A little rant if you don't mind : Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood.
Please bear with me, it's just something I came up with after watching the show for the bazillionth time. (Also, sorry if my facts are wrong, or mistaken timeline etc).
You know. I just realised. This is a whole new level of realisation and probably Tumblr has reached it. But hear me out:
So , you know how Riza is actually a very beautiful lady. And Mustang is not only her "Colonel" but also a very dear person, as he trained under her father, Berthold Hawkeye, the Flame Alchemist. (hope that's his name).
Riza and Roy must have known each other for quite a longtime, before she actually met him in the Army during the Ishval Extermination, where they called upon the Alchemists to end the job.
So technically, till he actually sees her again, Roy is not in "love with Riza". In fact, it's just "Lust".
Flash forward the whole war, and she becomes his subordinate (he keeps her close so he can monitor her and so that no one gets close to her; a promise he makes to her father to protect her and a promise he makes to himself, that if he ever crosses a line, she'll keep him in check? Yeah, so he keeps her close.
Then they find Ed and Al, and a lot of things happen. He becomes more responsible; she makes him take up responsibility but also respects his decision. Slowly, he begins to understand what it feels like to actually *love* someone. He loves Riza Hawkeye, but can never be with her, because *he has a dream* and she has one too. So they keep quiet about it.
But when the realization actually strikes him, we see it in two places; his *lust for Hawkeye completely disappears* as he *burns it away* (symbolisms are a beauty that way, burning one of the seven deadly sins). That's the first time he feels that he loves her.
Flash forward more, Riza is mirroring her feelings when she tells Ed , *while he sips his coffee, that he's in love with Winry*. Mirroring her feelings, but loading a gun, cause she *too has work to do*, a country to protect. So she can't tell the Colonel how she feels yet. They all plan to take their lives (or pay the price for Ishval after this promised day, anyway).
The *second time* Colonel Mustang loses it is when she gets her throat cut by the doctor and lying on the floor, bleeding , waiting to be healed. He *fricking loses it* and is nearly considering reviving her using the Philosopher's stone. This coincides with *Wrath and Pride* appearing and forcing him to open the *Gate and encounter Truth.* (In Mustang's eyes, he's been *blinded* by the Truth thinking that the usual way he used to follow, to lead the country is the only way. Military Laws can be changed, and that's what he planned to do by *punishing himself*. That was what blinded him. But his *pride* got in the way of his true judgements and motivations - that is doing good to Ishval and its people as well as Amestris (and as he never paid attention to his personal goals, aka Hawkeye), his "wrath and pride" made him pay the ultimate Price of Blindness. A very ambitious man, being blinded. When Hawkeye finally gets revived, the first thing they do is stare at each other; finally coming to an understanding as to what they must do to make sure the life they'll lead forward is a balance, and not a repeat of how the Deadly Sins envisioned it to be.
So, Mustang overcame Pride, Wrath (even if he didn't defeat them) and also his Lust (definitely overcame that) to form and become the true leader of a world that was in Chaos. Beside him was the one lady who never questioned his Judgement but always gave him alternatives; which is why his last Enemy was *Envy*.
Apart from avenging Hughes's death, he had to also encounter envy to get rid of the self sacrificial thought that was in him, once the war was over that is. This came in the form of facing his " *beloved Lieutenant* ". Of course, Envy took his own life after encountering Scar and Ed. But Mustang came to one final conclusion, which was the biggest leap in the Mustang x Hawkeye relation: he stopped envying Hawkeye's ability to fight back and also be strong, and started looking at his subordinate as an equal and himself as a worthy friend to Hughes. Up until now, Mustang kept thinking Hawkeye would keep him in line if things went wrong, and she does keep him in line, but he also remembers that if she'd lose her life, he'd be lost without her anyway.
This is one of the best Analysis I've done about FMA and I'm so proud. 😭😭😭 (Also hope my facts are straight).
