When people think of the most powerful members of Fairy Tail, generally a handful of characters come to mind: Erza, Gildarts, and Laxus. The grandson of Makarov Dreyar (himself the son of one of the founding members of the guild), Laxus has quite the pedigree attached to him.
But in need to prove himself, Laxus does some incredibly dumb things following his introduction. And while this briefly sees him take on the role of a villain, it also makes him one of the best-written characters in Fairy Tail, because of the development he goes through as a character and as a man. See? Not every overpowered character in anime has to be boring. This list goes into detail on all the things you never knew about Fairy Tail’s Lightning Dragon Slayer.
10 SECOND GENERATION DRAGON SLAYER
When people think of Dragon Slayers, they usually think of ones like Natsu or Gajeel or Wendy—ones who were literally taught the art of Dragon Slayer magic by actual dragons, some of the most powerful mystical beings on the planet.
But not every kind of Dragon Slayer developed their power this way. Laxus is a Second Generation Dragon Slayer, which means he gained the power he had by having a special lacrima—a form of crystallized magic energy—placed inside of them.
9 A ROCK 'N ROLL FAN
Before Laxus joined the guild properly, he was constantly wearing a pair of headphones. Though the series is meant to take place before modern technology, these headphones run purely off of magic, and even store songs in a magic database.
If this sounds familiar, just know we’re fully in off-brand territory, as his headphones are referred to as “Sound pods”. What we’ve also learned, thanks to chapter 69 of the manga is that his favorite form of music is old-school rock and roll. Which leaves the question—is he more into 80’s hair metal or more along the lines of arena rock?
8 COULD'VE BEEN A WIZARD SAINT
Laxus’ power is incredible, and he actually stands as one of the Top 5 members of Fairy Tail in terms of pure power for the entire series. Eventually, Laxus even goes head to head against Jura Neekis of Lamia Scale, a member of the Ten Wizard Saints.
Despite Jura’s incredible strength, which was enough to bring down Sabertooth’s Lightning God Slayer Orga, he still wasn’t powerful enough to defeat Laxus. This victory lead some to speculate whether he should become one of the Wizard Saints, but according to Chapter 352 this idea was tossed out because they considered Laxus too rowdy.
7 WAS A MEMBER OF BLUE PEGASUS
Everyone needs a job. After the Tartaros arc, Makarov disbanded the guild because the country no longer had the protection of Face bombs against the Alvarez Empire. But while the guild was disbanded, everyone had to find new things to do to keep their lives going.
Laxus and the rest of the Thunder God Tribe actually chose to join up with the Blue Pegasus guild in the interim year. What else people might not know about this however, is that their time in Blue Pegasus was actually given its own manga, known as Fairy Tail Gaiden: Lightning Gods.
6 HIS LOOK COMPLETELY CHANGED
Originally, Laxus had far more of a scumbag look to him. When he first appears in the manga, he has a long cape, wears metal greaves, and is constantly seen smoking a cigar. But later on, they toss the smoking out and leave him instead wearing a large coat, looking like more of a gangster.
Ultimately this change feels like it was due to Mashima deciding more of what he wanted from the character. But what’s more interesting is that in the anime, they never gave him any other outfit than his updated look, which implies that was always what Mashima wanted his official look to be.
5 HIS NAME ORIGINS
As always, names mean everything. The most important characters usually wind up with the most symbolic names. Natsu is Fire Dragon Slayer with an even more blazing disposition, so of course his name actually means Summer.
Laxus gets his name from Lux, which is the standard measurement of units for illuminance and luminous emission. Though the character didn’t initially have the powers he does now, it’s clear he was given that name to bring light to the Dreyar family.
4 CHANGED BECAUSE HE LOST HIS DAD
Interestingly enough, when we see flashbacks of Laxus, they’re always depicting him as this sweet little kid who loves his grandfather Makarov. He doesn’t seem like the kind of person who would have grown up into the man we meet in the Battle for Fairy Tail arc.
What changed him later on is when Makarov excommunicated his father Ivan Dreyar. Between that and being unable to live up to the immense shadow of Makarov turned him into someone much harder, who only cared about strength.
3 ALMOST MADE MAKAROV RESIGN
The Battle of Fairy Tail seems small in retrospect, but it nearly tore the guild apart. Laxus made his best effort to try and change the guild into something he thought people would respect, and in doing so, he risked the lives of multiple members—both the ones turned to stone, as well as the ones in combat with one another.
Makarov had no choice but to excommunicate him from the guild. But he wasn’t just satisfied with proving that Laxus’ actions weren’t acceptable, and out of embarrassment nearly left the guild himself. It’s understandable, considering that meant he’d had to excommunicate both his son and grandson, but the rest of the guild refused to allow Makarov to leave.
2 RUINED HIS BODY FIGHTING
After Laxus made his return to the guild, he became one of the guild’s biggest defenders. He worked his tail off to atone, and that meant making more risky decisions than he otherwise might not have if not for his actions during the Battle of Fairy Tail. When facing off against one of the demons of Tartaros, Laxus absorbed a near-lethal amount of anti-magic particles to save the people in the city.
This damage didn’t go away, and for the next year, he suffered violent attacks because his body couldn’t take the particles inside of him. However, he managed to outsmart Wall of the Spriggan 12, getting him to cancel anti-magic within a specific area, curing his body and making him healthy again.
1 HIS FATHER WANTED TO KILL HIM
Laxus was mostly raised by his grandfather, Makarov, leader of the guild. What initially drove Laxus off the deep end and lead to him attempting to betray the guild was Makarov expelling his father from Fairy Tail. What Laxus didn’t seem to know was that his father Ivan never really cared much for him.
Laxus started out as a sickly young boy, and he was given the lightning lacrima as a way of healing him. Later on, we learned Ivan never really cared about him getting better, so much as developing the lacrima so he could rip it out of him and sell it for cash. Jeez, what a jerk.