time for the nice part where I can show off just how much anime crazy I am and explain the anime (by the way if you new to anime all the explanations I have done so far are brief, just so I don’t do like 50 odd entries). Ok so the story line….. Well it’s about two brothers (wow they nailed that in the name, yeah not funny moving on) Alphones and Edward Elric (gonna call them Al and Ed for short) also know as the Elric brothers (hey I don’t come up with this stuff haha). Their father mysterious leaves them when they are small and their mother dies due to a illness, and that is where their whole world change. In the FMA world there are certain people that use alchemy, but not as you would know it (look back at the quote I started this entry with) everything can be made into something else (the basics of it is: understanding, deconstruction and construction) but you have to give something of equal value (so you get a chair if you give wood… something like that). This is done by the means of a Transmutation circle which produces the energy needed to commence the transformation.

Ed making a sword from his metal hand
So back to the story line, when the Elric brother’s loose their mum they do a transmutation which is taboo: Human Transmutation – making a human being. To do this they gathered the ingredients that make a human and for the soul they put some of their blood, but because you can not give a something to equal a human soul the transmutation goes wrong and Al looses his whole body and Ed looses one arm and then his gives his leg in another transmutation to put Al’s soul in a suit of armour. With it so far? Good. Moving on Alchemy in FMA Brotherhood is also used in the army as a weapon (such as colonels Mustang’s ability to make flames from one spark) so because Mustang finds Al and Ed and sees their potential he suggest that they become State Alchemists which will allow them access to information on how they can return their bodies to normal. So with Al’s soul in a suit of armour and Ed with a metal arm and leg they set out to find the answers to how they can return their body’s to normal, but along they way they find out a conspiracy that is shakes their belief in Alchemy (should be a anime reviewer with that last line haha).

Ed and Al Elric

Colonel Mustang (The Flame Alchemist)
Before moving on i would like to say that each State Alchemist is given a name which represents they teritory of alchemy (Mustang is the flame alchemist becuase he uses and manipulates flames... yeah a bit obivouse). Ed is the Fullmetal Alchemist, because he has a arm and leg made out of metal, but the name is ironic and it is more to do with his personality.
Edward Elric
Right now onto the reason that I like this anime. Well first of it has to be the fact that it is based on alchemy which is made into more of a fantasy item (and come on who does not want to be able to draw a circle and make bread out of grass). The story line is good but again not too much depth in my opinion. The character of Ed and Al is something else that I like about this, because I have a brother and the little arguments that they have just reminds me of me and him, also the fact that Ed does not like being called small and goes nuts if someone does is a joke that can be done again and again and for me does not get old one bit. One thing that I don’t like about FMA Brotherhood or FMA (and I think other people will agree with me here) is the fact that they killed off Maes Hughes (a friend of Mustang) off when he was such a great character (comic relief character) but he was good at that and who knows it could have developed into something better. Apart from that I like the anime a lot and like I said before if you going to watch it you should watch FMA first then move on to FMA Brotherhood so you get a little taster of the sort of things you are to expect from the series.