Fairy Tail: Non In-Universe Questions
Was Anna?Was Zervis planned? Was Zeref always planned to be completely evil?So @ac-fairytail posted some Fairy Tail non in-universe questions (all credit goes to her) and I figured: “Maybe I could attempt to honestly answer these questions and reverse-engineer Mashima’s thought process!” Of course, no sane person would ever attempt this, but here I am, so...
WARNING: Spoilers for the entire Fairy Tail manga.
Did Mashima base Stardresses off of Bravely Default’s Conjurerclass? Or was it Dresspheres? Or both?
Never played Bravely Default or Final Fantasy X-2 (even though they’re on my list of games to play), but if I had to guess after a quick wiki search, it would be Dresspheres. Problem is that the Stardresses are far less interesting, balanced, or explained. Oh well; Mashima trying to replicate a franchise with the writing quality of Final Fantasy is like an ant poking a dinosaur with a stick.
Was he always planning the time travel plot? If so, why did Erik refer to second gen dragon slayers as a “new” generation? There haven’t been dragons for centuries.
Considering that the “dragons vanished seven years ago” plot-point was established at the beginning of the series and further cemented by Natsu meeting Gajeel, I’m guessing he was planning to include time travel once he decided to continue the series past Tower of Heaven.
As for Erik, I’m guessing that he just declared himself as second-gen because a) he heard about Natsu and Gajeel as traditional dragon slayers from the Fairy Tail-Phantom Lord war (which caused ripples across Fiore) and assumed himself to be superior because dragon lacrima were invented after the age of dragons, and b) he never heard of Sting or Rogue.
If Irene was always planned to be Queen of the Dragons, why did he barely integrate Dragnof Kingdom into anything? And why didn’t Acno realize?
I think that once Mashima created Irene’s concept, he tried to integrate her into the stories of the Dragon King Festival, but failed to create anything even remotely interesting or new, so he just quickly scrapped together a kingdom and called it a day. Yes, it’s infuriating.
As for Acno, well...he’s Acno. He don’t give two flying fucks about anything.
Was Natsu always planned to be END? Why is there no foreshadowing for it prior to the Tartaros arc?
When Zeref mentioned that Natsu specifically couldn’t kill him back in Tenrou, he was alluding to an ability that Natsu would gain in the future to beat Zeref. However, when Mashima realized that nakama bullshit wasn’t a valid ability (yeah, he went back on that in Alvarez, whatever), he solidified this ability in the form of END around Tartaros. So yeah, I would refer to Zeref’s line in Tenrou as “shot-in-the-dark” foreshadowing.
Was Zeref always planned to be completely evil? If so, why was he established as sympathetic in his introductory arc? Was this bad writing on Mashima’s end?
See, this is what really intrigued me about Zeref in Tenrou. He was established as sympathetic, but he couldn’t remain passive because that would kill people. He was FORCED to be malicious and completely evil if he ever came into contact with people until he could find someone that could kill him because that is the nature of his curse. For him, it was better to intentionally than unintentionally kill if the person or life were to die anyway. It’s why I really fell in love with him as an antagonist.
However, what is bad writing on Mashima’s end is how completely Zeref flipped to Ruthless Big Bad in Alvarez. Him being “excited” about his battle with Natsu is inexcusably inconsistent writing, and him gaining Fairy Heart just to rewrite time for his own selfish reasons should’ve activated his Death Magic on the spot because of his optimism towards a life where he won’t kill. Plus, his loss due to nakama bullshit.
Was Zervis planned?
As much as I hate to admit it, probably. The light and dark love relationship is about as cliche as you can get, and Mashima is certainly not one to dodge cliches or subvert tropes in his writing.
Was Anna?
Hell no. However, I did think that Layla was planned. When Hades was ranting about primordial magic to Team Natsu during Tenrou, Lucy, in thought, said, “I think I’ve heard of this primordial magic somewhere. Mom?” Even though Zeref had no interest in primordial magic (as proven in him killing Hades in anger), Eclipse and the Heartfilias did. Hence, I assumed that Layla would play a huge role in the final arc of the series. Boy, was I naive and optimistic.
Was Clear Heart made so OP because Mashima knew he’d fucked up managing Requip?
No. Because fanservice. Duh. Although, I did think that Clear Heart was perfectly balanced in her fight against Azuma, with her magic power bring directly converted to her Crimson Sakura blade. Any other use just feels unnecessary.
Why did Erza never use Nakagami Armour again? Too OP?
Mashima’s reason: huge audience backlash from its magic-breaking abilities and pulled-out-of-its-ass reveal. Erza’s reason: she..doesn’t want to use it because of its magic draining properties???
Why introduce the bunny armour?
The bunny armor isn’t the armor Mashima introduced that made me mad. The Seduction Armor is. Seriously, isn’t the whole point of seducing a man to take off clothes? Does that even make it armor? At least the bunny armor is cute and cosplay-ish, which fits with Erza’s happier, more playful side we see of her outside of fights; the Seduction Armor is just flat-out nonsensical.
Why did Mashima specifically want 12 Spriggans? There was apparently a reason for this, but Mashima never revealed what it was.
Originally, he wanted six and Zeref to be the seventh member, since Mashima is obsessed with the number seven. However, I think that he wanted to get a few character concepts out before he copped out of the series, and he had too many to just have six. Thus, he probably got up to nine or ten, but then he remembered that Tartaros and Avatar had the same amount of members, so he just said “fuck it” and moved the number to twelve. This would explain why Invel and Bloodman were shoehorned in with no original magic whatsoever; Mashima just threw them in to get the number to twelve.
Were Lisanna and Loke sidelined because they were threats to NaLu, or because Mashima couldn’t be bothered writing them?
Both. The first goes without explaining. However, I have theories on why Mashima didn’t bother to write either of them.
Lisanna: Mashima’s absurd obsession with redemption arcs, nakama bullshit, and fake-out deaths prove to me that he follows by the “heroes can’t die” code of writing, something which I hope no mature, aspiring writer follows. Thus, he brought Lisanna back into the story to follow this code and thought, “Maybe I could do something with her later.” Turns out he couldn’t think of anything when he was developing each new arc. The closest we ever came to Lisanna getting in the spotlight (besides that god-awful scene from Tartaros) was when Azuma “killed” Mira. Originally, as much as I like Mira, I would’ve loved to Lisanna fill in Mira’s shoes and dedicate herself to become a stronger person because of the death of her sister. But no, Mashima didn’t have the balls to really kill Mira and the Nalu shippers were clawing at his door, so she ended up as a void of nothingness.
Loke: Once his arc was done, Mashima wanted to develop the rest of the Zodiac Spirits. Not that he really did, but he didn’t want to single out Loke too much, as much as I like Lolu. However, Loke being the key that Lucy sacrificed rather than Aquarius would have worked a lot better in the grand sense of the narrative, and would’ve really hammered in a new dimension to Lucy’s potential character arc in Alvarez. So much failed potential, Mashima. So much.
Why did Mashima skip to having Mira being fine using her Satan Souls all of a sudden in the Tenrou arc?
Because since the cause of Mira’s initial stress and reluctance has been completely retconned by the narrative, she’s perfectly able to go all out again, guys! I mean, it’s not like real-life victims of PTSD still suffer for years and years on end even with achieving social and financial success, getting married, and having children, right? RIGHT!?
Seriously, fuck Mashima.
If Key of the Starry Skies and Eclipse Celestial Spirits are canon, why weren’t they just written into the manga?
Because Mashima didn’t care enough about these arcs; A-1 just pitched the filler arcs to him and said, “this is what we’re gonna do, kay?” and he was like, “Oh, these are cool. Canon.” He couldn’t be bothered to write them because he was ready to launch into GMG and Tartaros, respectively. Also, while Eclipse Celestial Spirits works well into the show’s canon, Key of the Starry Skies doesn’t. GMG was effective in setting up the future of the series after the timeskip and NEEDED to happen right after it (doesn’t make the arc necessarily good, though). Plus, the Neo Oracion Seis feels unnecessary since they canonically are released from prison in Tartaros.
Why completely change what Wendy’s capable of in the last arc? Possession? Really?
Problem is, though, her arc was finished the moment Doranbolt saved her and Carla from Face. Her facing Sherria proved that she is willing to fight for her guild regardless of her moral issues with fighting, her going Dragon Force proved that she has gained the experience to become a tactical and efficient fighter, and her resolve to be with Carla and protect the people she loves by choosing to die when Face is about to self-destruct solidifies her developing outgoingness with the new people that she loves. As a character, her arc was concluded before Alvarez began. In my opinion, she wasn’t capable of anything more in Alvarez.
As for the possession, it’s infuriating because of the pedophilia implications, not ruining Wendy as a character. I see possession as a tool for character growth only if the possessed person is able to grow in strength and become a stronger person to overcome the weakness that allowed them to become possessed. Take Aoi Zaizen from Yu-Gi-Oh VRAINS. I really hope that her upcoming character arc will be based around the possession that corrupted her in her very first on-screen duel and how she can overcome the weakness that the Knights of Hanoi exposed from her. Wendy’s possession...did not have that potential. Once Irene left her body, Wendy went right back to her fighting as usual and didn’t seem bothered by the possession. Why? Because her arc was finished and the show was nearing its end anyway. You can be mad about that, and I won’t blame you, but any further growth from Wendy would feel redundant in my opinion.
Was he planning on doing an arc about gods?
Yep. I have a theory that Avatar was supposed to be his “god” arc, but I’ll talk more about that later.
Was it really Ankhseram that cursed Zeref?
I...guess? Mashima never introduced him as a character, but I guess he can still exist. Makes Mashima a bad writer, but it doesn’t make Ankhseram invalid.
Why bring Rogue’s shadow back as a minor plot point in Avatar? He had no intention of addressing it in Alvarez.
Okay, in Mashima’s hardly-deserved defense, Alvarez would not have been the best time to discuss Rogue’s shadow; to me, Avatar was a good point to address it because it was our first full arc with Devil Slayer Gray. To me, it makes sense that Rogue’s shadow would possess him after the dragons emerge through the Eclipse Gate and Gray would become easily corrupted by Devil Slayer Magic without his friends for support (since they’re dead in the alternate timeline, though that raises the question of does Tartaros still exist there). There was really no better time to address it.
Did he give up after Tartaros?
Well, the anime gave up after GMG, that’s for sure. For Mashima, I’d say it was in the middle of writing Avatar. I think that he was planning on fleshing out Avatar as a cult, since their existence was the whole reason that Hades formed Grimoire Heart and “awakened” Zeref’s malicious heart. In addition, since they had enough influence to convince countless wizards that Zeref could be revived with keys and/or Towers of Heaven, they would have the influence to interact with gods and God Slayers. As a writer, Mashima could’ve killed two birds with one stone and be ready to tackle Zeref’s big final arc. What probably actually happened was him waking up after a drunken tirade and realizing that his series was being more and more ridiculed for its poor writing decisions, his fanbase was becoming one of the most toxic in all of anime, and he was just running out of ideas. He questioned every life choice he ever made, decided to trash the remainder of Fairy Tail just to start over with a new work, burned through the rest of Avatar, and threw Alvarez together haphazardly just to prevent himself thinking about potential endgames any longer.
Thank you again to @ac-fairytail for these questions. The channel’s all about Fairy Tail critique, analysis, and salt; go there if you’re interested in that stuff. It really pains me to see Fairy Tail crashing and burning towards the end, but for what it was worth, I enjoyed it. It’ll be harder for me to go back and enjoy it because of my investment in much better shonen manga, such as HxH, JoJo, and YYH, but it holds a lot of memories for teenage me, and I’ll certainly treasure them.
Also thanks to Mashima for teaching me what NOT to do as a screenwriter. Helps a lot.
