Hiro Mashima, the famed author of Fairy Tail, is known not only for his enrapturing storyline but also for his stunning character designs. The characters in Fairy Tail are instantly recognizable while not being too generic. You could tell that each of them was designed with care.
From Natsu and Lucy to even the minor characters, you could take one look and know which anime they belonged to. Mashima’s art style is at times similar to One Piece, but he took the best of the manga world and implemented it into his franchise.
Why Hiro Mashima Feels Pressure While Drawing Female Characters in Fairy Tail
Despite the humongous success of Fairy Tail and the characters who are beloved all over the world, Hiro Mashima seems to doubt his own skills. In an interview, Mashima-sensei claimed:
I’m actually not very good at drawing female characters. I want to draw them so cute I feel a lot of pressure drawing them.
According to the author, he finds drawing men a lot easier as he can just draw them quickly. This proves that no matter how famous you get for your creative endeavor, insecurity never leaves you alone. Clearly, Hiro Mashima, of all people, shouldn’t feel pressure drawing women, given his track record.
For Mashima, drawing women means dealing with the urge to make them cute, and this is where the problem kicks in. Many other mangakas have also expressed similar concerns, including Gege Akutami who has openly admitted that he cannot draw cute or s*xually appealing women. Even Eiichiro Oda is blamed for having a single blueprint for creating female characters in One Piece.
Does Hiro Mashima Prefer Story or Art?
Mashima-sensei admitted that he had been drawing for as long as he could remember. His inspiration came from his grandfather who encouraged him with manga copies.
I have an early memory of my grandfather showing me a manga magazine that he picked up somewhere. I thought the drawings in it was so cool, so I tried to copy it.
This was the moment when Mashima realized that he loved to draw and he still continues to love the artform. However, a big part of being a mangaka is to create a story, which also involves its own kind of thrill.
The Fairy Tail creator himself couldn’t decide which one he liked more: drawing or storytelling. He claimed that both are fun, and was stuck in a severe dilemma.
When I make a story, I’m rolling out my imagination to figure out what’s going to happen, and that’s really fun. When I draw, I go through a lot of trial and error to get something to look cool or cute. That’s also fun.
Mashima is fascinated by the whole process of creating a manga, which needs a mangaka to marry a story with a suitable art style. Thus, choosing just one out of the two is an inhuman struggle for him.
You can read Fairy Tail on Viz Media and watch the anime on Crunchyroll.
