#contend with Tails and Nine not being exactly the same person. Do you think the best end (after all that fighting to be considered more than

[hadesknockedupintheunderworld]

No one:

Some random person, every week since July: Has anyone done this yet? *posts meme redraw of Shadow breaking it to Sonic that they’re gonna have to kill Nine and Sonic going "Damn😔"*

[the-a-j-universe]

I genuinely think that the fucking swing gets more screentime than Ino or Tenten. Especially if you include filler. And also, I think Kishi is good at writing female characters, but only when he forgets that they are girls. Seriously Sakura was amazing in the time between the start of pt2 and when she saw Sauske again. And then well... she saw Sasuke.

Yes thank you. Like, the swing is iconic. I see it and I feel, like, a thousand things at once, but it's not a character. He makes all of these characters so memorable so quickly, at least in most cases, and then he doesn't do anything with a third of them 90% of the time, and that third is suspiciously usually each team's token girl. Ino is interesting on her own, but her inner dialogue, out of combat, is about boys or rivalries over boys, and she's the one on her team that knows medical jutsu, just like Sakura. And Hinata, when she's not pining or being the literal best, is just Neji light, for when the Byakugan needs to be in this scene, but it can't be attached to anybody who's more than just kinda strong.

But then, until they see Sasuke again, Sakura is legit the viewpoint character, and she's wonderful the entire time, arguably more interesting than Naruto for a large chunk.

And then she just recedes into the background again as soon as Sasuke pops up unless something needs punched or unpunched, or someone needs to pine for Sasuke in a way that Karin or Naruto can't. It's exactly like you said: if the narrative is actively reminding him "hey, that's right, this person is girl" then they all just kinda devolve into the same loose pile of, like, six or seven tropes.

Even Hinata's pining for Naruto is just Sakura's pining for Sasuke, except that Naruto and Hinata is actually a good pairing. And Hinata actually has a reason for liking Naruto.

At the very least, even at his worst, I feel like he does have a reasonable grasp of his characters' voices, so they still feel like themselves, even when they aren't doing anything, but it is still so frustrating seeing Sakura going from the woman who convinced an old bigot to believe in peaceful cooperation, who ran at the four-tailed nine tails cloak Naruto and begged him to let her be the one to save Sasuke so he wouldn't have to keep hurting himself, back to the lovestruck schoolgirl standing in the background. Especially when well-written Sakura is a contender for best character in the entire series.

And it doesn't help that I just find Sasuke to be extremely boring. Just so dull. I don't get what the girls see in him, and I don't get why Naruto even likes him so much, beyond just being staunchly against giving up on people. The most interesting thing he ever did was realize his mistakes so hard that, by Boruto, he's content to just do whatever his people need until it kills him.

[fairytail-whathesays]

I’ve had difficulty putting it into words before now, but I think I’ve got it.

If there’s one thing that started to get on my nerves after a while, it was how no matter how far along in the story we were or how many powerful threats the heroes had faced, Mashima continued to use the Fairy Tail guild as the measuring block for strength and power.

In the GMG, how are we supposed to know how crazy strong Jura is? Because Makarov says “he might even be on the same level as Gildarts”. MIGHT. This came off as wholly biased comparison and overestimation of Gildarts when I saw it, because 1) the people we know are stronger than Jura are the Four Gods of Ishgar, and Gildarts is not one of them, nor is he a Wizard Saint at all, so the Magic Council has presumably not seen fit to grant Gildarts a title they granted Makarov. As Makarov has less respect for the Magic Council than Gildarts has for property, I would’ve assumed he wasn’t strong enough, but here’s Makarov, telling me that Jura is the one contesting Fairy Tail’s strength, painting him as the one who would be weaker on assumption. It basically just told us “Gildarts is so strong Wizard Saints measure up to HIM and not the other way around”. Oh, and 2) That’s not how you build hype. If you’re flat-out telling me you’re SURPRISED that one of your competitors has strength rivaling that of your guild’s, it doesn’t paint the picture of a very challenging or worrisome situation or obstacle.

In the Alvarez Empire arc, how are the Spriggan Twelve, final arc antagonists, built up as a fearsome set of antagonists? By saying their magic power is stronger than Makarov’s. Mashima? Judging by our previous measuring stick example of the Wizard Saints, here is a list of people occupying the nebulous sphere of power that could make them “stronger than Makarov”:

Jose Porla who, while commonly considered weaker, fought on par with Makarov until Makarov used his instant-kill spell.

Jellal Fernandes, a person of unrevealed rank among the Saints, only that it wasn’t 4 or above.

Jura, who while when first introduced claimed to be weaker than Makarov, worked his way up to rank 5 and, as none of the 4 above him are Makarov, can be presumed to have more raw power than him.

Zero, who curb-stomped Dragon Force Natsu, who had previously beaten up Jellal Fernandes, a Saint. This would make Zero’s claim of being “twice as strong as Brain” a bit of an underestimation.

Gildarts, due to the aforementioned GMG fuckery and his constant hype as Fairy Tail’s strongest.

Laxus, who was a runner for ‘stronger than Makarov’ as far back as Fantasia, and has only gotten stronger since, who also stood even with Hades, who curb-stomped Makarov.

Definitely Hades, who left Makarov dying on the ground.

Every one of the Seven Kin of Purgatory, who are described as having Saint-level power along with Bluenote Stinger.

The Oracion Seis post-timeskip due to their massive increase in power and ability.

Kagura Mikazuchi, who is considered a threat to Saint-level Jellal’s life and carries around the most powerful conventional weapon in the series.

Mard Geer, the strongest Etherious and able to tank Dragon Force Natsu at a far greater level of power than when he beat Jellal or Zero.

Silver Fullbuster, who fucking froze a fire dragon solid and, if his son’s success with Devil Slaying Magic was any indication, stood poised to take out Mard Geer if he had the chance.

Ur, described as a well-known Ice Make user so powerful she could easily contend for Wizard Saint position and who fought one-on-one against Deliora before sealing it.

All of the Four Gods of Ishgar.

That’s twenty-nine fucking characters all occupying that power sphere. More than twice the number of the Spriggan Twelve. So yeah, not exactly an informative measure of power.

Not to mention, he didn’t even need to do that one. We already get a second measurement for their power: they’re as strong as God Serena, the single most powerful wizard on the continent of Ishgar, and all of the Spriggans are at least that powerful. In putting those two measurements together, Mashima is implying that they’re equivalent. Or in other words, saying that “stronger than Makarov” and “as strong as God Serena” are the same realm of comparison. And that just irritates the crap out of me.

At what point do Fairy Tail stop being the ones to beat when dealing with hype building? Because that’s both backwards and annoying. Fairy Tail didn’t start like that. At the beginning of the series, the general idea was that while there was some pretty fearsome wizards in it, most of the reputation for untouchable-ness came from Wizard Saint Makarov. Fast-forward to the end of the series, and Makarov is still that same measuring stick for power.

Yeah, I know no one’s as upset about this as me. But I’ve never liked mangaka who have to constantly remind us that yes, their heroes are super powerful, the best, the strongest, the most fearsome of them all. Inflate them some more, why don’t you?