I give the first 4 seasons a 8/10. Please note I am going to do a more in-depth review of this later. But if you want my thoughts for right now… I thought that the first 125 episodes were extremely enjoyable. I loved the chemistry amongst our four main heroes. I loved Natsu and how much of a positive role model he was. I understand that may annoy plenty of viewers, but given how dark and pessimistic life can be I found the main character’s determination and passion for his friends to be quite endearing. Erza is probably my favorite character. She’s hilarious and so badass at the same time. Grey while definitely a cliché character, was executed quite well and his sarcastic personality had excellent synergy with the rest of the cast. And his romantic banter with Juvia was adorable and hilarious. Even Lucy was likable. I understand that she at her core a fan service character… But I like that she was actually funny and had a surprisingly fun backstory. I liked how the first season really was her trial by fire and she sort of learn to become a member of fairy tail. And by the end of season four, you really feel like that she’s a part of this family have a guild and it’s quite heartwarming.
As for the first for a couple of arcs, I thought they were used surprisingly well in the action scenes that accompanied them were really fun. My personal favorite storylines were “The Phantom” arc, “The Tower of Heaven” arc, “The Edolas” arc and the “S-Class Trial” arc. I like these arcs quite a bit because they did a fantastic job of developing the main cast while also feeling distinct from one another. It kept things fresh and dynamic. Now I will stress that none of these storylines are mind blowing in terms of “excellent writing”… But they were extremely fun to watch. It definitely is a nice distraction from how dark and pessimistic the real world can be. Again I stress I am not going to spoil anything so I’m not going to go into specifics regarding any of these arcs. So you will just have to take my word for it.
Other thing worth mentioning was the surprisingly strong voice acting within the first 125 episodes. They had a lot of charm and charisma to the characters. It made the jokes land even harder then they otherwise would have. To illustrate this point, I actually tried reading the manga version…. And I found it not even remotely as enjoyable if only because the voice acting wasn’t present. That’s how much the voice acting enhance the show. I think the voice acting for Natsu, Ezra, and Lucy, and Juvia in particular was very good and will probably stick with me for a very long time.
Unfortunately, the rest of the show is an absolute dumpster fire and it breaks my heart to say that. Season 5 felt like a horrible video game plot. To avoid spoilers, I’m just gonna say that the entire plot was just a hunt for McGuffins. It also introduced a character (Michelle) into Lucy’s backstory that had no previous existence, and the way that that was interwoven with the preestablished history with the character was very tacked on and poorly executed. It also brought back a whole bunch of villains from past seasons for absolutely zero reason and their redesigns were about as bland and forgettable as you can imagine. Seriously, the design for the main villain of that season literally look like a rejected concept design from “kingdom hearts”. On top of that, even some of the conversations between Lucy and Michelle felt like generic dialogue between NPCs from some of the earlier Final Fantasy games (e.g I and III) rather than anything that was supposed to spark an emotional response from people.
Season 6 redefines the phase “missed-potential” and so disappointing that I could not even get past the halfway point. I’m trying to avoid giving spoilers but it’s gonna be a bit tough to explain this. Essentially, they wasted a villain that they were building up in the first half of that season. And the way that they were defeated it was incredibly contrived and it definitely crippled my enjoyment of the story. And also a lot of the fights especially in that second half were incredibly lame. An example would be when Erza had to defeat 100 monsters. The reason that this was such a lame segment in the story was because it was a task that was well within her capabilities… So the tension was practically nonexistent. And once again, the choreography was absolutely bland and forgettable. Even really even see her defeat the enemies really… It just happens through a very mediocre montage that fails to generate any sort of excitement. The only part of that season that I enjoyed was the opening song at the start of the first half… Which hits different not gonna lie!
Why am I giving fairytale an eight out of 10 on this website? I say that because each season of the show stands on its own. It’s not like say “Game of Thrones” or “Dexter” where one’s enjoyment hinges on how much they liked the ending. The beautiful thing about this series is that you can stop watching it any time and still get enjoyment out of it despite not loving every season. And given that the first four seasons are enjoyable regardless of how bad the later seasons are… I can separate the parts I like from the parts I cannot with no effort.
If I were to summarize the show as a whole I think my best analogy would be this:
Imagine if someone were to get on a stage and tell a joke that was surprisingly funny and clever. It gets an a large chuckle from the audience and everyone’s having a good time. Now that same person (rather than doing the sensible thing and quitting while he’s ahead) decides to explain why the joke is funny and tries desperately to upstage himself. Of course, he fails and the entire performance is ruined and everyone just leaves in awkward silence.
With this in mind, I would give the show as a whole a four out of 10 if I were to include the seasons I did not like into this assessment. But since each season stands on its own, I will just simply pretend that seasons five through nine don’t exist and just have all of the fond memories of the first four seasons remain with me.
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