Fullmetal Alchemist: Conqueror of Shamballa (part eight)

Continuing this just bad movie.

After telling Noah about how excited he is to possibly have a way home (and how glad he is that he did actually succeed at restoring his brother's body, at least according to the latter's account. Despite him appearing on Earth in the armor, for some reason), Edward sees Earth!Alphonse come home and tries to tell him that the Thule Society is bad news. Earth!Alphonse doesn't listen. Edward tells him they need to stop that rocket from launching. Earth!Alphonse completely ignores him as he goes about packing some extra things from home and stepping out again, with the short explanation that he's going to stay overnight at the castle so he can get more work done. Haha, wow Earth!Alphonse.

Edward chases Earth!Alphonse down the stairs, babbling about how no, really, the Thule Society is plotting to use this rocket in conjunction with a magical portal-raid into his own homeworld that EarthAlphonse doesn't believe in to wreak mass destruction and evil. You...could have tailored your argument a little better to this particular audience, Edward. When he tries to grab Earth!Alphonse and hold him back, the latter turns around and...okay, I'm having trouble buying this.

Even taking into account that FMA03 Edward is significantly less "shonen superhero" than in Mangahood, and that his automail isn't in the best shape, and that Earthphonse took him by surprise...just no. Edward is an experienced martial artist who's been in more fights in his scant 18 years than most people get into in their lives. Earthphonse is just some Romanian kid who builds rockets. This isn't a comedy-slapstick scene, like the ones where Edward gets terrorized by a wrench-wielding Winry either, this is being played seriously.

After (somehow) knocking down Edward, Earthphonse has a flare-up of that respiratory condition of his that hasn't been alluded to since the literal first scene of the movie. It seems to have gotten worse. He's coughing up blood this time.

A consequence of overworking himself in a cold, damp, dusty castle full of fumes and machinery? Some kind of side-effect of his Amestrian counterpart projecting himself onto Earth? Wogdat stole his uterus last night? Could be any one or more of the above.

Earthphonse looks at the blood on his hand, and then turns back to Edward (and Noah, who's watching silently just like she's spent most of this movie doing) with a serious expression. He knows his time is short. He wants to leave a mark on the world before he dies. So, he's going to do that, no matter what stupid thing Edward is trying to convince him will happen as a consequence of that.

I guess Earthphonse's condition is terminal, whatever it is. The movie did just make a point of informing us that Izumi eventually died of her own illness, so I'll call that strong evidence for Earthphonse also suffering from Missing Uterus Syndrome.

Earthphonse turns and walks out. Edward starts to try following after him once again, but Noah pulls him back. She quietly assures Edward that he needn't worry, the gate isn't going to open anyway. And...Edward seems to just accept that.

-____-

Her saying that isn't what I'm going to take issue with here. We the audience know that she's been approached once again by the Thulites, this time with a friendlier face on, and that she's probably planning to sabotage their project. Thing is, Edward doesn't know that. He also doesn't know that her powers cover anything like precognition or prophecy; all she's ever demonstrated, or even told him about, is the ability to see people's pasts. If she's now claiming she can see the future as well, then he should be asking why she never mentioned this until now.

Meh.

Cut to Alphonse and the other blondies working on their rocket...craft? It doesn't look like they're building a missile, as it turns out. More like a rocket-plane.

According to wikipedia, we're still six years early for rocket-propelled aircraft. Plans and concepts existed in 1923, but they'd never been flown.

The hell do these guys think they're even going to be able to do, with this incredibly experimental ahead-of-its-time prototype? They can't possibly RELY on it in battlefield conditions.

I guuuueess it's supposed to be the delivery mechanism for the nuke? One-way-trip to drop the nuke on someplace, with no expectation of the pilot coming home afterward? Maybe?

Although, in that case, it would mean that they're hoping to open the gate, steal the nuke, load it on the untested rocket plane, and then deliver the payload within the timeframe of one day. Which...the odds of this actually being successful are so abysmally low that I don't know what the story thinks its stakes are supposed to be. And, remember, that's the LEAST far-fetched use for a rocket plane I can imagine the Thulites having in this operation.

Well, back to the apartment in Munich, where Edward is sleeping. Noah watches him from the bedroom door, just staring at him as he lays in bed. Then she tiptoes over to him and does this while weird music plays:

Is she doing some kind of more indepth psychic whatsit while he's asleep, or is she just being creepy? Probably the former, but who knows.

Back to Amestris, where Roy Mustang is placing flowers on a grave. Probably Hughes', just from pre-divergence precedent, but it could also be someone who died more recently. Then, after we see him stare at the grave for a few seconds, we cut to Winry and Sheska approaching the cemetery bearing bouquets of their own. Winry is still trying to track Alphonse and Wrath, and seems to think Sheska can help. Which...well, maybe she can:

There's an underground city, apparently. Maybe this is the FMA03 equivalent to the ruins of Xerxes, or something?

They reach the grave, and are startled to see a bouquet already laid on it. Is that really so surprising? I guess maybe it is. Mustang is nowhere in sight, so I guess he left already. Sheska wonders aloud if perhaps Elicia came by earlier today.

Hmm. It's not Hughes' grave then, probably, since he had quite a lot of friends and family. Also, come to think of it, this grave looks very fresh; no grass grown on it yet. It's been a few years since the events of the early (pre-divergence) series, so this couldn't be it. Alright, someone else's grave. Someone who didn't have many friends. Mustang bringing them flowers too is something the movie is taking care to establish, so he probably had some sort of either very mixed or very secret feelings about this character.

No idea who Elicia is either, for that matter. Maybe it's just Mustang's nickname.

Cut to an extremely bizarre, extremely bad CGI, reality-warping staircase descending through a black void passed a bunch of satanic-looking carvings interspersed with empty darkness and otherworldly vortexes of light.

♫ Zettai! Unmei! Mokushiroku! ♫​

It leads eventually to the underground city that they were just talking about.

It's a giant ruined metropolis. Most of the buildings are still more or less standing despite the wear and tear, save for the immense scar in the shape of a transmutation glyph torn through its buildings and streets. Yeah, this has got to be bizarro-Xerxes. Looks like Winry and Sheska were right; Alphonse and Wrath are here, surveying the eldritch cityscape.

Alphonse leads Wrath (how old is Wrath supposed to be, physiologically speaking? I thought she was supposed to be a young adult at first, but she's so much smaller than Alphonse that now I'm thinking early teens, or else just a small homunculus) through the ruins, until they reach a certain position located on the glyph-scar. He declares that "it's just like Liore," though I'm not sure what about it is just like Liore. The shape of the glyph matches the one that the nazis teleported through, maybe?

...has Alphonse seen this underground city before?

......or. oh. wait. okay. Was this glyph scar across the underground city just *recently* inflicted, and it wasn't here the last time he saw the place? There was an earthquake in Central at the same time as the one in Liore. Did the Thule Society blow a hole in reality here in the underground city at the same time, thus causing the other earthquake? With the quake at Central being much worse than the Liore one due to the epicenter being underground?

Maybe?

Alphonse kneels in the scarred wreckage, and performs some kind of transmutation on the ground. It looks like he's reactivating part of the residual symbol. Trying to open the portal to Earth again from the Amestrian/Shambalan side? I hope he's not doing that without making sure he won't cause another earthquake by doing so, but, well, this movie's version(s) of Alphonse is kinda sorta a supervillain.

Speaking of villainy, our next scene is in Munich beer hall in the fall of 1923. Edward and Noah enter, and find everyone staring at them and hardly anyone drinking. A couple of dumbasses with abysmally bad opsec happily launch, unprompted, into a speech about how tonight Germany will be reborn into a glorious Reich of ages, and if Edward isn't planning to participate in that rebirth he should probably pick a different establishment to hang out at this evening.

Then Hughes enters, side by side with Hess. Edward probably should have suspected a connection at this point, given Hughes' secretiveness and obvious far-right connections, but I guess he has been fairly preoccupied. Edward tries to tell Hughes that his companion is part of a secret society of evil wizards, but before he can get more than a couple words out Noah stands up and walks over to them. Wordlessly following Hess out of the beer hall while Hughes bars Edward's attempts at pursuit and alsso pontificates at him as if he's actually still expecting him to be brought over.

Noah, Hughes explains, has seen fit to aid them in their cause. He obviously still has contempt in his voice when he speaks about the Roma girl, but - like The Writers explained in their Berlin conversation with Edward - his ilk have always been willing to make temporary exceptions for the good ones.

Edward is just sort of dumbfounded and lost. I guess he isn't making the connection with what Noah told him earlier, about how she's certain the gate will not be opened. Again, he's kinda preoccupied.

...although, I'm not sure why Noah didn't warn him about this? I can understand her not wanting Edward to know what she's planning, for fear of him blabbing to Earthphonse or something, but in that case why would she even let him come to the meeting place with her? Better to just slip away from him, or bring him somewhere else and then leave early.

...

The problem with uneven writing is that you can never tell if a mystery is being raised intentionally, or if it's just an author fuckup.

On one hand, the way Noah is going about this seems like she has some more complicated secret motives than the obvious, and the movie has had some legitimately clever bits to it that suggest it might be capable of pulling this off. On the other hand, characters making questionable decisions to make sure the plot happens is also a repeated occurrence in this movie.

In situations like this it's impossible to tell if you're putting too much faith in the work, or too little. Either way you end up disappointed and frustrated, because even if there really is a clever twist that surprises you the surprise still hinges on you not thinking you can trust the narrative.

...

Hughes also points out that all the men present in this beer hall are members of the NSDAP. Edward suddenly notices that literally every single one of them has a swastika pin displayed on their chest. To be fair, we could see that the people closest to the cameras had something on their chests, but the camera never came close enough to see the swastikas, so this isn't a case of "trick the audience into not noticing the same thing that the character didn't notice," it just makes Edward seem oblivious.

Then, Hughes and a bunch of other guys start grabbing Edward. Are they planning to kill him now? Or just beat him up? Maybe they're just making sure he doesn't try to chase after Noah? IDK. Fortunately, Edward is saved from the mob by the sudden intervention of the writers.

Yeah, they just had a car smash through the wall at exactly the right second to rescue Edward. Are they going to feel the need to justify this incredibly timely development, or acknowledge the legal consequences for someone charging a car through the wall of a building that might quickly catch up with them? Maybe, but so far the writers haven't seen the need to justify themselves when they make this sort of decision.

As the car speeds Edward away to safety, he asks the writers why they saved him. They tell him that it's because they need to protect their dream, which...well, that's accurate I suppose.

Cut to Castle Haushofer, where Alphonse and Co have finished building the rocket plane. They want to test it, but the newly returned Hess tells them that there's no time, they need to launch it on its mission. When they ask how they're going to haul it out of the castle, he explains that there's no need for that. Then, a ridiculous Dr. Evil-ish hatch opens in the ceiling. Lmao, how did they even install that in their fucking castle? Why would they BOTHER installing it, when there are so many easier ways to design/modify the space to get the same benefits? Anyway, up through the launch tube that this castle apparently has in its ceiling, they see the underside of the ritual room. Or maybe another room that Envy has been brought to, still bound and restrained in place. Either or. Ekhart watches as things are moved into place, flanked by Haushofer and Noah.

I want you all to take a moment and think about how they got Envy into this room.

I guess we could generously assume that Haushofer has yet another extremely-high-tech-for-the-1920's gigantic motorized hatch built into the roof of this tower as well as its floor. Somehow, that's less stupid than any of the alternatives that come to mind.

Speaking of stupider alternatives to things, the intent is pretty clearly to launch the rocket plane through the snek ring into the skies (hopefully. These guys don't have the best track record when it comes to keeping aircraft at a safe altitude :V) of Amestris. Which they think will accomplish...um...what, exactly? What is it that they need this untested rocket plane to do in Amestris that an ordinary airplane couldn't?

Do they think they just need a vehicle that goes really, really fast in order to take them through the portal before it can crush or zombify them or whatever? Maybe?

I'd been assuming the rocket plane was to use as a lightning-fast delivery method for their stolen Amestrian bomb that can't be intercepted by contemporary AA defences. Sending it THROUGH the damned portal, though? What the fuck even is this plan of theirs?

As Hess explains to the uncomprehending engineer group what the giant snake monster and the arcane glyphs are all about (somehow, Noah's presence is the detail that Alphonse fixates on, rather than the literal fucking dragon lmao), Ekhart and Haushofer ask Noah what she knows so far about "Shamballa." How much did she see of it, when going through Edward's mind with her powers? She replies that she saw, well...not everything, but a lot of things. Enough to know that the magic circles they're drawing are known as "transmutation arrays" on the other side, and to recognize the bound and wounded serpent as a hostile homunculus. She doesn't know the spell to open the portal, unfortunately; either Edward doesn't know it after all, or she just wasn't able to get at that memory. However, she was able to determine that Edward and the Gates of Truth have some kind of connection, power flowing between them in a way that it doesn't with most people even where he comes from.

Of course, Noah may or may not be misleading them about some of the details here. With her powerset, its very, very unlikely that she'd actually go along with a nazi offer, knowing what each and every one of them really wants to do to her and everyone genetically similar to her. I'd have trouble believing that someone with her powers could ever be tricked into thinking they'll really be tolerated as one of the good ones.

Suddenly, the glyphs start glowing. Ekhart makes a pronouncement about it, and seems dissonantly pleased with said inference.

Ekhart, are you sure this is actually good for you? Even if you're under some religious delusion that the Shamballa natives are unfallen Aryan demigods who would love to help you, you do know that the raging snek monster ALSO came from their world. Not everything over there is part of the faction that you think will help you lol.

Anyway, the glowing is probably being caused by Alphonse poking at the scar in the underground city.

Back in said underground city, Winry and Sheska are taking some tunnels toward where they think Alphonse and Wrath are. Either this part of the trip is before the Utena stairs, or after them. They feel a tremor, and look up in alarm. Cut to the city proper, where Alphonse is trying to do the thing. Unfortunately, all he succeeds at doing is causing some minor ground-shaking and possibly making Ekhart's ritual room glow a little bit.

Then, suddenly, a boulder comes flying at Alphonse, forcing Wrath to quickly yank him out of the way. It turns out that the boulder was thrown by an old friend with a new look. Alphonse doesn't have any memories of dealing with this thing, but Wrath quickly fills him in on what his golem counterpart had to fight a whole bunch of times.

Not sure what the heck happened to turn Gluttony into whatever the hell this form is. It almost looks like someone tried to combine him with Envy's monster form from Mangahood, ish. Also, he isn't talking, even in the psychopathic monster child way that he used to do during combat in the pre-divergence material. Just growls and roars.

I guess something happened to make him more monster and less person, during the events of the 03 series. Consumed something he couldn't quite handle, perhaps? An experimental attempt at upgrading the Sins by the villain? Not sure. Either way, this thing is even more hostile and more hard to kill than Gluttony's previous self, and Alphonse's lightshow seems to have brought it right down on their position. Guess it's time for our first proper monster fight of this instalment.

That said? He might be ugly and intimidating in this form, and I don't doubt that he'll be a challenge for Alphonse and Wrath to deal with, but...the gluttonizer was still way scarier.

Splitting it here. Hopefully just a couple of posts left.