Forum - View topicREVIEW: Fairy Tail GN 13
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CCSYueh
 Posts: 2707 Location: San Diego, CA |
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I've really been enjoying this series & in no way did I pick up filler on this. (Blackbird has just about moved over to drop, though. It needed to end 2 volumes back.) His crowd scenes are fun (Ussop a couple volumes back, for instance). Lucy's nowhere near as annoying as Nami. She's much sweeter than the Straw Hat Pirates' navigator. In fact, I really. really like Mashima's gals more often than not. I read a lot of yaoi to avoid horrid female portrayals (since they often don't even appear).
It was also cool we didn't have to jump through all the hoops Viz makes us jump through to get a signature. Unlike most other Japanese artists, Mashima posed for pictures & was very cool. (Actually, he was adorable & sweet. Kubo wasn't sweet & adorable & Del Rey & Viz are worlds apart). I wasn't reading Fairy Tail when he came out, but had to buy 2 volumes so I could get 2 tickets & what he said in the panel & how he behaved at the session boosted me into reading the title (I had planned to wait until finishing Rave Master). So we got some info on the villain of the last arc. We saw Natsu's dragon friend. We get to wonder why Natsu can't pass through a spell barrier meant to block people over a pretty old age or stone statues And that's filler? I'm pretty interested in the next volume. For shonen, FT is fairly high on the enjoyable list. That last Bleach(36? 35?) is treading water, but not FT 13. I thought it was pretty standard practice for there to be a "break" chapter in shonen between arcs & at least this one had to do with the Guild. Unlike those obligatory hot springs/beach eps they throw into anime. That was actually one of the more annoying aspects of Gestalt--that Koga thought she had to do a light chapter after a heavy one so it took entirely too long to progress. At a certain point these things NEED to end. Stretching it out is annoying. |
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Charred Knight
 Posts: 3085 |
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Fairy Tail has recently became one of my favorite manga, a terrific blend of comedy, action, and great characters so it's nice to see it get some recognition by having a large review to itself.
This volume is mainly about setting up the Fairy Tail Civil War arc, and integrating Gajeel, and Juvia into Fairy Tail so I don't expect this volume to get a lot of praise, and I think Rebecca nailed most of my thoughts on it. I will say that Mashima does an excellent job varying the character designs enough that I can easily tell whose who. |
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Scormio
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"Too many named characters"? I have to question why you're reviewing a shonen then
I'll admit, this isn't the most action packed Fairy Tail volume, but that's mainly 'cause it's just setting up the next arc. |
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Gasero
 Posts: 939 Location: USA |
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I agree, complaining about too many named characters in any action heavy shonen show is a waste of criticism, That's just how these things work. I watched Bleach for years and still didn't learn everyone's name (it certainly didn't help that most had a rank and a name). I wouldn't complain much about a transition like this in an anime, but in an action manga a volume dedicated to review and set up with nothing special happening would be disappointing. And don't even try to say defeated villains joining the heroes is special because that happens frequently. |
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Charred Knight
Posts: 3085 |
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I would complain that Bleach has too many characters because Kubo Tite simply keeps most of them in the background until they have a moment to shine, and then they return to the background. In Fairy Tail, you have the core team of Natsu, Lucy, Gray, Happy, and Erza, then you have a secondary group of recurring characters that also fight but are not main characters. They never drop out in importance, they just expand. You don't need to learn the background mages simply because they never become important. |
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ArsenicSteel
 Posts: 2370 |
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The never become important? Isn't this a volume or two before the guild brawl where the background mages get heavily focused on...
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Scormio
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Mhm. Basically what I was trying to say just without spoiling anything. |
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Princess_Irene
ANN Associate Editor
 Posts: 2655 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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Probably because I like shounen.  I have that complaint about a lot of titles, Bleach and One Piece included - and I really enjoy all three. In terms of writing - and I'm putting on my professor voice here, so I apologize for that - it is generally considered bad practice to have too many characters with names, as it signals that the characters are important. The general rule of thumb in creative writing classes/programs is to avoid superfluous characters because it can distract readers. So this may be my professional and academic background talking rather than my rabid manga reader background.
I have very high hopes for volume 14! (And I agree, CCSYueh, Black Bird needed to end a few volumes ago.) |
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Aara123
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I thought filler was non-canon stuff that they put in the fill the time for the original source material stuff to make progress....how can the manga, the original source material, have filler?
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Princess_Irene
ANN Associate Editor
Posts: 2655 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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"Filler' can also refer to not-the-main-plot sections of a story, where the author is trying to get from A to B but doesn't do so in a meaningful way. Since things like the beauty contest didn't feel like they advanced the plot (and I could be proven wrong in volume 14, at which point I will apologize), I called them filler.
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KabaKabaFruit
 Posts: 1901 Location: Winnipeg, Manitoba |
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There's no such thing as filler in manga because it comes from the author's own hand. Filler refers to something that is usually put in anime or other adaptations of the original work that was never part of the original work to begin with. If the author is choosing to stretch out the manga with self-contained stories or expanded battles, it's called padding.
Sorry, but I'm calling BS. If you're going to do a manga based on a guild, it's only common sense that everyone who is a member has to get their own equal billing for every arc. You can't just take your primary characters and have them be the front and center 90% of the time leaving the other members to pad out panels. It defeats the purpose of this manga and unfortunately, Mashima is either having a hard time realizing that or just doesn't give a you-know-what. |
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Charred Knight
Posts: 3085 |
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You would have a manga that has a rotating cast of a hundred characters. You wouldn't care about any members of the cast if it was written like that. The manga follows the adventures of one Team, that doesn't mean the other teams are not doing anything, we are just not following them. |
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Son-kun
Posts: 345 |
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While Mashima's art is derivative of Oda's, I think it's generally much cleaner and sharper. It's also the only Shounen manga that I can think of that has a strong roster and focus of female characters. Most of the time we're led to believe that Natsu's the main character, but it certainly never seems that way.
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CCSYueh
Posts: 2707 Location: San Diego, CA |
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I also have a hard time thinking of manga as "filler" though many refer to it as such so I comprehend the term. It seems easier to me to refer to the light chapters thrownin between arcs as "breaks" just as it's fairly accurate to call what many shonen titles do (new fight/different fighters) as treading water.
Son-kun is right. Natsu seems like the lead in theory, but it's Lucy. We started with her joining the guild & she is the focus of much of the tale. I like Natsu, but like Luffy, we see reaction to him rather than getting inside his head & seeing what he's thinking. |
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KabaKabaFruit
Posts: 1901 Location: Winnipeg, Manitoba |
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I still don't see why at least one or two of the other featured members of the guild can't get a chance to join the team in specific quests though. Sure, we already know that Natsu, Gray, and Erza compile the guild's strongest team but it doesn't mean the other members are chopped liver. The other guild members from their profiles look like they have plenty to deliver and it doesn't seem fair that they're being shoved into the background. Let them have a chance at some development too. |
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