#madoka meta;

[lesenbyan]

You know I love Mami, I do. But I think it's utterly fascinating the immediate bad faith reads she does on Homura. Like yeah, she was trying to kill Kyuubei but she's not (yet) been an actual danger to you or Sayaka or Madoka. She's been Weird and she's been Ominous, perhaps even Creepy, but never raised her hand to hurt anyone until Kyoko shows up and even then (tho Mami's dead) it's to protect Sayaka and Madoka. The only time I'm recalling that she was actually legitimately a physical threat to any of the others is shortly before Sayaka becomes a Witch in order to prevent that bc she knows what's about to happen.

Like yeah, there's rebellion but that's a whole different can of worms.

Like it's fascinating what it says about Mami. One rejected grief seed and a threat about "hey so I mean to stop Madoka from making a contract at All Costs" and she assumes it's about a need to be the most powerful bitch in town. Like. It's not really pride (tho it's. Not not pride) that makes her turn down the grief seed. She just knows your future and wants to hope that maybe this time things will be just different enough. Like yeah it's about the rejected kindness, and also you know nothing about her, but also.

[silvermoon424]

I've always loved how ominously Kyubey is framed in these shots. The Mami scene is from episode 3 and the Sayaka scene is from episode 4, so we don't yet know the full extent of Kyubey's manipulation or even that he's a bad guy.

But there's something so sinister and predatory about the way that Kyubey appears when these girls are at their lowest point, at their most desperate. They'd do anything for a miracle, and Kyubey just so happens to provide those. Unlike the powerful and energetic awakenings portrayed in most magical girl shows, these just feel eerie and sad. You really get the sense that these girls had no other options, or felt like they didn't.

Not to mention these scenes do a great job of foreshadowing Kyubey's true nature.

[biggesthomuradefender]

one thing i feel like some ppl forget, gloss over, or just don’t know abt madoka/madokami, is that her existence as a concept/god is much more than being lonely and unhappy, it also involves a cycle of endless and constant suffering and purification w absolutely no reward outside of saving magical girls from being witches.

let me explain:

when madoka made her wish, aka became a god, she swore to prevent all witches from the past, the present, and the future forever, meaning that madoka is CONSTANTLY sending herself everywhere at once all the time in order to do that, while also having to absorb the negative energy from their gems AND purify it all at the same time.

could you imagine just how absolutely fucking exhausting and lonely that is? not only does no one know or remember her, outside of homura, and she can’t even interact w anybody outside of her role as a savior and a god.

and she constantly has to purify all of the negative energy she absorbs 24/7. is an endless cycle with, as i said before, zero reward except for preventing witches.

there’s a scene in rebellion where madoka reaches for homura, and each time she does, you can see scars littered on her arm (s). not only is that a literal representation of her dying for the “sins”, aka wishes of all magical girls, but i also think that they’re meant to signify madoka’s pain, the pain she hides and lies about behind her god status and her genuine, loving demeanor.

it’s why the flower scene is so important and powerful; yes, it may have been madoka w/o her proper memories intact, but that’s exactly it: madoka is only able to be so honest w homura right then and there bc she doesn’t remember her godly obligations, all of her guilt and responsibilities at all.

and homura knows all of this. it’s why her reaction is so intense, desperate, and painful, esp after her fake world begins to rly fall apart; like madoka, homura very easily blames herself for a lot, even the stuff that isn’t rly her fault and she’s just being unfair/mean to herself.

[the-vivi-section]

i love how despite kyoko's death reflecting her father's, the nature behind it is completely different.

like they both died in the process of killing someone else but kyoko's father died with his actions being a sign of violence & corruption, while kyoko died with her actions being a sign of mercy & redemption

also fire imagery :3

[cosmiclumalee]

Kirby has all the qualifications to be a mahou shoujo protagonist!

[abyranss]

Smile!

In Magia Record's re-run of the Nagisa's Wish event, Yuu has at long last been given a canon design, and she's adorable.

In the past, I drew a design for her myself (here, and here) based on the old silhouette they used and I talked a bit then about the similarities I saw between her and Nagisa's appearances. Have a look at those for context if you'd like, because I'm going to revisit that again here with her new look. Below the cut ↓

To start with, some of the things I pointed out on Yuu's silhouette as being shared with Nagisa's magical girl outfit did not survive to her final appearance, such as the fuzz around the edge of her neck frill, the shorts she wears, and the bows along her tails and across her frill.

Though the tails themselves which I compared to the pompoms hanging from Nagisa's hat did survive, that alone isn't enough to draw a connection.

So it seems unlikely that when Nagisa made her wish, her appearance was influenced by Yuu being the first and only magical girl she'd met up to that point.

We can scrap that idea.

However, the parts of Yuu that I noted as resembling Nagisa's witch form, Charlotte... those do still hold up. When you look closely at Yuu, she has rings in her eyes which aren't present when she isn't transformed, and we now know that she uses her horn as her weapon.

Charlotte has a pure white face and a split open mouth, like Nagisa's mother described her killer. This is the strongest piece of evidence which the rest of it is built upon.

Charlotte attacks with her face as well.

And admittedly, perhaps reaching a little here, Charlotte as a worm has a cone-shaped pointy nose that might resemble Yuu's horn.

They also just both have clown energy.

Huh. Looking at these pictures I'm now wondering if I could draw a comparison between Charlotte's head wings and the bundles of cloth hanging from either side of Yuu's head.

...

Yuu was instrumental in Nagisa's transformation over the course of the story, from someone accepting of the abuse she experienced every day into a person seeking to cut ties with her family and create her own freedom, and then Yuu played the part of the person who mistakenly took Nagisa's agency away from her at the end which is what tipped Nagisa over the edge, so I like the idea a lot that Nagisa's grief made manifest from that event took a form that recognises the significance of the Sleepwalking Ghost.

[mooniety]

DID BRO MAKE A CONTRACT WITH THAT MAGICAL GIRL WISH GRANTING CAT????

[saaraofthesand]

Okay, the scene where Mami kills Kyouko is actually my single favorite scene in PMMM. I think about it all the time. I love it so much. Which sounds horrible, I know? But I think I love it because of its honest look at the characters in a desperate situation. And how in-character it is for all of them. It’s such a fantastic bit of storytelling from the writers.

Like Mami would absolutely be the first one of them to snap like that. She’s such an emotionally unstable character. Mami, more than any of them, wants to stop witches and save people because that’s how she makes peace with her lifestyle. So, learning that they’ll all turn into witches… of course she’s going to try and eliminate that possibility before it happens, even if it means killing her friends.

But even more so than Mami’s characterization in this scene, I love Madoka’s. I think it would be easy to assume that Homura would be the one to stop Mami, because Homura is seen as the colder character. So, I love that it’s Madoka. Madoka makes the quickest call she can in that moment to save Homura. Maybe they could’ve talked Mami down, and at that point, that would’ve been what Homura tried first. But Madoka couldn’t risk it and needed to react right away.

It shows us that in the main timeline, Homura is giving Madoka the time and space to make her decisions carefully/fully stop her because she knows that Madoka is impulsive when it come to her friends.

Basically it shows their characterization as this: Mami will always try and make the call that she believes will save the most people, Madoka will always try and make the call that saves her friends, and Homura will always try and make the call that saves Madoka. And that’s because for each of them, those are their salvations from the cruelty of being a magic girl.

[samble-moved]

reminder that homura is a middle schooler. she is 13 or 14 years old, depending on source. she is not old enough to drive or have a permit. she is not old enough to live on her own (it's implied her parents are out of the picture in some way — in the US she'd need to be in adoptive or foster care, or at least have a guardian or social worker, but this appears to be handwaved in the series and none are ever shown). she cannot vote. she is not old enough to get a job (earliest i've seen is 14 in the US, and that's usually in not great environments, in summer, and for low pay and short hours). she is only "independent" in the sense that it's forced upon her by lack of any adult support — nobody helps her fill out school transfer forms, she lives alone, she has no shown family or even mentions of relatives, nobody visits her in the hospital, etc.

i say this because a lot of "anti homura" arguments act as if this information doesn't exist, and that homura is "actually an adult" or at the same level as one due to looping. she canonically is not. her brain and physical body are not developing, she is only learning walpurgis tactics and memorizing test answers. her brain is not developing so she's not "mentally 26", like is often claimed by "homura is a predator" truthers. i'm not even going to touch on how weird and borderline creepy it is to say "she's a child but so mature for her age (from extreme, repeated, potentially pre-series trauma), so she must be an adult and can be treated like one".

there is a reason that children are typically tried differently in the US. unless "tried as an adult" for very serious crimes, it is widely accepted that children (and even young adults) are more impulsive, think less rationally, and are generally "less responsible" for their actions due to not having the experiences of a full grown adult. children are less mature, more prone to "overreaction" and panic, and are immature — because they are kids.

homura is a child. she also has extreme trauma, potentially from before the series even began (where are her parents? are they just neglectful? dead? why isn't there even a single adult helping her?) that is never helped or addressed. homura doesn't get help for any issues she has (obvious ptsd and depression, borderline delusions over the past being "just a dream" in wraith arc). she is not some spoiled, rich, mentally stable almost-adult who's never faced a consequence. she is a young and traumatized teenager, young enough to be a middle schooler, and has experienced:

neglectful, absent, missing, or dead family/parents

watching her friends die horrifically almost a hundred times

having zero adult support at all, no caseworker or help

bullying, half being because she's disabled

having her soul ripped from her body without consent and learning if she ever loses her soul gem (or god forbid accidentally drops it somewhere), her body will basically be "dead"

learning she and all her friends turn into eldritch horrors when they die, a process shown in rebellion to be something they are aware for (aka the horror that witches aren't "just" bodies being moved, they are actively and constantly suffering and aware to some degree the whole time)

learning that the witches they fight are girls around their age who fell into despair, and not purposeless monsters

learned of the prospect that witches can potentially "regrow" via familiars, thus if their consciousness transfers, this shows the possibility of literally eternal suffering as the witch is "reborn"

realization that, the more she tries to save madoka, the worse the situation gets

having a full on breakdown with delusions in wraith arc, thinking maybe madoka was all just a hallucination or a dream she had

finding out in rebellion it wasn't a dream, but then thinking she betrayed madoka by not stopping her from contracting

becoming a witch whose whole theme is based around suicide and wanting and waiting to die, but not being able to

being a witch whose familiars are malicious towards her and belittle her

trying to "fix" her believed betrayal of madoka by making a new world, ending up hated by sayaka and isolated from her friends

is still stuck as a witch while the last event happens!!! (her soul gem is never shown purified)

all of this while she is 13-14.

homura is not some cruel adult playing god because she is bored and likes the power trip and wants the world to burn. she is a deeply traumatized and mentally ill child who never got help. she is not a predator — and i honestly don't know if that is more of a "she's a predator because she's the most openly sapphic" or "she's a predator because she's traumatized and thus 'acts weird' due to trauma" belief nowadays in most anti-homura spaces, i've seen both. she is not a murderer or rapist or whatever else i've seen (yes, "homura is a sexual predator" claims exist, despite this never once even being implied). she is not an abuser — you can argue she's cold or rude, but she is not "an abuser".

if a child like homura existed irl (and they do exist), a professional's first thought would not be "this is an evil, irredeemable, abusive predator who can be treated like an adult", it'd likely be a reaction of horror and deep concern of "what happened to this child to make her act this way?". someone being "the perfect victim" — that is, being soft, demure, sweet, docile, flawless — in response to trauma is a harmful myth for a reason. some trauma victims will react with anger. some may be overly happy in an attempt to prevent further abuse. some, like homura, end up acting "cold" to try and avoid being further hurt. it doesn't mean homura doesn't experience emotion, hates her friends and wants them to suffer, is a predator, is "a bad person", etc.

think! when you write posts about how homura is actually an evil, awful, no good, very bad person with no positive traits, remember she is a middle schooler. of course, she's not a "real" child, and thus doesn't exist to have her feelings hurt over it, but consider this: would you say these things to/about a real child? are you aware that "real children" (often victims of trauma themselves) relate to homura due to this? i was one of them at 14ish, and while "homura is evil [for acting like a traumatized child often does]" discourse never left me particularly hurt, i know it does genuinely upset several people i know. and if you had, say, a real life child relative who acted "cold" after seeing their friends die horribly, would you call them an evil and irredeemable abuser as well?

[liridus]

The loops, role reversals, and Walpurgisnacht: A PMMM meta

Madoka and Homura seem to consistently take on roles similar to each other. And because I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this, I’m going to write it all down. This stemmed primarily from NezumiVA’s video Understanding Madoka Magica- Part 2, especially where they pointed out that with each loop Madoka becomes more docile and the other magical girls tend to die earlier.

Timeline 1

At the beginning of the first timeline, Homura is relatively unconfident. When overwhelmed by others talking to her, Madoka steps in, and converse to what we see in episode 1, Madoka introduces herself as the nurses’ aid, asks to be called “Madoka” and asks if she can call Homura by her given name.

When Homura expresses hesitancy about her given name, Madoka says that it’s a cool name and Homura should become “cool” to match it. Immediately after this, we see a compilation of Homura performing relatively badly in both academics and athletics, both in front of an audience. While in both cases, others mention that she likely needs time to catch up, Homura seems to take this on herself. She also seems to have taken Madoka’s comment about becoming cool to heart, seeing herself as not being able to. Though most of this is likely amplified by the effect of the witch, Homura sees herself as being useless and a burden on others.

After Mami and Madoka save her and explain that they’re magical girls, we see Homura happy, visibly happy, opposed to earlier in the episode.

When Mami and Madoka fight Walpurgisnacht, Homura is the one to call attention to the fact that Mami just died, also here seemingly caring about death more directly than in other loops. As Madoka says that she is the only one left to defeat Walpurgisnacht, Homura pleads with her to run away, saying that no one would blame Madoka for doing so. Madoka persists, saying she is glad that she became a magical girl, eventually dying in the fight.

After Madoka dies, Homura is left with an immense amount of survivor’s guilt, placing emphasis on the fact that Madoka should not have died “Saving someone like her”. Bringing back ideas of her being a burden on others. Thus, as opposed to just saving Madoka, Homura wants to instead become someone who can protect Madoka, someone “cool” like Madoka wanted her to be. And most centrally, someone who would not be a burden, someone who others can rely on; someone who Madoka can rely on so she won’t need to fight alone.

This wish traverses time and continues to rewrite it. Homura finds a moment of gaining control in a moment that seems hopeless, and decides to take responsibility for the new world she wants to create herself, regardless of how long realizing this wish may take.

Through the loops, Homura continues to do what she believes is necessary to protect Madoka: she trains, she becomes less docile, she becomes more hostile to the other magical girls (especially Mami and Sayaka who more directly influence Madoka’s involvement as a magical girl). She becomes colder, and she physically loses aspects of herself (her braids, her glasses) that might stereotypically be associated with weakness, or her old self. Then we arrive at the present loop.

The series loop, loop n.

In the nth loop, Homura begins with taken on the initiative of reaching out to Madoka, who in this timeline is visibly more timid. She also seems to speak with less conviction than she used to in timeline 1. She seems hesitant to approach Homura as she previously had. Homura introduces herself, and initiates Madoka and herself referring to each other with their given names. Homura is notably leading the way this time.

Homura here has restarted their first meeting, however she seems to have taken on a role similar to Madoka back then. Here she issues Madoka her warning, telling her that she does not need to change, ironic considering that Homura’s timeline resetting seems to have affected Madoka’s personality the most.

Just like Homura in loop 1, we find here that Madoka does not see herself as anything special, the idea of becoming a magical girl in itself gives her a sense of joy and a sense of purpose. This is cast aside with Mami’s death. However, Madoka does try to help out in whatever way she can. The feelings of being a burden reach a hight for Madoka when Sayaka (at this point almost a witch), brings up how unhelpful she is despite having an enormous amount of potential (this likely coming from Sayaka’s frustration in not having the same abilities despite putting her all into her fights).

In this timeline, Homura has decided to, like Madoka in timeline 1, take Walpurgisnacht alone. But Madoka decided that she will not let her. With each timeline, Madoka becomes a magical girl later and later, this potentially being the latest in the timeline Madoka has become one. Madoka here decides on a wish to rewrite time, like Homura, and be directly involved, taking a position of control and executing her wish herself. She is also willing to take on this role for however long it might be necessary, similar to what Homura continues to do.

It is interesting to note that in every timeline despite what Homura does, Madoka in the end, due to the cosmic energy now tied with her, ends up becoming more powerful than her, and ultimately due to differences in how involved they want to be with the world, Homura is consistently unable to “save” her from her “fate”. Even when Madoka takes on Homura’s timeline 1 role, Homura is consistently unable to escape from her own role at the end of timeline 1; being helpless.

At this point Homura cannot restart as she usually would, and even if she was able to Madoka has become so powerful that Homura cannot be the one protecting her.

Rebellion

As a witch, Homura here is essentially causing herself misery and despair, perhaps partially due to the incubators containing her, or perhaps due to her self-loathing being so great that she first enacts it on herself.

The labyrinth she traps herself in is ideal where she and the others are safe. Interestingly, Homura here is Homura similar to herself in loop 1. As time passes, even with Homura figuring out the true nature of the world, she is essentially unable to do much able it, taking back her role from loop 1. Before her witch form takes root, there’s a scene with Madoka literally braiding her hair, putting her back into the mindset of this role. We see her consistently fail to save Madoka, consistently being helpless, consistently not being strong enough. Emphasized further by the Nutcracker imagery (Homulilly’s imagery is similar to the Nutcracker in the story of its’ namesake after it’s jaw has been cracker, rendering it useless. Pointed out by NezumiVA (Understanding Madoka Magica- Part 2)).

Rebellion changes things however, as here Homura learns that Madoka does not like her fate at the end of the series (interestingly, Madoka never said she was okay with in in the finale as far as I could find, she mostly just assures Homura that she technically won’t be alone). Homura at this point has tried to fight fate countless times, and each time, despite what she does, Madoka does get involved. Her braid unravels, things are moving away from their usual loop. At this point she realizes that she needs to protect Madoka from herself. She has to fight Madoka.

She pulls Madoka away from the circle, again taking on a role of control and resetting the world to create something that she desires (similar to the end of loop 1). However this time, similar to Madoka at the end of loop n, Homura herself moves outside of the loop, gaining power (likely connecting enough cosmic power to herself via the loops, largely unintentionally, to do so), and considering that Madoka here is now to be not in her God form, Homura finally has more power than her (and even in case of Madoka regaining her powers, she at least has a chance of having equal powers).

Loop n+1

When we reset this time, Madoka and Homura more literally switch roles from loop 1, with Madoka being the transfer student and Homura guiding her. Homura gives back Madoka’s ribbon, perhaps signifying that she will not be taking Madoka’s role in loop 1. Homura has decided that she will do everything necessary to keep Madoka safe, even if that means fighting her. Somewhat unwittingly, Homura also seems to have taken a little more of Madoka’s sacrificial nature here, seeming to have less self-preservation her than in the past, though this could also be due to the influence of her witch state.

Walpurgisnacht

Seeing that in the finale we see Madoka save magical girls before they become witches, I find it interesting that we do not see this for Walpurgisnacht.

From the wiki:

“Its nature is helplessness. It symbolizes the fool who continuously spins in circles. The Witch's mysteries have been handed down through the course of history; its appellation is "Walpurgisnacht." It will continue to rotate aimlessly throughout the world until It completely changes the whole of this age into a drama.”

As many others have pointed out, the chairs that appear randomly, for example in Madoka’s room, and the curtains that at points seem to resemble a stage with curtains and a seated audience.

At the beginning of Rebellion, as @atamascolily has pointed out here, there are several elements that go around in circles. Knowing what we know now about this being Homura’s world, and her time loops, essentially causing her and Madoka to circle and loop around one another, both literally and in terms of roles, and Homura’s primary fear being too helpless to have influence and help Madoka, I think at some point Homura or Homulilly becomes Walpurgisnacht, or the primary witch that triggers the creating of the merge of witches that we now know as Walpurgisnacht. As pointed out by @sayaberry, here, in the trailer for Walpurgisnacht Rising, Homura’s dress becomes similar to Walpurgisnacht’s. The loops also are consistently linked to Walpurgisnacht’s appearance, so she ends up keeping the cycle going. Additionally, it might be that the way that Homura might move away from the helplessness of not being in control, might be in taking total control via creating, essentially the ultimate show.

Also, interestingly, Walpurgisnacht and Madoka’s witch form, Kriemhild Gretchen are said to form two halves of an hourglass; together needing to literally switch places in order to reset time.

[lintwriting]

GUYS where is the kyosaya 'good luck babe' animatic.

sayaka in love with kyousuke and devastated that she can't be 'normal' for him because she's a dead girl walking. kyoko seeing that this impossible "love" is only devastating for sayaka because it represents her inability to reach that selfless 'ideal' girl image she has of herself, chasing shadows on the wall

kyoko, a fellow dead girl, a dead idealist, seeing that noise for what it is, only for her screams to fall on deaf ears. "you'd have to stop the world just to stop the feeling" kyoko holding sayaka's grief seed in her hands "i hate to say it, but I told you so"

god where is it?

[lesenbyan]

Trying to sleep more but I think the reason Madoka works is bc like. She's the central focus but it's Homura's story from start to end. From Madoka's dream to the way she's slowly in more and more of the story until she's the central focus of Rebellion and that's not what feels off. Like, not even as a Homura kinnie, that's the kind of shit I love. Where the main character isn't really the main character except yes she is (bc Homura's whole life is Madoka now)

[pruskita]

KIRBY AND MADOKA MAGICA!??!?!??!

[biggesthomuradefender]

kinda long homura rant/analysis

“homura doesn’t care about anybody but madoka !!!!”

literally homura:

originally tried to save all of the girls before she eventually gave up bc it was literally impossible,

literally ran like hell to get sayaka’s soul gem back after madoka chucked it off the bridge and even closely inspected it w such care to make sure it wasn’t damaged at all,

admitted that she has hurt people (most likely the magica quartet, aka all of her friends, bc who else?) and feels immense guilt abt it and wishes she could erase it all (she literally says that hurting mami hurt HER),

can’t bare to kill mami (she looks so conflicted and sad when pointing the gun at her) and can’t even look at her when she shoots her in the leg bc she rly doesn’t want to hurt her,

subconsciously created a desired reality that she brought all of her friends (even kyosuke and hitomi, implying that she even cares for them as well) into where alive, happy, and together (ppl seem to forget that homura’s labyrinth was literally what she’s wanted deep down before it started to fall apart as she realized it was fake; sayaka literally points out how a witch who just wants to keep everyone happy and out of harm can’t be that bad, and kyuubey points out how homura would have most likely preferred to stay in this fake, happy world instead of realizing the horrible truth),

apologizes to kyoko for “getting her involved in this” after she realizes that she herself is the witch, aka most likely apologizing for wasting kyoko’s time when she asked her to go to kazamino city w her and for calling her,

rewrote reality in order to bring sayaka and bebe back to life and give everyone the happy life they always desired and deserved (she is literally willing to proclaim herself as “evil” and “the devil” and be unhappy if it means that madoka and everyone else gets to be happy and alive, safe from all the pain and the incubators who are still trying to prey on them and all magical girls)

… but she only cares abt madoka?

[theomniplayer]

Unsure of how to find people who like similar stuff to me on this site

So interact with this post (maybe follow if you’d like) if you like these things

- Meta Narratives/ interaction between reality and fiction

- Paranormal and Cryptids

- scifi and mind uploading

- The Owl House

- Narrators with personality (and breaking the 4th wall)

- Amphibia

- Madoka Magica

- stuff about being hopeful and understanding

- Liminal Spaces/ Dreamcore/ otherworldly mystical vibes

- Baten Kaitos/ Numina/ Oneshot / Deltarune/ other games with Player and character interaction or relationships

[mimikyuno]

after 2 weeks of being sleep deprived and drowning in procrastinated schoolwork, and after 2 sleepless night physically fist-fighting youtube who kept giving me random copyright flags my second video essay is finally up 😭🙌🏻

in it, i discuss how two of goethe’s most influential works, “the sorrows of young werther” and “faust”, have influenced the themes and narrative in madoka magica. in the essay, i use this analysis to speculate what might happen in the fourth movie. at the very end, there’s an unscripted rant that i recorded after the second pv came out and i lost my mind lol

HOPE YOU ENJOY! i’ll now be sleeping for the foreseeable future 🫡