Hagane no Renkinjutsushi – Fullmetal Alchemist Ep. 53
鋼の錬金術師 FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST Episode 53 review
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood – 53

SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:

Mustang’s troops take Bradley’s wife to Radio Capital, where she reveals on air how the military tried to kill her and that it was Mustang’s people who saved her. Since rumors of Mustang leading a coup d’état had been circulating Central City, the people are now asking if Colonel Mustang is the villain or not. The Central Military tries to get the broadcast shut down but fail as the radio station is not going to play ball. Ross even gets on air, letting Brosh know that his partner wasn’t killed by Roy Mustang after all.

As the Briggs forces bring in a tank, Roy observes the situation Ed and company are in, bemused by the fact that Scar and Ed are on the same team. He takes out all of the sub-homunculi by turning them to ash. Meanwhile, Mei Chan flees Envy and ends up crashing into the courtyard area where Ed and company are. Envy follows and is happy to see a chance to get back at those who’d defeated him. Roy demands to know who killed Hughes and when he finally gets his answer, he attacks Envy with pinpoint attacks to the eyes and more. Envy turns to giant form, but that only gives Roy more to burn. Realizing this is the person who killed Lust, Envy flees and is pursued by Roy. Riza is to remain in the courtyard and the others are going to find Father.

A desperate Envy, losing the fight, turns himself into Hughes but gets fried as a result. However, Envy sees an opportunity when Riza violates Roy’s orders and enters the tunnels. Roy loses sight of Envy after frying him again. “Roy” and “Riza” encounter each other with “Roy” telling “Riza” to stay close to him. “Riza” ends up pointing a gun at “Roy.” Are either of them Envy?

Thoughts/Review:

I should have known bad things were going to happen with Riza. Actually, I smelled something but just couldn’t put my finger on it when only Riza came with Roy to gain access to the underground facility of Father. OK, so nothing bad has happened yet, but right now, with Roy enraged and Envy surely taking advantage of the situation of Riza disobeying orders, then that smacks to me that something bad is going to happy to Riza, possibly at Roy’s hands. We’ll see though. For all I know, she may end up saving Roy considering Scar and Ed’s chat. *lol*

At least the fight with the sub-homunculi in that courtyard is over and we are slowly progressing inward.

The fight with Envy, no matter how it turns out, was good. The thing is, with them being so close to Father’s location, would Father show up and save Envy should Roy be close to killing him completely?

I liked how Roy’s plan to throw the country into confusion and shift the blame to the military worked. Thanks to the radio broadcast, now he comes off as the good guy trying to save the country and his Führer rather than the rebel that he truly is. *lol*

It was nice that Brosh finally got to learn the truth of Ross being alive. Hopefully, he can see his partner soon.

Considering how much the anime has slowed down, it makes the earlier decision to skip a few things (Yoki’s story for example) seem a bit silly. However, I suppose BONES was worried that audiences wouldn’t want some of the same stories repeated in full and so raced ahead to get to the new material as fast as possible. With the introduction of Mei Chan and the Xing stuff, I don’t think that should have been as big a worry but what do I know?

So, not a whole lot to comment on here. The Sloth fight was forgotten, the Envy fight is ongoing, Pride has to be returning to Central soon, Wrath has to be around somewhere, Hohenheim has to be around somewhere, and the slug fest will continue. ^_^