It's Juli. Resident Wacom Witch. Feel free to message me anytime. No seriously, I have insomnia and I'm lonely. Please message me. (Warning I am a spotty tagger.)

Okay Okay Okay, I’ve been re-watching FMA and re-watching Brotherhood and I noticed some interesting stuff about Ed and Winry’s relationship in both series.

One of the major complaints I see leveled at the Original Anime is that Ed and Winry don’t get together and their relationship is more sibling-esque as opposed to romantic where in the Manga the relationship between Ed and Winry is one of the major plots.

However, after re-watching the 2003 anime, I don’t think that is necessarily the case.

Let’s start by pointing out an event that happens very early on in the 2003 series that is not in either the Manga or the 2009 series.

Winry and Edward are both kidnapped by a serial killer. Not only that but this event occurs during a very emotionally charged time period for Edward. Not only is it his first week in the military, but it’s only a day or two after Nina is murdered by Scar. If you’ve seen the episode you know Edward comes very close to dying and basically reacts the way any child would in the same situation. He begins panicking, losing his cool, and by the end of the episode he’s sobbing his eyes out, frightened by his own helplessness in such a dangerous situation. It’s a very good episode if you haven’t seen it, and if you want my opinion it gives better closure to Edward’s emotional turmoil over Nina than the manga.

What’s really interesting however, is the episode directly after this one. As a means of making it up to Winry, who granted was probably just as traumatized, Edward and Alphonse take her supply shopping, and it’s clear if your watching Winry is trying little antics to get Edward to cheer up some, or at least distract him. She picks out especially expensive materials, and makes comments directed at him “You’ll buy all of this for me, right Ed?” and yet Edward is hardly paying her any attention, in a very pointed way. He isn’t looking at her, he isn’t speaking to her, heck he’s willing to let her just go wild with his research funds and purchase whatever she wants no matter the price. And even with her intentionally trying to get his goat, there isn’t even one snarky little comment coming from his direction. Very un-Edward. You know something is wrong where Winry and Al are the one’s squabbling and Ed is the calm mediator.

But then let’s get into their relationship as young adults and not children and the events that go down later in the series. The biggest difference I think between the Manga and 2003 Anime, is that, where in the manga it is established Alphonse and Edward visit periodically and call every now and again, in the 2003 Anime, Edward severs all contact with Winry and Pinako for three years. No calls, no letters, no nothing, and he’s only forced to come back when his automail is completely ruined by Scar, suggesting Edward was going to lengths to repair his own auto-mail as a means of avoiding Winry. This is made even stranger when it’s established that before the incident with Barry the Chopper, not only was Winry visiting Edward, but Edward was also writing to her, something he did not do in the manga.

So when you look at it carefully, it appears as though after the Barry the Chopper incident, Edward was attempting to distance himself from Winry. Now why could that be?

Well think about it. He’d just witnessed the brutal murder of a young girl he was very close to, and directly after put his best friend in harm’s way and was unable to do anything to help her.

Edward in the 2003 Anime pushes Winry away as a means of protecting her. Oh and don’t think Winry isn’t aware of this fact either, as she makes it very clear time and time again she doesn’t enjoy getting the cold shoulder from Edward.

Let’s look at episode 17, House of the Waiting Family. The entire theme of this episode is Edward rejecting his home life and his family as a means of achieving his goal of returning Alphonse to his body. This basically boils down to Edward refusing to allow himself a normal life in order to restore Alphonse. This of course means rejecting Winry and Pinako as well, and denying that he has ties to them as a means of letting go of the things that hold him back. Winry and him argue semantics all throughout this episode, her asking him why he’s so against having a support network, him going on and on about why he burned down his house and all the things he has to do, but if you read between the lines, it’s very clear what else is being said. The two of them want a relationship, but Edward is putting it aside as both a means of keeping himself motivated to find Alphonse’s body, and as a means of keeping Winry safe and free of his baggage. At the end of the episode when Winry is seen waiting for him to return, flashing the light on the deck of the house, the message is made clear that she intends to wait for him.

And if you watch the series carefully, that is always the conflict between them. Winry wanting to be emotionally involved with Edward, and Edward pushing him away.

And to be honest, I kinda like it.

It’s not just Winry Edward does this to in the 2003 anime. Maria Ross, Mustang, and even Alphonse have their fair share of Edward shoving them away, and it makes sense that Edward would because he’s a tragic hero and the guy sucks at outsourcing and asking for help and accepting the fact that he may in fact need a little pat on the back once in a while.

That being said though, his feelings for Winry are so blatant I almost suspect the two of them might be partaking in romantic behavior off screen. The two of them don’t seem to be dancing around each other like they do in Brotherhood. For the most part they act like exes, awkwardly skirting around each other.

It’s also an aspect of their relationship that doesn’t seem to be present in Brotherhood that sort of upsets me, considering Winry is used against Edward three times before either of them get a clue. Give credit where credit is due guys, in the 2003 anime Winry is only used as a hostage once. By the end Dante can’t even put together that it’s Winry Edward loves, and instead mistakes it for Rose, so Ed did a damn good job keeping Winry and Pinako out of harm’s way.

The important thing to realize though at the end of the 2003 anime is that where Edward and Winry in Brotherhood are meant to be together, in the 2003 anime they are star-crossed. Their relationship is doomed the second Edward decides to join the military, and at the end where it’s established that Ed never comes back and Winry let’s him go, I don’t feel like it’s Winry getting the raw end of the deal, or the series being depressing, but I feel more refreshed, I suppose. Winry and Edward not getting together is just one of the things Edward subsequently loses in his attempt to bring back his mother. It’s not either of them being mean or self-centered, it’s just a bad set of circumstances. And sometimes that happens. Also it’s clear in the 2003 anime Edward’s role as the Martyr has drawbacks, and he’ll always pick his overall purpose over his own wants. So I think it’s good Winry let him go. It feels better than watching Edward, dressed in Hoenheim’s clothes, get on a train and promise to comeback, as such a motif is associated with disastrous results in the FMA world.

So even though I am and EdWin shipper til the end, I think the 2003 Anime gave the two of the all the romance and closure they could possibly have, in a smart and tragic way.