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MÄR: Difference between revisions
Adding the trope of Guardian Arms and found a minor mistake.
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Poor Ginta just can't get a break. He's nearsighted, does poorly in school, isn't athletic, and to top it all off, is really short for his age. He has quite the imagination, however, having had the same dream of the fantastical world of Märhaven, where he's the hero that saves the day, a total of 102 times. This only makes him a bigger laughingstock at school, except for his childhood friend Koyuki who very much enjoys Ginta's imaginary adventures. Then one day, a mysterious portal appears in the middle of his class room and its guardian summons Ginta to the world beyond. With litte hesitation, Ginta steps through to find himself in the land of his dreams. Not only is Märhaven real, but Ginta is now strong and agile and best of all, no longer needs his glasses to see! Thus begins Ginta's adventures in Mär Heaven.
Early on in the plot, the action revolves around fighting [[Monster of the Week|monsters and bandits]] and introducing the other main characters. The plot then takes a [[Darker and Edgier|darker turn]] when the [[Nebulous Evil Organization|Chess]] declare war on all of Märhaven which culminates in an [[Tournament Arc|epic tournament]] with the fate of Märhaven hanging in the balance.
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* [[A Glass of Chianti]] - [[Bloody Murder|Peta]] drinks Nanashi's blood from a fancy (yet creepy) wineglass ''during'' their battle. And yeah, it's just a glass, not an Ärm.
* [[Alternate Universe]] - Mär
* [[
* {{spoiler|[[Amnesiac Dissonance]] - Babbo was Phantom's Ärm in the first games.}}
** In the last volume, we learn that isn't strictly the case. {{spoiler|Babbo's "evil" personality was actually the result of the evil from the Caldian Orb inhabiting him. It left after the first War Games, leaving Babbo with the personality of Caldia's Elder... And Ginta's father.}}
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* [[Ascended Fanboy]] - Ginta gets to visit the fantasy land he dreamed so long for.
* [[Authority Equals Asskicking]] - The Chess are ranked via chess pieces. Pawns being mooks, followed by Rooks, Bishops, and Knights being the highest ranked fighters. There is only one King and Queen and they don't fight {{spoiler|till the very end.}}
* [[Back
* [[Badass]] - Characters on both sides each exhibit moments of badassery, but Alan takes the cake, literally everything he says and does looks badass.
** Except [[Weaksauce Weakness|against cats]].
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* [[Battle in the Center of the Mind]] - Though, as a twist, it's {{spoiler|Ginta and the Caldian Orb}} inside {{spoiler|''Babbo'''s}} mind.
* [[Betty and Veronica]] - With Snow being the Betty and Dorothy being the Veronica.
* [[Big Screwed-Up Family]] - {{spoiler|Dorothy is Diana's sister, who's Snow's stepmother and also the Queen of the [[Big Bad]] }}
* [[Bilingual Bonus]] - Märchen is German for "Fairy Tale"
** Koyuki is Japanese for 'little snow', her alternate within MAR is Snow
* [[Black Magician Girl]] - Dorothy
* [[Blade on a Stick]] - Nanashi's weapon of choice.
* [[Blessed with Suck]] / [[Cursed with Awesome]] - The Zombie Tattoo, depending on how you look at it. On the one hand, it grants immortality; even if you die, you simply [[Rise
* [[Bling of War]]: Justified in that the flashy outfits with fancy rings, necklaces and accessories are what the characters use to attack. In short, their bling ''is'' war.
* [[Blood Knight]] - The basic Chess Piece philosophy, especially Phantom and Peta. They believe that a peaceful, pristine world like [[Mär Heaven]] is meaningless without conflict, war, and battle.
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** Bumoru is a counterpart to Merilo, though significantly less of a 'cat-girl' impression.
* [[Chess Motifs]] - The Chess, if you couldn't tell. Most obviously, their ranking system is organized by the strength of chess pieces, the order being Pawn, Rook, Bishop, Knight, Queen, and King.
* [[Clothing Damage]] - Happens a lot in the anime. Dorothy and Alviss are the main victims.
* [[Chaste Hero]] - While Snow and Jack comment on Alice's appearance, and Bappo is embarrassed to take that form, Ginta doesn't even seem to give her the time of day.
** He does notice that Snow is an attractive young girl when he carries her off the battlefield in the third round, and when Dorothy gives him a kiss for helping her at the story's start, he blushes and apologies to Koyuki, which he notably doesn't do when Snow [[Crash Into Hello]] with him, twice!
* [[Combat Sadomasochist]] - Candice. She outright says this to Jack when she fights him. Her Chimera guardian works by having her take pain in order to power it up, and then inflicts that "pain" on the foe by way of [[Taken for Granite|petrification]].
* [[Conspicuous CG]] - The anime is very guilty of this, especially with its Guardian type Arms.
* [[Crap Saccharine World]]: It's a world of [[Sugar Bowl|children's fairy tales]]... populated by [[Omnicidal Maniac|Omnicidal]] [[Blood Knight
* [[Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass]] - Ginta, Jack, and Nanashi. All three display varying degrees of stupidity, yet when pushed hard enough show their badass sides.
** Nanashi definitely as well, seeing how he acts like and is in fact a skirt chaser all of the time. However the few matches that he loses are because he went easy on his opponents
* [[Curb Stomp Battle]] - Dorothy vs. Avrute.
** {{spoiler|Arguably, all of the battles near the end of the manga, esp. v.s. the Knights, Queen and King. They, almost invariably, followed the formula, A uses X, hitting B once, then countered easily by B using Y, and then after several X,Y,Z... A summons a Guardian, which looks really badass, hitting B once, but it is always killed by B's Guardian, often in one shot. The end. Hell, none of the heroes even got a scratch after the last battle.}}
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* [[Emotionless Girl]] - Subverted with Loco, {{spoiler|as she is simply a stoic, 32-year-old woman in a little girl's body.}} Also, she shows genuine surprise (in one case, horror) at some of the crazy shit the good guys pull off.
* [[Empathic Weapon]] - Babbo, which is considered an impossible trait for an Ärm to have.
* [[Epic Flail]] - Babbo again, the weapon in question looks like a [http://www.onemanga.com/Mär/4/02/ Kendama]{{Dead link}} (like paddle-ball, only with a hammer), Ginta uses him like a flail until Babbo gets upgraded later.
* [[Even the Guys Want Him]] - "Man, Alviss-dono is popular among both men and women!", as stated by Edward during episode 88's Mär Heaven Network.
* [[Evil Only Has to Win Once]]
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** Nanashi is reminiscent of Robin Hood, stealing from others and giving to his guild. Alan is likely related to Beauty and the Beast.
* [[Eyepatch of Power]] - Both Nanashi and Galian wear their bandanas so that it looks like they're blindfolded (although close-ups reveal that one eye is exposed) and Candice wears an actual eye patch (with a flaming skull insignia no less) over her left eye, and they look pretty badass this way.
* [[Eyes Always Shut]]: Ian. He opens them slightly when being creepy.
* [[Fairy Tale Motifs]]: They're Everywhere, most notably Aqua's storyline has
* [[Face Heel Turn]] - {{spoiler|Danna, and in the anime, Alviss}}
* [[Famous Ancestor]] - {{spoiler|Ginta's father Danna}}
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* [[Fun with Acronyms]] - The English title "MÄR" stands for "Märchen Awakens Romance", the "[[Bilingual Bonus|Märchen]]" standing for fairy tales.
* [[Fractured Fairy Tale]] - Boy howdy. Almost everyone is a reference to some fairy tale, even guys like Alviss. It'd be easier to list the people who ''aren't''.
* [[Guardian Entity]] - Guardian ÄRMs can summon a Guardian to fight for their user but they are unable to move from the spot they summon the entity.
* [[Gecko Ending]]: An rather odd example in that the manga ended ''before'' the anime.
* [[Genre Blind]] - The Chess were fully capable of completely destroying Mär, and instead they decide to ''deliberately'' sit back and watch the good guys become stronger. [[What an Idiot!|What a bunch of idiots...]] [[Justified]] in that an easy victory goes against [[Blood Knight|basic Chess philosophy]].
** It's even worse for the Zonnen. In order to end the War Games, they intended to assassinate the main characters during the latter's [[Training
*** More of a case of [[Hoist by His Own Petard]]. They loved killing too much (to which even Phantom couldn't stand). So they fore went the usual easy method in favor of trying to appease their sick pleasure. Course they ended up underestimating the Mär crew and wound up face in the dirt.
* [[Gingerbread House]] - In one round of the War Games, Princess Snow fights against the Bishop Emokiss, an ugly little girl whose signature ÄRM is the Gingerbread House - a house of sweets. When she eats the House, she bulks up, growing fatter and larger and stronger with each bite.
* [[Gladiator Games]] - The War Games
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* [[Heroes-R-Us]] - Cross Guard
* [[Heroic BSOD]] - Ginta, in the anime, after {{spoiler|Snow's death}}
* [[Heroic Sacrifice]] - {{spoiler|Danna dies in his fight against Phantom.}}
* [[Hidden Elf Village]] - Kaldea, from which all Ärm are produced.
* [[Highly-Visible Ninja]] - Kouga
* [[Hoist by His Own Petard]]: Phantom pretty much, he wanted to see how strong Ginta would become. And wasted a chance to kill him when he was still weak. He even admits it wasn't such a good idea in the final battle when Ginta starts to overcome him.
* [[Holding Back the Phlebotinum]] - Utterly averted. Most notably, the [[Year Inside, Hour Outside|Training Gate]] is introduced early and used often; every character not participating in the current day's fights will be training inside, and everyone goes inside to train on the days off.
** In battle, the big weapons and guardians are used often, but saved for late in the battle, but this is [[Justified]] because it takes time to build up synchronization with one's Ärm. Using a big guardian too early will result in it being as [[Incredibly Lame Pun|hÄrmless]] as a soap bubble, as [[Badass|Alan]] is all too willing to explain to an unfortunate Rook.
* [[I Coulda Been a Contender]] - Gaira on the surface, has the makings of a [[Badass]] and was the number 3 player in the previous War Games {{spoiler|gets eliminated in the preliminaries by Chimera.}}
* [[I Have You Now, My Pretty]] - There's an entire arc in the anime dedicated to Phantom kidnapping and keeping ALVISS at his side, under mind control-complete with Yaoi Fanservice! No, really.
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* [[James Bondage]] - Alviss, in the anime.
* [[Jumped At the Call]] - Ginta heads through the portal to Mär with minimal regrets.
* [[Karmic Death]]: Rapunzel {{spoiler|after taking it upon herself to kill her fellow teammates if they lost (or tied in poor Aqua's case). Say the least after she lost her battle to Dorthy, Phantom has her killed personally (in the manga, she decapitated, which was one of her favorite killing methods.}}
* [[Karma Houdini]] - Girom. Sweet blue monkey hell, ''GIROM''. No matter how many atrocities he commits, the only punishment he ever gets is getting blasted into the sky and punched unconscious {{spoiler|and losing his sister Rapunzel to Ian}}. He never learns his damn lesson.
** So he's a one man Team Rocket
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* [[Loads and Loads of Characters]] - All the members of Chess are named, and there are a lot of members... A select few (mainly the knights) are given backstory and/or become recurring characters throughout the tournament.
* [[Loveable Rogue]] - Nanashi
* [[Love At First Punch]] - Jack and Pano.
* [[Love Bubbles]] - Quite usual in the anime
* [[Love Makes You Evil]] - Subverted: Phantom only got more bitter when Alma dumped him for being a villain.
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* [[Orgasmic Combat]] - Candice's sadomasochistic streak makes her enjoy her fights too much.
* [[Our Werewolves Are Different|Our Vegetarian Werewolves Are Different]]
* [[Perky Female Minion]] - Candices's (one sided) relationship with Phantom. Also Chaton and Aqua.
* [[Princesses Prefer Pink]] - Snow.
* [[Psycho Supporter]] - Peta, Rolan... hell, the ''entire Chess organization'' qualifies for this.
* [[Remember the New Guy?]] - Bell, Alviss' [[Fairy Companion]], isn't active during the tournament, making very brief appearances in the interludes beteween rounds. The same happens to Ed, the dog. They both get more screen time in the anime though.
* [[Rose-Haired Girl]]: Dorothy and Diana.
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* [[Shout-Out]] - in one episode of the anime Ginta is turned into a {{spoiler|pink rabbit}} in what is probably a shout out to ''Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening''
** In the first episode, Ginta is playing a Video Game that closely resembles ''[[Final Fantasy VII]]''
*** Ironic considering Ginta looks very much like Cloud Strife.
* [[Sissy Villain]] - Rolan again.
* [[Smoking Is Cool]] - Alan does it, and only looks more like a badass for it.
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* [[Stalker with a Crush]] - Chaton stalks Alan in the anime due to her crush. It's a pity he hates cats.
** Technically Dorothy this to Ginta.
** Phantom to Alviss. It creeps the other out.
* [[Storming the Castle]] - The final fights take place in Lestava castle.
* [[Summon Everyman Hero]] – Somewhat Invoked to bring Ginta due to it working before once with "Boss".
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* [[Tertiary Sexual Characteristics]] - Pozun's wife and their female children have bows on their heads.
* [[The Baroness]] - Candice
* [[The Chosen One]] - Ginta
* [[The Dragon]] - Peta
* [[The Glorious War of Sisterly Rivalry]] - Subverted. Both Diana and Dorothy are beautiful, popular, and sMärt. {{spoiler|Diana is evil, though, and that's what causes Dorothy to try and}}
** Well that and its the law of their floating continent. She ''has'' to do it.
* [[The High Queen]] - Diana
* [[Theme Naming]] - A great number of characters are named after and have attacks based on fairy tales.
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* [[Time to Unlock More True Potential]] - Gaira and Alan are usually responsible for those.
* [[Tomboy and Girly Girl]] - Dorothy and Snow.
** Wait, whose the Tomboy? And whose the Girly Girl? Because Dorothy and Snow were kinda a combination of both! I mean, sure Snow wasn't-mega tomboyish, and Dorothy wasn't mega-girly...but Dorothy also wasn't mega tomboyish, and Snow wasn't super girly. They both were feminine and girlish and both could fight.
* [[Together in Death]]: {{spoiler|Chimera...or rather, Irene and Märco}}
* [[Tournament Arc]] - The War Games making up 2/3 of the series.
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* [[Yandere]] - Candice, for Phantom.
* [[Year Inside, Hour Outside]] - Dimension Ärm Training Gate. Time passes sixty times as fast inside the gate. The heroes use the Ärm at just about every opportunity to train for enormous periods of time. Ginta's first training period saw him spend half a year inside the Gate, while only three days passed outside.
* [[You Have Failed Me...]] - {{spoiler|In the fourth battle of the War Games, the Chess Knight Rapunzel kills those Chess members who lose their battles. Unfortunately, the last one killed was [[Tastes Like Diabetes|sickenly adorable]], and her death drove Ginta [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge|COMPLETELY BERSERK]]}}.
** Ironically this happened to {{spoiler|Rapunzel herself}}.
* [[Your Universe or Mine?]] - Life is though for Ginta.
* [[When You Snatch the Pebble]] - After Gaira's [[Training
* [[Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?]] - Alan, the most [[Badass]] of anyone on Team Mär, has a crippling cat phobia. This turns out to be a problem when he has to fight a [[Catgirl]].
* [[Word Salad Title]]
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[[Category:Fantasy Anime and Manga]]
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