that's a really nice reflexion post and i think that there are several elements that make sense.
But something just popped in my mind. U think that fma is a kind of alternative story , but what if fma occurs in the future ?
I mean the reason that in the preview of the 49 al mentions the 2 september 1916 maybe represents a key date in the britain history. I wonder that because i suddenly thought of the city under central, is it possible that this city was some kind of london attacked during the WWI , after all this city is pretty important , we know nothing about it yet .... Why is it located under central ? Why is it in some kind of black vortex ? Does the 2september 1916 represents some kind of history reset ?
Sorry if that doesnt make sense but i'm trying^^

Well I hate to say anything for sure unless it really is. FMA maybe in the future, in terms of "absolute" time as comapared to, but I doubt highly it is 'our' future like trigun or a host of others. It feels more Jin Roh though not that specific.

I think that city is a bit of london from whatever happened in 1916 which I think was in the past.

This FMA war might be something that had happened in WWI that was never recorded in the history books! Then again, maybe I'm talking nonsense. But I like the way they weave all these historical aspects into it.

This has nothing to do with the date that Al said at the end of ep 48 , what I think he is refering to is that Mustang's troops will be ambushed by the Furher (quite obvious).

About the city, what I think in here is that old city was full of people who were sacrifcied by Dante to make the first PStone (Where we see Hohenheim die and Dante attached his souls into the budler's body) and therefore the city is empty, leaving a Dante with the Pstone and trying to get immortality, so she get's the hell out of that empty city and stars looking for homunculi to get more of the philosopher stone. So she creates Bradley in order to organize the army into her favor and create more wars to sacrifice people , which so far it worked.

Sometimes the answer is quite simple XD. Maybe the date refers to what is going to happened to Mustang's troop but it doesnt need to mix both worlds , it uses it as a reference but I could be wrong.

For those of you interested in 02 September: This is what I found. (I'll admit it, I love doing research

Source: http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Zeppelin
"The first night-fighter victory came on September 2, 1916 when W. Leefe-Robinson shot down one of a sixteen strong raiding force over London. He won the Victoria Cross."

Source: http://www.firstworldwar.com/airwar/bombers_zeppelins.htm
"William Leefe-Robinson, flying a BE2c, was the first to shoot down a dirigible over Britain, on the 2nd of September, 1916. The massive fire of the burning airship was visible for over a hundred miles. This was during a raid of twelve naval airships which were, somewhat unusually, accompanied by four army airships. Leefe-Robinson became an instant hero. He survived the war, only to die a month later in the influenza epidemic."

Note that they mention the influenza epidemic. I think this is the "plague" refered to in FMA.

http://www.firstworldwar.com/atoz/influenza.htm
"In the summer of 1918 a severe form of influenza - 'Spanish Flu' or 'La Grippe' - broke out which eventually claimed up to 70 million lives around the world until it finally, unexpectedly, disappeared in 1919. In this the virus claimed far more lives than the war itself."

My personal (crazy?) theory is that the next episode will have a flashback in it featuring Hohenheim during the first world war (before the epidemic and so before he created the philosopher's stone). During this time he had a kid (Envy) whom we see in the preview.

Edit: Wait! I just realized something. Hohenheim switched bodies when he created the philosopher's stone, so my theory is flawed... Oh well... Try and try again

If thats Envy I will be really disappointed. Envy could look like Hoenheim/Ed but not identical to Ed...possibly Ed fights a Homunculus and during the battle his hair gets cut off.

Or maybe he cuts it off in a dramatic gesture. Anime characters have a habit of doing that.

Good post shrimpusmaximus weasel.

Alternate history sounds good. Perhaps the Germans were more successful in that raid in the FMA universe.

Eventually the secular "Fuhrer" took over and abolished Christianity. Hitler never rose to power, and the world's a rosey place.

Except "barbarians to the north"? The Irish? Remember those dudes Mustang and co. were sent to exterminate? Oh well.

I like EVA. I like FMA. they both end in A. yAy.

I had forgotten about the whole influenza thing. That would make an excellent plague. However there is two big issues with that. First plague actually means the black plague. Unless another word is attached thats it. Second there was mentioned and inquisition. NO inquisitions during WW1. The more I think about it though the less the london reference feels like a actual event. I think it is either a severe warping, ie not dirigibles but [blank], or a parable to events past. An interesting though unlikely possibility is that Hohenheim and dante created the Pstone in our world then passed into theirs along with a sizable chunk of london and chistianity. But thats kinds far out.

On the topic of Envy I really like the idea that his original form was that of Edward, though I'm unsure how that would have happened. Envy is eldest. Greed is voer 130 years old and Envy is older. Unless Hohenheim chages the appearance of his bodies to a baseline or was very very selective about his transfers he would have looked different back then. And since children are a product, physically at least of your body and thus random, there is a dual impossibility, first there no chance that Envy could have been created to look like Ed before ed was born, or that Hohenheim could have extrapolated what his son would look like in a body that wasn't yet born.

However there is one thing that might perk the Envy fans up. It is possible that, given hohenheims love of blond haired bodies, he created envy in one form, then after abandoning his used his powers to select the form of Trishas first child. She could have even not been aware of it. However given that Al looks like eds brother he would have done it to both which is kinda far fetched.

The conclusion, it is most likely an end of Scryed what things could have been like, or an end of Eva soul searching within a constructed environment.

Fun Fact: the Black Plague was the 'inspiration' for the fourth horseman, death. THe original four were Master of the Wild Beasts, war, famine and Pestilence/death. You can see why they cut the first horseman for pop culture. Sort of ruins the image.

Hi,

for the "mystic fair guy".

what about Russel Tringham?? The "fake ed" . He appeared in episode 48 so it´s much likely that he´s still around offering some help. And he looks nearly like Ed.
[img]https://fotoalbumdl.web.de/transfer/download/original/13718400/19867650/mystic1.jpg[/img]

[img]https://fotoalbumdl.web.de/transfer/download/original/13718401/19867650/russel1.jpg[/img]

[img]https://fotoalbumdl.web.de/transfer/download/original/13718402/19867650/russel2.jpg[/img]

If the images don´t work, u can find them at www.fotos.web.de/kab_76, just 2 images of russel and the "mystic fair guy" from the ep49 teaser

cheers
Kay