Listen, when I started watching Fairy Tail when I was very young and a big fan of fantasy and action anime. I also liked the series that were very long and had this ‘family kind of vibe‘ to them. Fairy Tail was exactly that and I did like watching it back then!
However, when I started re-watching the anime I asked myself: why did I like this? I’m not hating on the manga or anime because I still think that the art style of Hiro Mashima (the creator) improved a lot over the years and I still like some of the character designs but all in all the show was meh. It felt like there were a lot of filler episodes and whole arcs I did not really enjoy watching. For example, the whole traveling to an alternate dimension arc? You know, the one that put the spotlight on the flying cats. Didn’t really like that one. To me, Fairy Tail was this happy show with (too) many characters and nice little ideas but it was never really more than a nice adventure. I mean, it doesn’t have to be but I can see why people would drop the series after the first two arcs or even sooner than that. Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t drop the anime nor the manga because it feels nostalgic and I still hold it somewhat dear but I couldn’t defend it even if my life depended on it.
I don’t even mind the suddenly overpowered characters like Erza but some inconsistencies were just too apparent throughout the series. Especially, in the anime, the characters look different in the different frames. Lucy’s boobs change size in like every other shot and I believe that at some point (for the last season) they changed studios and the characters looked completely different from before. Natsu Dragneel, one of the main characters and a fire wizard is actually a pretty generic hero with his amazing powers and his good heart. He’s brave and while he often acts a little childish he cares deeply for his friends and guild members. I don’t mind his character all that much because while he may not be that different from most other hero characters I did like the way he acted a bit silly and didn’t just seem like the cool guy of the series. I also love that he has pink hair and was raised by a dragon.
Learning magic from a giant ass dragon? How cool is that?
In my opinion, Natsu’s pretty much the only one with an interesting background story and he was pretty much the only reason I wanted to finish the manga. I also enjoyed Natsu’s relationship with Lucy Heartfilia because it was both cute and funny. Their relationship was another reason for me to give this a chance because I liked how oblivious Natsu was and how much Lucy grew thanks to teaming up with him. Other than that, I felt like the story was being a bit repetitive and while I liked some arcs more than others I did not really feel like I needed to actively watch what was going on. I often used the show as background noise when I was doing something else and didn’t want to watch something I needed to pay much attention to. That in itself says a lot about the show though.
The character Lucy Heartfilia was another big problem for me because at the beginning of the series I did not like her at all. She felt like the kind of character the creator included merely for the purpose of fan service or as the potential love interest for the protagonist. But later on, my opinion of Lucy was heavily changed as we learn more about her history with her father and how lonely she felt as a child. She became more of an actual character who could fight and support her friends without needing to be saved and protected every single time. Sadly, she was still used for so much fan service, like showing her panties or her being completely naked and while I personally didn’t mind it that much it often felt a little too forced. It wasn’t funny nor was it unexpected. The same goes for some of the other female characters that were involved in a lot of fanservice. The characters are drawn very similarly and don’t look that different from each other. I think that Hiro Mashima did a better job of drawing them differently in his art books but I’ll make a separate post about that. All in all, when the characters aren’t colored or don’t have different hairstyles most of them are indistinguishable. My favorite female character was Mirajane because her demon forms looked so cool and she was so sweet but she didn’t play that big of a role. There were too many side characters I didn’t really care about and I wish that some of the designs were more sophisticated.
Everyone loves Happy…
This little blue cat is the main supportive character in the series and while I don’t hate him I never really liked him either. Honestly, he could be so annoying and as I recall it, his actions didn’t really matter all that much. He could fly and liked fish but that’s about it. I know that my opinion about him can be considered controversial because he seems so popular but I still can’t bring myself to love this character. I’ll just say it as it is; I don’t really like Happy all that much. Sorry! Usually, I love cats but the cat characters in Fairy Tail just weren’t for me and in addition, I didn’t like their designs at all. Except for Frosch because that cat was stupidly cute for some reason. Carla (the female white cat) I didn’t like at all and when she suddenly was able to transform into a human I was like really? It felt like Mashima just wanted to draw a neko girl character.
Despite everything, I think that Fairy Tail is a fun series and I still don’t think that it’s a bad manga or show but for a long time I feel like praised it too much simply because I was so much younger and didn’t really pay attention to the details. Actually, I did like some of the reveals we got to experience like Natsu’s past or Lucy’s relationship with her father and mother. I also liked how friendship and familial bonds were present throughout the story and like I said I liked seeing Natsu and Lucy interact. There were also some other characters I liked but the best thing about Fairy Tail was it’s charm. Some of the fight scenes were also pretty cool and I liked how all the characters used different kinds of magic. Lucy’s celestial magic was really cool and I enjoyed the idea a lot.
