(L) Fairy Tail Manga Discussion Thread

[Krono]

Originally Posted by felix

I have to admit... that was pretty damn funny. And yeah, as sad as it is, it's all TRUE! (well the analysis part, synopsis is kind of wrong)

Judging by the transcript, if by "kinda wrong", you mean "they obviously need to be spoon fed the plot and the dialogue before they'll get it right, and that isn't happening right now" then yeah. I give them some leeway since I suppose they were trying to be funny, but when the things you're mocking are your own ab libbed in dialogue and reasons, it kinda kills the humor and just makes them look stupid.

[Charred Knight]

Originally Posted by Krono

Judging by the transcript, if by "kinda wrong", you mean "they obviously need to be spoon fed the plot and the dialogue before they'll get it right, and that isn't happening right now" then yeah. I give them some leeway since I suppose they were trying to be funny, but when the things you're mocking are your own ab libbed in dialogue and reasons, it kinda kills the humor and just makes them look stupid.

There's a reason why JesuOtaku is the only TGWTG reviewer I still watch since she actually comes off as a person who enjoys what she reviews. She's not trying to make jokes at the sacrifice of making a coherent argument.

Is the ending a deus ex machina? No, the "deus ex machina" he keeps referring to is the fact that the island is holy ground for Fairy Tail which was stated right off the bat.

[felix]

As far as the "the guy doen't know the plot too wel" yeah, but that does make it interesting; since it's a valid way of interpreting, and it's not like the plot was too overly explicit.

Originally Posted by Charred Knight

There's a reason why JesuOtaku is the only TGWTG reviewer I still watch since she actually comes off as a person who enjoys what she reviews. She's not trying to make jokes at the sacrifice of making a coherent argument.

I don't suppose, she's also the only female reviewer or something? since usually I think everyone likes the people who can crack a joke while making a point rather then the uptight people who are like some review making assembly line.

Originally Posted by Charred Knight

Is the ending a deus ex machina? No, the "deus ex machina" he keeps referring to is the fact that the island is holy ground for Fairy Tail which was stated right off the bat.

The guy didn't really say anything about that being a deus ex machina. He said the little angel hair girl was one, which even if she is the first master, she's still a deus ex machina pretty much. Not that deus ex machinas are necessarily bad or anything (outside of endings).

You then have all the other deus ex machinas:

• Kana's power
• Zeref killing Crow-what's-his-name
• Clockboy saving Wendy
• Laxus teleporting from a desert to where they are
• Natsu friendship power stunt
• The heart and how our little boss is weak as hell with out it; I mean lets face it Markov and Gildarts could take them all on with no problem

[Shuuda]

Zeref killing Crow-what's-his-name

Wasn't it all ready established, at the beginning of the arc, that Zeref had a magical death aura? So that's not really a deus ex-machina, it was him using a power we knew he already had. Honestly, you people complain that no one dies, and when someone finally does you label it, inaccurately I might add, with another flaw.

Laxus teleporting from a desert to where they are

It was already hinted that Laxus might appear on the island long before he actually did, and we have no real idea of how far away he was from the island.

Natsu friendship power stunt

It's corny, but hardly out of left field. If you don't already expect this kind of thing in this genre, then you have very bad memory.

Just felt like putting you straight on a couple of those.

[Charred Knight]

Originally Posted by felix

As far as the "the guy doen't know the plot too wel" yeah, but that does make it interesting; since it's a valid way of interpreting, and it's not like the plot was too overly explicit.

I don't suppose, she's also the only female reviewer or something? since usually I think everyone likes the people who can crack a joke while making a point rather then the uptight people who are like some review making assembly line.

The guy didn't really say anything about that being a deus ex machina. He said the little angel hair girl was one, which even if she is the first master, she's still a deus ex machina pretty much. Not that deus ex machinas are necessarily bad or anything (outside of endings).

You then have all the other deus ex machinas:

• Kana's power
• Zeref killing Crow-what's-his-name
• Clockboy saving Wendy
• Laxus teleporting from a desert to where they are
• Natsu friendship power stunt
• The heart and how our little boss is weak as hell with out it; I mean lets face it Markov and Gildarts could take them all on with no problem

There are plenty of female reviewers on TGWTG.

Fairy Glitter's purpose has yet to be revealed but it seems more like foreshadowing the end of the arc. If Mavis is the little girl who saves the party than she will most likely use Fairy Glitter.
Zeref doesn't seem like the kind of guy that would like Zancrow so when he woke up he killed him.
Wendy being saved is true
Laxus showing off a new ability is common in shonen series
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph...ThePlotDemands
Friendship power is common in shonen
Hades weakness isn't that bad and I really enjoyed that the cats are having more activity in the past few arcs.

While I don't think the Tenrou arc is the best arc (edoras is) I don't see how they can claim that Mashima can't end arcs.

[haegar]

bluenote already explained what glitter does... mashima just forgot about it or felt Kana aint ready for it yet - maybe miss angel mavis is gonna give her extra lessons so she can use it after the timepskip... I am more interested if that angel/mavis/woman/whoever might bestow the third FT magic ... I wonder what that is ...

[felix]

Originally Posted by Charred Knight

While I don't think the Tenrou arc is the best arc (edoras is) I don't see how they can claim that Mashima can't end arcs.

I don't fully agree either, but the point that fairy tail has these very anti-climatic cheezy arc endings way too often kind of rings true.

I mean I don't pretend to know how to properly end an arc, but the endings on some arcs so far even otherwise good arcs, were kind of left wanting...

[Casshern]

Tbh I love all the arc endings so far. A few stand out as my favs, such as the phantom arc with Makarov's epic roflstomp over Jose, the Tower of Heaven with Erza's ceremonial farewell, the Oracion Seis arc with the disbanding of Caitshelter, and the Laxus arc with the FT parade in the end. Probably my favorite arc so far was the latest one; awesome fights, mega-powerful wizards, lost magics, Zeref, Acnologia and especially Gildarts, Hades and Makarov going all out. I wasn't too fond of the Edolas ending, or even the entire arc for that matter. The villains didn't appeal to me, I thought the dragon-mecha was kind of lame, and Natsu's "ceremonial" farewell paled compared to Erza's; but it did have the funniest climax with Natsu becoming Dragneel daimao.

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

[immblueversion]

Originally Posted by Casshern

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

I read it because everyone in it is just so damn fun to watch, generic character archetypes or not.

[felix]

Originally Posted by Casshern

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

Because I'm a sucker for stories with dragons and guilds.

(and of course because I like the artstyle and setting overall)

[Randrak42]

Originally Posted by Casshern

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

Because Erza

That is all

[Keroko]

Originally Posted by Casshern

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

I'm reading this for the dragons, the magic and Erza, the girl who kicks ass with swords that aren't katana. I also enjoy the cheese. Is it corny? Yes. But I hear corn and cheese can be a delicious combination.

I enjoy Fairy Tail. And that's all I need to keep reading.

[creb]

Finally caught up on the last few chapters. LoL @ time skip. That's got to be the first time in the entire manga I went "wtf". So the main cast most likely teleported. Probably through time. Or to another dimension. They'll either pop up now seven years later, (but seemingly instantly to them), or they're stuck somewhere and we'll be introduced to new Fairy Tail members who will spend the next umpteen chapters on a quest to find them. The other possibility that they actually died...yea right. No one dies. This is Fairy Tail.

Hoping for the first choice. I think the main cast is big enough, and don't really want to have to try to absorb a bunch of new faces. But, I can see the temptation as a manga artist to throw in a whole bunch of new characters, so won't be entirely surprised if it's actually choice number two.

And, yea. I don't think there are many reading this as high literature (I'm sure there are some young children who simply don't know any better ). But, for anyone over twelve, I have to believe it's definitely for the cheese, and this timeskip is the best cheese it's done yet, imo.

[haegar]

just as an aside, stuff doesn't have to be "high lit" just to NOT pull a lame asspull plot stunt every second corner every arc though generally, yeah, point taken. Cheese ftw

[Kafriel]

I think some people's expectations for this series are somewhat unreasonable. Everything about this manga, from the characters, the themes and fights, is uber-generic. If you're not reading it for the cheese then I'm not sure what you're reading it for.

Since we're at it, I clearly remember reading FT for the guild system, was really expecting all kinds of guild jobs and dark guild subplots connecting to a rotten council and a scheme to rule the world...how far from the truth that was Still, shortly after, I read RAVE and realized that Mashima's got an appealing way of telling a story, so I'm sticking with his works till they're over.

Sooo...are we getting a chapter this week?

[Casshern]

Originally Posted by haegar

just as an aside, stuff doesn't have to be "high lit" just to NOT pull a lame asspull plot stunt every second corner every arc though generally, yeah, point taken. Cheese ftw

I don't consider any of the events that people called asspulls as such. Every time Natsu defeats a boss people call asspull; but they also forget that even Makarov, who is the strongest guildmaster shown so far other than Hades, was defeated and nearly killed by Aria. Also Aria was wiping the floor with Natsu afterwards. Then the very same Aria was one-shot by Erza.

Natsu shouldn't have been able to beat Zero, but Jellal's powerup was severely underestimated. Jellal isn't just some nobody, he's one of the most powerful mages we've seen in his own right. And Zero wasn't a particularly powerful guildmaster himself. IIRC as Brain he was even frightened by Jellal.

No matter how many powerups Natsu had, he wouldn't have been able to defeat Hades. It's only because the cats destroyed Hades' heart. Some complained because there was nobody strong protecting it, but all the strong members were already defeated. Not to mention the cats had Lilly with them, who is on par with Gajeel in full-size form. Hades obtained immeasurable power in exchange for accepting a major weakness. It was contrived to have Natsu beat him but not so much as to be an asspull imo. Even Gildarts I'm sure would've had trouble, and probably fail to defeat Hades. He lost to Natsu because he lost his source of power, not because of any powerups that Natsu had, which didn't even leave a scratch on him.

Erza beating Azuma was also criticized, but no one else so far has been shown to have Erza's resilience. She took the Jupiter canon head on, as well as most of Laxus' thunder palace. If anything is certain it's that Erza keeps coming back over and over no matter how many times she gets blasted.

It's just the way things happen in FT. There's rock-paper-scissors but it doesn't work all the time, there are power-levels but they aren't absolute, and importantly a lucky shot or an ambush can make all the difference (like Aria vs Makarov and especially Natsu vs Cobra). Even Zeref was beaten by Ultear and after the explanation he gave it's still no more or less of an asspull than Natsu beating the other bosses. It would have been more of an asspull if Gildarts or Laxus roflstomped Hades on their own like some people wanted.

The only asspull so far imo was Lucy summoning all her spirits at once, but only a small fuss was made about that.

Originally Posted by Kafriel

Since we're at it, I clearly remember reading FT for the guild system, was really expecting all kinds of guild jobs and dark guild subplots connecting to a rotten council and a scheme to rule the world...how far from the truth that was Still, shortly after, I read RAVE and realized that Mashima's got an appealing way of telling a story, so I'm sticking with his works till they're over.

Sooo...are we getting a chapter this week?

When the manga pilot came out I personally thought the whole guild concept was kind of lame. It was only after I realised that this is actually epic-cheesecake-fest that I really got into it.

[Keroko]

Originally Posted by Casshern

The only asspull so far imo was Lucy summoning all her spirits at once, but only a small fuss was made about that.

Plus she only did it for several seconds tops and immediately collapsed afterwards. We learned later during the Nirvana arc that summoning multiple spirits is possible, but takes a powerful mage, so that scene during the Loke arc was a scene to show Lucy potential.

[immblueversion]

And let's not forget when Natsu ate Laxus's lightning. It was stated in chapter 106 that Natsu had eaten Laxus's lightning once before during one of their fights, but was defeated before he could even do anything. They even said that Natsu fell ill because he ate magic other than fire. So by the time Natsu accepted Laxus's lightning to use against Hades, it was an established fact that Natsu can eat any individual magic other than fire (but not without a price), and the only real thing that no one knew would happen was the lightning power-up. Other than forgetting or overlooking this detail, there was no excuse to complain about Natsu eating something other than fire, or what aftereffects would occur.

[felix]

Originally Posted by Casshern

I don't consider any of the events that people called asspulls as such.

It's first impressions that matter though. If a lot of people thought it was an asspull that's what it gets labeled as. Since reading comes before discussion. As far as arguing against, sure, but you could argue anything is good or bad really. Just showing a "good" side doesn't actually kill the bad side, or change the fact for some of us that when we read it we felt it was crappy—speaking in general, not this particular chapter.

[Keroko]

So they call the foreshadowing or the events that already have been foreshadowed asspulls. I'm hesitant to lay all blame on the author on this, considering in some cases it's just readers leaping to conclusions or outright ignoring events that foreshadowed things. Just like with Natsu eating lightning, people were up in arms about it, completely ignoring that we were already told Natsu did so before.

It's a funny case of hypocrisy. On one hand people expect a deep story out of Fairy Tail, and complain when it becomes cheesy and predictable. Yet, on the other hand, the small bits forshadowing and more complex storytelling this manga has gets either ignored or forgotten and often called an asspull as a result.