Fairy Tail

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The story is probably one of the best in terms of manga, simply because it does wrap up quite well with a satisfying conclusion and stays narratively consistent. But dear god the fanservice is atrocious, the editors clearly ended up just leaving the author to their own devices after the success of the manga because this stuff is atrocious. The fanservice begins as something somewhat understandable, given the targeted audience, but quickly devolves into completely unnecessary garbage that bends the rules of reality to force itself upon the story.

The story itself is fun and interesting enough to justify wasting a week on, but you ... can clearly tell which plot points were written and more thought out than others. That said, give the story a try. It didn't make it to 540 chapters for no good reason.

No Spoilers

If you have been immersed in the anime and manga community for around, let’s say a week, then you have at least heard the name Fairy Tail once or twice. One of the most divisive series in the entire medium, Fairy Tail has garnered a massive fan base that defends it to the last man and equally large legion of haters who will fight and die on their desire to see it burn in the fiery pits of hell. This ridiculous conflict between the fans and haters has created an extremely toxic environment surrounding the series, which severely discourages newcomers from even seeing why ... this has escalated to such a degree. For me, I am a bit more in the middle of the conflict. As a series, I appreciate what it did well, but I can’t just overlook the flaws either.

This manga is known for its extensive and awkward mix of childish storytelling and adult fanservice, which is one of the biggest points of contention. However, this was heavily exaggerated by the first anime adaptation, which censored most of the more violent scenes and somehow made the fanservice more in your face. The manga of Fairy Tail gives the reader a much greater sense of gravity to each situation, especially during the second half. At the same time however, this is contrasted by the lack of a specific story arc in the anime that covers important material related to events in the second half. While not a dealbreaker, it is certainly debilitating.

For starters, the story is a big dividing point in the fandom. The story moves at a considerably fast pace from the get go before slowing down around the halfway point. However, most of the story arcs are disconnected in the first half, usually for the purpose of introducing a new character or story beat for later. This brings up an interesting issue. Hiro Mashima wrote the story for Fairy Tail on a week-by-week basis. He would get ideas when out drinking with his friends and try to incorporate them into the greater story. The only thing he had preplanned was the backstory of Natsu, the main protagonist, while everything else was just added as the series went on. Fairy Tail was never meant to run for as long as it did, which is likely the reason for its incredibly odd pacing and story writing, especially with how some plot points are either introduced and fade into obscurity, or are barely foreshadowed at all until their execution.

Despite this, the strong points of the story stand tall with fantastic highlights that carve out an interesting identity for Fairy Tail. The first half is far more geared toward the adventure theme of the series, while the second half takes a more focused approach around the evolving narrative. While some pieces of the story are relatively predictable, whenever it takes a sharp turn it does so in an unexpected manner that adds a more flare and interest to the growing story. The most interesting stretch is by far the middle section, which brings together all the different moving parts of the story into what feels like a well oiled machine with how it is executed. Unfortunately, it doesn’t keep momentum into the final stretch, but the upswings are a blast.

One of the biggest complaints about Fairy Tail is the lack of character development, which is just a completely false statement. Most of the cast gets substantial development throughout the story, but Mashima’s own fear of killing off the wrong character and relying on the power of friendship archetype gives a bad impression and execution in places. Still, the characters are an interesting bunch that bring together all sorts of emotions and styles, with a crazy amount of different designs that reflect their personalities well.

The Fairy Tail guild serve as our main heroes with Natsu taking the role of protagonist. Natus as a protagonist is not one of my favorites, but he is serviceable. He has strong ideals and a basic, but well defined power set with some added quirks that give him more personal depth. Still, most of Natsu’s development in the first half is extremely subtle beyond some clearly big moments, and it is difficult to wade through his over-energetic personality sometimes. Lucy is initially a damsel in distress who gets more competent and relevant with each story arc. She can be a bit disappointing, but when she shines it is certainly entertaining and heartwarming. Gray is my personal favorite character with his interesting story and hilarious dichotomy with Natsu. Erza is called the queen for more than just one good reason, and Wendy is precious and must be protected at all costs.

The supporting cast is separated into major and minor characters. Most major characters are the other members of the Fairy Tail guild with some others from different groups or locations. A pretty good chunk of the supporting cast get strong development of their own, however their personal stories become more disconnected from the main story after around the halfway point. Despite this, most of the characters still are heavily involved in most of the story arcs. Each of the major characters feel like more than just a simple side character, oftentimes having moments in the peak of the story that enhance the already emotional highlights. Emotions are the focus here, and while the story itself doesn’t always work with the characters, the resonance of each personal journey they experience still hits home more often than not. While you won’t be seeing many of these characters dying throughout the story, it is important to note that the scarcity of character death enhances the few times in which it does happen. This works both to the series benefit and detriment depending on the scene at hand.

The antagonists are a mixed bag that feels like both an incredible accomplishment and heap of wasted potential. The main antagonist of the story is one of the few pieces of the story planned from start to finish, and is executed especially well throughout the series with an impact in almost every major story arc, to the point where I would argue that regardless of the series quality as a whole, they should be regarded as one of the best villains in shonen. Despite most of the other antagonists not being planned throughout the manga, a multitude of which are brought into the fold early on to become major players throughout the rest of Fairy Tail’s run in a positive way. At the same time, this cannot be said for one of the primary overarching villains. This is a character that lasts until the end of the story, and while his status and strength create a strict and constant power ceiling to measure other characters against, he is very one-dimensional personality wise, and by the time we understand why it is too little too late, at least for me. Some other villains that feel like they could become major players in the story turn out to be less impactful than previously thought, which is a pretty big letdown.

Another major complaint of Fairy Tail is that a large number of the story’s villains end up turning over a new leaf, which diminishes the gravity of both their actions and quality as an enemy. This is actually not as big of a problem as the fandom has made it out to be, mainly because of how villains that do end up turning good are given a proper story-basis for their morality change, or have been influenced by the protagonists to a degree that it feels reasonable or at least acceptable character-wise. To compensate for this, there is still a plethora of villains that remain evil to the core from start to finish, specifically in the second half. Even with the large emphasis on the ‘Power of Friendship’ archetype that Fairy Tail is famous/infamous for, the second half of the story brings out those that are as disconnected from that concept as possible to contrast them against our heroes and their own values, or sometimes the way it has been twisted into something of their perspective on the archetype.

The action is one of the consistently strong points of the series that never really drops in terms of quality in the manga. Complemented by Mashima’s own fantastic talent and skills with drawing, the action is presented with beautiful panels that show a strong understanding of the page and two-dimensional space. Combined with the manga’s willingness to showcase the gore of a scene and the spectacular art, the fights always feel properly grandiose in execution. The magic system and each character's individual powers are all taken into consideration for the large majority of the bouts, especially the fights with a heavier focus on tactics and outsmarting opponents. Despite a consistent weekly serialization, the quality of the art and action never seems to drop and is one of the few aspects of Fairy Tail that remains consistently fantastic from start to finish, although it would be more than a stretch to say there aren’t some… controversial choices on Mashima’s part for the way some fights end, but that is more up to the individual reader to decide.

This has been a fairly mixed review overall, which is pretty much how I feel the series is meant to be seen by each individual person. The highs of Fairy Tail are immensely high, but the lows are some of the lowest in the shonen genre. It is a mix of good and bad that leaves more up to the reader than some might find comfortable. It really depends on whether you think that the positives outway the negatives or the other way around. While my personal rating for this series is an 8, that is my own biased opinion, and as such, I don’t feel comfortable rating the series quality that high when the ending is such a controversial one. Instead, I will give it a relatively middle ground, but somewhat more positive rating due to the series having one of the best antagonists in shonen manga, a lovable (and sometimes infuriating) cast of characters, and some story arcs and action scenes that stand tall in terms of both quality and visual value despite all of these problems that the series suffers from. Anything else is your own conclusion.

Do you want to read a manga filled with adventure? With likable characters whose antics make you laugh? With constantly building stakes in a well-established world, and moments that bring tears to your eyes? Want a "little" fanservice to go with it? In that case, may I direct you to One Piece, written by Eiichiro Oda.

In all seriousness, a lot of elements in Hiro Mashima's Fairy Tail can be found in One Piece, and a lot of it is done much better in the world of pirates. However, I won't deny that there are reasons to like Fairy Tail.

For one, the first few arcs are ... pretty good. They all have relatively low stakes as Natsu, Lucy, Happy, and the others all go on missions together, usually resulting in hijinks, Lucy in a revealing outfit, and Natsu finishing off the antagonist with a speech about how much Fairy Tail means to him and the others. It all culminates in an arc called the "Battle of Fairy Tail," which was built up pretty well and ends with a pretty emotional moment. That is where the series peaked, and I wish it had either wrapped up there or ended soon after. Also, the very last chapter was pretty nice, and I honestly felt a little tug at the heartstrings at the last panel, something that didn't happen to me for other long series that I ultimately enjoyed more.

The art is also pretty good. This is clearly not Hiro Mashima's first manga, and that is reflected in the consistency from the first chapter to the last. As much as I like seeing how the art in a series evolves, which is very obvious in series like One Piece, Bleach, and even the legendary Berserk, I won't discredit Fairy Tail for having good designs and style and sticking with them to the end. (I know that they all got better just because of the improvement of the artists' skills over the passage of time, but still, there's a clear difference between how Guts looks in volume 1 of Berserk and how he looks in volume 41.)

Finally, I don't hate any of the main characters. Natsu, Lucy, Happy, Gray, Erza, Makarov, and those not present from the very beginning, they're all fine. I find that a lot of negative reviews tend to hate on every single character except maybe one, but I never got to the point of hating any of them. I just got tired after a while.

That tired sense comes from a lot of repetition and the latter half--actually, latter two thirds--mostly being a mess. First of all, the Edolas arc sucks. It was the first point where I realized just how rushed a lot of the arcs could be, since this concept of an alternate world gets introduced and finished in the span of three volumes, including meeting all the alternate versions of the characters, discovering secrets about some of them, and stopping a world-ending catastrophe. And after that world-ending catastrophe, the stakes never seem to go back down. Except for a single-volume adventure that helps set up the longer arc following it, just about every conflict afterwards feels the need to be about the end of the world. I'll admit, I read the series in broken chunks during school breaks, so there might be an arc that I'm misremembering. But the last three big arcs were all about how Fairy Tail's members had to stop an evil wizard or group from destroying Fiore. The earlier arcs all had stakes too, but they were all more personal, such as a conflict with Lucy's family early on. And while there are similar ties throughout, none of them worked as well as those earlier stakes.

I mentioned earlier that the main characters were fine. However, while I like plenty of the side characters and some of the villains, there are plenty of them who get on my nerves. The final big bad was annoying, none of the villains felt as much of a threat as they did in the beginning, and several Fairy Tail members and members of other guilds were pretty one-note and their gimmicks got old fast. Some of them I came around to, such as a cat named Fro, but there were plenty who were the opposite. The biggest stinker in this regard is Mystogan, a masked figure who is one of Fairy Tail's strongest members. I'm a big fan of the strong silent types, especially when they remain shrouded in mystery for most of the story. Sadly, Mystogan was not shrouded in mystery for long, and that is all I'll say in case you still want to read it. And there were plenty of others who had plot twists that ranged from head-scratching to book-throwing. (IMPORTANT NOTE: I did not throw any books.)

Finally, a somewhat big complaint of mine that came later on is that a lot of elements feel derivative of the Big Three, especially One Piece. I should note: I am not hating just because it seems like Mashima was inspired by them, or because the events show up as a coincidence. I firmly believe that an artist has every right to draw from or reference a work of art that they love. And it's not that specific plot points were copied-and-pasted from one of them, it's just the general vibe of the story reminded me a lot of them. Maybe that's just because they're all shounen series from roughly the same era, but I could never get it out of my head. I won't name specific things, since this is a spoiler-free review, but many character abilities and moments made me stop and think, "Hey, didn't I read this somewhere else?" I name One Piece in particular because it feels like Mashima is trying to take elements from earlier in the story and rework them in at later points, much like a lot of past elements in One Piece come back in a different manner. However, whether by a plan or a last-minute decision, it rarely works in Fairy Tail, whereas it rarely fails in One Piece. That, and there is a lot of fanservice in both series.

I didn't want to make this review a long rant, but one thing I do want to rant about is the levels of fanservice in Fairy Tail, because there was so much of it that I sometimes felt like dropping the series for that sole reason. While plenty of anime have moments where female characters will lose clothing or be put in suggestive positions, Fairy Tail takes it up to eleven. So many times, Lucy will be shown in the shower or bath, or get attacked by an enemy who ends up removing her clothes, and almost always her... uh... assets will be drawn front and center. One panel that sticks out in my mind (not for those reasons) is when the group is at an open-air bath, and with the exception of a few leaves on the water, you can see everything. And this also applies to just about any female character who has some relevance during the current arc. Even Wendy, who is basically a loli, gets depicted in a moment with... uh... curves. (Again, looking at you Edolas arc). I know a lot of people complain about the way Oda draws women, but honestly, the fanservice in One Piece feels a lot less egregious. Sure, Nami and Robin have literal hourglass figures, and there are plenty of moments where they're in the bath or a swimsuit, but they're rarely the foremost thing on the page. Meanwhile, Fairy Tail forces it so much, I'm surprised there are no panels where Lucy or Erza is pressing their butts against the frame like they're mooning someone out a window.

All things considered, I do not recommend reading Fairy Tail. So much fanservice, and the plot gets bad beyond a certain point. If you want to read a super long shounen series, then as I said in the beginning and alluded to in basically every paragraph, read One Piece. If the thousand-plus chapters and the fact that it's still going intimidate you, read Bleach or Naruto. If those are still too long, then look elsewhere. Sorry, I just haven't read anything beyond the 500-chapter point besides these four. But if you're insistent on experiencing Fairy Tail, then I recommend you watch it. I was listening to some of the music while writing this, and it's an absolute banger of a soundtrack.