Sixteen-year-old me probably could never fathom that I’d be writing something like this in my twenties, but here we are. Fairy Tail, a fantasy shounen slash comedy slash romance centered on the power of friendship and found family, is most notorious for its overdone obnoxious fan-service. If you’re like me, you loved the show for the fights, soundtrack and how the characters stick together through thick and thin. While the fan-service just gradually got worse throughout the years and eventually turned me off from the show completely, I’ve realized that it isn’t the only reason I can’t come back to the series. 

Recently, the creator of Fairy Tail, Hiro Mashima, made an appearance at New York Comic Con and was asked at a panel by a fan what inspired him to write this series. If you haven’t heard, his answer wasn’t about a dream to draw awesome fights with cool powers and most of the women half naked. It was actually something much more vulnerable. Turns out Mashima created the series because he didn’t have any real friendships or his own. “My loneliness is what you’re seeing” was a part of his actual response and it’s what I really want to discuss today. 

I’m not sure about you guys, but when I randomly found Fairy Tail episodes on YouTube split into seven part clips with spanish subtitles and a border so thick the actual episode took up only five inches of the computer screen, I was only thirteen. After weeks of watching it on YouTube, I eventually found out about anime websites like GogoAnime and KissAnime and kept going from there. At thirteen-years-old, I was still the only Black girl in my seventh grade class (Catholic school survivors make some noise!) and had a hard time fitting in. Getting into anime wasn’t gonna make that any easier, but it opened the door to a  whole new world of storytelling. Now, while I only talked about it with two of my friends, anime became such a massive part of my life through Fairy Tail. It was my first long series and gave me time to get emotionally invested in the characters, versus the two one season shows I’d seen earlier that year - Attack on Titan and Kill La Kill.  Watching Natsu, Lucy, Erza and (sometimes) Gray fight for the sake of protecting their friends was a new concept to me. In comparison to the other two, the show’s focus wasn’t on political tactics or conspiracy, but the genuine power of friendship. 

Before Mashima’s statement, I hadn’t considered the reasons why he created the series. I mean it’s a show about hot wizards with parental issues who get stronger after every fight and then get drunk together. Honestly if they were pirates, it would just be One Piece with a third of the episodes. Either way, for all the themes of found family and the platonic love you find in your friends, I don’t know how it didn’t occur to me that maybe the creator was just as lonely as I had been. Maybe the biggest takeaway from the series is that the Fairy Tail guild will always be there to welcome you until you can stand on your own in the world. And despite my grievances with the series, maybe that’s why I can’t go back to it. 

For all my criticisms about the overly obnoxious hyper-sexualization of the female characters, there was a time before that where I was innocent and just loved the show for how it made me feel. I lived for the Grand Magic Games arc, bawled my eyes out during most of Tartarus, and prayed to the fandom gods of Tumblr for Gajeel and Levvy to wind up together before one of them died running away from their feelings. Cringey as it may be to admit this, badass characters like Natsu and Erza helped me to be brave. Starting high school wasn’t so bad because I was able to identify the types of traits I wanted in the people I surrounded myself with - how to put myself out there and not be afraid to fail sometimes. As I grew, I subconsciously carried the things that I’d learned into my adult life and you know what, I have to thank Mashima for it. 

So if you haven’t guessed it by now, the reason I can’t go back to the show is because I don’t need it anymore. Loneliness is no longer a regular in my bed and while I don’t welcome her anymore, I acknowledge that shared emptiness. Many people today feel like there’s no one in their lives who gets them, trudging through their days feeling misunderstood and on the outside looking in. Mashima has created a world where even loneliness has a seat at the table and is encouraged to stay for as long as she wants. And that’s gonna be impressive no matter how old I get.