Summary:

As the siege at Radio Capital continues, Denny Brosh is sent in to be the negotiator and is surprised to find Maria Ross alive and well inside the building. After a tearful reunion, we focus on Bradley’s wife who is still distraught over whether or not her husband is still alive.

Back underground, Father explains to his human sacrifices that it’s useless to struggle as they are already in his belly. Even then, May Chang decides to challenge Father to a fight using her Eastern alchemy in order to steal his secret of immortality. With her lead, Ed and Al decide to fight Pride, whom Ed realizes was weakened after forcing Roy to perform human transmutation.

Meanwhile we flash back to the city as the Ishbal-jin make their move and start seizing the various points where Father’s transmutation circle will focus upon.

Back in the sewers, Bradley announces his pleasure at getting to fight it out with Scar using his last bit of strength. After a pitched battle, Scar reveals his secret weapon, his ability to perform constructive (as opposed to only destructive) alchemy, made possible by his now completed tattoo based on his brother’s research.

Meanwhile in Father’s lair, the battle continues as Father creates an alchemy ‘gun’ to shoot at May Chang while Al heroically jumps in front of her to stop the bullets. Izumi contributes by creating a barista ballista to shoot giant arrows at Father. Ed and Pride continue their fight as Pride taunts Ed that he’s fighting someone smaller than him for the first time, but Ed will have none of it as he tells Pride that he knows how little guys fight. Just as Pride is about to be defeated by Ed, Father interjects as he grabs each of his sacrifices with tentacle arms protruding from his body.

The solar eclipse has begun, and thus it is finally time for Father to put his plan into motion. He explains that the Earth is one giant system, one vastly more complex than any human could possibly be. By opening the Gate of Truth of Earth he will be able to gain unimaginable power and thus that is his plan. Before Father can act though, Greed jumps in from nowhere demanding to be the recipient of all of that power as he smashes Father’s figure to bits. Greed is no match for his Father though, as Father recovers instantly and laughs as he states that Greed has appeared just as he had planned. One last attempt by Hohenheim to stop Father by blowing up his alchemy chair contraption is of no use. With everything in place, Father’s body expands spherically and absorbs the centre of Central while a giant alchemy circle runs through the city and then Sloth’s tunnels and eventually all of Amestris.

As the circle works it’s power, the scene in Xerxes centuries ago is repeated again as everyone in the country falls to their deaths, including Winry who has an extra long death scene.

As the episode comes to a close, an invigorated and giant Father reaches through the Gate of the Earth. Using his powers, he pulls Truth (coming from the moon) into his own body.

Summary:

After months and months of waiting (years for you manga readers, although I guess y’all saw this scene a while ago anyway) we’ve finally seen what Father’s plan is all about. I have to admit, that this plan is even more ingenious and ambitious than I’d ever imagined. Instead of just repeating Xerxes on a larger scale, Father is actually going for something exponentially larger, namely the power to know the ‘truth’ of the entire world and grasp that power for himself. The fact that Father is so seemingly successful at this point is a bit of a surprise but not really. Without obvious conflict the eventual victory of our heroes will not be as heroic, and as such Father is required to be ‘successful’ in his plans to rule the world for at least a split second. I of course would be extremely amazed if Father actually manages to just win after all, and the entire show ends on a very dark note, but considering the shonen nature of the show, I highly doubt it. The fact that the show went as far as to kill off everyone gives me more hope that various body parts will be restored when everyone eventually turns to their bodies alive and well. I mean if you can return from the dead, surely Ed and get his limbs back?

I thought overall this episode was a bit all over the place. There was simply too much, yet not enough happening at the same time. The entire opening scene with Denny Brosh and Bradley’s wife was completely pointless. The brief flashes of everyone we’ve seen so far in this show dying to Father’s power (well except the three Armstrongs who are out of the country!) was almost an ‘end of show montage’ but not quite. The multiple battles, and the brief and completely forgettable reintroduction of Greed also seemed tacked on. Of course all of this is useful for one reason, namely to set things up for our heroes eventual victory, and as a clear reminder of what was NOT shown.

Allow me to explain. During the ‘death montage’, we specifically did not see the Ishbal guys dying en mass at their alchemy circle checkpoints. We did not see Scar die from the red transmutation (merely being absorbed into the blackness) and we certainly did not see what happened to Dr. Marcoh and gang.

It’s important to note that it seems that the Ishbal guys and Scar are working in concert to stop Father using Scar’s brother’s research. The fact that we didn’t see him ‘die’ shows that he may do something next episode. The fact that the fate of Dr. Marcoh, arguably the most knowledgeable alchemist in Philospher’s Stones in the country (now that Gold Tooth is dead) was not shown to die is also important. This is all speculation of course. We did not see Ran Fan’s fate either, but I doubt she knows any alchemy to save the day. Finally, Greed’s appearance merely assembles our heroes all in one position, as once Ling gains back control there will be the perfect team for the  huge battle to come.

As for everyone being inside Father, it seems the guy’s entire lair is actually part of his body. This explains neatly how Hohenheim was defeated, although that was already strongly hinted at before. Funny though that not even Greed realized this. Was Father hiding things even to his own ‘children’ or did Greed just leave and betray before he ever found out?

One final note that I want to make is on the mystery of Scar’s new arm. It seems that he is now able to perform both destructive and constructive alchemy without clapping his hands or using a circle. His tattoo in other words gives him the power of Truth itself or so it seems. We know long ago that Scar had thought that his brother’s research was the key to everything, and so I really do believe that any resolution to our current dilemma rests with Scar.

I wonder if next episode will feature some weird reunion of souls between Winry and Al inside Father’s body or not?

*As always, I’ve stopped watching next episode previews, and NO SPOILERS PLEASE!*

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