#magi rambling

[ghostdeals]

It bother me so much that people misunderstand sayaka miki's descent into madness in madoka magica. She doesnt become a witch "just because of a boy." Sayaka is a character who ties all her self worth into being in service of others. We can see this right from the start with her idolization of mami and everything that she was. She saw mami as this "perfect hero" even though mami i would say is mentally the weakest of the holy quintet. In the timelines where mami finds out about the incubator's true goals she always immediately breaks and goes crazy, trying to kill the other girls in her own twisted way of trying to "save them". Instead of seeing the fragile person that mami was, sayaka instead sort of treats her as a martyr, a goal to achieve. We continue on to sayaka's magical girl wish. Instead of wishing for something for herself, she instead sells her soul for the sake of kyousuke. Then when he starts dating hitomi she spirals not because she's sad about the rejection but because she feels replaced in his life, that he doesn't need or want her around anymore. Then she throws herself into her magical girl work not seeing that she's harming herself because she justifies it with "well im saving people that means what im doing is a good thing." She doesn't see that she's becoming more sloppy, more ruthless until its too late. It's only in the end when she turns into a witch that her story gets resolved.

Sayaka Miki is an incredibly sad character to me. While her actions have the illusion of being selfless and "for the greater good" she is actually incredibly selfishly motivated. Everything she does is in service of wanting praise and admiration from the people she cares about. If she helps kyousuke he'll appreciate her and love her, if she becomes a hero she'll receive praise and admiration for being a good person. This is why it is important that of all people it was kyoko that fought sayaka in the end. To homura, sayaka is someone to be saved. To mami, sayaka is her sweet apprentice/younger sister figure. To madoka, sayaka is her energetic and happy go lucky friend. Kyoko is the only one who from the start called sayaka out on her bullshit, seeing straight through her. And at the end, kyoko is the one who truly accepts sayaka. Sayaka as the witch Oktavia von Seckendorff is stated multiple times in official material to be "looking for love." In the end it it kyoko who gives her that love. Even when sayaka has lost her humanity it is kyoko who accepts her for the entirety of who sayaka is with all of her selfishness and desires. She is the one who sees what sayaka has become and stays together with her till both of their ends. Kyoko choosing to die with sayaka is her saying "I'm here for you, i know all of you, and I will love you regardless."

[megaultrasuperhypergodkiller]

I feel like a lot of MadoMagi copycats miss that MadoMagi doesn't really hold any malice towards the magical girl genre at all and if anything embraces it fully, it just takes its concepts and interprets it in a darker sense. A lot of media that tries to replicate misses that and just go "Pfft magical girls are so stupid and childish, we should make a show where they all die, and are miserable and depressed, and it's dark and edgy for the sake of being edgy."

[rosenlied]

If I had a nickel for every time people blamed a teenage girl for making dumb (well not really dumb in Via’s case) decisions as opposed to the actual adults who messed up or the demons manipulating them I’d have three nickels.

No because the sheer amount of awful takes I’ve seen on these three is baffling, teens do dumb shit and all of them had completely justifiable reasons for what they did. I truly hate the Internet.

[xaytheloser]

hey

*pokes you*

hey hey

what if Delusional! Megatron manages to rip out the matrix out of Optimus, while also removing Optimus' T-cog to,,?

....... .... HIS Orion is finally back, in his eyes anyway,,

basically Megs pulls a Homura Akemi,,, kinda,,,, forcing Optimus to participate in his sick delusions, being forced into his old name of "Orion Pax",,,,,,,, raaaaaughhh,,,,,,,,,,,,,

making parallels between PMMM and TF my beloved,,,,,

can you guys tell I'm not normal?? :33

[lamemummy59]

started watching madoka magica recently and decided to draw mami lol

[lionacuty]

something something about looping =w=

[songsofwaterandnight]

"I love the world so much that I'd sacrifice myself for it a million times over" vs "I love you so much that I'd sacrifice the world for you a million times over" is already such a crazy dynamic then they gave it to two gay highschool girls

[liridus]

I can't believe I didn't pick up on the religious themes of Madoka Magica between catholic guilt incarnate, Akemi Homura, and savior of the world, Kaname Madoka.

Homura works on guilt partially because she's failing aspects of her devotion to Madoka (here saving her). I think it's interesting that she's built her life up so she doesn't really have a purpose outside of that. All of her purpose is centered around Madoka. Her magical girl outfit doesn't really have too much of her personality in it either, it's simple, it's plain, it's just what works.

It's also really interesting to me that Homura is one of the first to realize that Madoka doesn't nessisarily want to have to be the sacrifice, she doesn't really want to be the savior. Homura pushes back on the idea that Madoka is a global savior so much, while also still idolizing her and holding her up on a pedestal that doesn't even exist anymore. It's tragic to me that that she's doing the one thing that she absolutely despises-- not fully considering Madoka's wishes and autonomy. Because somewhere along the line, I think the devotion to Madoka became a need. Because without Madoka to save, without Madoka to live for, who even is Akemi Homura?

[bitchliteraria1906]

Trying to write about how Kyoko and Homura being religious affects their characters but I'm not smart enough to make it coherent.

[11syrups]

“You believe me like a god, I betray you like a man”

[missholloween]

Gift of the magi is mostly from Della's point of view, and we don't spend much time with Jim except their first scene together, "my hair/my watch" and the last scene of their story. The show itself plays with this expectation in "What did you do", where we see a really mean Jim that has nothing to do with the guy we've seen happily singing "christmas eve" some minutes ago and Della herself admiting that he won't do that.

But then we reach Jim and Della's reunion after she's cut her hair. The narrator is right by saying he has a strange expression that is hard to read, as Curt is conveying so many emotions at the same time: we see confusion, sadness, some dissapointment and a slight regret just by one look. Jim takes some time to talk, which makes Della even more anxious than she was. This rubs into the spectator too, doubting Della's words and afraid of what Jim is going to say. But then he says, with the brightest smile in the world "You're more beautiful than ever". And that's the best summary one could do of who Jim is.

I really love how Jim is written (and acted!) because of how this scene is played. During the whole gift exchange, his only goal is to make Della happy and comfort her after what she has given. And when Jim realizes what they have done, the first thing he does is be closer to her, ask her to spend time with him. I reallly like that Curt and Janaya hug during Clark's verse, and that they include a close up of them in the pro-shot. Jim and Della deserve a quiet moment to display their affection, but it is also a really realistic portrayal of these kind of conflics and affection. This joined to the switch of gifts at the ends just wrappes one of my favorite Starkid stories period.

The sincerity and heart of this story, as well as the other two, is one of the things that make VHSCCs such a special project. It's just so earnest and you can see how everyone (especial shoutout to Curt and Janaya for their performance) loves the story just as much as we do and understands their importance. Thank you Clark Baxtresser for such a wonderful show <3

[murderenjoyer]

Having a lot of madohomu feels rn

Homura loved Madoka so much that she chose to make the contract and become a magical girl despite knowing the consequences. Normally girls don't know what's going to happen, QB obviously doesn't tell them. And Homura made the active choice to become a magical girl anyway, knowing she would suffer, knowing she would turn into a monster that is eternally suffering and causing suffering to everyone around her, that she would ultimately die and be consumed. She chose that fate because she loved Madoka so much. Because she wanted to save her that much.

She spent 25 years (iirc) repeating the same month or so, over and over, suffering and fighting against a fate that seemed carved in stone. 25 years before she finally succumbed to despair. 25 years is the majority of time I've been alive. I can't imagine how horrible and disheartening and painful it had to have been to try as hard as she could, to fail over and over, to see all her plans and tactics and attempts dashed, to watch Madoka die over and over and over. 25 years! It took 25 years for her to finally, sadly, mournfully accept fate and give up. Her adoration for Madoka allowed her to swallow a quarter of a century of despair before she finally ran out of steam.

And when she turned into a witch, she built an entire artificial city just to spend time with Madoka. She created thousands, millions of artificial people just to make Madoka feel a sense of normalcy. She allowed Madoka's friends into the labyrinth because she knows how much Madoka loves her friends and her only priority, her only wish was to make Madoka comfortable and happy. Homura cares for her friends too of course, but not like she cares for Madoka. Had Madoka not been in the picture, she would not have expended the energy required to pull her friends in and wipe their memories. She did that for Madoka's sake.

And when Madoka regains godhood and comes to collect her, Homura, at this point completely insane, is still so wholly dedicated to Madoka, she needs to be with Madoka so strongly, that she doesn't even care if they're opposing forces anymore. She doesn't care if Madoka hates her. She doesn't care if Madoka considers her an enemy. She doesn't care if she becomes the devil to Madoka's god.

She's so in love with Madoka, she's so obsessed with Madoka, she yearns for Madoka so strongly that she rips Madoka's psyche in half. She rewrites reality into a perfect world where she's not even Madoka's friend anymore - its not about that anymore. It's not about being with her anymore. It's not about spending time together anymore. It's simply Homura's concentrated need for Madoka's presence in her world. It's about being able to give Madoka a happy life without tragedy or suffering. She doesn't care about Madoka in relation to herself anymore. She only cares about Madoka's well-being, her happiness, her joy.

That is so fucking romantic to me. I'm drowning in otp emotions every time I think about it. I can't think of another love story so intense, so raw. It's beautiful.

[glitchyko]

As of today, the Madoka Magica spin off game, Magia Record, has closed.

I have to be honest, I have issues with various aspects of this game, but I still loved it greatly. Madoka Magica is one of my favorite anime ever, and when it was announced Magia Record would be getting a NA server, I was ecstatic. I preregistered for the game, and I was there from beginning to end of the NA server. Magia Record was a huge source of fun for me, I loved so many characters, I was invested and curious about the story, and I had a great time with the gameplay.

So when the NA servers were announced to be shutting down, I was hit pretty hard. I had so many memories and feelings with this game, and now I wasn’t going to be able to play it anymore, but there was nothing I could do about it. Before I uninstalled the game, I took screenshots of every single character I had, to remember all I had gotten, screenshots I still have to this day.

But even after the NA servers shut down, the community came together to pick up where everything was left off, I am so grateful to the amazing people who would take time out of their day and work to make videos of transformations, attacks, translations of arc 2, events, quotes, etc. It’s because of the efforts of these people that even if I couldn’t play the game anymore, I could still connect with the characters and stories I have grown to love and I could not be more grateful. And I’m sure it’s the same for many other fans.

The story of Magia Record has ended, but the memories and feelings I share with it will always be there. Thank you for everything, Magia Record!!!

[lixel-5]

ultimate madoka/madokami’s gold accents reminds me of kintsugi, fixing pottery with gold

her memories have been reconstructed, but she’s still the same person

[xaytheloser]

oh how I love you, very specific brand of doomed yaoi and yuri<333

[thecur]

About Kriemhild Gretchen

Madoka's witch, Kriemheld Gretchen, might be based on the Brockengespenst (Brocken spectre). This is an atmospheric optical phenomenon (presumably) first described on the Brocken, in which the greatly enlarged shadow of the observer can be seen on a fog or cloud bench. The head of the shadow is often surrounded by coloured rings. The cloud/fog wall not having a smooth surface and being in motion makes the shadow appear ghostly.

Source (of both the image and the explanation I vaguely translated)

Source (just image)

As you can see the "spectre" itself resembles Kriemhild Gretchen in appearance; additionally one could argue that a small, seemingly inconspicuous Magical Girl turning into the witch with the potential to "destroy the world in ten days" is representative of a regular person's shadow turning into something so huge and imposing.

It's also important to note that the Brocken is associated with witches. This was "perpetuated by Goethe who described the Brocken as a centre of witchcraft revelry in his Faust. One of his scenes is of Walpurgisnacht, (Walpurgis Night, 30th April) when witches meet on Brocken to hold revels with their gods, and there are still bonfires lit on the mountain to this day." (Source)

You probably recognise Walpurgisnacht as the name of the witch that acts as the antagonist for the main series, which further solidifies the connection. (If you want to read up on Walpurgisnacht itself, I like this article)

Now this last point is something most people already know but I'd like to mention it anyways, for completion's sake. Walpurgisnacht's and Kriemhild Gretchen's silhouettes on top of each other make up an hourglass.

Here, I think it's interesting that Walpurgisnacht makes up the top part. She's there first, signifying the beginning of the end of the world, in a way, as the sand trickles down from her part of the hourglass — Kriemhild Gretchen then, who is destined to come after her as "even if Walpurgisnacht is defeated, a stronger witch is destined to appear after her" and holds the power to "destroy the world in ten days" is the lower part and signifies the end of time.

There's also an entire possible tangent to get into about Kriemhild Gretchen's name itself, but I need to re-read the Nibelungenlied before I feel like I can say what needs to be said about it.