... Distraction!

[evilhippo]

Goshdarnit. I finish my book, reload my friendslist and what's there? Hello, chapter 59. Fancy meeting you here.

Ishbal Flashback! Proper-type! Finally!

...

HUGHES!!! (I can't help it. I have been needing this backstory since... well, this time two years ago? (To be fair, at that point I hadn't started reading the manga yet, but I still wanted to know.) Even though I can't entirely make sense of things until there's a translation, but I can still look at the pictures. And I suppose the Hawkeye thing is explained now. Though, really, you shouldn't train your loaded gun on someone you're watching out for, ja? She's a sensible girl, wouldn't she know that? I think at this point, though, I'm just sad she's not playing the wrong side. That was such my favourite role for her. (We've already established that I'm evil, right?) Though, I suppose... no, with her backstory now, and her father being against the military this... this shoots everything all to heck, really. Though her grandfather's... gah. I'm going to have to sit down and work her out now. My guess right now is Roy didn't know she was there? Something something Hughes. Also Hughes!! Hehehe. Finally, he gets more time in the manga. And I can piece together more of his character. As if I haven't been doing enough of that already. Ooooh, backstory. Love.)

Also, anyone thinking Kimbley bears an odd resemblance to Ling? It's quite possible this is just me, but... hmmmmm. I can't imagine any sort of significance that'd have, but, well... interesting.

And young!Armstrong? I want to hug him. So badly.

I do have one complaint, though. GLACIER! IS STILL A FREAKING CHUNK OF ICE IN THE OCEAN. NOT. A. NAME. FOR. PEOPLE. Thank you. Too bad I can't read her maiden name there. Jones?

There's something about their expressions on page 27 that makes me go "hee" and then "wow, that guy's creepy."

This chapter's actually got me trying to piece together some kind of semi-translation for myself, but I think for right now, I'm just going to end up sitting here going "wow, are these kanji more complicated than usual?"

As a parting note, Tim Marcoh bites his nails.

Oh, and Kabuto? Why are you Scar's brother? And what interestingness are you cooking up?

Edit: I'm allowed to laugh at the wank going down about this chapter being boring, right? Because I am.

Comments

[evilhippo.livejournal.com]

I think people have gotten too used to constant action and surprise or something. I'm not sure if I was the only one getting tired of that. Near the end of the most recent arc, I was really worried there was going to be a point where it was just too much, and I'd lose interest. But now we have backstory. And backstory is yay, even if we're in a small corner of the fandom by appreciating it. ^_^

If we'd gotten to the Ishbal flashback and there hadn't been Hughes... well, I would've been mighty suspicious. Most of what I know of Hughes is based on the anime. I need me some manga!Hughes now. (And, I've realized now, I'm just a hopeless fangirl when it comes to him. (-:)

[verie.livejournal.com]

That's the thing, though... it's not like there's *not* action in the new chapter. It may not be long and drawn out battles, but I get tired of long and drawn out battles when there's no explanation for them. And to have a major battle in a flashback chapter seems pointless to me, since there's no suspense. It's a flashback. We already know that if someone gets into a battle, whoever we've seen in previous chapters is the person who won. People are complaining about the lack of plot twists like they wont be happy until one of the main characters die or something.

Yeah, me too. But I've noticed that he's been missing from a lot of the new art... like that one where it was all just old photos of the military. Hughes wasn't in a single one of those, but if it's old photographs of everyone, you'd think there'd be at least one of him somewhere. It's not like he was camera shy or anything. Although that didn't affect the plot at all... I just want more Hughes. XD;

Is it just me, or are the manga characters radically different from their anime counter-parts? It's interesting comparing their reactions to things.

[evilhippo.livejournal.com]

No more main characters dying! Or being maimed, or changed, or whatever else evil could be done. At least for a while yet. Once we've been lulled into complacency again. Goshdarn insatiable fangirls, wishing such things upon the characters. I think he was pretty much nowhere in the first art book. In fact, I was actually surprised at the amount of Hughes in the second one, even if that amount was still Very Little. Maybe he's hard to draw or something. (Or, you know, he's just Arakawa's equivalent to Douglas Adams' whale.) The manga characters have so much more depth than their anime counterparts sometimes. I think that's getting to be because the manga's been going on longer, but I think almost everyone's got more personality, plus, yeah, I think a few people are quite different. Hawkeye, for one, has been confusing the heck out of me lately, which is wonderful. And I'm happy that I was both right and wrong about Roy's past. Oh, and Kimbley? Already seems so much different than his anime counterpart, just by his expressions. And now I'm finally going to find out a bit about what was going on in the war between Roy and Hughes. Though I know it sadly must involve a bit less snogging than I sometimes pretend there was. (-;