Been thinking a lot about how Edward Elric and Van Hohenheim are like if Vash the Stampede got split into two characters (who happen to be father and son).
Vash similarities to Ed:
- Blonde protagonist that wears a distinctive red coat. - has a brother, and a brother complex (Knives for Vash. Alphonse for Ed). - Has a prosthetic arm. Lost their arm in an incident that involved their brother. - Prosthetic was made by people who connect them back to their pasts (the surviving SEEDS colony for Vash. Winry for Ed). - deeply values their mother (figures) and mother figures in general (Rem and, in Trigun Stampede specifically, Luida for Vash. Trisha and Izumi for Ed). - they can be spastic morons that cause people to underestimate them, until they show they're scary competent in a fight. - staunch pacifists who refuse to kill even when it's deeply inconvenient. - Have a 'title' that is known by the general public (Humanoid Typhoon. Fullmetal Alchemist). - wanders the world trying to atone for a tragedy they blame themselves for (The destruction of the city of July for Vash. Human transmutation and its resulting fallout for Ed). Vash similarities to Hohenheim:
- Blonde men who stopped aging, are at least over a century old, and seem to be functionally immortal. - Said perceived immortality is dependent on an internal 'energy supply' that can eventually be depleted (Vash is literally a humanoid energy/matter generator. Hohenheim was turned into a living Philosopher's Stone). - lived through and remember time periods that most people have forgotten due to their extended lifespans. - have become men of myth and legend. - can slip into uncanny/inhuman behaviors that scare or worry the people around them and they've both been described as 'monsters'. - has an evil 'twin' who has a God Complex and is the Main Antagonist of the series (Knives for Vash. Father/The Dwarf for Hohenheim. Bonus points that their 'twin' is visually distinguished from them by having hair a lighter shade of blonde.) - is indirectly responsible for a historic disaster, that was primarily the fault of their 'twin', which obliterated a city in a single night (July for Vash. Xerxes for Hohenheim). - wanders the world trying to atone for a tragedy they blame themselves for (See above. Bonus points in that there is imagery of them both wandering aimlessly through a desert.) I don't think this even exhausts the list of similarities, but is what I could think of on the top of my head. Trigun predated FMA, for the record. I stress though that it does not take away the brilliance of the story that FMA told at all, since they ultimately are very different stories. But it wouldn't surprise me if Hiromu Arakawa drew some level of inspiration from Trigun. Especially since Arakawa seems to be a Trigun fan herself, given that she drew Vash for Yasuhiro Nightow once.
