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Reviewed by James Hanrahan Fairy Tail is a fun, simple shonen adventure. If you're the type who enjoys manga like "One Piece," "D.Gray-man," or "Rave Master," then this manga might also be for you. It's another world, a world of low mechanical technology, where aristocracy and magic users rule lands, and magical creatures roam the planet. Lucy, a girl versed in the use of "Celestial Magic," is on a quest to become a fully-fledged wizard and to join a mage guild. Joining a mage guild is the only way to really expand one's abilities, reputation, and income. Her personal quest causes her to meet Natsu, a young man with powerful fire magic and terrible motion sickness, and his flying, talking cat sidekick, Happy. Natsu is on a quest of his own, to find and re-unite with the giant dragon, Igneel, which raised him and taught him everything he knows about fire. When they uncover a plot by a criminal to use magic for piracy, Lucy also learns that Natsu is a member of the guild known as Fairy Tail. Fairy Tail stands out among the various magic-user guilds as a guild of reckless, powerful magic-users who cause a stir wherever they go. Fairy Tail members are the bad boys of magic among the guilds but, naturally, they all have a sad secret in their individual pasts. Well of course they do! This IS a modern shonen manga, right? The characters and action are over the top. There are evil dukes, renegade wizards, magical monsters, cute animal sidekicks, shapely girls, and brash heroes. Hiro Mashima builds a world and a system of mages and throws in special magic fighting moves and techniques. Some people might be a bit thrown off by Mashima's art style because he draws EXACTLY like Eiichiro Oda, the creator of "One Piece," One may read somewhere else on the internet that Mashima attributes this to the fact that, like Oda, he is a huge fan inspired by the work of DragonBall Z creator Akira Toriyama. One may also read elsewhere on the internet that Mashima is called one of the "Four Kings of Plagiarism" for swiping layouts from "One Piece" for his previous series "Rave Master," so there you go. Some closer reading of the two authors will show you that Mashima is not as talented a writer as Oda, but he's still a fun author. There are no huge surprises here, nor completely unforeseeable plot twists. If you have read a couple of shonen series, then you know how this is going to go. It's shonen manga by the numbers, but if you just let yourself go with it, it can be a lot of fun. I had to seriously ask myself if I really thought these two books were worth a good grade. There are so many shonen books out there now, after all. Was I just getting caught up with the simultaneous releases of volumes 1 and 2 on the same day combined with the fact that this is Del Rey's first release of a manga of this type? I think I did get caught up in the initial release, but what a pleasant surprise it was from Del Rey. That isn't going to matter a bit to anyone who buys them now; what will matter is if they are enjoyable, and they are. Interested in writing for MangaLife? We're always looking for talented reviewers and columnists, so drop us a line! Charles Webb Editor-in-Chief, MangaLife.com |
1 September 2010
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