Fairy Tail

''Fairy Tail'' is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Hiro Mashima. It was serialized in Kodansha's ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'' from August 2006 to July 2017, with the individual chapters collected and published into 63 ''tankōbon'' volumes. The story follows the adventures of Natsu Dragneel, a member of the popular wizard guild Fairy Tail, as he searches the fictional world of Earth-land for the dragon Igneel.

The manga has been adapted into an anime series produced by A-1 Pictures, Dentsu Inc., Satelight, Bridge, and CloverWorks which was broadcast in Japan on TV Tokyo from October 2009 to March 2013. A second series was broadcast from April 2014 to March 2016. A third and final series was aired from October 2018 to September 2019. The series has also inspired numerous spin-off manga, including a prequel by Mashima, '' Fairy Tail Zero'', and a sequel storyboarded by him, titled '' Fairy Tail: 100 Years Quest''. Additionally, A-1 Pictures has developed nine original video animations and two animated feature films.

The manga series was originally licensed for an English release in North America by Del Rey Manga, which began releasing the individual volumes in March 2008 and ended its licensing with the 12th volume release in September 2010. In December 2010, Kodansha USA took over the North American release of the series. The Southeast Asian network Animax Asia aired an English-language version of the anime for seven seasons from 2010 to 2015. The manga was also licensed in the United Kingdom by Turnaround Publisher Services, in Australia by Penguin Books Australia. The anime has been licensed by Crunchyroll for an English release in North America. As of February 2020, ''Fairy Tail'' had 72 million copies in print.

Plot

The world of Earth-land is home to numerous guilds where wizards apply their magic for paid job requests. Natsu Dragneel, a Dragon Slayer wizard from the Fairy Tail guild, explores the Kingdom of Fiore in search of his missing adoptive father, the dragon Igneel. During his journey, he befriends a young celestial wizard named Lucy Heartfilia and invites her to join Fairy Tail. Natsu, Lucy, and the cat-like Exceed Happy form a team, which is joined by other guild members: Gray Fullbuster, an ice wizard; Erza Scarlet, a magical knight; and Wendy Marvell and Carla, another Dragon Slayer and Exceed duo. The team embark on numerous missions together, which include subduing criminals, illegal dark guilds, and ancient Etherious demons created by Zeref, a wizard cursed with immortality and deadly power.

After several adventures, Natsu and his companions find Zeref living in isolation on Fairy Tail's sacred ground of Sirius Island, where he expresses a desire to die for the atrocities he has committed. A battle over Zeref ensues between Fairy Tail and the dark guild Grimoire Heart, which attracts the attention of the evil black dragon Acnologia. The Fairy Tail wizards survive Acnologia's assault when the spirit of their guild's founder and Zeref's estranged lover, Mavis Vermillion, casts the defensive Fairy Sphere spell that places them into seven years of suspended animation. Later, Fairy Tail wages war against Tartaros, a dark guild of Etherious who aim to unseal a book believed to contain Zeref's ultimate demon, E.N.D. When Acnologia returns to annihilate both guilds, Igneel – revealed to have sealed himself within Natsu – emerges to battle Acnologia, only to be killed in front of a helpless Natsu, who departs on a training journey to avenge Igneel.

After Natsu returns one year later, Fiore is invaded by the Alvarez Empire, a military nation ruled by Zeref, who intends to acquire Fairy Heart, a wellspring of infinite magic power housed within Mavis's equally cursed body preserved beneath Fairy Tail's guild hall. While battling Zeref, Natsu is informed of his own identity as both Zeref's younger brother and the true incarnation of E.N.D. (Etherious Natsu Dragneel), whom Zeref resurrected as a demon with the intention of being killed by him. When Natsu fails to do so, Zeref absorbs Fairy Heart from Mavis in a bid to rewrite the present timeline with one where he might prevent his own curse and Acnologia's rise to power. After Natsu defeats Zeref to stop the drastic changes to history his actions would create, Mavis lifts her and Zeref's curse by reciprocating his love, which kills them both.

Meanwhile, Fairy Tail and their allies detain Acnologia within a space-time rift created by the use of Eclipse, Zeref's time travel gate. However, Acnologia escapes while his disembodied spirit traps all of the present Dragon Slayers within the rift to maintain his godlike power. Lucy and many other wizards across the continent immobilize Acnologia's body within Fairy Sphere, while Natsu accumulates the other Dragon Slayers' magic and destroys Acnologia's spirit, killing him and freeing the Dragon Slayers from captivity. The following year, Natsu and his team depart on a century-old guild mission, continuing their adventures together.

Production

After finishing his previous work, '' Rave Master'', Hiro Mashima found the story sentimental and sad at the same time, so he wanted the storyline of his next manga to have a "lot of fun." His inspiration for the series was sitting in bars and partying with his friends. He also described the series as being about young people finding their calling, such as a job. Mashima drew a one-shot titled ''Fairy Tale'' that was published in ''Magazine Fresh'' on September 3, 2002, which served as a pilot. Mashima's later concept for the serialized version involved Natsu as a fire-using member of a courier guild who carries various things on assignments. Mashima then came up with the idea to have different types of wizards hanging out in one place, and eventually coerced his editor into allowing him to change the concept to a wizard guild. The title was changed from "Tale" to "Tail" in reference to the tail of a fairy, which the author said may or may not prove to be a "pivotal point." Mashima stated that while he tried to consider both his own interests and the fans' on what would happen next in ''Fairy Tail'', the fans' took precedence.

In the period between ''Rave Master'' and ''Fairy Tail'', all but one of Mashima's assistants left, and the artist said making sure that the three new ones knew what to do was the hardest thing throughout the first year of serialization. Mashima described his weekly schedule for creating individual chapters of ''Fairy Tail'' in 2008: script and storyboards were written on Monday, rough sketches the following day, and drawing and inking were done Wednesday through Friday; time in the weekends was for ''Monster Hunter Orage'', a monthly series Mashima was writing at the same time. He usually thought up new chapters while working on the current ones. Mashima had six assistants in 2008 that worked in an area with seven desks, as well as a sofa and TV for video games. In 2011, he stated that he worked six days a week, for 17 hours a day.

For the characters of the series, Mashima drew people he had known in his life. In establishing the father-son relationship between Natsu and Igneel, Mashima cited his father's death when he was a child as an influence. He took Natsu's motion sickness from one of his friends, who gets sick when they take taxis together. When naming the character, the author thought western fantasy names would be unfamiliar to Japanese audiences, so he went with the Japanese name for summer; Natsu. Mashima based the reporter character Jason on American manga critic Jason Thompson, who interviewed him at 2008's San Diego Comic-Con, and another on an employee from Del Rey Manga, the original North American publisher of ''Fairy Tail''. He based the humorous aspects of the series on his daily life and jokes his assistants would make.

Publication

Main series

Written and illustrated by Hiro Mashima, ''Fairy Tail'' was serialized in the manga anthology ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'' from August 2, 2006 to July 26, 2017. The 545 individual chapters were collected and published into 63 ''tankōbon'' volumes by Kodansha between December 15, 2006 and November 17, 2017. In 2008, a special crossover one-shot between ''Fairy Tail'' and Miki Yoshikawa's ''Flunk Punk Rumble'', titled , was published in ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine''. It was later included in ''Fairy Tail+'', an official fanbook released on May 17, 2010. Another crossover with Mashima's first series ''Rave'' was published in 2011. A special issue of ''Weekly Shōnen Magazine'', published on October 19, 2013, featured a small crossover between ''Fairy Tail'' and Nakaba Suzuki's '' The Seven Deadly Sins'', where each artist drew a ''yonkoma'' (four-panel comic) of the other's series. An actual crossover chapter between these two ran in the magazines' combined 4/5 issue of 2014, which was released on December 25, 2013. A two-volume series called '' Fairy Tail S'', which collects short stories by Mashima that were originally published in various Japanese magazines through the years, was released on September 16, 2016.

The series was licensed for an English-language release in North America by Del Rey Manga. The company released the first volume of the series on March 25, 2008 and continued until the release of the 12th volume in September 2010. After Del Rey Manga shut down, Kodansha USA acquired the license and began publishing ''Fairy Tail'' volumes in May 2011. They published the 63rd and final volume on January 23, 2018. Kodansha USA began publishing a larger omnibus version of the series in November 2015. Called ''Fairy Tail: Master's Edition'', each installment corresponds to five regular-sized volumes. They published the first volume of ''Fairy Tail S: Tales from Fairy Tail'' on October 24, 2017.

The manga has also been licensed in other English-speaking countries. In the United Kingdom, the volumes are distributed by Turnaround Publisher Services. In Australia and New Zealand, the manga is distributed by Penguin Books Australia

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