Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood - Episode 5

After the shocking events of the last episode, Edward Elric is still trying to come to terms with what he's seen and experienced, issues made all the more pertinent given his own history and his attempt to resurrect his mother.

However, the brothers have little time for reflection, as before they know it they're set upon by Scar, and after they run out of places to escape to they're left with no choice but to stand up and fight. This particular battle nearly costs them both dearly, and leaves Ed and Al both in serious need of repair, as they find themselves saved only via an intervention by Roy Mustang and a host of other State Alchemists after the former realises that the Fullmetal Alchemist would be an obvious target for Scar. Despite their best efforts however, Scar escapes, although not before his origins (and thus his reason for attacking State Alchemists) are realised by those present.


Meanwhile, and elsewhere, Father Cornello is up to his old tricks once again... At least, it looks like he is, but of course we already know that he was killed a couple of episodes back. Instead what we're left with is some kind of Homunculus plot which leads to violence and riots in a city.

While the end of the last episode was perhaps the first real sign of divergence from the original anime series with the death of Shou Tucker, this instalment is really all about balls to the walls action, and as a result the episode seemed to verily fly by at great speed. After the dark and foreboding character of episode four, it was actually good to see this change of pace to something more adrenaline-fuelled (although a fair amount of that darkness remains), and I found myself thoroughly enjoying the well animated and coreographed fighting which punctuated this episode. It still remains too early to say whether this remake will do enough to differentiate itself from the original series, but I'm beginning to worry about that less as the enjoyment factor of watching Brotherhood has notably ramped up over the past couple of episodes.