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STORY: Alright, alright.... So Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood follows the original Manga more closely than it's predecessor, Fullmetal Alchemist. I'll introduce you to the so called "story". Ed and Al are brothers who lives with their mother, Trisha in a small village of Risembool. Trisha dies of a strange disease and Ed and Al try to bring her back to life by using a magic called Alchemy, in doing so Ed loses an arm and a leg and Al loses his whole body. Ed and Al set out to look for the Philosopher stone that is said to break the rules of Alchemy. There is also some military business and something about Homunculus but for the life of me I can't pay attention to it. And thus the "journey" begins. So FMA Brotherhood... I keep on reminding myself of how good the first series is. You see, where as the first FMA was a fantastic fantasy world, Brotherhood fails to pull me in or build up on any atmosphere or charm. Without atmosphere it's very hard to be sucked into the story, but that isn't to say the story is not good, the story is very good! The story has a ton of twists and turns with a lot going on but there is no charm which makes all the events just seem bland. Sure it may of not needed charm if it weren't for the fact that the story has an absurd amount of comic relief, maybe the comic relief was supposed to be charming however the comic relief is so misplace and awkward it kills any atmosphere the story was trying to build up upon. The drama is also very weak, it actually is more soap opera like than the first series, barely any of the moments manage to squeeze a single tear from my eyes. It's that weak. Moments that brought tears to my eyes in the first series are just a side note in Brotherhood. It is also worth noting that Brotherhood absolutely does not feel like an adventure but more like a series of events, so much happens in a single episode that all the episodes just seem to run together. This is alright if you are heavily into action but it really gets in the way of any heartwarming or tear jerking moments. One more thing I think I should talk about is the symbolism and Philosophy, The symbolism in Brotherhood is barely noticeable, but even if it was why should I care about it if the show doesn't even let me into it's world? If I was sucked into the world then I would care, then I would say "THIS IS BRILLIANT!" The philosophy has an entirely different problem. Brotherhood has many different themes like, "Friendship (Yu-gi-oh)", "Revenge (Naruto)" and some old Greek philosophies. This is all well and good but it's hard to take it seriously when there is some silly comic relief taking place only a few moments after "Za Meaning of Life". All in all the story does seem like it has a lot to offer but the bad pacing, comic relief and overall lack of tone and atmosphere brings it down. All it needed is some better direction. 5/10

ANIMATION: The animation is actually pretty decent, I can't tell how they did the animation however the world of Brotherhood lacks color, this is a huge problem for a fantasy title. The only time the animation looks good is when an action scene is going on, Brotherhood has some of the best looking fight scenes I have ever seen but this is also a problem because it looks like the animation gets a sudden boost in quality as soon as someone enters looking like s/he is about kick some ass. Overall the animation is mostly lack luster only saving the extravagance for the action scenes. 5/10

MUSIC: Oh god the music! OH GAWD! Don't get me wrong, some of the music is incredible but the way they use it is so wrong. Barely does the music support any scenes often using some of the most bland songs from the soundtrack to make the scenes dreadful to watch. Add that to the already bland animation and the end result comes off as dreadful. This is too bad because I've listened to the soundtrack and the songs aren't really that bad, the soundtrack could of easily made up for the bland animation but... I'm starting to wonder if the director really cared about this series. 4/10

CHARACTERS: At least the characters are decent! At least! You got Ed and Al who's relationship is downplayed from the first to make room for it's large cast members. Yes, this is a series with loads and loads of characters. Does it handle it well?.... To a certain extent, yes! All the characters get their moment to shine and they are all well developed HOWEVER one thing that makes me want to bitch slap the writers into another dimension is their over used comedy gags. How am I supposed to take their emotional side seriously if they just crack a joke right after some dark and brooding moment? How am I supposed to take the fights seriously if they just randomly go into their chibi-form right in the middle of a fight scene? They did this is the first series a lot too but it wasn't shoved in your face (well... not as much) as in Brotherhood. Overall the characters could of been very good but if it weren't for their quirky side being shoved down my throat it would've been so much better. 6/10

OVERALL: I hear so many people calling this a masterpiece but It's too flawed on so many basic levels to even be called good. It's an average anime. This is really too bad since I loved the first anime so much. Do yourself a favor and read the manga instead, don't let bad art, bad pacing and terrible music do the job for you. I give Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood a 4/10

Brotherhood also gets an award or being the most overrated anime of all time (currently the third highest rated anime on anime news network and ranked third on this site)