Fairy Tail - Part 2 [DVD]

Following on from the previous volume.

Contains Episodes 13-24
Audio: English/Japanese
Subtitles: English
Region: 2

The first half dozen episodes in this volume conclude the Galuna Island arc, with the focus being on Gray and his relationship with Lyon, and his associates. The anime delves into Grays backstory and why Lyon hates Gray so much. Much of this backstory is focused on them as kids, with their mentor Ur.

Also explained is the backstory of Ur/Lyon/Gray and what exactly happened with Deliora.

Featuring lots of action, with Natsu and Gray having much of the screentime with their battles, and of course Erza makes an appearance too.

Following from this arc is the first few episodes of the Phantom Lord arc, Phantom Lord are a guild that come into conflict with Fairy Tail, much of the focus in this arc is on Lucy. This arc is arguably much more enjoyable than the Galuna Island stuff, with many of the other Fairy Tail members having their time to shine, show off their skills, and generally show how likable they are.

This volume is very good, Fairy Tail is a fun series.

This second volume of the 'Fairy Tail' anime sees the show improve greatly. The volume begins with the conclusion of the Demon island arc with Natsu and his friends fighting to stop the revival of the powerful demon Deliora and trying to lift the curse on the islanders but not everything is as it seems. This is a good arc that includes some nice backstory for Gray and has some nice action as well as some humour.

After the Demon Island arc is done we get a couple of standalone episodes. The first is a light but funny filler episode involving body swapping that does a reasonable job of introducing Levi and her partners. The second standalone episode is based on one of the manga side stories and shows us the events of Happy's birth. This is a very nice episode that has some entertaining humour as well as giving us a nice view of how the various characters in the show were when they were kids.

The final four episodes of the volume begin the Phantom Lord arc with which sees Fairy Tail come under attack from a rival guild, causing massive damage to the guild house and leaving some members hospitalized. It is this part of the series that things become really good with some revelations about various characters background, some nice action sequences and some reasonably emotional moments as well (the expansion of Elfman and Mirajane's background is particularly good). This arc also gives some of the more minor members of the guild a chance to show off their magic which is always nice.

The main improvement to the show in general with this second volume seeing far less use of the stock footage than the episodes in the previous volume did. The animation of the series is just as good as the previous volume and although there are a few minor changes to from the manga here and there, they are mostly minor and easily overlooked. The English dub still has a few issues though with some inaccuracies creeping in a couple of times (a major one being the explanation of Sherry's magic as allowing her to control any living thing, and then she uses it to control rocks in the following episode) but as with the previous volume the Japanese version is included as normal. On the plus side though I will admit that I am getting use to Todd Haberkorn voicing Natsu and the choice of Ed Blaylock to voice the Phantom Lord guild master Jose was perfect.

There are still a few downsides to the show that stops me giving this volume a full five stars though. First, each episode has got an extremely annoying warning not to sit too close to the TV. Secondly is the choice by the animators to remove some of the blood and battle damage when compared to the manga. This is usually the case for shonen anime (such as in Bleach when Jidanbo had his arm cut off in the manga but only received a deep cut in the anime) but is particularly annoying here when characters talk about how wounded they are but they just look a little dirty.

Overall while the show still has flaws, this second volume of 'Fairy Tail' is very entertaining and well worth a four stars.

We got it at their request as they had already loved Part 1. In fact, the boys enjoy it so much that the eldest one (who got it for Christmas) uses it as a treat for the younger two: "if you don't fight today, I'll let you watch another episode."