When Does Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Season 2 Come Out? Is It Renewed?

What is Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood about?

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood is one of those rare anime series that earns its reputation honestly. Edward and Alphonse Elric are two brothers who broke the cardinal rule of alchemy, tried to bring their dead mother back to life, and paid for it with their bodies. Ed lost an arm and a leg. Al lost his entire body, his soul bound to a hollow suit of armor. The show follows their quest to recover what was taken from them, and that simple, human premise turns out to be sturdy enough to support 64 episodes of escalating complexity.

The tone is not what you might expect from a shonen action series. Brotherhood can be genuinely funny, even silly, in its early episodes, and then it will walk you straight into something devastating without much warning. The world it builds is a kind of early-20th-century Europe refracted through a fantasy lens, where alchemy functions as science and military politics drive much of the plot. The show is rarely content to let a battle just be a battle. Most of the major fight sequences carry real stakes for the characters involved, and the series has an unusual willingness to let its villains be ideologically serious rather than just menacing.

Critics and anime audiences have placed it among the best of its medium for years. The IMDb rating of 9.1 across hundreds of thousands of votes is not something you see often, and it reflects a genuine consensus rather than a niche fandom. Western viewers who came to it fresh and longtime anime watchers tend to respond with equal enthusiasm. Some critics note that the first dozen or so episodes rush through material covered by the original 2003 Fullmetal Alchemist adaptation, and that rush can make the early going feel slightly breathless. Once Brotherhood establishes its own footing, though, the pacing steadies considerably.

Where it pulls ahead of most comparable series is in its ending. Long-running action anime with complex mythologies often collapse under the weight of their own plots, or resolve their central questions unsatisfyingly. Brotherhood does not. The final arc is large and operatic and it actually pays off, which is, somewhat depressingly, not as common as it should be.

Is Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood renewed or cancelled?

Why did Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood end?

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood was always going to have a finish line. It was produced specifically to adapt Hiromu Arakawa's manga from start to finish, faithfully and completely, unlike the 2003 anime series that diverged into its own original story when it outpaced the source material. Once the manga concluded and the anime caught up to that ending, there was simply nothing left to adapt. The show did exactly what it set out to do.

The 64-episode run covered the entire story, and the final episode aired in July 2010 just months after the manga itself wrapped up. This was a planned conclusion in the most literal sense. MBS and the production studio Bones were not pulling the plug on a struggling series. They were delivering the last chapter of a complete work.

With a 9.1 on IMDb and a reputation that has only grown in the years since, this is about as far from a troubled ending as a show can get. Brotherhood ended because the story ended. That's the whole explanation.

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood Season 2 Release Date

Best & worst episodes

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood seasons

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood trailer

Where to watch Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

NetflixstreamHulustreamCrunchyrollstreamCrunchyroll Amazon ChannelstreamNetflix Standard with Adsstream

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood latest news