Fairy Tail: Blue Mistral Review - Chapter 1

Written by: Shiggins

Oh this is gonna be a tough one...

A few months ago, the Fairy Tail series was given it's own magazine and with it, spin-offs were announced. While Fairy Tail Zero is about the story of Mavis growing up and is written/illustrated by Hiro Mashima himself, the others are by different artists and writers so they all have different art-styles and probably can't be considered canon. After reviewing the first chapter of both Fairy Tail Zero and the disappointing Ice Trail, I was nervous about reviewing this one when it was finally released.

To quote a Soul Eater character: I don't know how to deal with is.

How is it? Well, it's a magical girl/romance/shoujo thing so I can promise you that I won't be reviewing this one again because all three of those are series that I have trouble enjoying. So enjoy this review and hopefully, enjoy the manga series after reading this. And I'm not sure if it's a rule or anything but Blue Mistral is based on the youngest, smallest girl in the entire Fairy Tail series, Wendy Marvell.

Wow. I'm annoyed after one page. That's impressive, Blue Mistral.

The story begins with Wendy trying to sneak out of the Fairy Tail Guild alone with Carla, her Exceed. Wendy wants to prove herself by taking a mission without any help and after we see a glimpse of the supporting poorly-drawn cast watching her leave, Wendy gets on a train and reads the request again, which speaks about a "phenomenon" in a village.

Oh god... What did the writer do to you people?!

So once they get to the lovely village, Wendy is attacked by an overly energetic supporting cast member who then apologises for attacking her. Wendy says she got a request from someone named Ryuu but apparently, there's nobody here by that name. After some "hilarious" banter and over-the-top expressions, the new girl reveals herself to be Yoshino and shows off a bunch of flowers with her magic.

Before I realised Yoshino was a girl, I was shipping these two together... So I'm just gonna keep shipping them. Why not? Lesbianism!

They then see some sort of strange ceremony where people are wearing dragon masks while looking like a cult. Other people are begging them to return family members and this situation seems dark... so let's liven things up by having Wendy fall and be caught by Generic McHandsome. His name is Shuu and yes, he is handsome. As in, that's his character here. Eye candy... I'm definitely in a shoujo if the only guy so far can be that generically handsome.

Give that guy a blue blazer. He belongs in the Ouran Highschool Host Club!

After more banter about how Yoshino has a crush on Shuu and Wendy hasn't got a crush due to the guys at her Guild, (weird how she thought of Natsu before Romeo, the boy her own age...), we meet Yoshino's father who is injured in bed. Now staying over, the first thing Wendy does is eavesdrop on Yoshino and overhears how they are using prayers to appease a dragon's spirit which is making people disappear.

Sweetie, if you think "fetish" after hearing "eat fire", then you're the pervert here.

We find out that the dad was injured when the bridge he was working on collapsed, but it was repaired in the very next moment. This fact and all the disappearing people leads everybody to believe that it could only be a dragon spirit that can only be appeased by praying. After a boring love-friend scene between a little girl and her cat, they hear a loud roar from the dragon and Yoshino runs outside.

Can we please stop romanticising every talk Wendy and Carla have? Or are we supporting bestiality now?

The father begs Wendy to stop Yoshino going to the Dragon's Valley, which they do and discover a huge canyon. Yoshino tries to run across the bridge but it breaks suddenly, and Wendy saves the day in a very romantic way, holding her dramatically, sparkles everywhere and a giant roar of wind thanks to her Sky Dragon Magic. After a lovely hug, Yoshino realises Wendy is from Fairy Tail and that the bridge is back to normal. They then look up and see the silhouette of a dragon.

It's at this point I realise that with all this talk of dragons, Wendy never even thought about Grandeeney once. How odd.

Opinion: I very reluctantly consider this "okay". The constant sparkles and giant eyeballs and such really put me off. It's not the quality of the artwork I dislike. It's the style itself. Seeing Wendy as a main character would make a lot of sense but only if it was in the canon of the main series. Since this isn't canon, it makes this spin-off surprisingly pointless. I still don't understand why we can't have a Blue Pegasus or Sabretooth spin-off instead.

So how was the actual story though? As far as first chapters go, this one wasn't awful. I've read first worse opening chapters and while I didn't enjoy this one, it never pissed me off like Ice Trail did which is a plus. Wendy's set of characters are all typical and uninteresting, and as seems to be the case with every shoujo series, the girl-love vibes in this is unreal. Maybe that's just me though because I'm not a huge reader of shoujo.

Manga Rating: 2.5/5

Character of the Month: Wendy for being the only character who does anything.

Predictions: It's just an evil mage or dark guild that's behind all this for some really random, silly reason like gold or building an army. I don't know and I don't really care that much. Sorry.

Best Part: There are signs of a conspiracy going on which could lead to something good.

Worst Part: "Hi, I'm a handsome male. That is literally my character."

*deep sigh* Just one more spin-off to go...

Shiggins:[Admin]
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Shiggins enjoys many strange forms of communication, especially those including cosplayers or presents or videos. However, until that wonderful day comes when people care enough to give him things for being him, you can contact him on his Skype; shigginsishere. You can find out about him or ask him stuff on ask.fm/shigginsishere or go to his tumblr page http://otakugajeel.tumblr.com/.