But you've gone as far as to say that deaths in medium is "terrible writing", to say that stance only applies to characters you like personally seems unfair.
If I cant connect with a character then its difficult to feel intimately connected to them, and I guess hard to care for their fate in the medium. For Lucy, I don't feel as strongly against this death scene than I did towards others in other series, it certainly didn't anger and depress me as the major one in say jjba pt2 anime or one pieces that Ill never forgive and forget. I didn't really even praise this scene or chapter (beyond the cover and, as always, Natsu). If I gauge the quality of writing for this death scene, then yes, Id still say that, even written by Mashima, it was a terrible scene. Most of the other death scenes are bad because they make me feel emotions that writing ought not make us feel, we should feel tears of joy and be left feeling good not crying and mourning our characters that have been with us through many numerous chapters. So that is why writers must avoid death scenes.
Juggling alternatives for this scene, maybe if spread out over two chapters, it could have made it more powerful. Additionally the only good aspect or odd aspect is the character chosen to die was just not with us long enough to have lasting effects, if it was present Lucy, the one that journeyed with us from pretimeskip and been with us from day one, then maybe tears would have flowed from her death. Future Lucy has only been with us for such a short time and her true identity was even questioned at some point in time.
