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EP. REVIEW: Sugar Apple Fairy Tale

What a weird, awkward story this is.

Even putting the slavery aspect aside, the whole human/fairy thing is just utterly tonedeaf. It keeps teetering on the edge of understanding, and then falling back into a clearly well-intentioned but still deeply unfortunate attitude. Like the whole thing with Cathy and the relationship between her and Jonas, and Anne's reactions to it... all that just leaves me scratching my head every time, wondering if the writer does in fact realize the gigantic issues and is just deciding to handwave them away, or if she only has some vague sense of "it's not quite OK" but nothing deeper. (But the intentions do count as far as I'm concerned - everything considered I'd still rather have something like this, than the usual slave harems where the slave girls are just dying to please their master in every way possible, and the main character is supposed to be an amazingly good person for, uh, clearing the lowest of low bars by not taking advantage of them.)

Also, even that aside... Anne is weirdly unknowledgeable about fairies despite living in a world where fairy slaves are common. Sure, I know all that is supposed to be for the reader's/viewer's benefit, but why can't they do exposition in a less jarring way.

Also, Anne goes out of her way to buy a fairy as a slave bodyguard and is not above abusing her power over him, despite thinking that fairies and humans should be equal, instead of just avoiding the whole problem by hiring a human bodyguard (I'm sure they have those around, don't they?).

Also, I spent most of episode 3 with my mouth hanging open over the stolen sugar plot. Like... two barrels' worth of silver sugar go missing. Anne accepts that it was Mithril who stole it, despite Mithril being like, fifteen centimeters tall and having a power that is completely unsuited for stealing two barrels' worth of sugar. Like seriously, Anne knows Mithril's power and how sucky it is, how does she think he even managed to take two entire barrels? And why doesn't she ever wonder about what he did with it? Also, why doesn't she even try asking Mithril what he did with the sugar and where it is now (no way he ate all that sugar)? Why does she immediately take the hard route by picking how many apples (that just happened to be there, clearly belonging to nobody...?) and cooking them and all that? Why didn't she order Chal to look for the sugar, or ask him to help with the apples while Jonas & Cathy look for it? (That they clearly wouldn't do because obviously they're the thieves, but anyway.)

And then there's how terribly stereotypical most everyone is, right down to the voice acting. Especially Chal is painful, but Anne and Cathy as well... At least Jonas was sort of a breath of fresh air, despite being obnoxious and clearly a dick. (It's the one thing the show has done well, showing the dogged suitor as actually annoying and even threatening, instead of giving him the "poor nice guy" treatment.)

All in all, this is not my cup of tea, but I think I may continue to watch simply because I'm vaguely curious about some characters in the OP/ED who haven't shown up yet.

I'm a sucker for a good Shojo romance and so far I think they're doing a great job of developing Anne, Challe, their relationship, and the developing world around them.

I think we see in the plot itself Anne grappling with the moral implications of what she's doing with Challe and how she's perpetuating the systemic issues despite her ideals.

I think the implication was that Mithril ate all the sugar.

Again, I don't doubt that it's all well-intentioned, and I appreciate that at least she is being called out on her hypocrisy, it's just that the whole thing then just stops at "Anne knows it's not good, but at least she's a good slave owner who is nice to her slave, so it's all OK." And sure, I don't want the story to be about the discussion of the ethics of slavery or whatever, but there are ways to do this sort of setting without half-assing it like that.

I guess "good" is extremely subjective... Even in the genre of fantasy romance for girls, there's just so, so many better works, stories that are infinitely more intelligent than this one. Where's the anime adaptation of manga like Elia to totsukuni no ou? Or Itsuwari no Freya? Or even Boukoku no Marguerite, as much as I think it's not all that, it's still a lot more intelligent than this show, has better characters, and it's been getting a lot of attention lately.

(Frankly, this is the sort of show that grates on me simply because the terms "shoujo" and "shoujo romance" is being associated with this particular style and delivery and just general degree of (im)maturity, despite all the diversity within even "romance for female readers", let alone "works mainly targeting female readers that may or may not contain romance"...)

Anne isn't really grappling, though? She's like "I'm aware I'm doing a bad thing that goes against the principles I claim to staunchly hold, but I'm still going to do it for extremely selfish reasons that basically boil down to my convenience, and uh, I'm going to be nice to my slave and release him later so I guess that makes it OK!" And then she even says that much to Chal himself! It's like a vegan athlete being all "I'm staunchly against consuming anything whose creation caused an animal to suffer, but I'm still going to eat juicy steaks and chicken and drink milk all day for an entire month because I want to bulk up fast for this competition that I could do next year but I don't feel like waiting, also I don't want to take vegan protein supplements either."

Again, I don't doubt that it's all well-intentioned, and I appreciate that at least she is being called out on her hypocrisy, it's just that the whole thing then just stops at "Anne knows it's not good, but at least she's a good slave owner who is nice to her slave, so it's all OK." And sure, I don't want the story to be about the discussion of the ethics of slavery or whatever, but there are ways to do this sort of setting without half-assing it like that.

But there's two barrels missing. And Mithril is like, the size of my palm. It's so blatantly impossible, and Anne just takes it all in stride.

Then again, she just took it in stride when the Maeno Tomoaki character was like "Sorry for attacking your fairy - as a compensation I'll pay for your stay here... if you make me some candy creations." Like... dude, you didn't compensate for anything. in the end technically he got Anne work for him for free!

I'm a sucker for a good Shojo romance and so far I think they're doing a great job of developing Anne, Challe, their relationship, and the developing world around them.

I really like Challe's performance myself and his character, as typical as the brooding classically handsome love interest is in these types of shows.

That's what I meant by saying that it reminds me of antebellum abolitionist novels, mostly the ones that didn't stand the test of time for modern readers. They pulled things like this a lot, and it often feels like it comes down to well-intentioned authors who felt strongly but didn't have a solid idea of how to tackle the issue.

I think it's pretty good so far? The leads are likeable, the animation and visuals are very nice, the relationship development is going at a nice pace, and I don't see it as particularly immature. But your mileage may vary.

I mean, I don't think we're meant to take away that Anne is a "good slave owner who is nice to her slave which makes it ok," Challe is happy to remind her of the status they're in even when she tries to bond with him or seems to think their relationship isn't that of slave and owner, just that it's the situation they're in and Anne's own desperation (she probably would have been dead by now if he weren't there) despite her ideals. It's not trying to "glamorize" or diminish the slavery at all in my opinion.

Considering how we see fairies eat, which is through their hands and not their mouths, I don't think it's impossible that MIthril could've just absorbed it all.

He paid for their room and board like he said he would, though?

I'm not very familiar with those (my American literature studies were a loonnnnng time ago) but yes, it really does seem like the writer had this idea and had a decent "actually this is bad" attitude, but then thought that they were doing enough with how they were writing it...

He did (apparently...?), but this is how it went: he has his companion attack Chal -> he says he'll make up for it by paying for her stay -> oh, but only if they make him candy. So how is it making up for attacking Chal, if it's got this condition? Or, if it is making up for attacking Chal then Anne & Jonas worked for free...

Princess_Irene wrote:

That's what I meant by saying that it reminds me of antebellum abolitionist novels, mostly the ones that didn't stand the test of time for modern readers. They pulled things like this a lot, and it often feels like it comes down to well-intentioned authors who felt strongly but didn't have a solid idea of how to tackle the issue.

I'm not very familiar with those (my American literature studies were a loonnnnng time ago) but yes, it really does seem like the writer had this idea and had a decent "actually this is bad" attitude, but then thought that they were doing enough with how they were writing it... In any case while I'd still rather have this than the "Master why don't you let me please you" type slave fantasies, but I'd really rather it was done with more care.

MFrontier wrote:

I think it's pretty good so far? The leads are likeable, the animation and visuals are very nice, the relationship development is going at a nice pace, and I don't see it as particularly immature. But your mileage may vary.

As I said, it's all very subjective. I don't agree with you at all, but hey, your opinion is not mine and that is fine. If you enjoy the show that's great, good for you, I'm just here saying why I'm not enjoying it, nobody has to agree.

MFrontier wrote:

I mean, I don't think we're meant to take away that Anne is a "good slave owner who is nice to her slave which makes it ok," Challe is happy to remind her of the status they're in even when she tries to bond with him or seems to think their relationship isn't that of slave and owner, just that it's the situation they're in and Anne's own desperation (she probably would have been dead by now if he weren't there) despite her ideals. It's not trying to "glamorize" or diminish the slavery at all in my opinion.

It's not glamorizing it, but it's absolutely dismissive of it on many levels - as I said above I'm sure it's not intentional at all, but it happens nevertheless. Anne's grappling with the whole problem of her essentially having a slave and even abusing her power over him starts and ends with "Look, I'm very sorry, I hate to do this, but I really want to enter this contest right now and for that to happen I needed to buy you as a slave. But I actually think we are equal and I'll let you go once we arrive." ...yay, you go girl? She says she strongly opposes humans oppressing fairies, and yet she buys a warrior fairy slave to be her bodyguard so she can enter a contest that she could just enter next year. She buys a fairy slave instead of hiring a human bodyguard. She says she's doing it essentially to honor her mom's memory, but we know that her mom was also very much against fairy slavery. She seems to think nothing of Jonas having a fairy of his own, and in fact when she finds out that the fairy is in love with Jonas her first thoughts are "aww love between a fairy and a human, isn't that nice"... and so on.

What I'm trying to say is, it's all not very well thought out. For example, there could have been ways to force her into a situation where she is not buying Chal for selfish reasons - that would have still worked better than her being all "this hurts me as much as it hurts you". She could have come from a faraway place without a real knowledge of the fairy situation in this country. She could have had at least some problems with Jonas owning a fairy, or some thoughts about the problems with that fairy being in love with him. Etcetera.

MFrontier wrote:

Considering how we see fairies eat, which is through their hands and not their mouths, I don't think it's impossible that MIthril could've just absorbed it all.

Two entire barrels? That seems completely implausible to me. But that really is beside the point - what I'm trying to say is that Anne is shown not questioning for a moment that Mithril stole the sugar, despite, for all she knows (and she knows very little about fairies, living in a world where they're common) it may be completely impossible. She never even asks "Mithril, why would you have done something like that?" let alone "but how??" Again, just bad writing, making the character look like a dummy just so the writer can force the plot along.

MFrontier wrote:

He paid for their room and board like he said he would, though?

He did (apparently...?), but this is how it went: he has his companion attack Chal -> he says he'll make up for it by paying for her stay -> oh, but only if they make him candy. So how is it making up for attacking Chal, if it's got this condition? Or, if it is making up for attacking Chal then Anne & Jonas worked for free...

It's not glamorizing it, but it's absolutely dismissive of it on many levels - as I said above I'm sure it's not intentional at all, but it happens nevertheless. Anne's grappling with the whole problem of her essentially having a slave and even abusing her power over him starts and ends with "Look, I'm very sorry, I hate to do this, but I really want to enter this contest right now and for that to happen I needed to buy you as a slave. But I actually think we are equal and I'll let you go once we arrive." ...yay, you go girl? She says she strongly opposes humans oppressing fairies, and yet she buys a warrior fairy slave to be her bodyguard so she can enter a contest that she could just enter next year. She buys a fairy slave instead of hiring a human bodyguard. She says she's doing it essentially to honor her mom's memory, but we know that her mom was also very much against fairy slavery. She seems to think nothing of Jonas having a fairy of his own, and in fact when she finds out that the fairy is in love with Jonas her first thoughts are "aww love between a fairy and a human, isn't that nice"... and so on.

What I'm trying to say is, it's all not very well thought out. For example, there could have been ways to force her into a situation where she is not buying Chal for selfish reasons - that would have still worked better than her being all "this hurts me as much as it hurts you". She could have come from a faraway place without a real knowledge of the fairy situation in this country. She could have had at least some problems with Jonas owning a fairy, or some thoughts about the problems with that fairy being in love with him. Etcetera.