Forum - View topicREVIEW: Puella Magi Madoka Magica: the Movie Trilogy 10th Anniversary Blu-ray Box Set
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TarsTarkas
 Posts: 5915 Location: Virginia, United States |
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Rebellion.........
Is made of three arcs. The first being the candy coating one that show the world our characters are in. Arc two is what I consider the high point of Homura's character, quite an uplifting chapter for her for me. Which is what makes the final arc so upsetting. The Homura of the second arc, would never have done the things of the final arc. Some above have said that the final arc is the ultimate wish of Homura. Well, if it is, it is a pretty nightmarish wish. I mean, the series ended with our characters brain washed out of their minds, prisoners in Homura's nightmarish world that is literally breaking at the seams. I agree with a poster above the the final arc was the high point for Sayaka's character. Resisting Homura to the very end, until Homura snuf's her out. So the series ends with our characters "brain wiped, mind flayed, or brain washed", pick your choice. Are they screaming on the inside, pounding at their mind's walls to free themselves from their friendly and smiling caricatures that Homura has created. The ending of Rebellion demands a sequel, because the ending of Rebellion is a cliff-hanger. Madoka Magica is not a horror movie franchise, where all your favorite characters are trapped forever in a house of horror. (edit, I say this knowing that there is a sequel coming, now. But I don't think they really ever intended a true sequel to fix or conclude what they had done.) |
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wolf10
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(As for the larger genre: PriMagi and the rest of the "Pretty" (not Cure) franchise are a more merchandise-driven throwback to the magical idols of the 90s, but it's all aimed squarely at the same demo as Precure and Sailor Moon. There's also Jewelpet, Ojamajo DoReMi, and Onegai My Melody, off the top of my head, but I don't think they have currently-airing series at the moment. Yuki Yuna and Symphogear are more seinen-flavored, and both fully concluded, but both hit pretty hard with the yuri fans I know.)
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Princess_Irene
ANN Reviewer
 Posts: 2638 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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I firmly believe that this franchise is best looked at in context of the magical girl genre as a whole. Especially if you go back as far as both the text I mentioned in the review, The Tale of Gisho and Gangyo and even earlier folklore in the Animal Brides tale type; it's probably worth thinking about how in Animal Brides stories women transform to and from swans, seals, celestial maidens, and other supernatural beings into humans and their happy endings are getting to return to their magical roots. (By contrast Animal Bridegrooms get their happy endings when they get to remain human.) Thinking of Kyubey as the man who steals the selkie's sealskin can be an interesting bit of context, especially if we think of the girls' souls as their sealskins - and Madoka's god form as the Celestial Maiden returning to the heavens. (I had that problem you speak of for a while, too.)
I mean, we can go back as far as 1968 and Sally the Witch, and the 1980s and 90s had a lot of good shows; someone already mentioned Kamikaze Kaito Jeanne, which alongside Sugar Sugar Rune, Magical Emi, and even Saint Tail are all solid examples of child-oriented (and marketable) magical girls. More recently we've had a few oddities like Wish Upon the Pleides and Day Break Illusion, but I'd hesitate to say that those were truly aimed at a child audience. |
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Nev999
Posts: 151 |
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I mean, we can go back as far as 1968 and Sally the Witch, and the 1980s and 90s had a lot of good shows; someone already mentioned Kamikaze Kaito Jeanne, which alongside Sugar Sugar Rune, Magical Emi, and even Saint Tail are all solid examples of child-oriented (and marketable) magical girls. More recently we've had a few oddities like Wish Upon the Pleides and Day Break Illusion, but I'd hesitate to say that those were truly aimed at a child audience.[/quote] I think I'm being misunderstood, I'm aware of the history of the magical girl genre and that most of the entries from the sixties on were aimed at girls and usually children, I'm saying post Madoka, unless it's an already established franchise, we're not getting much aimed at girls or women and the majority of the new content is 'magical girl but make it edgy like Madoka! in increasingly juvenile ways'. I think we've seen that chill out slightly in the last couple years at least. I'd count Yuki Yuna and Daybreak Illusion among those, and sadly I didn't like either of them, though I think the first season of Yuki Yuna is more restrained than most about it (though it wears its Madoka inspirations on its sleeve to the point it's sometimes funny) it's just I found the entire premise and how it treats disability to be tiring, and the characters forgettable. I would also be shocked if Daybreak Illusion was for young kids, I recall it wanting to be very edgy and very bad at it and I couldn't even finish it. |
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wolf10
Posts: 922 |
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Just this past season we had Healer Girl, which definitely counts, even if the demographic line is a little blurry. I wonder if it's less that not as many are produced anymore, and more a matter of how so many more series are produced now that the quantity seems low in comparison. Looking back it does kind of feel like a golden age has ended, though, and that's sad to think about.
There could also be a bit of a licensing gap. It took almost decade of legal streaming services for Precure to start getting simulcast, and there are similar shows from the last few years in ANN's encyclopedia that never even got news coverage on the site proper, let alone any kind of overseas release. I imagine it's not all worth it, but as an avid consumer of shows I'm way too old for, there are always some overlooked gems.
It's really not the show's or Butcher's fault, even if I do think he lacks the flair for natural character dialogue that Makoto Uezu has. Ah damn it, I'm doing it again. (Also, wow. I'm usually familiar with your fairy tale citations, but my childhood must have shielded me from The Juniper Tree. Feeling a bit scarred now that I've filled in that gap, but I'll live. I think my closeted morbid side enjoyed it.  )
Last edited by wolf10 on Mon Jun 27, 2022 5:12 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Princess_Irene
ANN Reviewer
Posts: 2638 Location: The castle beyond the Goblin City |
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Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that you didn't! Yes, you're right, I think that's about the state of things lately, and I wish it wasn't.
There's a really fascinating film version of it starring Bjork, just to make things even wilder. The Robber Bridegroom was always my go-to scarring fairy tale, but The Juniper Tree is a close second.
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nobahn
 Subscriber Posts: 5140 |
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You reminded me of something that came out in 2016 ─ Magical Girl Raising Project. I loved it, so I'm quite surprised by the poor ratings. Maybe it was because the character intrigue didn't begin to amp up until episode number four? That was the episode that signaled that the dangerous ones were not so obvious. I don't know if our tastes align at all; but if you enjoy battle royale, then you might enjoy it. |
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Juno016
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To respond to TarsTarkas first, Urobuchi had planned the draft for the upcoming movie around the end of Rebellion, but had originally intended to leave the draft to a new writer and focus on a ton of work he was offered at the time, retiring from Madoka. We don't know why they waited so long or why (or even if) he returned yet. He has been credited with the writing and returned for anniversary interviews, so evidence suggests he's directly involved in the new movie. For Wolf10, I don't know if it was because of a mistranslation from the infamous Rebellion brochure, another interview, or a bad internet game of telephone combined with heightened emotions and debates at the time, but there were some weird rumors that went around the English fandom that Urobuchi had written the story of Rebellion completely and then Shinbo somehow forced him to make an open-ended conclusion so everyone would be alive. That's not exactly what happened. From what I remember (I translated a lot of materials for fans myself, but it's been a while), Urobuchi had been asked to write a sequel when the original series was in its final development stages (before airing), to which he wasn't sure of what to write (Madoka had just pulled him out of a writing slum after the Fate/Zero novels, but he wasn't expecting to write a sequel). When the anime began airing, he fell in love with its presentation and ideas for the sequel came to mind, so he started an early draft of a story revolving around Homura and how she would wind up rejoining Madoka. However, he struggled to write an interesting enough story of proper series length until Iwakami mentioned he thought the burden of Madoka's wish was realistically too much for a middle school girl to handle on her own. Shinbo agreed and suggested some unknown ideas (he mentioned himself in a separate interview that he wanted everyone alive and together, but I think he meant he wanted them shown as a team in Rebellion because Mami and Kyouko never met on-screen in the original--I could be misremembering this), after which Urobuchi finally felt motivated to revise his draft from the ground up before writing the actual story from start to finish on his own. He left much of the happy-go-lucky scenes to Shinbo, InuCurry, and some of the other staff to write between the actual major story points, but the last 5 minute twist was planned by him around the time of his final draft, before writing the story out. In short, there was definitely some influence from both Iwakami and Shinbo on Urobuchi during the early planning stages of Rebellion's story, but it was not the sudden forceful late-stage change a lot of people keep saying it was. Hope that helps clear things up! |
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zrdb
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My favorite magical girl series is the vastly underrated Maho Shoujo Tai Arusu or as I like to refer to as Magical Girl Squad Alice. It was saddled with the really asinine name Tweeny Witches when it was released by Media Blasters years ago. It was a really unique take on the whole magical girl genre with excellent world building and likeable characters and a lot of really dark undertones in the story.. There was some humor and banter and sol elements in the overall theme.
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Villain-chan
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As for the contradictions you pointed out, I'm willing to bet the 2nd one u explained isn't actually what was said, but, I'd have to rewatch the 3rd movie and am waiting for movie 4 b4 I rewatch the series again. But as to the shield bit, that isn't quite true from what i recall. From what i recall Madoka resets the timeline herself, with I think Homura's help? That or just Madoka herself. However, by doing this the shield itself losses its power, well, is broken is more like it iirc. As to the amount of time that passes, I do not know how much time passes from the start of the Wraith Arc to the End of it, however, the reset brings her to where we see her at the end of movie 2/TV series (b4 the skip to her fighting alone and showing her becoming a Witch which was a COOL ref and giant hint at movie 3, yet done in a way u likely won't see it even in rewatches) and I'd also like to point out that as far as I am aware, in the series, it is never once stated how FAR Homura can travel back to. If it were stated then my apologies and yeah maybe u could say there's a contradiction there but not really, if Madoka was helping her she'd be able to do it and even if she weren't, let's not forget that Homura's powers got affected so who knows, her time traveling power might actually have gotten stronger, that's assuming she has a limit on how far back she can travel ofc. As for Kyubey's experiment. Lets not try to over look the plot hole u just created urself with that what u said Kyubey said. Kyubey's race doesn't do things on emotion, curiosity is an emotion if am not mistaken and Kyubey never once believed Homura was telling the truth. He'd never have even started the experiment in the 1st place UNLESS he had a reason too (Such as what happens in Wraith Arc where he got proof) and he doesn't have her powers, not sure where u got that from, all he has is a broken shield that's power is gone and his memory in tact. Let's not forget that he can't see Madoka so his line there was likely in ref to Madoka herself, nothing more, nothing less. Plenty of things are written to bridge stuff, also not needed but they fill in the gaps of the story, thats why its called a continuation of the story, or a bridge like u said, connecting the stories, thats not not canon territory, thats canon territory there.
We do not know how it is for them whose forgot, or brainwashed to forget is what I'll call it here, but let me just say that the ending of the OG series wasn't as pretty as we believed it to be. From what i understand, magical Girls don't simply "disappear" when Madoka comes for them. They go to sleep inside of Madoka herself. Unless she wakes them up to go on a mission for her, they continuously sleep in her for all eternity. That's just too sad, much like movie 3's ending cept, least u can say Homura is TRYING to make Madoka happy. She doesn't even have to keep anyone alive might I add (Please ref the OG series and how she treated Sayaka when Sayaka was losing it), she keeps them alive solely to make Madoka happy, becus she knows Madoka would be sad if she killed them. (Someone gonna point to movie 3's scene where she let Mami live, Homura didn't have her full memory in that scene for one, but likely might not have for Madoka's sake) Its hard to say if Homura would kill her and Madoka's friends if given the chance if it was to protect Madoka but yeah, hopefully movie 4 pleases all Madoka fans... |
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TarsTarkas
Posts: 5915 Location: Virginia, United States |
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There is no proof, there is just people's interpretation of events and actions. I never bought into the line, that Homura was too obsessive that she is crazy. But Homura would have to be beyond twisted to do what she did to everyone in the finale of Rebellion. Rebellion clearly shows a happy Madoka and friends trying to rescue Homura. There is nothing sad in that. Other fans have called this Madoka heaven. Homura could have had it all, if she had just stepped on the multi-colored rainbow. Instead the producers gave us a twist, with a horribly twisted Homura character, that completely ignores all the character building in the second arc of Rebellion. |
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Suxinn
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While I'm not saying I entirely disagree with this, or the rest of this review, I personally don't think that the ending of Rebellion wasn't organic to Homura's character. In fact, while it was certainly a twist, and an extremely shocking one, it was one that seemed to make perfect sense to me in retrospect as a natural evolution of what Homura went through, both in the original TV show and Rebellion. I understand why folks hate it, though, since it's basically the antithesis of the decisions that Homura (and Madoka) made in the TV show, but that, at least to me, doesn't mean it wasn't a decision that Homura would never make, just one that the TV version of her didn't.
And, yes, this! This is what made the ending work so well for me. I think the definitive scene for me was Sayaka's final confrontation with Homura: spoiler[where Sayaka is clearly furious at Homura's decisions, but right after this conversation ends, she meets Hitomi and Kyousuke and bursts into tears of happiness at being able to be with them again.] There's a really clear tension here between living a happy lie and a cruel truth. As the reviewer mentioned, the main theme of the movie is whether you would choose to wake up from a happy dream, which Urobuchi hammers home with this ending, and it's one that Urobuchi has played with before. (Psycho-Pass deals with similar tensions, between living in a safe society devoid of free will vs. having agency in a precarious world. Urobuchi clearly lands on the side of the latter in that show.) That's what makes me really like this movie, even when I understand why others would not, because Homura's choice is wrong, and even she knows it, but the movie ends with a montage of everyone's smiling and happy faces, so... How do we deal with that? And where do we go from here? I'm glad those questions are finally going to get answered, now that a continuation is confirmed, haha. |
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Nev999
Posts: 151 |
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No problem! I just wanted to clarify. And nobahn, sorry, but MGRP is pretty much the embodiment of what I hate about 'magical girls but make it edgy' post-Madoka, I think only Magical Girl Site and it's ilk would be a worse time for me. To be super clear, I pretty much at least glanced at any new mg anime that's come out the last ten years, so if it's 'dark' and not the two I mentioned, I hated it (but yes, I did like Healer Girl). On the Western side of things, I do think the webcomic Sleepless Domain at least does something interesting with it's Madoka inspiration, so it's not all bad. And uh, so it's not off topic, I do like the Madoka tv series for what it is -divorced from all the other stuff. It's not the groundbreaking thing the more passionate fans hype it up as, but it's a solid show and it was fun to follow back when it came out. I did not like Rebellion and didn't find the direction it took with Homura interesting. We can talk about interpretations all day, but the imagery and voice acting and cringy dialogue in the movie hit us over the head 'wooo she's a yandere now scaaaary' in such an over the top way it made me roll my eyes. It will be interesting to see how the movie follows up on things though. |
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Everlasting Coconut
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My own takeaway is that, while the TV show ended on a bittersweet (but mostly hopeful) note, it was nightmarish in its own way. Yes, Madoka's wish saved all magical girls, but the price Madoka had to pay was too high. It doesn't matter if Madoka says she's fine with it, it's cruel for one person to have to shoulder such a huge responsibility all by herself. Way too cruel. Homura realizes this during the flower scene and eventually rewrites the universe. Yes, her plan is too idealistic and the world she creates is full of flaws, but at its core, her plan is a well-intentioned one. She wants to preserve the system Madoka created, while also allowing Madoka to live a normal life with the people she loves. I also believe she wants the other girls to be happy as well. Yeah, she erased their memories, and there was her confrontation with Sayaka, but Homura could've erased Sayaka or any of the girls from existence if she wanted, yet she didn't. She wants to avoid conflict as much as possible. Sadly, it's not possible, and Homura acknowledges this. As you said, the world she created is nightmarish and breaking at the seams, so conflict is inevitable. Which is why I disagree that they never intended to make another sequel. All the elements for a sequel are there, and Madoka Magica was never the kind of story that was gonna end on such a bleak note. My guess is that the final movie will end with the universe being rewritten again and the girls getting a happier ending than the previous two installments (but probably still bittersweet). On a different note, I hope we don't have to see Nagisa again, since her only purpose in Rebellion was to be fanservice. She's there in the concept trailer, but hey, they keyword here is "concept." The writers still have time to change their minds
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Juno016
Posts: 2415 |
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You misunderstood what I was saying. Wraith arc was written by someone (Hanokage) who wasn't involved with Rebellion, who was interpreting the movie their own way when writing Wraith arc. Magica Quartet approved their interpretation for publication and it's up to them if they want to acknowledge anything from it in the new film, but the story of Wraith arc had no baring on Rebellion's creation. When suggesting it to supplement Rebellion, the fact it is only an interpretation by a single person needs to be considered. Nothing in Rebellion was written anticipating the events of Wraith arc. It cannot be used to explain Homura's feelings or choices in Rebellion. The same author adapted the original series to manga when it aired and made a LOT of funky interpretations, such as when they believed Sayaka had killed the two sexist jerks on the train and drew her dragging a bloody sword behind her off the train in the manga. Urobuchi, who is part of Magica Quartet, also approved this for publication, even though he says he was shocked at the interpretation. That doesn't make it "canon" to the anime. Though I'm pretty free-minded when it comes to "canon" and absolutely fine with treating Wraith arc as its own interpretive "canon", I think its contradictions do make it harder to accept as part of the core story without some fixing. Hanokage recently (December 2021) remade their original adaption and the new editions are absolutely gorgeous. They also re-adjust Hanokage's wild interpretations to align more with the original anime's presentation. As for the contradictions themselves, I have both Wraith arc and Rebellion in front of me. In Rebellion, about an hour in, Kyubey explains they were willing to start the experiment because the prospect of controlling the Law of Cycles was too great to ignore after Homura's story. Originally, it was only intended to see what would happen if they secluded a soul gem from interference and learn more about the Law of Cycles bit by bit, but they adjusted the field to allow some actors in and, to their surprise, in came Kaname Madoka herself--the girl Homura said was the Law of Cycles incarnate. This caused them to shift focus of the experiment, thus going to the extreme lengths they did in the movie to try and coax out Madoka's powers. If Kyubey had seen the Madoka wraith like he did in Wraith arc, he'd have used that as proof already of Madoka's direct existence in tandem with knowing Homura's story to be true from the shield piece. As for how Homura's shield works, there is sand at the ends of it that, when she turns the shield 180 degrees, causes time to reset and the sand to fall anew. It's basically an hourglass. This is visually seen in episode 10 multiple times and we see the sand getting low and running out in episode 11 just as Homura resigns herself to giving up. Right before that, Homura also checks her shield during the Walpurgisnacht fight and says she "doesn't have any time left" while doing so, showing the sand getting very low. The reason we know the exact limits of reversing time is because Urobuchi himself explained how it works in subsequent material. It's also written in the commercially published draft, which is where I first learned of it myself. Urobuchi added a limit to keep time travel grounded. His explanation is consistent with the dates on the calendar in Homura's hospital room in episode 10 and the scene in episode 11 where Homura gives up, so it's considered true as evidenced in the text itself.
On the contrary, Nagisa's underuse in Rebellion is exactly why I want to see more of her in the next film. She was intended as a red herring in Rebellion, so had little time to develop, but that purpose has been served now. She should be given an arc to grow and establish herself as a full fledged member of the crew. If she's nothing more than a device like she was in Rebellion, I'll be quite disappointed. I enjoyed her presence, but her lack of real character definitely is one of the few genuine flaws of the film to me. If the concept trailer is true, though, Mami will be playing a major part. Nagisa is essentially Mami's "partner" now, what with MadoHomu and KyouSaya being oft paired together as friends (or frequently more than friends lol). |
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