Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood - 33

Just a quick note before I begin — I’ve decided to drop Letter Bee. That choice is more a reflection on my lack of time than the quality of the series, though I am not certain I would have continued blogging it past this season, anyway (particularly with a surefire awesome show like Durarara on the horizon for winter). Plus, I want to catch up on Cross Game and finish up Kare Kano, both of which I have neglected for too long now. So, apologies to anyone who read and enjoyed my Letter Bee posts, but anyone who likes the series should be more than happy with Scamp’s posts at Bokutachi no Blog. Go read them!

Anyway, this episode is solid but not exactly amazing. (I just need to stop hyping things up altogether. Every time I do, I set up Epi for disappointment. I’m sorry, man! Not a word from me regarding anything in the future.)

As short as Kimblee and Scar’s skirmish is — and as absurdly ill-prepared as Kimblee is for it — I think it is a decent fight. At the very least, Scar chucking a pipe into Kimblee’s abdomen is pretty memorable. Scar could represent Ishbal in the Olympics with that kind of skill. And if a biased Russian judge keeps going after Ishbal in some of the events, all Scar has to do is “accidentally” throw a javelin into the guy’s head. Who would argue with Scar? The guy would just blow shit up everywhere. He would be the greatest Olympic athlete in history. He could probably smoke a bowl with Michael Phelps and get away with it, too, if he wanted.

At least before his massive brain fart in his fight against Scar, Kimblee showed some keen investigation skill in tracking the guy down. Hilariously, he is actually dressed sort of like a high class detective. I could see Kimblee as a classy detective who usurps the law by killing the bad guys he investigates. Who here would watch that show? I would definitely watch it. Give Kimblee some David Caruso sunglasses, and he will be set for stardom.

(Never really thought about this before, but Kimblee left prison dressed in that kickin’ white suit, right? Did he have it there the whole time? If so, then either Amestris prisons have some awesome dry cleaning policies, or that thing reeks of mothballs and the elderly. If the suit was provided for Kimblee upon his exit from the prison, then Father must be very strict about his low level subordinates looking good when they are doing his work. Most of the Homunculi are excused from this rule because they’re like his kids.)

With all the crowing about Olivier Armstrong I have doing, I can’t believe I forgot to give Buccaneer his proper due. His short fight with Ed and Al reminded me that he is pretty big badass in his own right. How could I not hype up a huge dude with a freakin’ chainsaw arm? It’s like Ash from the Evil Dead movies leaped into the FMA world after mooching off Barry Bonds’ steroid collection for three years. If Buccaneer were here, he’d chainsaw my head for that egregious slight. I’m sorry, man! And, Olivier, well, what can I say? She doesn’t make a great first impression, because she’s a total hardass (as is obvious after 0.000000001 seconds of screen time for her), but hey. I grew to love her.

One last thing — I had a few laughs when reading the confusion and speculation about Ed’s alchemy not working at the end of this episode. Not that I want to poke a bit of fun at people for honestly trying to think through things and find answers on their own, but the real reason is a good deal less complicated than people might think. I probably should not talk much, however, since I have made myself look like an ass more than a few times in the past coming up with wild explanations for events that ended up being quite simple in the end!