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natsubeatsrock · 5 years

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The Rewrite of Fairy Tail: Part 15 (Wendy)

What am I going to do with Wendy?

tfw you were going to crossover event yourself and review captain marvel the day after this came out but you don’t get the review ready in time and you don’t get the post for the blog you want to do this for typed up in time and you also realize you need to add stuff and this intro is too long

I'm in a tough spot with Wendy. I can't say that Wendy is a particularly bad character. She may be one of Mashima's best-written female characters this side of Rave Master. But I have some issues with how that writing is handled, keeping me from saying she's outright the best of either the Dragon Slayers of the Strongest Team. In fact, she might be the toughest of the five to rewrite.

In my analogy of the Strongest Team as a team of five protagonists, I would describe Wendy as a character similar to one I've mentioned before: Princess Yona from Yona of the Dawn. As I've mentioned earlier, Yona's journey is coming from a life of comfort and protection and growing into a strong and capable fighter and leader. The series involves seeing her grow in these capacities while also keeping core personality in the process. Also, something, something reverse harem series.

Wendy introduces herself as mostly able to use support magic. Of course, she knows magic spells that can be used to attack people. However, she knows she is at her most useful as a support mage, not an attack mage. After learning her life up to that point was largely a lie, she joins Fairy Tail and starts heading towards the path of becoming a competent combat wizard.

If you think about it, we don't see a strong showing of Wendy's fighting ability until the Grand Magic Games. She doesn't take out one of the Oracion Seis or Seven Kin of Purgatory. She plays more of a support role in the anime arcs. Even in the Grand Magic Games, she ties in a fight with Chelia and her fight with Cosmos had to be padded out in the anime. Even then, it's not that great and is easily one of the least memorable fights in a tournament arc, of all times. Her capture of Aquarius in the Eclipse arc is more about making friends than fighting with her. And, in Sun Village, she fought the Treasure Hunters with Lucy and Flare.

To be clear, this is not a knock on her. I don't think that this doesn't make sense for Wendy. Not to mention, I think that her fight between Chelia is one of the best fights in the series and might be one of her most important moments as a character.

However, it's hard to compare that fight with her fight in Tartarus. When she actually does fight Ezel, it's almost a spectacle to see. In the anime, before destroying Face, there's an unnecessarily long flashback of Wendy and Carla's time together. Thinking back through it, though, it's crazy that the same Wendy who wasn't confident in her fighting ability in Nirvana beat one of the Nine Demon Gates on her own. While she never exactly gets as great a spotlight, she more than holds her own in other fights.

There are two things that are important to mention in regards to how this plays out.

First is that she never actually gets worse at her main ability of healing/support magic. It never becomes something she does worse than regular combat magic. As much as the combat stuff becomes better, it's not too much of a stretch to say that her best role is as a support mage. After all, Irene takes over her body because of both her dragon slaying magic and enchanting abilities. Looking back, it makes sense that her secret arts were both the combat skill Sky Drill and the support skill Milky Way. And in the anime, she combines both in a fight against Erigor.

The second, a fact that I've come to recognize as Fairy Tail has ended, is that Wendy is a fast learner. Not just in being able to work out those arts in a matter of days of training, as one could argue that's aided with the use of Gale-Force Reading Glasses. She picks up the Sky Dragon's Wing Attack just from watching Natsu use his version of the move. So as annoying as it was to see Dragon Slaying Enchantment, it's not terribly improbable of her to after just hearing about it. (I didn't expect this to come back when I wrote the first draft of this.)

Why does this make her a hard character for me to rewrite?

One of the big issues I have with how this arc plays out for Wendy is one I've spend much time talking about before - lack of training. The fact that Fairy Tail doesn't focus on training probably hurts Wendy the most. The progression from Edolas to Tartarus makes less sense with little training in between fights. There's no sense of Wendy's making the change in perspective of combat magic. Obviously, with some of the changes to the series, this will help.

But the other bigger issue involves the way Wendy herself is written. I said that Wendy's fight with Exel marks a sign of growth for her. As it stands, it's probably the only sign of growth she has in the entire series. It's easy to look at Wendy only being about 14 now in the sequel and think about how little Wendy has grown up during Fairy Tail. I mean that's still around the time puberty happens so something, something Reedus' drawing, blah blah blah body issues.

But it's hard to say that she starts to grow up in many other respects. Of course, I've talked a bit about her magic ability growing. However, she doesn't become less prone to cry. She doesn't become less apologetic over things she can't possibly control. Even her cutting her hair after the Exel fight gets changed back at the epilogue at the arc.

I can understand this being excused as she still is a kid during the series and she has time to grow as a person. But, in rewriting this series, I can't carry the same type of mindset. With a shorter Fairy Sphere time, Wendy will actually have to grow up. She'll be at least 6 years older than she was at any point after the x791 arc in the original series.

This presents writing Wendy with a more unique issue than most other characters. For the most part, I can keep the characters in a similar state from the beginning of that time skip to the end. There are some issues to worry about, like justifying Juvia's prolonged unrequited feelings for Gray, but I have some ways to get around that. Wendy at the end of the first time skip doesn't have to be a drastically different character from how she is. However, she has to be written in a way that recognizes that, once Natsu returns, she's a young adult.

What should kick off that change?

As is the case for some other characters, one big catalyst for change ought to be the end of Tenrou. Of course, that's the biggest and most important moment before the skip starts. However, seeing Acnologia and recognizing the gap in power between them isn't a bad motivator, assuming she sees it as another way to support her friends. With Natsu going off later to find Igneel, there's also a recognition that she can't rely on him or other mages to fight battles she thinks she can't fight all the time. She might even want to go with him, but he doesn't want her to go with him because he's concerned for her safety.

You can probably tell what the end result should look like. We should get a Wendy more similar to what we got before chapter 416 with the abilities and skills she gains after the second time skip. She can't and shouldn't stop all her tears, but she has a better grip on her emotions than before and isn't afraid to get into a fight. She's still as kind-hearted and optimistic as she is in canon. The difference is that she's no longer just a girl. (I hate myself over this.)

Now that we’ve talked about the main characters in the Strongest Team, I’m going to start talking about some of the other characters in the series. Who am I going to start with?

Who else do you expect me to start with?

#wendy marvell #the rewrite of fairy tail #part 15 #well that's done #HOPEFULLY #i can get the next one done tomorrow #that one is a special one #at any rate #alita battle angel is a good movie #go watch it in theaters #there were 5 people in my theater #that makes me mad

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