Why “Fullmetal Alchemist 2003” is NOT Better Than the Manga

As far as I am aware, there have been three adaptations of the manga Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa: an anime in 2003 that had little in common with the manga, another anime in 2009 that adapted it quite faithfully, and a live-action movie in 2017 that we shall not speak of.

In spite of the 2009 anime sticking far closer to the source material, the 2003 anime had already gained a throng of fans who didn’t want an anime that stuck to the manga.  They wanted their beloved anime, nazi portals and all.

This has led to a surprising number of blogs arguing frantically that the 2003 anime is superior.  It has also led to an altogether unsurprising number of arguments on forums.

In either case, and regardless of which is the better standalone story, there is an annoying bit of rhetoric that it’s hard not to notice in the arguments of damn near every fan the 2003 anime has.

I’ve mentioned this in a previous article, but it bears repeating: if you are talking with someone and tell them that a particular movie is way better than the book, they might not take you seriously.  But if you tell them that a particular remake is terrible compared to the original, you’ll likely strike a chord with many people.

How many times have we seen classic movies remade as modern catastrophes?  It is understood that the original, whether a book or an earlier movie, is likely to be better than an adaptation or remake.  If you tell them something that feels more in line with that idea, they’re more likely to trust your statement.

I’ve already written a whole article on why the 2003 anime should not be called “the original,” so let’s move on.  In today’s article, I will attempt to explain why I disagree with many of the more structured (and a few less so) arguments people have made in the 2003 anime’s favour.  Welcome to yet another article on why Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 is not better than the manga!

Acknowledgements

I will begin by saying that this is not an article about why the manga is better.  That article’s coming; don’t worry.  This one, however, is intended to dispute and hopefully refute things that the 2003 anime’s fans have said.  It is intended to expose all the flaws in these claims.  This is not to say that none of their arguments have merit, and I will mention some that are valid.

I must say too that Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 is not a bad show—far from it.  I didn’t particularly like it, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t many good things about it.  Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 does have some really interesting ideas and even some great scenes of its own.

The Shou Tucker Incident

It has been argued even by fans of the manga that Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 handled the Shou Tucker Incident better, and I can definitely see the logic behind that.  In the manga, this part of the story takes place within a single chapter, whereas the 2003 adaptation stretches it out to two episodes.

The first anime does this by having the Shou Tucker Incident take place at the same time as the alchemy exam, and Shou’s daughter Nina is present for all of this.  Despite the 2003 anime devoting more time to Nina Tucker, they also made it too obvious what her father was going to do.  As for Nina, if anything I was more invested in her character in the manga.

“Lust Is More Developed”

I can definitely see how Lust’s character was more developed in the 2003 anime, merely because she was a more important character than she was in the original.

Compared with the sadist of the manga, the character in the 2003 anime is somewhat more—for lack of a better word—human.  However, this does not excuse the numerous characters whom the 2003 anime made less interesting.

“Sloth Is a Better Character”

I will concede that the manga’s version of Sloth isn’t interesting, although I’m not sure he needed to be.  His entire purpose was to be a strong, fast, and mildly amusing enemy for the heroes to defeat.  He served his purpose, and he served it well, but he was easily outshone by all the other characters in the story.

Considering the role Sloth played in the 2003 anime, she had to be a lot more interesting than manga Sloth, and she was.  I don’t quite understand what the connection was between Trisha Elric and the sin of laziness (if any), and I suspect that the writers only chose that one for her because all the other sins were taken.

Comparison

All the same, there’s really no comparing a merely-serviceable minor adversary with a fully-fledged character who’s central to the story.

Sloth in the 2003 anime is a better character than Sloth in the manga in the same way as Pride in the manga is better than Selim Bradley was in the 2003 anime.

Sloth is a more extreme example of what I talked about with Lust, and I must reiterate that Sloth being an actual character in this show doesn’t make up for many of the other characters being simplified.

Is manga Sloth even worth comparing to 2003 Sloth? Perhaps it would be more worth comparing him to the 2003 character Dietlinde Eckhart, as the latter fills a more similar niche.  They’re both just obstacles for the protagonists to overcome, and there’s little more to them.

In fact I would say that Eckhart, being the final villain of the series, had some obligation to be more interesting than the Sloth of the manga was, but she wasn’t.  This does bring up an interesting question: how does what a throw-away grunt means to a story relate to what a real character means to another story?  Can the two really be compared?

Roles

It is often futile to compare a character in the 2003 adaptation to its namesake from the manga, as they all-too-often fill utterly different roles in the story.  Sheska, the librarian with an eidetic memory, is upgraded to the status of a main character in the 2003 anime.

The manga’s character Greed is a major character in the story, whereas the 2003 anime relegates him to a more minor role; of course he’s going to be a more interesting character in the manga.  That is perhaps less extreme than some characters.

The 2003 version of Selim Bradley, for example, fills a role more similar to that of Nina Tucker.  In the manga his role in the story was completely different.

It is therefore difficult to compare the two as characters; in a contest of which one’s more interesting, Pride will inevitably come out on top.

If you’re going to suggest that 2003 Sloth being more interesting than manga Sloth is a reason for the 2003 anime being better, then you may as well assert that Rey being more interesting than second-stormtrooper-to-the-left makes The Force Awakens better than The Empire Strikes Back.

“The Homunculi Have More Interesting Backstories”

I would disagree, as I find the concept of the homunculi being the physical embodiments of Our Father’s personality traits to be infinitely more interesting than the rather simple idea of resurrected humans.

It also struck me that the 2003 anime offered no explanation as to why the homunculi embodied the seven deadly sins.  It’s implied that there have always been homunculi to embody the sins, as it’s stated that it’s been a long time since there were all seven of them.

However, when you consider that the 2003 homunculi are the products of mere accidents, this raises a question: why have there never been more than seven of them?  Also, what happens if there are, seeing as they have to embody the seven deadly sins?  This idea is never explored.

The 2003 anime also goes so far as to have Envy imply that there were other versions of the sin-embodying homunculi before them.  This is never explored nor explained.  I was left confused as to what the homunculi had to do with the seven deadly sins in the 2003 anime, except that they represented them in the manga so they had to here, too.

In the Manga…

Needless to say, the manga explains why the homunculi embody the seven deadly sins, and it makes perfect sense!  The homunculi were aspects of Our Father given physical bodies so they could serve him while leaving him as a “perfect being.”

The side-effect of this was that Father lost almost his entire personality, becoming void of his former charm.  We see Father when he’s reabsorbed Greed, and having even one of his sins makes his personality quite vibrant, but once he again expels his Greed by injecting it into Ling Yao, Our Father once again becomes an uncharismatic shell.

We experience Father’s personality through the homunculi, with Greed masking his desire for friendship with a desire for power and Envy masking his desire to be human with his trademark cruelty.

To make things even more interesting, there’s the fact that homunculi in the manga are living philosopher’s stones injected into bodies, whether it’s a body that Our Father created or that of a living human.  Envy, for example, is a giant green monster with the ability to take the form of any person or animal it wants.

Wrath is a philosopher’s stone consisting of a single soul inside what was once the body of Prospective Führer Number 12.  Greed, on the other hand, consists of many souls and is injected into a Xingese prince, leading to both Greed and Ling sharing the same body and eventually forming a friendship.

“Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 Has Better Music”

Although this doesn’t really pertain to the manga, I thought I’d bring it up.  Many fans of the 2003 anime have said that its music is just a bit better than the music from Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood.

Obviously this is subjective, but I thought I’d say my piece all the same.  When it comes to the opening sequences, I would say that Brotherhood wins hands-down.

Below I have written down a summary of my thoughts on each of the theme songs from both shows, beginning with the 2003 anime.

2003 Anime

“Melissa” by Porno Graffiti

Melissa’s okay; it’s memorable.  I’d recognize it quickly.

“Ready Steady Go” by L’Arc-en-Ciel

Awful.  Ready Steady Go sounds like it was written by a robot.  Annoying.

“Undo” by Cool Joke

It’s okay.  Undo is your typical anime theme song.

“Rewrite” by Asian Kung-Fu Generation

Rewrite is by far the best of the 2003 themes.  Sounds kind of like Green Day only good.  Distinctive nasally voice.

2009 Anime (Brotherhood)

“Again” by YUI

Best anime theme song ever! Hell, probably the best theme song ever!  Just plain awesome!  I love everything about Again.  Every moment of this song is utterly captivating.

“Hologram” by Nico Touches the Walls

Hologram is pretty good.  It’s memorable.

“Golden Time Lover” by Sukima Switch

Golden Time Lover is also quite good.  It’s certainly memorable.

“Period” by CHEMISTRY

Period is excellent.  The opening riff is, to me, the main theme of the show—perhaps even more than Akira Senju’s main theme.  It’s insanely memorable and constantly stuck in my head.

“Rain” by SID

Rain is a bit soft and doesn’t have much of a hook, and it found me constantly wishing I were listening to the far superior Beatles song of the same name.  Not particularly good but not bad either.

The Openings Compared

Keep in mind that I’m not taking into account the visuals of the openings; rather, I decided to focus on my subjective opinions concerning the songs.  Overall, I think the songs in Brotherhood tend towards being better than the ones in the 2003 anime.

Even if we ignore Period and Again, Brotherhood’s themes include two good songs and a mediocre one.  The 2003 anime’s theme songs, by contrast, include one good song, two mediocre songs, and one terrible one.

When you add Brotherhood’s two freaking awesome theme songs back into the equation, things really start to shift more in its favour.

Again is, in my opinion, the best anime theme song I’ve ever heard. Period isn’t quite as mind-blowing as Again, but it has one of the catchiest choruses ever.

Of all Fullmetal Alchemist 2003’s theme songs, only Rewrite could compete with even Hologram or Golden Time Lover, and none of those come anywhere near the level of Again or Period!

Orchestral Music

I feel that the thematic music in Brotherhood fits the tone of the show better while also being more memorable.  The orchestral music to the 2003 anime is great; the main theme (called “Bratja”) has a wonderfully Medieval feel, which I always love.  But for some reason, no matter how many times I listen to the piece, I can’t remember a bar of it.

Every time I try, all that plays in my head is the theme from Brotherhood, and every time I listen to the 2003 theme I forget it almost immediately.  When I try really, really hard to remember the Medieval feel of Bratja, the closest I can come up with is the theme from Brother Cadfael.

If you’re the opposite, I completely understand, as even for me this one was a close call.  This one’s completely subjective, but I prefer the music from Brotherhood.

“Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 Is More Mature”

This idea usually comes from the fact that the 2003 anime has a rather contrived bittersweet ending where Edward and Alphonse become trapped forever in our world.  When comparing this to the manga’s ending, 2003 fans often cite that their anime ends with Edward and Winry being forever torn apart.

I would argue this carries far less weight there than it would have had something similar happened in the manga, as Ed and Winry were never romantic interests of one-another in the 2003 anime.  Rather, it is more appropriate to refer to Edward being separated from Rosé, his love interest in the 2003 anime, despite that he presumably ends up with her doppelgänger Noah anyway.

Bittersweet Endings

A bittersweet ending does not, on its own, make a work more mature.  A good ending is one that fits the tone of the story and thus doesn’t feel out-of-place.

Throwing in a portal to our world certainly felt out-of-place, but did having a bittersweet ending fit the tone of the 2003 anime?  Kind of.  Despite being contrived, it did match the insanity of the 2003 anime’s second half quite nicely.

It’s hard to make a comparison, as I was never as invested in the 2003 anime’s characters as I was in the manga’s.  However, contrivance aside, the mere state of having a bittersweet ending wasn’t a problem in the 2003 anime.

It certainly wasn’t more fitting than the manga’s ending was for its story—in fact, I would argue the opposite.  I would argue that the manga’s ending, regardless of being happy or not, was in line with the themes of the manga’s story.

“Maturity”

Now, what about Edward suddenly having to leave “Shamballa” forever in order to close the gate from the other side?  From my perspective, it’s a wondrously clichéd diabolos ex machina!  Being less happy doesn’t automatically make it more mature.

For an example I think is illustrative here, my favourite novel The Lord of the Rings has an absolutely brilliant ending.

Merely because one story benefits from a less happy ending says nothing about what ending a completely different story would need.  I rather suspect that the aversion some people feel to happy endings stems from stories like Harry Potter, whose putrid and saccharine ending is embarrassing, to put it nicely.

An ending that doesn’t work for its story is bad whether the ending the story needed was happy, bittersweet, or tragic.  Granted, writers giving their stories dark endings when the story needed a happy ending is less common than the reverse, but it’s no less bad when it does happen.

Different Stories, Different Needs

All of that is kind of beside the point, though, because this “mature = bittersweet” argument usually rests on the unstated premise that Fullmetal Alchemist is rhetorically interchangeable with the 2003 anime.  The idea is that the two are in some way the same story, and therefore both must require the same sort of ending.

But put very simply… No!  There’s no meaningful connection between them.  The plot of the 2003 anime bears no resemblance to Fullmetal Alchemist.  Most characters diverge considerably, often fulfilling completely different roles.  The 2003 anime expresses different ideas from those of the manga.  Even the metaphysics of the world differ greatly from one work to the other.

Once again, I personally don’t think much of the 2003 anime’s ending, and I didn’t care for the 2003 anime in general.  But there’s nothing wrong with preferring the 2003 anime if it resonates more with you than the manga does.

Whether or not the 2003 anime’s ending works for its own story, the manga Fullmetal Alchemist has an ending that works beautifully for the story it concludes.  It is the ending the manga’s story needed, and whether it would work for the unrelated story of the 2003 anime couldn’t be less relevant.

Saying that a bittersweet—or even downright tragic—ending on its own makes a work more mature conjures images of a small child making a story with its toys and then ending the story by saying, “and they all fell off a cliff.  The end!” because they think it’s deep.

The Lorax Argument

As for the comparison fans of the 2003 anime all too often make between the manga and the deplorable Illumination Lorax movie, it’s a really bad comparison.  First of all, the Lorax movie was based on a book, and that book had an ambiguous ending for a reason.

Dr. Seuss didn’t write it that way because he wanted his story to seem more mature; he wrote it that way to send a particular message.  The Illumination movie threw away that message and betrayed the source material—just as the 2003 anime was a departure from the source material, if I may be blunt.

If the Illumination movie had ended with the truffula seed being crushed, dooming the environment forever, then that would still have been a betrayal of the source material.  The book’s message was that we need to act before it’s too late, that the world’s fate is uncertain; having the message be that we’re all doomed isn’t that different from sending the message that things will all just fix themselves.

“Fullmetal Alchemist  2003 Is Better-Paced”

At best the idea that the 2003 anime was better paced is highly debatable.  Both adaptations had issues with this in the beginning few episodes, and I will admit that the beginning of the 2009 anime had its share of pacing problems.  The worst part has got to be that Brotherhood began with a filler episode.

However, the first episode of Brotherhood was one of only two filler episodes.  By my estimate—and the exact number depends on what you define as filler—the 2003 anime has somewhere between seven and twenty-eight filler episodes, with most others having significant amounts of filler mixed in.

For argument’s sake, let’s assume the number is around ten (a conservative estimate: seven episodes of pure filler with three more to account for filler distributed among others; not counting anything contributing significantly to the anime’s plot).

That’s five times as much filler, amounting to approximately 16.4% of the show.  If you define filler as being anything that wasn’t in the manga (as many do), then it’s much closer to 46%.  Compare either to the measly 3% of filler in the 2009 anime.

“Wrath Is a Better Villain”

First of all, let’s not confuse any of this with Bradley’s mildly interesting 2003 doppelgänger Fritz Lang.  Got that?  Good.

It is perhaps more appropriate to compare 2003 Wrath to Pride, as both take the form of children.  In the 2003 anime the Führer himself is Pride.  The character of Wrath in the manga can therefore be most easily compared to 2003’s Pride.  Confused yet?  Get used to it!

The manga’s Wrath (Führer Bradley) is a great villain.  He was raised in secret with no name other than “Prospective Führer Number 12” before being injected with a philosopher’s stone and becoming Wrath.  He’s lived his entire life making virtually no decisions of his own, and so he cherishes the one thing he did choose for himself: his wife the First Lady.

Wrath has become so bored with following Our Father’s orders that he comes to secretly enjoy the master plan being hindered, although unlike Greed he never defies his Father.  On top of that, his charisma makes him a joy to read about (or watch in the 2009 anime).  In the 2003 anime Pride’s just a Hitler stand-in who gets replaced by Dietlinde Eckhart, the worst villain in the series.

“Brotherhood Doesn’t Stay True to the Original Anime”

Possibly the most ludicrous of assertions is this: that “Brotherhood doesn’t stay true to the original anime.”  It is perhaps best summed up in this quote from an article criticizing the 2009 anime:

“Brotherhood ignores a complex ending that challenged the viewer in favour of a happy ending that sweeps all negativity under the rug so its audience can come away from it in a better mood.”

The first and most important problem with this is that an adaptation is not obligated to stay true to an earlier adaptation that didn’t stay true to the source material!

I’ve heard similar criticisms levelled against Peter Jackson’s adaptation of The Hobbit, with people saying it betrays the ’70s cartoon—never mind the book both of them are based on.

Likewise, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is based on the manga, not the first anime.  It may also be worth noting that the ending with the bloody nazis was neither complex nor challenging; it was stupid and confusing.

It was also rather heavy-handed with its “Look!  Look!  Isn’t Shamballa just like Nazi Germany?” motif, which I feel treated its audience almost like bleeding idiots who couldn’t see the similarities between two genocides.  It’s as though they thought calling the president of Amestris “Führer” wasn’t enough for people to make the connection.

My biggest issue with the fans of the 2003 anime is that they tend to characterize Brotherhood as a retelling that missed the point of the original, as opposed to an adaptation that strived to follow its source material more closely than its predecessor did.  I don’t care which one you prefer; that kind of rhetoric is dishonest.

How to Fix Fullmetal Alchemist 2003

Even ignoring the manga’s existence altogether, it would still have been possible to make at least a decent stand-alone show out of Fullmetal Alchemist 2003.  Having said much about why I don’t particularly like Fullmetal Alchemist 2003, I’d like to talk briefly about how I would go about improving this anime.

The changes I will discuss in this section wouldn’t have made it as good as the manga, yet I think they would have resulted in a better stand-alone show.  Accordingly, I’m not going to suggest here that the 2003 anime should have followed the manga more closely; rather, I’m going to assume here that the manga doesn’t exist.

Get Rid of the Nazis!

My main suggestion for fixing the 2003 anime’s ending is rather simple, actually: dispense with the portal to our world entirely.  Throwing our world and Nazis into the story just turns the whole thing into a farce.

It just doesn’t fit with the story so far, and it feels like the writers just went with the most insane twist they could think of.

Just make it so the Gate of Truth doesn’t lead to our world; it’s that simple.  But what then happens to Edward when he resurrects his brother?  Easy!  When Edward sacrifices his life to resurrect Alphonse, just have him die and be done with it.

Really—when Edward survives by going to our world, it kind of cheapens his sacrifice; I’m not so worried about what he sacrifices as I am that he sacrifices whatever it is.

Aside from that, don’t wipe Alphonse’s memories after he’s brought back; that part served no purpose in the anime anyway, and it only wound up depriving Al of his character development.  End the 2003 anime with Edward giving up his own life so that Alphonse can live.

Had they done something like what I have outlined here, I would have some respect for the 2003 anime.  Sure, I’d still prefer the manga, but I’d at least understand better where some people are coming from when they say that the 2003 anime was better.

Conclusion

I think I’ve just explained why I prefer the manga, but you know what?  It’s completely fine if you happen to like Fullmetal Alchemist 2003 better than the manga.  I’m sure if I thought about it I could think of adaptations I prefer to their source material.

Feeling more drawn to a particular story doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you.  Just make sure you’re honest about it—that you prefer the adaptation to the original.  Don’t compare the 2003 anime to the 2009 anime when what you really don’t like is the manga.

Don’t try to characterize Brotherhood as a remake or as anything else that would be obligated to follow the plot of the unfaithful adaptation you like.  And please don’t feel like there’s anything wrong with saying openly that you don’t like the original.

For those who prefer the manga as I do, tell me if I’ve missed anything.  I’d love to hear what you thought of the 2003 anime if you’ve seen it.  And for those who prefer the 2003 anime, do you have any better arguments in your show’s favour?  I’d love to hear those too.

I had originally expected to write only three articles about Fullmetal Alchemist.  Now I’ve written six, with a seventh coming quite soon.  As for that one, it will be a list of the top ten reasons I think the manga is better than either anime.  See you then.