Was the Fairy Tail Sequel a Flop? Fairy Tail 100 Years Quest Anime Review

Season 1 of Fairy Tail: 100 Year Quest has just concluded, having finished three arcs so far.

While there is no announcement on Season 2, there is enough content for a new anime season and the manga has not announced a climax of as yet.

But how did J.C. Staff’s adaptation of the sequel go so far?

Well, it did not go far enough and sometimes, not even close enough.

Manga Storytelling

Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest, as the name suggests, is about the highest level of quest that any wizard could take as a job but it is said to amount to 100 years due to its intense difficulty and for Fairy Tail, this quest is the sealing of the legendary Five Dragon Gods, beings said to surpass Acnologia, the deceased King of the Dragons.

We learn from its quest giver, the Law Dragon Elefseria, that the reason for the duration is due to the amount of time he waited for a wizard to even seal one of the Five Dragon Gods.

While Hiro Mashima remains the writer and storyboarder of this work, Atsuo Ueda is in charge of the art and he replicates Mashima’s latest style almost to a tee.

This is quite different from Boruto’s situation, also a sequel series to the more popular original Naruto, as Kishimoto’s assistant, Mikio Ikemoto, was not only the artist but also wrote the story more (albeit with Kishimoto’s writing credits and overall supervision of course) after Ukyo Kodachi left the series.

However, right away there are some distinctly different writing strokes here.

The most obvious difference between the original and the sequel is the pacing.

Whether it is due to the biweekly release schedule or Mashima juggling two manga at once, each chapter, even at more than 20 pages per release, seems to have the expectation of either finishing one battle or shorten it enough to grab the audience for a month of time.

This results in Fairy Tail battles getting shorter and faster, akin to most modern shonen, with only one to two chapters focusing on that battle or phase instead of stretching it to five or so.

Character Focus

The original Fairy Tail was more of a fantasy adventure story where a group of friends and their guild community cause trouble and strengthen their bonds, the source of their Magic.

Set in the new continent of Guiltina, Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest seems to follow a different route, as we not only focus exclusively on the main squad on a secret mission but also give time for these characters to breathe.

As the main male protagonist, Natsu Dragneel has his own arc in both stories, with the original Fairy Tail being about his search for his adopted dragon papa, Igneel.

Now we see a different family member, Igneel’s more wicked son, Ignia, challenging Natsu’s beliefs in his friends as he empowers Natsu with his Fire Dragon Slayer Magic while also proving that he would be different from every opponent who could be won over with the literal power of friendship.

Early on, this seems to darken Natsu’s path as we see Ignia’s power and philosophy being responsible for the sealing and near-death of the Water Dragon God Mercphobia, a being whose magic was erased with Whiteout yet still was able to cause mass destruction.

Lucy was the one brave enough to embrace Natsu in spite of his heated and berserker state.

Speaking of Lucy, as the main female protagonist, she should not be left out as she now has a mission to find Aquarius’ key, which she learned in the Alvarez Empire Arc is somewhere hidden in Earthland.

Lucy gains a friendly rivalry with her once less-friendly rival and lowkey soft friend Brandish Myu, a former member of Zeref’s Alvarez Empire, who frequently appears as a testament to her popularity among the fanbase.

Wendy is also a lot more proactive, acting as the brains of the group in spite of her younger age, and this is helped by the assistance of a certain figure. More on that later.

Although most of the focus is on the main crew, we have a dedicated arc for the entire Fairy Tail guild through the Wood Dragon God Arc, which primarily features a “Battle of Fairy Tail Round 2”. as it was dubbed.

With the guild under the control of the White Wizard Faris, Natsu and the others are forced to fight against their own friends, resulting in neat fight combinations and new abilities and revelations.

After dealing with their hypnotized comrades, the guild would face their recurring rivals, Diabolos, a guild of Dragon Eaters (Fifth Generation Dragon Slayers) and within their battles were some drastic developments.

If you notice, most of the character development has connections to the Alvarez plotline.

After a battle with a berserk Dragon Eater, Nebaru, we witness the reintroduction of Irene Belserion, Erza’s mother who had survived her death through a sleeping Personality installed into Wendy even after the Personality Enchantment had been lifted in the Final Season.

She will keep popping up throughout the story as Wendy’s secret mentor to help Fairy Tail out of the stickiest situations with her in-depth knowledge of Magic and even other forms of power such as Elentear’s Spirit Arts.

Second and less notable is Natsu’s feelings over his brother and the original series’ main antagonist, Zeref Dragneel.

When the Dragon Eater, a ghost of Fairy Tail’s forgotten past named Wraith, separates his soul from his body, Natsu enters a “Beta Heaven” state, where he finds Zeref and Mavis happily living together with their children.

Although these appearances work more as fanservice, they do layer the main characters’ attitudes towards their familial connections, as Zeref is someone Natsu fully considers a brother more than Ignia, the biological son of Natsu’s beloved Igneel.

The Five Dragon Gods work as an interesting set of antagonists as they have different ideologies and motivations, such that one of them is not even an enemy and is only forced to fight them.

The Water Dragon God Mercphobia was once a typical dragon, who hated and ate humans, until he met

His story is quite similar to Animus, the main antagonist of the second Fairy Tail movie, Dragon Cry.

The Fire Dragon God Ignia is the opposite of his father and adopted brother and seeks to restore the Age of Dragons.

The Wood Dragon God Aldoron stays dormant yet feeds on the humans visiting his cities over the centuries to grow in power.

The Moon Dragon God Selene, the only female member, wants to distort worlds (as in mess everything up) so that their secret weapons (Face, Alta Face) awaken and so she can use them to get rid of her competition.

Viernes is an enigma as of the anime’s release but his arc introduces yet another system of power, Alchemy.

More Jellal Greatness

One of the most notable aspects of the sequel has to do with the maturity and healing of some of its cast.

Jellal Fernandes and, most especially, Gray Fullbuster, come to mind.

Jellal’s journey is a lot simpler in the sequel since he starts off his usual Crime Sorciere dark mage hunting but through some comical shenanigans involving mind control, he expresses his hidden feelings for Erza Scarlet and slowly works

We even get a payoff by showing a metaphorical separation of his guilt-ridden self, Siegrain (his original name and fake Council persona back when he was evil), which parallels the time the Siegrain is Jellal twist happened.

There is a nice hidden story of Crime Sorciere fading off in the manga as essentially, Jellal lightens up more than his guilt-ridden self.

At the end of Season 1, Erza even offers to have Jellal join the guild, phrasing it as a way for the two of them to get close.

During both the Wood Dragon God Arc and in being accidentally brought back to Edolas, Erza was able to express her feelings for Jellal more, especially since we see Mystogan, Jellal’s Edolas doppleganger, and Erza Knightwalker, become quite close, which did not happen at all in the original.

Gray and Juvia 

The most prominent character arc outside of Natsu has to come from Gray.

Throughout the original run of Fairy Tail, Gray was defined by his survivor’s guilt after

Although any fan could tell early on, Gray’s annoying tendency not to respond or reciprocate to Juvia’s affections, even in spite of his own admitted closeness to her, is finally answered when Gray reveals his insecurities to a Juvia lookalike (this is a lookalike in Earthland this time and yes, Fairy Tail is known for so many copies of its characters already).

It seems that Gray never responded because of his lack of self-worth.

Ever since almost losing Juvia in the battle against Invel in the Alvarez Empire Arc, Gray has slowly come out of his shell and

After the Wood Dragon God Arc, where Gray used Juvia’s water body to freeze one of Aldoron’s God Seeds, Gray and Juvia become more openly affectionate with each other, rather than Juvia leading the pair emotionally.

We even see a dream in the Moon Dragon God Arc where Gray imagines his ideal life with Juvia, their son Gr (whom we see in Edolas), his deceased father, Ur and Ultear celebrating his birthday.

This dream is telling since Gray does not really celebrate or open up about his life yet even an enemy’s trap, which he rightfully escapes from, is telling him to finally pursue his happiness, even if he breaks out by saying he only wants Juvia to be happy.

As romantic as this line is, Gray’s illusion was speaking a truth to the guy and if Juvia would be the path to Gray finally overcoming his guilt, then yes, we are witnessing a wonderful character arc.

All I can say is that this sequel makes many Gray fans quite happy.

Anime Critique

Now we finally get to the actual anime adaptation.

J.C. Staff was the studio behind Mashima’s other current work, Edens Zero, fans were expecting some high quality animation this time around, an expectation not fully met by the Final Season, which did not consistently have animated battles.

The first episode actually gave fans the optimism to trust the new studio while the rest of the episodes were fine but kept up the momentum of an improved aesthetic.

Episode 6: “Lineage of Fire” stands out too much for having some of, if not, the best animation in the entire Fairy Tail franchise outside of the two movies, although there is an easy argument that the episode’s overall quality could compare.

Not just for the high octane animation of the fight between Natsu and Mercphobia but the overall direction, with the contrast of water and fire in the color direction and the impressive special effects throughout the episode.

However, once we entered the Wood Dragon Arc, we understood what type of show we were in.

From that point on, most of the battles were the same slideshow affair we have seen since the second adaptation of Fairy Tail that began in 2014 by Studio Bridge.

This is especially evident with Erza vs Laxus, one of the most hype battles in the sequel, a battle that is so recognized that it was the debut of the season’s main insert song, “Beyond the Quest”, sung by Noora Louhimo (lead singer of the Finnish Battle Beast band), but apparently not enough to be treated the same way as Episode 6.

This resulted in a lot of backlash from the online fandom, such that some of the animators had to block Twitter users who persisted in tagging them in their online rants.

More recent episodes of Fairy Tail (The final season, as an example) are known for their limited or sparse use of animation, with the beloved Tartaros Arc even receiving constant recaps that drag down the pacing a lot.

The post A-1 Pictures seasons of Fairy Tail have also used a lot of image distortion and shaking effects to ensure the “slideshow” presentation looks palatable.

The Fairy Tail sequel is more comparable to the Final Season, which was a collaboration between Cloverworks and Bridge, which still makes fights into slideshows with lighting effects but can sometimes present incredibly well-animated fights such as Gildarts vs August, Brandish vs Lucy, and the final battle with Acnologia.

Although the anime has improved in art quality, this is more of a consequence of the times and J.C. Staff’s quality control than of anything outstanding.

They followed the manga’s character designs faithfully and adapted the content of the manga exactly as it was, with minor alterations and censorship here and there, such as Giant Gajeel being stabbed by Aldoron being replaced by Gajeel’s 3 minutes being reached.

Although Yasuhiro Takanashi remains the composer of the Fairy Tail sequel, his work does not hit as hard and seem quite limited.

Like with Bleach: Thousand Year Blood War, the Fairy Tail sequel does not use older soundtracks even if they come from the same composer, both due to the distance between seasons and the need to promote the tracks.

At 25 episodes and adapting nearly 100 chapters, it is surprising how much less fanfare there is for the anime.

Whether it is due to the marketing, Fairy Tail’s decline in the community consciousness or the track record of the Fairy Tail anime adaptations, it seems that things might not be so optimistic even for the rest of the story.

If the next season had the consistency of the Water Dragon God Arc all the way, we might see a resurgence of interest but as it is now, Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest is more or less a flop that, thankfully, is not unwatchable in the slightest.

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