A Jesus Ending? It’s been a while since we had one of those.
Yeah, the loophole that the creators used was simply the fact that they never explicitly stated that there was any limit to the wish you could make. Madoka just wishes for a world without witches and Kyuubei… grants it. He doesn’t even seem to have the power to reject such a wish. And so, Madoka dies for our sins and completely changes the world. It neither was the best nor the worst ending of this season, but it didn’t hurt this series either: Madoka Magica remains a wonderful show to watch.
Now obviously the first question that came to my mind when Madoka made her wish was “why the heck didn’t people do this before?” I mean, we all asked this question before: instead of just wishing for simple wishes like resurrecting someone, why couldn’t you wish for an unlimited amount of wishes? Because this series refused to explain that, we all just assumed that Kyuubei would obviously refuse any wishes disadvantageous to him. And here, this episode showed that those wishes could have been possible.
My guess is that nobody made such a wish yet, because Kyuubei keeps targeting emotionally distraught teenaged girls who have just been hit by a major trauma. Yes, in a regular situation in which you’re just sitting in your comfy chair you can indeed try to bend these rules all you’d like, but I can imagine that Kyuubei always presents himself to girls who are desperate for one single wish, offering exactly what they need the most. I could be wrong here, but when you’re about to die in a car accident, you wouldn’t really try to be cheeky and think of a loop-holing wish from out of nowhere.
Madoka was the exception, because at the start of this series, she had no reason to be in despair: she didn’t know anything about Homura, and Kyuubei instead got greedy for her powers, and tried to convince her by tempting her.
And yet, I do fault Madoka for not thinking of this obvious solution any sooner. It’s probably the biggest flaw of this series: she pretty much spends 10,5 episodes angsting, only to snap out of things, go Jesus and wish all the witches away. In the end, the only way in which she really set herself apart is the way in which she refused to change into a mahou shoujo, even though this is a mahou shoujo series. At least the other characters in this series had really interesting backstories.
Oh, but that aftermath was really good. It showed that even though witches are gone, there are still other things that demand a mahou shoujo, and Kyuubei also isn’t gone, albeit completely different. It’s definitely interesting to see the different characters here in a world without Madoka or witches. Especially the latter lead to some interesting character development, but also the lack of Madoka in her family was really interesting.
Overall, Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica definitely belongs in the top 3 series that premiered in the past Autumn and Winter Season, along with Hourou Musuko and Level E. Whether or not it was the best out of all of them though is very hard to say because they’re amazing at completely different things. Hourou Musuko also had an amazing second half, Level E had an absolutely fantastic beginning. Either way though, this was the best series that Shaft has made since Sayonara Zetsubou-Sensei 1, and I really hope that future Shaft series will follow this series in its tracks: not just blindly copy Shinbo’s style, but also letting the writers really do what they want to do.
Rating: ** (Excellent)
Blatant internet penis attempt much
Judgement day has come….By which I mean we can judge today if Madoka will enter the realms of a must watch masterpiece or instead be that anime which was really good except for the ending. I doubt Gen will let us down.
All hail Kyubey, gentlemen. All hail.
@anonymous (how brave of you): pot.non-existent kettle.much?
He was asked by the readers to do it, and it’s a wise precaution anyway.
—
yay the end finally :D, I’ll be glad to have watched it whatever the end.
Is everyone ready for this?!!?! I’ve been waiting for ages!!
How do you think its going to end?
Personally I think Madoka going to become a witch and bring everyone inside her barrier.. either that or homura is going to die.
I think that madoka is going to stay human and to end the cycle of witches on earth, homura is going successfully defeat the walpurgis night, but by doing that she in turn will become a witch. Then like in the past when homura killed madoka, preventing her from becoming a witch, now madoka will kill homura from becoming a witch.
That way homura’s mission is complete, madoka doesn’t become a puella magica and the last of the witches are dead and done. But I guess that would be a kind of sad ending.
That’s what I think will happen though! Just from speculation!
Burning with anticipation, yeah!
Wow, I can’t believe what I just watched! Or that it’s over…
Oh, that was EPIC.
Oh, that was EPIC.
I don’t know what just happened T___T seriously?!?! what just happened??!?!
Because of Homura’s constant time travels Madoka, not just Walpurgis, have been steadily growing stronger. When Homura was about to be defeated Madoka made a wish to erase all magical girls from history, which meant she had to rewrite the Universe itself. Which made her God. Homura and QB were somehow exempt from this, Homura because of her time/space travel powaa. Because Madoka became omniscient and omnipresent she remembered all of Homura’s iterations, but because she became God she wrote herself effectively out of the current universe. Homura now fights a new source of entropy Madoka added.
Or so I understood.
tl;dr MADOKA DIED FOR OUR SINS. ON GOOD FRIDAY, NO LESS.
Thank god I watch it before your comment. All hail Madoka as our savior.
hence spoilers post XD
Seriously. WHAT A WAY TO START OFF EASTER
I didn’t see it coming, that was EPIC.
I was hoping for an ending along those lines. Yeeeeeeah XDD
*comment got cut* the song in my head while reading spoilers and looking at screenshots of the end around the net http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1I_crD6Oqsw&feature=related
Homura has become like the second most powerful being in the Universe =O
btw did you see that Joan of Arc was a mahou shoujo
My eyes just had an orgasm. Yummy eye candy.
Madoka is jesus O.O I SEE IT NOW!!!!
THAT WAS SO EPIC.
-spoiler-
madoka is god. XD
i like to think of it as she doesn’t die. she just exists everywhere. ^^
and lexi, so was cleopatra. XD
If I have a complaint, it’s really that if you’re in a position to alter the rules of the game you could pick a lot better rules than what we end up with, which leaves us with a bittersweet outcome solely at the author’s whim. I have no qualms with ceding that this is always the case, but usually the writer doesn’t present his character a free choice at the infinite flavor sundae bar when he intends for his character to get the turd sundae.
Still, for the author in question, this is pretty much a Disney ending. I was expecting something crueler.
m: So was I tbh. I’m a huge fan of angsty endings because I find that they have a way of provoking me to reflect on myself. This ending fell short because it tried to give us an at least semi happy ending. I won’t complain though because I think that although it wasn’t the best ending, it was good enough. I did enjoy watching it. Had the ending been more angsty, it’d get a 10 from me but as it is, it gets a 9.
Overall though, it was a great anime and one that I will probably end up watching over and over again. It joins the likes of Katanagatari and Kino no Tabi in my list of favorite anime and anime that I will watch over and over again and never get sick of.
The ending, in my opinion, was also there to set up for a season 2. Madoka repeatedly hinted that she would meet Homura again and there as long as Homura doesn’t give up hope, then anything is possible. Tatsuya also remembers Madoka somewhat, even though he thinks she’s his imaginary friend, which leads me to think that she wasn’t totally erased from the world. Lastly, the new demons that were introduced went unexplained too. I think that if there is to be a sequel, the story will either star Homura chan as the main chara or will introduce a whole new magical girl to the story.
Damn that was epic… with that ending, Madoka has officially become an instant classic.
-spoilers-
Sure, the “become god and change everything” trope has been used time and again, but the execution here is stunningly good.
They could have explained what happened to Homura better though, but I guess they just wanted to leave it open.
The way I see it, Homura kept a piece of Madoka with herself, both in memory, and in a physical sense (the ribbon). Because she kept a part of Madoka with her, she was able to manifest some of Madoka’s legendary power. The black wings Homura had at the very end looked a lot like the despair which Madoka prevented from overtaking the Earth. Homura carries that despair with her now.
The reason the reorganized universe still has manifest demons is because Madoka, although a God, received her universal powers through a single wish. Her wish was to erase witches before they were born. Her wish was not to erase all evil, all sadness, from ever occurring. In short, her wish was imperfect, and thus so is the world born of her wish.
-major spoilers-
So they actually set up for this earlier in the ep when madoka was talking to kyubey. Kyubey mentions how having wishes granted is normally impossible and obviously would have consequences. Previously those consequences were that they would turn into witches and “curse” people once their “hope” died. In the last ep Homura says that “we still have curses”; indicating that the price of the wish are those curses and that those curses simply have a new vessel (those things that she’s fighting). In other words, the author set up an ending where good is fighting evil, hope vs “anti hope”, aka “demons”, aka “curses”. It was all fantastically done, though I could do with everyone not sprouting Jesus references every time something like this comes up.
Very good, although “epic” isn’t the right word to use. Unless you’re talking about LoGH, the Illiad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid, the Journey to the West, or the Mahabharata, then the word “epic” doesn’t apply. That said, this is one of the best show’s I’ve seen in a long time.
I’m gonna say this now and hope I’m first.
Madoka isn’t just the NGE of the mahou shojo genre, it is also the TTGL.
Bravo Urobuchi Gen!
I find it interesting how we were lead to believe there was no option but for a tragic ending, and then despite everything, get a semi-happy ending. I feel like I can’t stop getting trolled by Gen.
Madoka died on Friday.
And will come back to life on Sunday.
Finally got it subbed and was quite happy with that ending. Not only was it a good was to “end” such a series, but it was a nice way to set up further ones (given how popular it is). I know some prequels are in the works, and love the depth that this series can delve into!
Also, YEAH on Kyubee not remembering. Makes it more tolerable to see him at the end. He’s still terrible, but less so…
I am still a bit confused on what happened with Sayaka though.
awesome series though one question. the girl at 5:00… did it remind anyone of kemono no souja erin?
For those confused about the ending:
Madoka sacrifices herself so Magical Girls don’t turn into witches. However, the despair that is created by the existence of Magical Girls needs an outlet and now manifests as Demons.
Kyoko kills herself so her existence doesn’t continue to spawn demons. Mami’s solemn statement that this is the future for all Magical Girls indicates the system is essentially the same; the only caveat is that instead of turning into witches directly, they form demons indirectly. Same vicious circle in that they are fighting things their very existence creates. The irony and lols.
Fast forward who knows how many years into the future and the world looks to be pretty much destroyed with Homura left against some large demons. She springs to attack them. The end.
Ultimately, Madoka’s sacrifice was meaningless. Gen gave us a masterpiece, complete with a despair-filled ending. Series rating: 12/10. 10 points for excellence and a 2 bonus points for no panty shots.
“Fast forward who knows how many years into the future and the world looks to be pretty much destroyed with Homura left against some large demons. She springs to attack them. The end.”
Oh my, this was the only part that I was like WTH about. But since Madoka says not to lose hope…haha, dunno, I really loved the ending but I wish that last NGE part would be out at times.
@ Drew
Not quite… The magical girls don’t create the demons. It’s the natural despair of humans, remember that witches fed off the stuff to gain more power. Without witches around the stuff was just left to fester forming a lifeform of it’s own which the incubators harness as a far lower output but apparently far more abundant form of energy.
Sayaka’s death was likely due to a particularly rough fight where she ended up putting too much of her power into her final attack. In the new world though instead of turning into a witch at the moment of transformation the magical girl meets Omni-Madoka who destroys the negative energy and the magical girls seem to just fade away.
fcuk yeah!!! I knew it was goin to be epic! I didnt expect it to be that epic!…
seems like Shinbo plans on making a slice of life series Madoka. All I can say is: “Garbage! Thats absoulute garbage!”.
I think people are misinterpreting some things. The final scene with Homura, people keep referring to it as a post apocalyptic scene or the end of existence etc. It’s just one of the barriers that the demons set up similar to witches. Just look at how the world transitions back to normal around the girls after the Madoka/Sayaka scene. They were in some sort of barrier and when they defeated the demons the space dissolved. It’s just as likely that this hellscape Homura was in was a barrier.
I actually think that the final scene is supposed to represent Homura’s “death”. If you consider how all of that energy is just bursting out of her and that the objects floating around in the energy have a serious “witch” vibe going for them it’s likely we’re seeing Homura using up all the energy she has sine she’s fighting alone and on the verge of becoming a witch.
This is why she suddenly hears Madoka’s voice since her becoming a witch means she’s going to meet the Omni-Madoka and then disappear like all of the girls in the earlier montage. Madoka told her before disappearing that they would see each other again, and that is the point when they’re guaranteed to meet.
It makes the ending even more bitter sweet if you think about it that way.
Not bad, but definitely not good either. It was a nice yurish ending, but nothing unexpected, while almost all previous eps were filled with things you wouldn’t expect. Interesting dialogs, deconstruction of genre and here we have apocalyptic\happy ending N212351273 And the art wasn’t good either. The last witch and those demons were not a 1/100 as creative as previous witches.
Maybe my expectations were too high, but this series deserved them. What it didn’t deserve is such an ending.
Somehow, this ended just like how my OC in my daydreams did, except he harbors all the darkness instead of destroying them, and is going insane. ^o^. But yeah, bittersweet endings suck but always draw me back in.
Am I the only one who thought it was really sad that Madoka’s mom didn’t remember her? She was consistently there before or after a really bad/pivotal scene occurred. There was so much love there that it was heartbreaking to see it erased. To me at least.
Reminds me of the Sailor Moon Sailor Stars ending. And it seems Japanese storytellers have an obsession with creating stories about ridding the world of despair / sadness / chaos. Knowing full well that humans are emotional beings and can easily do bad as they can do good.
Madoka Magica is a nicely done short series, and an interesting version about a powered up girl taking on something bigger than herself. However, the ending felt like anime I have already seen just with different characters and some slight rearrangement on how the main character will accomplish their task (can’t say goal).
Basically it is: “the world sucks, i wish i could change it! but sometimes the world is awesome! so i don’t want to change it that much, just enough so i don’t cry about how hopeless it is all the time… because i can accept its faults and welcome its good moments.” *smiley face / burst into sparkles*
Everyone has the “I wish I were God” or “I wish I could question said being” fantasy.
@ Unico
Couldn’t have said it better myself. But that’s the hard truth isn’t it? Humans are so extremely conceited and yet selfless to the point of absurdity at the same time. Think the Japanese found that that idea the most intriguing and just wanted to play off of that in many ways. Hollywood wouldn’t dare make such films because most Americans don’t want that kind of stuff. We like self-made men and definite, happy resolutions.
Beautiful ending. (a happy ending wouldn’t have suited this series anyway…)
whoa….truly fascinating.
ALL HAIL MADOKA!!!
now where’s the review? can’t wait for it!
I think I’ll save my opinions after psgels real post of the episodes. Just want to state that I’m really satisfied with the ending.
I guess it was an okay ending. I don’t agree it is amazing at all though. The emotional impact is superb, but the conclusion is simply lacking.
Madoka is the invisible pink unicorn!!!
Simply great.
I wasn’t disappointed the least although I was a bit worried after having read so many comments saying the ending was disappointing. I think those people just got their expectations up too high.
I wont say it’s satisfactory. I wont say its awesome either. I’ll just say it’s a very interesting conclusion; in many different ways that is…..
Just had one strange thought come to mind: this series might as well have been a prologue to the happy-go-lucky mahou shoujou series that we have seen all this time…..
The ending was a safe ending. Guess they got scared of messing it up.
Just a question. Did Homura also become a god? Her wish transcended time, but she can never save Madoka, but Madoka’s wish negates her from ever become a wtich, but at the same time, it prevents her from ever having her wish granted, how does this work?
Kyuubei DID state that he can grant Madoka almost any wish because of her latent power, meaning that not everyone could make such a wish. It sounds like a reasonable rule, at least to me, I buy it.
Yeah, I recall Kyubei saying something along the lines of “Your wish is near impossible! Though it might just be possible because of all the world lines converging on you” implying that normally you wouldn’t be able to pull off that wish.
“And here, this episode showed that those wishes could have been possible.”
WHOA WHOA WHOA,hold it right there psgels
those wishes,and especialy the one we got this episode, are possible to Madoka and Madoka only,no other girl in history could have pulled this off.
QB’s system will grant a wish that’s proportional to the girl’s power,If the girl doesn’t have the power then QB can’t grant the wish.
Madoka is an annomaly,because Homura time traveled countless times Madoka has accumulated more and more power as each timeline has gone by to the point that she now has an amount that’s unprecedented.
The odds of something like that acuring before in history are quite small.
THAT’s why nobody did it before,because nobody could.
As for why it took so long?
Well she had to know what to wish for,and to know that you had to wish that magical girls don’t become witches she has to know that they do first,and she doesn’t learn that until episode 8.
In episode 9 she angsts but by the end of the next episode that involves her she’s made her decision,so it took 3 episodes:
EP8:learn that MG become witches
EP9:angst a bit and try to seee if anything can be done to tearn a girl back to normal
end of EP11:she’s decided on what her wish will be.
Madoka’s wish was to stop any witches from being born with her own hands either from the past, present and future. Kyuubey may be contractually obligated to make any of their wishes to come true, but remember that being a mahou shoujo is a double edged sword. If for instance you were to make a wish to have an unlimited number of wishes and it is granted, remember that for every miracle, the world must balance out with misfortune, if according to the shows logic on entropy. So their wishes may in turn bite them back, and they fall into despair, and thus a witch will be born that will provide energy for the incubators.
If Madoka had simply wished to erase all the existence of witches, it may stop that threat, but as it is shown after Madoka rewrote the universe, the other creatures replaced the existence of witches that manifested from the despair and hatred of humans. So, the existence of mahou shoujo is still a necessity. But what Madoka’s wish did was that now a person who makes a contract to become a mahou shoujo will get one wish granted in exchange for their whole life dedicated to fighting. But if they ever fall into despair and their soul gem is turning into a grief seed, Madoka will be there to take away their soul gem and all the stored up despair, stop a witch from being born, and giving them a true death instead of turning into witches. And Madoka will carry their despair herself, so that it won’t affect the balance in the world.
@EXM- I think that in the rewritten universe, Homura’s wish when she contracted to become a mahou shoujo would be different from her original wish of wanting to save Madoka. In this new world, Madoka technically doesn’t exist, so Homura technically couldn’t have made that wish. But probably her new wish probably still had something to do with how she wanted to help Madoka protect the world that Madoka had sacrificed herself to save, which probably explains why she doesn’t seem to have that shield with the gears anymore, and instead her new weapon was the same as Madoka’s bow.
yeah, like the other said, only madoka could have been granted that wish
also, about why no one else thought of it;
only very few mahou shoujos know about the turning into a witch part, and that too only after they became mahou shoujos. so they can’t wish for that when they have no knowledge of it, right?
i’m pretty sure madoka was the only non mahou shoujo who was aware of this.
@totoum and Mae
I’m gonna concur w/ totoum’s point, Kyuube distinctly notes the difficulty of the wish in the series and mentions that Madoka is probably the only girl to pull it off, suggesting her degree of potential power. Mae makes a good comment also that there are probably a very few select mahou shoujo who are even aware of the transformation to witches, and fewer individuals outside that circle still. So Madoka has been unique all along in her potential and position to pull this kind of act off.
Personally, i’m not a huge fan of “savior”-endings because of their tackiness, but I really applaud SHAFT because I think this was really tastefully done. Good job SHAFT, you’ve finally scored a series i’m willing to unequivocally call a masterpiece! =)
Um, guys. I put up the message “I will delete any spoilers in the Shoutbox” for a reason. I know I missed a few things earlier on in the series that caused me to misinterpret a number of things in this episode, but there are still plenty of people who haven’t watched this episode yet!
Here are the comments that I deleted in order from newest to oldest::
Zi
Because of the amount of misfortune and fate set on her, the limits of her wish increased. Didn’t Kyuubey explain that? It wasn’t a loophole in the first place.
Joe: @Zi, yeah, exactly. It was also possible because Homura wove multiple timelines so that they focused on Madoka; from that point, she was able to influence every possible timeline.
Joe: @ Dango: You should probably avoid this shoutbox for now. Just finish watching Madoka.
Zi: Because of the amount of misfortune and fate set on her, the limits of her wish increased. Didn’t Kyuubey explain that? It wasn’t a loophole in the first place.
totoum: tanz:in an interview Urobuchi gen stated he had never written anything about a cat,SHAFT just randomly put that in there as part of a troll OP,he himself asked shinbo “why is there a cat in the OP?”
gandalf8: @Tanz- the cat was probably just a red herring. It sure made a lot of people to make assumptions way of the mark from the real plot.
Tanz: btw. The cat in the opening of Madoka was never resolved =/
Joe: So it wasn’t really a plothole at all. Kyuubey probably just refused the truly impossible wishes.
Joe: psgels, it seems like you didn’t understand the Madoka ending. Madoka’s wish was only possible because of Homura’s time-travelling.
I cried at this ending, it was sooooo awesome!
My eyes! They hurt so much from crying!! What a GODLY ending for a great mahou shoujo anime! ;_; I’m rarely satisfied with the way they usually end, but DAMN. man. maaan!
Following the timeline of continuity and the problems with time reversal, I have a theory about the walpurgis night. I believe that the witch in the walpurgis night is Homura’s witch. Homura is bound between all her versions just like Madoka is (there is even a scene of her tied up with her timelines just like Madoka). The Gears on the walpurgis night witch match those on and in Homura’s shield. Homura’s power is time travel, so her witch would have that same ability crossing timelines. This explains why no matter how more powerful Homura gets, she can not defeat the witch, because the witch is HER in a theoretical later timeline when she finally gives up and falls into despair. Kyubi said that it was her wish being focused on Madoka that allowed the timelines to all focus on a single Madoka joining them all. She did not make the wish focused on the walpurgis night witch, so it would not have grown in power, though both Madoka and Homura did, and were shown to have their timelines all bound up.
That is my take anyway, and lends an even darker aspect to everything.
Jesus, really? I don’t see that at all.
First, it’s not dying for ‘sins’, she didn’t die at all, it’s more like transcending her current level of existence. Her powers manifested to such a great deal due to the repeated attempts of Homura trying to alter reality to something more suitable (i.e. a reality where Madoka doesn’t die.) If anything she wished for the incubator to augment her already massive power into something even more: the ability to transcend time and negate the negative energy aggregated within a mahou shoujo’s time, given Homura already could transcend time, it’s not all that difficult to believe, given the suspension of disbelief at this point in the show.
From what I understand she negates the witch transformation by removing the corruption from their Soul Gems at the very moment they fall into despair, thus causing them to simply disappear instead of them turning into a monster.
My guess is, that Homura could never beat the final witch was the same reason Madoka kept growing in power; thus, no matter how many tricks she pulled, she could never finish it off.
Granted the notion of altering reality as we know it might seem like some sort of god-like power, but it’s really no more believable than Homura’s ability, it’s just a lot more powerful.
@doug
Yea I had the same suspicion about Walpurgis being Homura’s witch form. Definitely would explain why she never could defeat it. The only thing that has my doubts is because of the death scene for the witch includes what looks like a soulgem looking part breaking and it doesn’t remotely resemble Homura’s
Been a while since a Jesus Ending? Naturally. How many people actually pay attention to Jesus nowadays?
@Alexander Morou: Well, I think what psgels was going for is the concept of sacrifice for the salvation of all. And that’s how Madoka’s wish turned out.
I am conflicted.
On one hand this style of ending is something I have not seen in ages. It takes balls to pull off something like this. There are so many ways it can go wrong and come off a pretentious. However it managed to avoid this. It also gives the viewer a happy conclusion to a otherwise depressing series. Oh and just in case people wonder why any magical girl didn’t wish for what Madoka wished for before, Kyubey did mention that because of her power any wish would be granted no matter how absurd. Meaning, previous wishes had limits.
However on the other hand I don’t think this was the best way to end the series. I can think of another way that could have worked. This ending had too much hope and happiness. It left a bad taste. I would have preferred an ending where the cycle was broken but the kyubey system was still in effect and the dead magical girls remained dead.
I still really love the show. However, there were flaws.
1: Kyubey infodumps were unnecessary. We didn’t need to know that Kyubey was an alien. We didn’t need to know about the counter entropy system. We didn’t need to know that past famous female figures were magical girls. It would have been much better for Kyubey to remain an unknown entity. The minute Kyubey revealed himself to be an alien he changed from manipulative dark demon to intergalactic energy salesman. This killed his interesting character. Should have just left it a mystery so we could paint him as whatever we wanted.
2: When you think about it the characters were not really special. It was the situations they were placed in that really defined them. They wouldn’t be half as interesting to watch if placed in a different kind of story.
3: Say what you will, I still think the cutout animated witches in the beginning just looked terribly out of place.
4: Slow start-up. Madoka only got truly interesting at episode 3.Before that it was fairly stereotypical magical girl story. I understand why this was like this. Still I cannot ignore it.
So I am conflicted about my score on this. I say…..9/10. Maybe 8.5.
Double Faustus ending! Oh my god! It’s a double Faustus! Whoa, that’s so intense. One Faustus saves the other Faustus from her ill conceived wish.
I salute you, Shaft. 10/10. Best show of the 2010s so far.
So what’s everyone’s interpretation on the very last part with Homura?
Did she suicide nuke?
Is it really a post apocalyptic world?
Personally I think she’s spent ages fighting against the demons to protect Madoka’s wish and the crazy effects behind her is due to her growth in magical power. It might be showing that maybe Homura might gain enough strength as a mahou shoujo after an eternity of fighting to be able to once again see Madoka. Only issue with this is that she didn’t age at all. There has been no mention of magical girls having immortality.
And that repeating X few days over and over again to save person Y was totally stolen from Steins;Gate.
Blocks, it’s not a good idea to discuss plot details from works with currently running anime adaptations.
I think there wasn’t any wishes like that before because the previous magical girls weren’t as powerful as madoka.
Kyubey said: “No matter how impossible your wish, it could probably get fulfilled” which implies that impossible wishes (e.g. rewriting space-time)are usually not fulfillable, but madoka is a special case because of homerun’s repeated time travelling which is why she is able to make that wish
tl;dr WISHES CAN’T ALWAYS BE FULFILLED BUT MADOKA IS A VERY SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE
@AidanAK47 I have to say I disagree with your first two points. Kyubey was still a fascinating character throughout the series, because he represents what humans would act like if they only acted in rational self-interest. He’s absolutely fascinating because you as the viewer wanted to hate him and say he was evil, but at the heart of it, he was as “evil” as a gun, or a mortar, a rational force that only acts through its own self-interested will.
As for your second point, I firmly disagree again. The characters in themselves were quite interesting. Sayaka’s emotional and mental development throughout the series mirrors, to be honest, a soldier developing Post Dramatic Stress Disorder. It is so rare to see a character in any action show, anime or otherwise, actually be forced to undergo the real and apparent psychological stresses of battle. That alone makes her a quite unique and interesting character.
One last thing. A friend of mine thought up and interesting idea about what this whole series is about (beyond playing with the mahou shojou tropes). He suggested that the entire series is about the emergence of Marxism and its subsequent limitations in a capitalist world. You can actually go through every character and see this, and it shockingly fits. I would encourage you to consider it.
It’s explained in the anime, or at least hinted at. There’s an energy requirement for making such wishes. Only Madoka has enough potential energy to make a reality warping wish as a result of Homura’s meddling.
Just Wikied Walpurgis Night. Anime, you’re so obscure.
“Walpurgis Night (Walpurgisnacht) is a traditional spring festival on April 30th or the 1st of May in large parts of Central and Northern Europe. Its celebration is associated with dancing and with bonfires.”
“30th of April is pálení čarodějnic (“burning of the witches”) or čarodějnice in the Czech Republic, the day that winter is ceremonially brought to an end by the burning of rag and straw witches or just broomsticks on bonfires around the country. The festival offers Czechs the chance to eat, drink and be merry around a roaring fire.”
Seeing as how Homura had Madoka’s bow at the ending, why wouldn’t all the power coming from her back be a representation of all the souls gathered from when Madoka cleansed the world of witches. In an alternate reality somewhere Madoka is holding on to all those soul gems, preventing the girls from becoming witches themselves. Think it would make more sense to assume Homura is tapping into that universe, and Madoka is granting her the power of all the Mahou Shoujous/Witches. Witches vs. Demons has a nice ring to it.
Just to point a last comment, these final comments got the right interpretation out of the chapter. Note that making a wish and pulling it off are different matters. For me it’s more like Q extracts the soul gem and lets the mahou shoujo make a wish with all her energy, determined by the potential misfortune the character can face in the future (looks like it can be accumulated through linking parallel worlds with time-travelling).
Madoka gets to God-level thanks to the solid determination she builds up through all the angst and knowledge, and finally her family support, so she can follow her wish to the bitter end (like a saint) avoiding forever the doubt that could make her wish fail.
The demons are created by nature, and I think Homura will probably fight till the end of time while her will lasts and Madoka is there to avoid despair. Now getting grief seeds is a simple matter, every demon gives them like beach souvenirs and QB has a better harvest.
Oh yeah, it was wonderful seeing Homura change her time-travel power to Madoka’s bow with its limitless potential. That means Homura’s pray changed probably to Madoka’s “to protect everyone” ^^
SPOILER
Madoka didn’t intend to become a puella magi. It wasn’t until she learned Homura’s story and saw that Homura was in trouble that she thought of her wish. And the wish wasn’t obvious. Since there are no limits to wishes, Madoka’s wish itself was flawed since, well… spoilers. Great review. I just disagree about some things pointed out by the reviewer.
I actually think Madoka’s wish wasn’t ambitious enough, and I’m halfway convinced she just put everyone into a different realm of hell. Speculation aside, it was a fun ride.
I agree, Madoka’s ability to pull off that wish was an exception to the rule, a case of all the circumstances aligning just right.
A magical girl’s wish potency, for instance, is clearly correlated to her potential power. Kyuubei basically says so himself, whenever he makes a pitch to Madoka; he’s always careful to include “for you” whenever telling her the grandness of the things he wishes for. He never makes proposals so grand in front of Sayaka, however, presumably because she doesn’t have nearly the power Madoka does. This is supported in the fact that Sayaka, despite having fairly grand notions of her obligation towards justice and the world, ends up with a relatively minor wish, and then exhibits a power level that causes even her to admit that she’s probably the weakest magically of the bunch.
Then, we get the factor that Kyuubei usually seems to pick girls in emotional distress, who are therefore more susceptible to his pitch and probably more likely to make relatively selfish and/or shortsighted wishes. (I suppose you might argue that Sayaka’s and Kyoko’s wishes were altruistic, but they were still far closer to being selfish than Madoka’s final wish, because they essentially wished for the sake of someone whose well-being would provide them a large degree of emotional satisfaction.) Kyoko and Mami were both in fairly desperate situations when they made their wishes, for instance, making it sensible that they’d be typical targets for Kyuubei. Also note that in episode 10 Sayaka doesn’t show up as a magical girl for a good two or three iterations, implying that she wasn’t even on Kyuubei’s call list originally. Given his series-timeline manipulation of Kyoko, it’s likely that he only contracted the relatively contented and weak-powered Sayaka as a lever for fostering the despair of a then-powerful Madoka.
Conversely, look at Madoka’s situation when Kyuubei first pitches to her. Kyoko even points it out in episode 9: Madoka is well-loved, by a family in a good financial situation, has a couple of really close friends, and currently neither has a boyfriend nor seems particularly interested in getting one. There isn’t much she’s really lacking, or anything that’s giving her emotional grief. So, she really has no reason to make a wish for much of the series.
Ergo, Madoka in the final timeline was in a position to fullfill three already rare requirements: 1. Knowledge of the entire magical girl/witch cycle while not actually being a magical girl yet. 2. Lacking in serious practical or emotional needs, leaving her wish free for altruism. And 3. Power completely disproportionate to her relatively contented life, thanks to Homura’s meddling. Even after thousands of years of human/incubator interaction, Madoka was probably the only one to have all three of these conditions met, and even then almost blew it on wishing to un-magical girl Sayaka in episode 8!
As for the bittersweet ending, I think it’s caused by a flaw in Madoka’s approach to the wish: she wished to keep magical girls from becoming witches, but that means that there would still have to be magical girls for her to save. Hence, in order to balance that out, there then had to be a need for magical girls, so the “curses” of people manifested as the magical beasts to fill that void. Even if she had wished to keep magical girls from making contracts, the Incubators would still have had the need for offsetting entropy. Only wishing away entropy would have prevented human/Incubator interaction, which in turn would likely mean wishing all energy out of the universe in the first place, thereby annihilating everything. And Madoka is far too loving and optimistic to wish for that.
The wish of Madoka alone had the potential to change the laws of nature, QB said so himself. A Jesus wish would be impossible for any girl with a reasonable amount of misfortune spun around her. Madoka is significant, explained at the beginning of episode 11.