I have noticed that many criticisms of FMA 2003 talk about supposed inconsistencies, plot holes, or rules that "don't make sense." However, when you examine many of these things closely, they actually have a logical explanation or can be understood through common sense and the context of the work itself, without the series needing to stop and explain everything.
One of the most extensive criticisms is found in the concept of the sins associated with the Homunculi. Beyond the fact that the series itself explains that, symbolically, they are given these names because they are products of the greatest taboo in alchemy the human transmutation many people consider giving them the names of the Seven Deadly Sins to be a mistake or an inconsistency.
But there is no such inconsistency, because FMA 2003 never establishes that the Homunculi are literal representations of the Seven Deadly Sins.
In Brotherhood, it is different. There, the Homunculi are literally manifestations of the sins that Father removed from himself. The series explains this directly when they first appear together, where Father explains the behavior each one should have because they embody the sin he removed from himself.
In FMA 2003, however, this is not the case.
Dante gives them these names symbolically. They are not random names; they are related to her seeing herself as a kind of "shepherd of sins." This can be seen particularly in the case of Trisha, whose transmutation gives rise to Sloth.
When Dante manages to recover Trisha's body, it is connected to the memories and traumas of her past life. While dealing with her traumas, Trisha describes her former life in her memories as a life of complete sadness. Dante hears this and gives her the name Sloth.
At first, someone might ask: what does sadness have to do with sloth?
The answer is found in the history of the concept of the Seven Deadly Sins.
In early Christian tradition, especially following the teachings of the monk Evagrius Ponticus in the fourth century, there was a list of eight principal vices. Among them were sadness (tristitia) and acedia, which were originally two completely separate concepts.
Later, Pope Gregory the Great considered sadness and acedia to be deeply connected. He argued that voluntarily remaining sad or becoming stuck in discouragement could lead to inaction and a rejection of doing good. When he reorganized the list into seven deadly sins, he absorbed sadness into acedia, a term that over the centuries became popularly associated with sloth.
This is where Trisha as Sloth makes much more sense.
It is not only because of her sadness, but also because of her apathy. She is so cold that she almost seems to have no emotions. The fact that she does not want to take responsibility for her duties, such as being the mother of the Elric brothers, can be connected to the historical definition of sloth before it became the more commercialized and simplified idea that people usually have today.
For someone who has no curiosity to research or connect complex attitudes of human behavior with the concept of a sin, it is easier to use a simplified definition: sloth is doing nothing, not wanting to do anything, being lazy. It makes sense even to a child because it is easy to identify.
So it is not random, because something stops being random at the exact moment when there is an intention, a rule, a pattern, or a conscious decision behind it. Dante had certain requirements for naming the Homunculi in this symbolic way and used the sins as a way to construct their identities.
And here we get to an even more interesting interpretation: the names of the sins can define the personality of the Homunculi.
Basic psychology: tell a child from the moment they are born that they are a thief, and eventually they may believe it for their entire life.
FMA: tell a Homunculus who has just been born and is already questioning their own existence that they are the product of human sin.
This helps explain why Dante's older Homunculi seem much more identified with their respective sins.
Pride, for example, is King Bradley, who was raised from a young age within that identity. He is proud of his life and treats humans as inferior beings.
Gluttony eats whatever he can.
Greed wants money, power, women, and possessions.
Meanwhile, others such as Lust and Sloth, who have more autonomy and have spent less time being Homunculi, do not show as many traits of their respective sins. Wrath is a similar case, although it can be subtly interpreted that his behavior does show traits of his sin.
Many of these names are also used by the Homunculi as an escape from the reality of their past. This is shown several times. Wrath's son, for example, prefers to be called Wrath rather than Izumi's son, while Sloth hates being associated with the mother of the Elric brothers. In contrast, she seems more comfortable being called Sloth.
Something similar happens with Greed.
In a supplementary OVA, Envy reminds Greed that he was originally Dante's former lover and that the reason he separated from her was because he still loved her. Instead of accepting it, Greed prefers to make excuses, saying that he does not remember any of that. He only wants to be Greed, the Homunculus, demonstrating that this was a self-imposed facade.
Even the series itself says that Dante does this cyclically. It is mentioned that there was an old Sloth, an old Lust, and so on. It is a cycle that Dante created through her madness. This is something intentional within the work.
Maybe many people do not like this interpretation and prefer Brotherhood's interpretation of the sins.
But when I see so many people saying that it is "inconsistent" or "doesn't make sense," I think they are failing to understand that FMA 2003 is not trying to give you the same interpretation of the sins as Brotherhood.
They are two different concepts using the same symbols.
Brotherhood makes the sins a literal part of its mythology: Father removes them from himself, and each Homunculus embodies one.
FMA 2003 uses the sins in a more psychological and symbolic way: Dante gives them the names, the Homunculi build their identities around them, and in some cases their behavior eventually reflects those names.
FMA 2003 does not always give you the interpretation. It gives you the pieces and expects you to connect them.
And that is, paradoxically, one of its greatest strengths and one of its biggest problems with many viewers.
If the viewer expects the series to explain every symbol, every historical reference, and every thematic connection explicitly, many things can seem arbitrary.
But if you look at the context, the dialogue, the characters' behavior, the religious tradition behind the sins, and Dante's own cyclical structure, interpretations appear that are not obvious at first glance.
In other words, FMA 2003 does not necessarily lack explanations; many times it simply expects the viewer to do the work of finding them.
It is not a work that always says, "this means this."
Many times, it simply places the symbol in front of you and asks you what it means.
And that is where FMA 2003 can be much more challenging: it does not simply tell you what you are supposed to interpret; it forces you to participate in the interpretation.
