Travis's Reviews > Fairest, Volume 3: The Return of the Maharaja

I don't hand out bad reviews very often, and especially not one star reviews, but I have to join on the dog pile of negative reviews for this volume of Fairest. For a series concentrating on the female Fables this volume did a poor job portraying interesting and strong women.

First of all, the main female, Nalayani, isn't even a Fable, she's just a civilian living in a Fable land. With a rich tapestry of Indian/Hindu Fables/tales/gods to pull from, I have no idea why the author focused on a commoner. Sure, she can shoot a bow and arrow and apparently single-handedly defends her village from dhole attacks but she quickly becomes a secondary character compared to Prince Charming.

Oh, sorry, Maharaja Charming. I guess maybe Charming taking over as Mahajara is supposed to be some commentary on British imperialism in India? But I think that's giving the writer too much credit. Bringing back Charming in the main Fables series would make more sense. It felt like they wasted an entire arc of Fairest just to restore Charming to the main series.

The reveal about one of the secondary character's sexuality wasn't necessary and felt shoehorned as some sort of social commentary. If the writer wanted to include this story thread then more details, even subtle ones, should have been included throughout the story. As is it's just Charming saying "yeah, I know you're gay" and a single page of backstory in response. Ugh.

The artwork is still a cut above average but still not up to the usual Fables greatness.

Hopefully the Fairest series returns its focus to strong, independent female Fables.