FMA 51 - Laws and Promises

I'm going to Chicago on Wednesday and not getting back until Sunday, so if I
stop responding to posts, don't worry about me.


Episode 51 Laws and Promises

"And Titus Livius, who has given an account of all the above troubles,
concludes by saying, 'Fortune thus blinds the minds of men when she does not
wish them to resist her power.'

"Nothing could be more true than this conclusion; and therefore men who
habitually live in great adversity or prosperity deserve less praise or less
blame. For it will generally be found that they have been brought to their
ruin or their greatness by some great occasion offered by Heaven, which
gives them the opportunity, or deprives them of the power, to conduct
themselves with courage and wisdom. It certainly is the course of Fortune,
when she wishes to effect some great result, to select for her instrument a
man of such spirit and ability that he will recognize the opportunity which
is afforded him."

Niccolo Machiavelli - Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livius

http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/machiavelli/works/discourses/ch02.htm

We start with Adult Swim's standard disclaimer about inappropriate material
for viewers under 14, and then we get a second disclaimer that reads: "Just
in case that last disclaimer wasn't enough, this episode contains extreme
violence. We would rather run this than cut the violence from the episode
because we are American cowboys." We then go to a shortened version of
"Rewrite."

After the opening, we join the action at the end of the last episode.
"Brother?" Al says, watching Envy stab Ed. Ed vomits blood, and Rose screams
his name, as he falls into a pool of his own blood. Rose is restrained by
Dante as Envy gloats, "That was too easy. Humans are so pathetic."

"Brother, no. You can't die! It's supposed to be me!"

"He's dead?" Wrath asks, still sprawled on the ground.

"That's right'" Envy replies. "He's setting the pace for every human to
follow. Now we'll kill off each one of them, until only homunculi are left!"
He cackles with laughter as Rose and Dante look on.

"Brother can't die," Al declares. " That's ridiculous! He wouldn't let that
happen... he couldn't!"

"That's reality for you," Dante replies. "All the effort he gave got him
nothing in return. You can pay all you want. It's never enough. " A
slavering Gluttony rushes toward Al in the array.

At Bradley's mansion we see two cars fleeing the scene. One holds his wife
and son, the other Lt. Hawkeye. An oncoming car veers erratically into
their path, crashing the car carrying Selim. The guards in the second car
confront Roboarcher who demands their car in order to go to Bradley's
mansion. Archer focuses on Hawkeye and shoots at her, wounding her in the
shoulder. She shoots back as the guards attempt to restrain Archer, saying
that she is to be interrogated at headquarters.

"Have you seen headquarters?" he demands. "We're in a war zone! Rebels are
everywhere! We don't have time for questioning! Let me kill her!" As Archer
shouts, Selim sneaks away.

Back at the mansion, we find Mustang in a burning room. He has three cuts in
his face, and blood stains his collar. He watches Pride emerge from the
flames, saying, "Is my species of consequence to you now?" I can't describe
the ghastly appearance of Pride here. "I haven't had the chance to test my
homunculus traits much." Pride reforms his usual appearance. "I wanted to
see what would happen if I let my whole body explode." He launches into
attack, stabbing Mustang with his sword. "You really wanted my position
badly, didn't you, Mustang? I can appreciate the vanity of ambition, but you
should have been more patient about it. Even if this had somehow worked, the
council would have found you out, and they'd never let an assassin back into
the fold."

"I didn't do this for politics," Mustang replies, pinned to the wall by
Pride's sword. "I couldn't forgive myself for being blind this long. This
was the only way I could atone for the friends I didn't save."

"Well, then by all means, let me help you with that," Bradley says, his
benign voice contrasting with his diabolical expression. "Give my best
regards to General Hughes. " He grinds the sword into Mustang's flesh, and
Roy screams.

"What's going on?" asks Selim, entering.

His hand still on the sword, Bradley turns to say, in a peculiarly
avuncular tone, "Hello, son. Good news. I've caught the rat!"

Selim sighs with relief. "I'm sorry I disobeyed you, father, but I just had
to come back! I forgot something." Selim reaches into his satchel. "And I
wanted to make sure that you were okay."

Bradley walks over to the boy, smiling benignly, and puts his hand on the
smiling boy's shoulders.

"So what now?" rasps Mustang. "You said people are foolish, so how do you
explain loving him?" Mustang stops, realizing that Bradley is in distress.

"Father, what's the matter?" Selim asks. "You look like you're hurt. What's
wrong?"

"What have you done?" Bradley growls. "You idiot!"

"I just got it from your safe. You said your life depended on it." Selim
pulls a cloth-wrapped object from his satchel, "and I didn't want it to get
hurt in the fire!" The poor kid thinks he's done a good thing for his father
to be proud of, but the hands on his shoulders clamp around his neck.
"Stop!" the boy gasps as Bradley chokes him.

Appalled, Mustang struggles to remove the sword. Bradley snaps the child's
neck and tosses him aside, as he says, "You are foolish. All of you! Even my
own son!"

Mustang kneels beside the boy's body, as though to check for life. He pulls
the skull from its wrappings and holds it out. Pride sweats. Mustang stands.
He draws an array in blood on the back of the hand that holds the skull. "I
don't know how long you've lived, Fuhrer, or how many times you've cheated
death, but not any more." Roy activates the array, and Pride bursts into
flames. "It's the end of the line."

Back in the opera house, Gluttony chomps on Al. We hear a strange sound.
"That sound," says Dante. "What did he just do?"

"He used alchemy with the stone," Envy says.

Al pulls himself up, the array glowing red on his body. "You petulant boy!"
Dante scolds him. "look at the damage you've inflicted on yourself." She
gives the baby back to Rose. "Sit down before you're wasted completely!"

"Stay back!" Al yells at her. "You can't make me do anything." He walks
over to Ed's body.

"And what do you think you can pull off?" she asks him.

"Brother hasn't been dead for long. Look, there's still some color in his
face. His soul is probably still at the gate. I just have to pull it back,
the same way he did for me. "

"Don't be a fool. You know what would happen to you!"

"Yeah! I do! A lot of people died to make this stone. I would have died
too, if not for them. And it's time I gave my share. And made my own choice.
"

"Alphonse," Rose whispers.

"Goodbye, Rose," Al says. Angered, Envy leaps at Al and Ed, as Al claps his
hands. "This is for you, brother." The blue glow catches Envy in the
transmutation. Huge red arrays appear around them. "I'll miss you," Al says
at last.

Back at the mansion, a blood-soaked Mustang stares at a red pool on the
floor. He sends another flame into the pool and then tosses the skull into
the fire. It disintegrates into sand. He looks over at Selim. A moment
later, he walks out into the porch carrying the boy as Archer approaches and
prepares to shoot. A wounded Hawkeye follows, shooting at Archer. She finds
Mustang and the boy lying on the ground.

"General? General? Damn it, Roy Mustang, talk to me!" She weeps over his
body.

We find Ed in a golden space. "Al," he says, as his brother flashes in and
out of sight. Then Envy appears in the space.

"What? What's going on? Where am I, you worm!" Envy cries out.

"The gate," Ed says softly, remotely.

Envy turns to see the gate they stand before. "So what's on the other side
of it?"

"I don't know." Ed is fuzzy while Envy is in sharp focus. "For me, it was a
place called London, if I remember right. That's what my old man said."

"Old man? You mean Hohenheim of Light?"

"Yes." The word is just a breath.

"You're telling me he's still alive?" Envy walks up to the gate and tries
to pull it open.

"I wouldn't do that," Ed says. "There's no way to know where it will lead
for you."

"Like hell there isn't!" Envy says as he opens the gate. "I'll tell it
exactly where to take me!" The eyes are waiting for him. "I've come to kill
him. Take me to Hohenheim of Light!" The black arms pull Envy in, and the
gathering begin to gnaw at him. "Stop messing with me!" he yells at them.
"You'll do as I tell you!" He transforms into Ed and then to his own
original form. "You're taking me to see Hohenheim! To that ***! To my
father!" Envy's form disappears into a bright light as a green dragon whips
through the scene and seems to follow him into the light. (There has been
some speculation on the adult swim board that Envy turns into the dragon,
but my pause-advance viewing leads me to disagree. I suspect instead that
the dragon is somehow in charge of the gate.)

The gate shuts, leaving Ed still waiting. The shot moves to a medium
close-up, and we see tears running down his face. "Al?" he says. And then he
fades out of the golden space.

Fade to black and then eyes open to see Rose. "Edward, can you hear me?"

I can't quite describe Ed's expression as he looks up at her. He looks
puzzled and a little detached. "Yeah," he says, "but what am I crying for?"
He brushes his hand over his eyes. "Al," he says as he looks at his right
hand. He sits up, still staring at his hand.

"He used alchemy to bring you back, Ed, after you died."

He turns and looks at her. "The philosopher's stone. He used it to fix my
body and pull my soul from the gate. But then what happened to him?" She
looks down. "Don't tell me. Don't tell me he's gone, Rose." He stands,
looking around and calling his brother's name. Rose's baby begins to cry. Ed
eyes the baby.

Dante is in the elevator. "Damn that child," she says, pulling on her bodice
to check the rot. "How could he squander the stone like that, with my body
in such terrible condition? I'll have to send Pride down there to teach
those boys a lesson." The elevator stops, and the floor opens and Gluttony
chomps at it. "Damn it, Gluttony," she says. "What are you doing here? I
don't have time for this!" Gluttony pulls himself up. "You don't understand
me, do you? Just hold on. We'll find you something to eat soon, okay?" He
lunges forward as she claps her hands. When the elevator arrives in
Bradley's office and the door opens, it is empty.

We see Ed standing shirtless in the center of the philosopher's stone array.
Other arrays are drawn in red on his forehead, chest and forearms.

He flashes back to Rose before she left. "You'd better get moving, " he said
to Rose. "I hate to ask this, but could you take him [Wrath] to the surface,
too?"

"What about you?" she asked.

"I'll destroy this place, down to the last plank, so no one ever gets the
idea to create a philosopher's stone this way again."

"Very well," she replied. I'm sure whatever happens, you'll find your way
out. You've got strong legs. You'll get up and use them, won't you, Edward?"

He looked at her and then chuckled.

As he contemplates the array, Ed says, "If what my dad said about the gate
is true, Al's old body and mind should still be there, and now his soul is
there too. Maybe life has no equal trade. Maybe you can give up all you've
got and get nothing back, but still... even if I can't prove it's true, I
have to try... for your sake... Al." He claps his hands and then touches the
array on his chest as all four glow blue. The array on the floor activates
as well. And we go to break.

Having broken the law of equivalent exchange, after the break, the
producers break the fundamental law of narrative: "Show. Don't tell." We
should have had at least one episode to show happening all the things
Sciezka describes in her letter. The general who had been Mustang's
commanding officer is now in charge, and Mustang's soldiers have been
reinstated. Control of the country is now in civilian hands. I don't see any
sign of Hakuro. Apparently, the fuehrer's fall has led the neighboring
states to see some opportunities, so a strong military is still needed. The
Ishballans have their region back, and even exiles may go home. Roy is still
recovering, and apparently in losing an eye to Archer, he is finally able to
see the love that has been at his side the whole time.

Al is in Resembool with the Rockbells, back in the body of a ten-year-old
boy, unable to remember anything since he lost his body. Also in Resembool
are Rose and her child. No one knows what has become of Ed. They are visited
by the Curtis family

"I still can't get my head around all this," Pinako says to Izumi. "Do you
think Edward's really gone for good?"

"There's no way to know what Ed paid to make this happen," Izumi replies.
"A life for a life has never been enough. It's possible he traded with
experience, that the value of the memories they shared together these four
years became payment for getting Al back as he is."

"Lately, he can't last an hour without sticking his nose in an alchemy
book. It's like the old days. It comforts him, I think. Reminds him of Ed.
Meanwhile, that boy Wrath got some help." Izumi reacts as Pinako explains
that she and Winry fit him with automail, after which he wandered away.

At sunset, Al visits his mother's grave. Over dinner he asks to train with
Izumi again. "May I, teacher? Please! We learned so much from you the first
time. I want to know more alchemy and more on equivalent exchange, so that
one day soon, I can be with brother again." Everyone at the table is silent
in the face of his determination. "I have no idea how to make that work, but
if I study hard enough, I will find a way to bring him back. I can't explain
it. I just know. Will you let me?"

Izumi sighs. "Can't say no to that face."

As they are leaving on the train to return to Dublith, Winry. Rose and
Pinako are there to see them off. "Now, Al," Winry says, "I want you to
promise me something. I'll study too... to be the best mechanic I can be,
however that may help down the road. So in exchange, you have to promise me,
okay? Promise you'll come home safely so I can help you."

"You got a deal. I'll find a way to bring brother back, and then we'll all
be a perfect team." Al, I don't think you understood what she was saying
there; at least judging by her expression, he didn't.

We move now to a dark room in which men chant in Latin and German.
"Brothers, let's adjourn for the day," declares a hooded man. Outside the
men are leaving the place. We hear one say in a German accent, "I want to
thank you for sharing your time with us, Professor Hohenheim."

"You really believe that knowledge can come from this sorcery?"

"The Thule Society knows certain truths about the Aryan race. We come from
an island long forgotten by the modern world. Communicating with the
Ancients will teach us what we've lost and help us fulfill our destiny. We
are counting on your continued help, professor."

Perhaps, but the expression in Professor Hohenheim's eyes is skeptical and
calculating before he assumes an ingratiating smile; saying, "Not to worry.
As you know, I'm a hunter of lost knowledge myself, Professor Haushofer. "

Later, we see Hohenheim buying fruit and complaining about inflation. The
camera tilts to the sky, and we see a title card that reads Munich 1921. The
shot fades to black, and we rejoin Hohenheim as he comes home to find Edward
packing a suitcase. He uses his left hand; his right arm hangs from his
shoulder.

"Planning a trip, Edward?"

Ed shows his father a paper on rocketry by Robert Hutchins Goddard. "He's
an American, but there's another guy studying the same thing in Transylvania
right now."

"Wouldn't happen to be named Dracula, would he?" Hohenheim has clearly been
reading extensively since his arrival.

Ed doesn't notice (or know) the joke. "Nah, it's Hermann Oberth. He's been
a student here in Munich. I'm gonna see him."

"You mind telling me why?"

"He thinks he can get to outer space in a rocket. No one knows exactly
what's up there, beyond the atmosphere. Maybe it's like the gate, a portal
between different worlds."

"Haven't you studied Einstein's theories?"

"No one believes him," Ed says dismissively.

"If you can't use alchemy, you'll go by machines. Is that the plan, son?"

"I know that my alchemy did something. I saw Al put back together at the
gate; and I thought that was it for me. But then I woke up here, and until I
understand why, I have to keep working."

"You knew the only way to keep your body and mind was to come to this side,
so you did it without thinking. Subconsciously, as Freud would say." Not
only has Hohenheim been reading, but he's been keeping up with all the
latest big thinkers.

"Still, what Al returned to me, I lost again." He looks down at his
artificial arm. "I should have found a better method."

"But nothing is ever perfect," Hohenheim smiles. "Haven't you realized that
yet? Earth turns on a tilted axis, just doing the best it can."

As Ed leaves, Hohenheim runs to the door after him. "It's wrong," Ed says.
"I thought I had made an equal exchange. My body, mind and soul for his. Yet
here I am, still alive. So does that mean Dante was right, except to the
opposite extreme, and I got something for nothing? Or does it mean that in
reality, Al wasn't "

"You boys had a long journey together. All the people you helped along the
way, all the hardships, the pain of losing friends you loved, the
determination, sweat and blood. Don't you think that may have been the price
you paid?"

Ed looks at his father and smiles before turning, ponytail swinging, to go.
Next, we see him in the train. Apparently he does have some use of his arm
as he holds the paper. He probably lacks fine control over his fingers. We
hear his thoughts: "I don't know how to get back to you. This world's a
strange place." We see that he studies the rocket diagram. "But one thing's
for sure, I will find a way. We'll be together soon, Al."

We see the photograph of the boys with their fish, and we hear Al's voice:
"Humankind cannot gain anything without first giving something in return. To
obtain, something of equal value must be lost. That is alchemy's first law
of equivalent exchange." We find Al sitting on the train beside Izumi. "In
those days, we really believed that to be the worlds one, and only, truth.
But the world isn't perfect." We see the burnt-out Elric home. "And the law
is incomplete." We see Tucker and Nina, as Tucker scrawls circles on the
factory wall. "Equivalent exchange doesn't encompass everything that goes on
here." The Ishballan survivors rebuild, and then we see Hawkeye and Mustang
shopping, him walking with a cane. "But I still choose to believe in its
principle. That all things do come at a price." Wrath sleeps beneath a tree,
surrounded by junk and milk can. "That there's an ebb and a flow." Gracia
and Elysia Hughes and Sciezka visit Maes Hughes's grave. "A cycle." Rose
plays with her son as Pinako looks on. "That the pain we went through did
have a reward." The Tringham brothers experiment with plants. "And that
anyone who is determined and perseveres will get something of value in
return, even if it's not what they expected." We see Winry working with
Dominic, and Breda practicing body-building with Armstrong as other soldiers
applaud. "I don't think of equivalent exchange as a law of the world
anymore." Al looks out the window with a determined expression. "I think of
it as a promise between my brother and me."

Al reaches out his hand. Somewhere else, on a train, Ed does the same. "A
promise that someday we'll see each other again." The shots cut back and
forth between the hands reaching for the sky. We end on Ed's determined
expression and an automail hand forming a fist.

Next episode: Conqueror of Shambala (Can that somehow be a reference to
Shangri-la?)


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