Fullmetal Alchemist 20
August 14, 2009
Hiromu Arakawa – Viz – 2009 – 22+ volumes
One thing I should mention every few reviews for this series is that Hiromu Arakawa does really decent end matter for her books. She and Mikiyo Tsuda are the only artists whose copious bonus comics I even bother with anymore. For some reason, Mikiyo Tsuda draws consistently entertaining bonus comics about whatever topic she chooses, and Arakawa’s bonus comics are always parodies of moments in the story or of her characters in general that always manage to be hilarious. I especially enjoyed her “In Memorium” moments that were included with every volume, showing the characters that died going up to heaven (or pondering what was going on if they weren’t actually dead in the story yet). They stopped after nobody died for a long time, but it’s really nice to see them appear again when they’re needed.
Anyway, this volume was quite suspenseful (I was going to say action-packed, but it’s mostly just awesome exposition), and it seems to be hinting that the final battle is about to begin… though there’s still quite a bit going on. The characters all seem to have met up with each other and gotten their goals straight, and all seem to be headed towards Central City in order to stop some sort of “promised day” use of the gigantic alchemy circle that surrounds the country.
Especially noteworthy was the somewhat touching reunion between Von Hohenheim and Al. It starts off rather comical (as both see one another, they call out in recognition, except Von Hohenheim recognizes his suit of armor, not his son), but then settles down and is appropriately awkward, since the two haven’t seen each other in ten years. I liked that it wasn’t sappy when the two finally did connect a bit later, too. It’s good to see Von Hohenheim a part of the story now, and I’m curious to see how Ed will take his sudden appearance. He seems to believe the same thing Al did about the doppelganger underneath Central City, which is interesting.
Greed reappears, and is still split between his Greed and Prince personalities. Ed deals with him wonderfully, and I loved seeing Ed basically spell out why he’s willing to put himself through any humiliation to do what he has to do at this late stage. It’s nice that he pointed out that pride isn’t something he particularly cares about, since he doesn’t need it to win.
For some reason, the short jokes never get old. I can’t explain why it’s still funny seeing Ed react to them, but it is.
It’s only been one volume, but already I’m dying to see Ed and Al back together. Al is too heartbreaking a character to leave away from his big brother too long. I suspect there’s all sorts of interesting things that can happen now that the final battle is commencing that will be far more important than their reunion… but you know. Their relationship is one of the things I love best about this series, the way the two brothers stick together and support each other in their common, heartbreaking goal despite all the weirdness going on.
So let’s see how the endgame plays out. I think the series is still running, so we’ve got at least three more volumes of battles ahead, probably more like… four or five for the series to really wrap up. Maybe more, who knows. It is a manga.
This was a review copy provided by Viz.
