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oh snap snap spark spark

@riza-squawkeye

it's time to light up the diggy diggy dark
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reblogged
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mahoushojoe

ok, unfollowing now. was a big fan of his automail arm, didn't know he committed alchemy's greatest taboo

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azdoine

do you ever think about how FMA writes Nina Tucker off as an unsalvageable ruin who is better off mercy killed but then you meet Greed's crew and Kimblee's bodyguards and it turns out that the military can just produce perfect human chimerae whenever it feels like it. the military has chimera alchemy down to a science. they could have called up a Doctor Moreau or whoever and had him fix Nina and turn her into a cute kemonomimi if he wasn't too busy being a state secret and producing shapeshifting supersoldiers for the brass to jack off to

when you first meet Greed's crew it seems super weird that Shou Tucker was even getting research grants because his work was objectively CRAP. he wasn't just committing crimes against humanity, he was being MEDIOCRE. but then you learn more about the fascist state he lived in and everything that happened to Tucker's family takes on a whole new layer of horror.

because there's no innovation left to be done! Father knows just about everything there is to know about alchemy. he came directly out of the Gate of Truth and was a part of the All-In-One. the military has been learning at his feet and running experiments at his behest for decades, to the point that they can manufacture armies of alchemically produced supersoldiers and keep human transmutation experts on retainer. there are no more boundaries left in reach of bureaucrats to push. the only mysteries that remain are theosophies better suited to the contemplation of lone archwizards than the nationalized arsenals of warhawks and policy wonks.

reading between the lines, the only way to square Shou Tucker's "groundbreaking innovations" with the state of the alchemical art as we see it in later chapters is to admit that the State Alchemist system is a naked, repugnant farce. a system which pushes public-facing researchers like Tucker to constantly make innovations or else lose their grant money and military privileges doesn't exist to elicit progress, because there is no progress those scientists can possibly make. not on the periphery of the military-industrial complex as they are.

instead, the State Alchemist system exists to take very smart people who are too clever for their own good and make them desperate. the seemingly degenerate outcome where an alchemist pushes limits in the hopes of rushing under the wire and meeting a deadline is actually the system working as intended, because Father wants to take useless pawns - lone wolves with no meaningful skill in the scheme of things - and trick them into making useful idiots of themselves by violating the taboos against human transmutation.

what do you want to bet that the official who came around to check Shou Tucker's work for yearly review knew exactly what he was looking at? that the brownshirt paper pusher who showed up on his doorstep could tell Tucker had mutilated his wife, and they rubber-stamped his research grants anyways?

"Hey, splicing humans with animals, that's cute. Maybe if we let him keep this up, he'll really bite off more than he can chew."

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“FMA is bad because it portrays war criminals as sympathetic, likable people” bro that’s the point. That’s the whole point. That is THE point. Did you think Ethnic Cleanser is some kind of special category of person that gets separated away from all the Good People at birth? Did you think there’s some kind of barn full of Genocide Doers that only gets deployed into the general public during world wars? Did you think assholes who do terrible shit in real life are never charming or likable or capable of doing good things and helping people? One of the best parts of FMA is how we the audience realize that some of our core protags have made irredeemable choices, and we have to reckon with the fact that they’re still people, with the unalienable rights and qualities thereof. Sorry if the Problematics aren’t constantly wearing a dunce cap and a list of all their crimes and this makes the media incomprehensible to you  

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fmasketches

…the longest 14 minutes of these guys lives lol

I had the office on as background noise so this happened, aka. how I’ve spent a week in a niche joke lol anyway, I guess you could call it……. ✨the (military) office✨ 😏

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Why did nobody in Fullmetal Alchemist carry around some fucking backup transmutation circles. Like Riza is there with a box full of fresh gloves for Roy when he gets soaked but you’d think after the first time he got rendered useless in a fight by some dude with a water bottle he’d start carrying around a spare set in a waxed bag or something but NOOOOO. And Ed’s even fucking worse like his arm gets destroyed how many times???? AND HE ACTS SURPRISED EVERY TIME. OH NO MY ARM. NOW I CAN’T ALCHEMY. Shit, boy, draw some transmutation circles ahead of time and keep em in your coat, this isn’t hard. “Oh no, you’ve destroyed my arm again, whatever shall I SIKE” Ed says, before throwing a rock with ‘explode’ written on it at his attacker and making good his escape. Everyone’s always carving shit into their skin or drawing it in their own blood, HOW BOUT INSTEAD YOU CARRY A PIECE OF FUCKING CHALK. Alchemists are useless

Alphonse wrote this post

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