Fairy Tales and Fairy Tail

For those who don't know, Fairy Tail is an anime that follows a guild of magic users who try to get work doing odd jobs for those who need help. Here's a picture of the guild's symbol, a fairy with a tail: 

Why do I bring this up, beyond the similar names? Well, I just thought it would be interesting to talk about how the show Fairy Tail owns up to the concept of a fairy tale. To begin, the show starts with Lucy Heartfilia, one of the show's protagonists, looking to join the guild. She starts off by telling Natsu, a character that she runs into, that she doesn't necessarily know how to join the guild, though. A series of events occur in the first episode that result in Lucy helping Natsu to fight a man impersonating a famous Fairy Tail member. At the end of the episode, the imposter is revealed to have been impersonating Natsu, who is actually a Fairy Tail member. Lucy is then invited to join the guild, ending the first episode.

For the sake of this post, I would like to look at two aspects of a fairy tale: the looking in the dark and the transformative nature. In this first episode, Lucy is clearly in the dark. She has no idea that the person that she's interacting with is exactly the sort of person that can help her achieve her goals. Throughout the show after this first episode, there is a similar feeling of being lost in the dark. The formula for the show is that some great evil arises that threatens life, the members of Fairy Tail seem to be defeated, and then at the last second, there is some sort of reversal of fortunes. In almost every arc of the show, there is some form of looking around in the dark, some form of uncertainty, similar to many fairy tales.

In addition to the above point, I think there is a transformative nature in Fairy Tail. When I watch the show, I get a real sense that the Fairy Tail guild is a large family. Natsu and Lucy continually look out for each, and that's not even mentioning the plethora of other characters the show introduces. Everyone acts as a family, and for someone who has always struggled with feeling alone, it shows that there can be a unity among like-minded individuals.

In the end, I think that Fairy Tail could be considered a sort of modern day fairy tale. But there are also other points to be considered. Although there is a striving in the dark, you also get the sense that the Fairy Tail guild often understands what it has to do to succeed. I think there's a point that could be argued that Fairy Tail isn't actually a Fairy Tail. What do you think?