I'm not sure at all it's my reflection
Nov. 27th, 2009 03:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lotesseSo we just possibly, like, ate all the episodes of Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood that are currently up on Hulu - through episode 30. In not very many days.
I feel like this take on it - even more so than FMA Prime - is doing really interesting allegorical things with WWII, and it's been frustrating to me that I don't have the cultural knowledge to interpret them. Because - okay, I know enough about anime to be able to locate Ishval and alchemy in general as atomic anxiety. Hagaren takes that one further, though, by introducing German/Holocaust imagery as well. And it's clear to me that Amestris is in some way a Germany-analogue, but I can't figure out if it's also a Japan-analogue at the same time.
Actually, one of the things that I've been really worrying about on this watchthrough is race. Because again, I know enough to know that however much difficulty we westerners have in detecting/interpreting Japanese visual race coding, anime characters are as a rule not white. I don't have the ability to interpret for myself, so I just pretty much assume unless told otherwise that every single person in any given anime is Japanese. But I can't figure out if, in FMA, we are being told otherwise. Ling and company are analogue-Chinese. Scar is analogue-Israeli. But what about the Elrics, with their blond hair and German names? Winry? Hawkeye?
The Ishval flashbacks in Brotherhood very carefully emphasize the Aryan nature of the Amestrian soldiers, which leads me to suspect that our blondies are meant to be read as white. But then again, my strong initial impulse is to read Mustang as analogue-Japanese. Right now, my working theory is that Amestris is a Germany/Japan fusion, combining both atomic anxiety and Holocaust issues - which, in view of actual WWII Japan, is fascinating. And then it would make sense for the Amestrians to be a combination of Japanese and Aryan phenotypes.
(Is anyone doing scholarship, or even blogging, about this sort of thing? I really, really want articles - possibly more than I want fic!)
But apart from that - my god, I didn't think it was possible to make Edward any more heartrending. Clearly I was wrong. Baby!
I feel like this take on it - even more so than FMA Prime - is doing really interesting allegorical things with WWII, and it's been frustrating to me that I don't have the cultural knowledge to interpret them. Because - okay, I know enough about anime to be able to locate Ishval and alchemy in general as atomic anxiety. Hagaren takes that one further, though, by introducing German/Holocaust imagery as well. And it's clear to me that Amestris is in some way a Germany-analogue, but I can't figure out if it's also a Japan-analogue at the same time.
Actually, one of the things that I've been really worrying about on this watchthrough is race. Because again, I know enough to know that however much difficulty we westerners have in detecting/interpreting Japanese visual race coding, anime characters are as a rule not white. I don't have the ability to interpret for myself, so I just pretty much assume unless told otherwise that every single person in any given anime is Japanese. But I can't figure out if, in FMA, we are being told otherwise. Ling and company are analogue-Chinese. Scar is analogue-Israeli. But what about the Elrics, with their blond hair and German names? Winry? Hawkeye?
The Ishval flashbacks in Brotherhood very carefully emphasize the Aryan nature of the Amestrian soldiers, which leads me to suspect that our blondies are meant to be read as white. But then again, my strong initial impulse is to read Mustang as analogue-Japanese. Right now, my working theory is that Amestris is a Germany/Japan fusion, combining both atomic anxiety and Holocaust issues - which, in view of actual WWII Japan, is fascinating. And then it would make sense for the Amestrians to be a combination of Japanese and Aryan phenotypes.
(Is anyone doing scholarship, or even blogging, about this sort of thing? I really, really want articles - possibly more than I want fic!)
But apart from that - my god, I didn't think it was possible to make Edward any more heartrending. Clearly I was wrong. Baby!