ANIME MONDAY: Fairy Tail – “To Keep From Seeing Those Tears” Review


Previously on Fairy Tail:

Fairy tail returned to Magnolia in order to regroup from the assault on Phantom Lord, but their break is short lived when Phantom’s guild hall arrives at their doorstep armed with the hellacious Jupiter Cannon! Spoilers Ahead!

Natsu (Todd Haberkorn), Elfman (Chris Sabat), & Gray (Newton Pittman) race inside the Phantom Lord guld hall in order to stop the Jupiter Cannon from firing. Inside Natsu engages in battle with Totomaru (Justin Cook) one of Phantom’s Element 4. After dispatching of him and the Jupiter Cannon, Phantom’s guild hall transforms into a giant robot (anime) and begins to cast the spell known as Abyss Break. While trying to find a way to stop the giant, Elfman runs into to Sol (Barry Yandel) who brings the Strauss family’s dark past to light.

The battle between Fairy Tail & Phantom Lord enters it’s next stage as Natsu & crew try to stop the Jupiter Cannon and subsequent Abyss Break spell, which has the ability to destroyall of Magnolia .

Natsu’s fight with Totomaru is a short one, although it is sort of interesting. Totomaru has the ability to control fire, so it takes Natsu using his brain to find away to defeat him, and even then Elfman & Gray have to come to his rescue when his motion sickness kicks in due to Phantom’s transformation.

Natsu Vs. Totomaru

On the ground, the rest of the guild is holding off Jose’s (Ed Blaylock) shadows with Cana (Jamie Marchi) leading the charge. With Erza (Colleen Clinkenbeard) out of commission Mirajane (Monica Rial) tries to distract Jose by masquerading as Lucy but is soon captured.

Later on Elfman engages in battle with Sol and we find out quite a bit about the Elfman and his family, including what happened to Lisanna (Carrie Savage). Sol himself shows a more devious and manipulative nature than his first appeareance as he uses his magic to create fake copies of Lisanna to mess with Elfman’s head, as well as trap him in a spell that makes him relive tragic events in his life.

Sol using his magic

These scenes are pretty heart wrenching as we get a closer look into the tragic past of the Strauss family, and how they came to be who they are today. The guilt is still deep within Mirajane & Elfman’s minds, especially Elfman’s when it is revealed how Lisanna died.

“To Keep From Seeing Those Tears” is a fairly decent episode, but it really doesn’t pick up until te fight between Sol & Elfman. The action scenes are good, the animation remains somewhat consistent and the dramatic moments hit the notes they’re supposed to. The magic continues next week as the mission to stop the Abyss Break spell continues.

4/5