Wow, I Need to Get on top of the Ball

I'm afraid that I haven't been so good about updating. Last weekend, although I got Saturday's page up and linked I forgot to change the "New" link so you couldn't directly access it, I didn't create a post telling everyone that it was up, and I didn't even get a page up on Sunday.

I have a good excuse, though! (Sort of.) On Saturday I was fixing crashed links, creating a character profile for Y'Mal, and playing with my cat. She now has an "Official Name!" She is Blackberry, because she's sweet, and yet has thorns. Yay for kittens. Anyway, on Sunday, well, the weather was super super good, and I kinda went walking instead of working, and when I got back I became immersed in Dominic Deegan. That web comic will be the first comic going up on my recommendations page. I love that story so much. I should get over my nerves, and write a fan letter to Mookie. I've already made some fan art, and (as a sneek peek) when I go to Bakuretsu Con over the first November weekend and I can't update, my filler picture will involve one of Gate and Key's characters Cosplaying as a character from Dominic Deegan. Glee.

Anyway, my Video recommendation for Last Saturday, when I forgot, is Better Days. I love the song, and think it's a pretty gorgeous. No fight scenes I'm afraid; it's all angst. Errrrr, if you're not okay with implied yaoi (a male/male relationship) don't watch this. The anime is Yami no Matsuei, and the song is the Goo Goo Dolls "Better Days."

Last Sunday's recomendation is If You Were Gay. It's a funny funny song. The clips are all FMA, but please don't take this to mean that I support the pairing used in here. I like this song, as to me it's a parody on all of the crazy yaoi obsessed fan girls (and a few guys) out there. This is just a funny, light hearted vid that has no objectionable content whatsoever -- it just implies it with clever twists and turns of the English language (something I really appreciate as a future English major).

Speaking of FMA, before I get to today's recomendation, I spent last night watching the end of the series and then switched directly to the Movie: The Conqueror of Shamballa. I was frankly disappointed by the movie. Fullmetal Alchemist has been my favorite series since I discovered it last year. I was expecting a movie that had the same plot development, and quality of characters, and was really just a two hour long episode. There were several good points of the movie, but not enough to make up for the failings in the points just mentioned.

Before I go on, if you haven't seen the movie, or haven't gotten to the end of the series and don't want to read spoilers: DON'T READ THIS POST! I need to vent, and unfortunately I can't vent without mentioning specifics.

Okay. There was a lot of good stuff in this movie. I have to say my favorite character in here was Fritz Lang, or the alternate Furhor King Bradley. He was wonderful, and any scene with him in it was bound to be good. Pride as a kindly movie director was just too cool -- especially as I just came off of seeing the Furhor strangle his son, and cut Mustang to little pieces.

I liked the idea of Wrath's redemption, and getting rid of Gluttony. I really admired how they managed to take all of the loose ends left by the final episode, and tied them up. What I disagreed with was the way in which they were wrapped up.

If I had been in charge of the movie the first thing I would have changed would have been Izumi's death. Oh, she would still be very much dead. But I would have changed the scene where her husband is telling Winry about her death by adding a moment with Wrath at the grave in order to help build up his character to the point where it made sense for him to sacrifice himself. Wrath made the Gate possible, and was huge part in this movie. So why does he have less than six lines, and no real character development? When we left him at the end of the series he was half insane and broken for want of a mother. When did he gain the mental experience in order to decide that he wanted to give up his life?

So, here is my addition to that scene:

~~~

The grass was long enough to come between Wrath's metal and flesh toes. It was soft, and under other cicumstances Wrath might have enjoyed it, and the bright sunlight. But other circumstances did not happen in grave yards.

He looked down at the strangely unreal headstone infront of him. The letters swam in front of his purple eyes, as he tried to read the name. The homunculus bit his lip with sharp teeth. He could only make sense of the first name on the tombstone, "Izumi," and only because he had heard her first name before.

He really couldn't read. He'd been working on it over the last three years, but it was hard without that Aunt Pinako person helping him spell out the letters, as he was recovering from the shock of having the Automail attached. Looking at that tombstone, and all tombstones that littered the cemetary, Wrath wondered if he should have stayed with that family long enough to learn how to read. These people had been loved by friends and family, and perhaps he should know what those friends and family actually had to say about those who had departed.

"This is pathetic. I only know your first name," he told the tombstone, his voice cracked and sounded as rusty as his automail. His body was growing up. He didn't think he would age past his prime, but nonetheless he was growing older. It also didn't help that he hadn't spoken in weeks.

"Ed and Al -- they knew their," his voice faltered, "mother as Mother. She didn't have a name to them. She was a part of them. I tried -- I wanted to be part of her too. But I knew her as Sloth. It didn't work. It never could have. I was just too desperate. I should have been more like them, shouldn't I?"

He slumped in the grass, the rust on his automail screaming. "I've hated you for so long. I don't even know why. You banished me to that Hell in the gate -- but that's not exactly why. I think its because you were afraid of me. You sent me there because you couldn't face me," Wrath's face contorted with anger, and his voice grew stronger, as he tried to yell at Izumi's ghost.

"My first memories are of being sent back to that Hell because you were afraid of the monster that you thought I was! Just because I didn't look like a normal child! That's why I hated you," his tone softened. He was learning moderation and control at last. "But -- you gave up your organs in exchange for what you thought was a monster. You lost your ability to have children -- you're to be pitied, I think. You couldn't stop making mistakes.

"Maybe I hated you because you gave that to me. I couldn't stop making mistakes, could I? I trusted you, and you tried to kill me. I believed that human limbs would make me human. I believed that I wanted to be human -- for no real reason.

"What's so great about being human? What do you have that I don't? After knowing Mothe--Sloth, and you, and Ed, and Lust," he paused his mind skipping tacks."I feel love. I feel hate! I feel sorrow, and pain, and joy, and happiness just like you humans!

"I don't know what a soul is. Envy said that we don't have them, but I don't know any more. That doll Tucker made had no soul. We can all agree on that. I'm nothing like her. Perhaps it's the feelings that are a person's soul. The ability to respond, to think and feel, maybe that's a soul.

"If it is, what use is it?" Wrath looked up, as if expecting an answer. "I've walked all over this land since Sloth was sealed. I've seen love and misery, bitterness and fear, joy and exultation. I even watched a baby get born. And at the end of it all -- all I am is tired," he sighed, and looked down at the marker again. "I'm not smarter or better. All I am is tired.

"I wish that I had seen you one last time," Wrath added quietly. "I wish that we could have just talked. I wish I knew what a soul really was. I wish I knew why you had to call me a sin before I had done anything sinful. I wish I knew if you really wanted to take me back from the gate after you flung me into it. I want to know -- did you love Ed and Al? Why them and not me?! Was it because you were like Envy, and you didn't believe that I have a soul?!"

Gears screamed again as Wrath's fist pounded into the ground. He was breathing hard again. "Did you love me, or am I just a mistake, Izumi?! What the Hell am I supposed to call you, anyway? Are you really my mother, or is Sloth? She loved me! She cared! Or was I just a replacement for her sons? Am I always going to be a replacement?"

Wrath stopped, breathing heavily. His lon hair fell in his eyes, as his eyes burned. "I've been wandering for such a long time. I'm so tired. I just want to go home. I want someone to go home to. I'm tired of wandering. I'm tired of being a replacement. A failed replacement. I'm sick of being alone, Mom."

He rose, breathing in deeply and swallowing the lump in his throat. It wouldn't budge, no matter what he tried. He looked away from the headstone, telling himself that his eyes were tearing up from the bright sun. Over by the gate of the cemetary he could see the shape of someone coming up the hill. He recognized the hair. Winry.

Suddenly he had to leave. He ran towards the woods boardering the cemetary. And just as he reached the cool shade of the trees his leg buckled, and he slumped against a tree.

~~~

I'll have more changes to the movie tomorrow. Heck. I might even turn it into a fanfic. Tomorrow I'll give you a new version of Envy's attack, and the death of Hohenheim. That was handled badly, as well. The character devlopment of Envy was flat, and Hohenheim's death was all on Hohenheim's part, when it should have been between Hohenhiem and Envy.

Anyway, today's video recomendations are: Lullabye for Fullmetal (again) in combination with Wrath's Song (yet again), Sailor Song, and When You're Evil in honor of the end of a great series.