The recent story line in the manga had a one year jump between chapters 417 and 418. The anime reached chapter 417 in the second series at episode 90, and they tossed in "Fairy Tail Zero" (which is anime original) beginning with episode 91.

Well, that ran ten episodes, and episode 101 picks back up again with manga chapter 418. And just to get us back in the rhythm of the series, they gave us some Lucy fan service.

Even when she's wearing street clothes, Lucy is nice to look at. One thing I like about Lucy as a character is that she's beautiful, she knows she's beautiful, and she likes being beautiful. She knows how she affects men and likes it, and she's not above using it to manipulate them.

But being beautiful isn't the core of her ego. What she likes most about herself is that she's a powerful and competent mage with a substantial record of accomplishments already to her credit, even though she's only about 18. She doesn't expect to make it through life by marrying a rich man and being a trophy wife, though she could have done exactly that. She wants to work and make it on her own, and she does so. She also knows she has room to improve, and during this one-year skip she trains constantly and gets a lot more powerful.

Her mother died when Lucy was small, and her father has also died, and he managed to squander the family fortune through risky investments and didn't leave her anything -- so she's on her own. She grew up a rich girl and thus got an excellent education, and in addition to being beautiful she's also very intelligent. Jason at Weekly Sorceror scouted her to be a regular underwear model (second picture up there) during the recent one-year skip, and she did it, and she's good at it. But she also talks him into hiring her as an assistant reporter and writer, and she works hard at it and gets pretty good.

And her knowledge of magic, which hugely surpasses anything Jason knows, turns out to be an asset to him. By episode 101 she's become very useful to him, and not just because he appreciates spending time with a world-class beauty. She's making her way, earning her living, and doing it well.

And that should make her a feminist icon, but of course it doesn't.

All the women in Fairy Tail are like that. They're all gorgeous but they're also all accomplished, equal to the men in Fairy Tail in all ways that are important. (No one tells Erza "Make me a sandwich" because she'd filet them.)

There's no glass ceiling. Erza is S-class, and there are only two others in the guild. At one point Makarov is missing and Erza gets selected to be the new guildmaster. (And the guild was founded by Mavis, who was the first guildmaster.) Fairy Tail is what SJW's say they want in life and in fiction (and games), but I'm sure that if an SJW looked at Fairy Tail, all they'd see was boobs. And then the reeling and writhing and fainting in coils would begin.

UPDATE: I need to learn to count. There are four total S-Class mages in Fairy Tail: Erza, Mirajane, Laxus, and Gildarts. So it's two women and two men.

Posted by: Steven Den Beste in General Anime at 01:52 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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