October 30th, 2009 
AstroNerdBoy Hagane no Renkinjutsushi – Fullmetal Alchemist Ep. 29
鋼の錬金術師 FULLMETAL ALCHEMIST Episode 29 review
Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood – 29
SPOILER Summary/Synopsis:
Envy, back in humanoid form, takes Ed and Al up an elevator and transforms into an army officer. Upon exiting the elevator, they discover that the homunculi base is directly under the military HQ. Envy leads them to a room where Wrath awaits, causing Ed and Al to be shocked to learn Wrath is actually King Bradley. Bradley has them sit next to Colonel Mustang. Roy informs them of the transfers 
of his aides and Ed decides he’s going to quit being a State Alchemist since they’ve likely been chosen for the sacrifice. Bradley begins talking about Winry and to save her, Ed is forced to stay as a State Alchemist. Roy says he won’t quit because of ambition and Al receives permission from Bradley to continue looking for ways to recover their lost bodies. Before they leave, Bradley stabs one of Al’s armor’s soft-spots but misses the hidden Mei Chan inside. Seeing he hit nothing, Bradley lets them go.
Ed gives Winry a call to make sure she’s OK while Major Armstrong is waiting for Roy. A drive to a distance away has Roy brief Armstrong on the truth and Armstrong makes a decision to take a stand rather than run as he did during the Ishval War. At the same time, Wrath and Greed have a chat on the roof where Bradley learns that Ling is going to try to take over Greed and appears amused by this.
Elsewhere, Scar finds Dr. Marcoh in a cell in the homunculi lair. To try to get Scar to kill him, Marcoh tells Scar that he was part of the Ishval slaughter and an angry Scar tries to get more information from Marcoh. Meanwhile, Al gets Mei Chan to Dr. Knox’s house, who’s not happy with having another patient. Al delivers a message to Lan Fan given to him by Greed-Ling and makes Lan Fan understand what has truly happened with Ling. Mei Chan gets wind of Lan Fan and the two immediately begin to fight until Dr. Knox breaks it up.
Ed gets summoned by the military to perform repairs to a civilian’s damaged house with alchemy, which he does. Hearing the military folks praise his skills as being superior to regular alchemist, who’d lost their powers, Ed realizes that Father had stopped the use of all alchemy throughout the city, save for that used by Scar and Mei Chan. He figures that if he could figure out the secret behind their ability to use alchemy, then he might find a way to restore his and Al’s bodies without the use of a Philosopher’s Stone.
Thoughts/Review:
Granted, there’s a bit of comedy with Mei Chan and Xiao Mei hidden in each of Al’s legs as Bradley stabs Al, but how is it that Bradley missed? He seemed surprised that his blade hit nothing. Could this also be part of Mei’s abilities which go against the homunculi (such as her being able to use alchemy when Ed and Al could not)?
And speaking of that, Father’s powers are very impressive if 
he stopped the use of alchemy all over Central City. I wonder how wide-spread the loss of alchemy was. If only city-wide, that’s impressive enough because at a whim, Father can stop alchemy altogether and leave anyone trying to save themselves via alchemy from what’s to come unable to do so.
I still say that it is a arrogant mistake for the homunculi to let 
Ed, Al, and Mustang know so much and still live. As I thought, Major Armstrong returns this episode and will be Mustang’s only military ally close at hand. His team can likely still feed him info somehow from the borders and I suspect that Ed and Al will certainly work with Roy to do whatever it takes to stop the homunculi. As such, the table would appear to be set for the fall of the homunculi.
Xiao Mei can be a little scene stealer when she imitates Mei Chan. *lol* I also loved it when Dr. Knox basically took two enemies and made them behave. I suppose Mei Chan and Lan Fan will become allies in a common goal at some point.
So, another good episode. I hope we get to see Lan Fan with a automail arm soon. ^_^
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The reason that the homunculi kept Ed, Al, and Mustang alive is a very important plot point. They need them to do something very spoilery when the time comes. Suffice to say, there’s a very good reason.
Also, IIRC, the next episodes are going to be Ishbal flashbacks, if I remember the manga layout well enough. Loved reading that part in the manga and can;t wait to see it animated.
About Wrath missing Mei chan no powers involved Mei just fell down in one of Al legs and Bradly missed it was just luck
he might have missed because he didn’t use his eye… and expected the person to be big.
With big, you mean, not ‘chibi’ size like Mei, because she’s very small and Bradley was expecting someone with a little more “normal” size.
Also there’s really no need to kill Mustang and the Elric Brothers – they’re too important and while the homunculi could easily kill those who they care about, they won’t do anything too stupid. So, that’s the reason.
The main reason the sword not hitting anything surprised Bradley was because, in the manga, it was more pronounced that he had noticed Mei’s cough, while in the anime the cough was there, just he showed no visible reaction. He only stabbed Al due to believing there was someone there from a cough, nothing else, thus didn’t pursue it further.
Looking forward to next episode introducing Kimbley and how he worked at Ishbal. Unlike the first anime, his power isn’t explosions, it’s more… actually, I’m not sure if he has a specialty. Rare considering the State Alchemists we’ve seen. Oh, and Brigadier General Grand should be good to see, too.
Well, I’m looking forward to seeing where things go. ^_^
@Anon2: I’m not doubting you, because not everything the homonculi do always makes sense… but why would Bradley stab someone without knowing who it was, just because they’re in Al’s armor? :-/
I’m sure there are other times I’m just not remembering, but that would be the first time I can think of for him to act like the sin he’s supposed to be instead of being rational. I’ve gotten used to Gluttony doing stupid stuff just because he’s “hungry,” but not Bradley. Even if he is Wrath.
um kimbley power is the same he can turn anything into a bomb that is kimbley’s alchemy power for example when he atacked scar’s family he used his stone and alchemy to turn the ground beneath them in to a bomb blowing them up and puting scar in the Rockbells care. so you could say kimbley inderctly killed the rockbells
@arimarejii:Because only mustang and the elrics were supposed to be there. Also, he might have heard that they once hid someone with a key role in their plans(Rose)in Al’s armour.