| 1 | '''As a Fridge subpage, all spoilers are unmarked [[Administrivia/SpoilersOff as per policy.]] Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned.''' |
| 2 | ----- |
| 3 | !!FridgeBrilliance |
| 4 | |
| 5 | * Homura is commonly associated with [[ReptileAndAmphibianTropes lizards or salamanders]] during the entire movie. The salamander is also used to symbolize the flames it passes through and is a symbol of fire, temptation and burning desire. It was considered the "king of fire" and as such was representative of Christ who would baptize with the flames of the Holy Spirit. Cloquet considers Christ the salamander king of fire because he passed through the fires of hell after his crucifixion without harm. It should be noted Homura's name can be translated as "flame", as is 'Lucifer'; witches were commonly burned on the stake and a lot of things were on fire in ''Rebellion''. |
| 6 | ** It can also refer to a basilisk. When a serpent's egg is warmed by a chicken the resulting creature gains some of its bird traits, but only as a deadly monster that exudes poison. Homura's corrupted Soul Gem was watched over by a goddess only to birth something horribly wrong. The basilisk is known as the king of serpents and the lizard wearing a crown in the second movie resembles its classic depiction. Once Homura completes her transformation the lizard is shown again adorned with feathery wings but no crown... until you realize it is on the bottom of her new, crown-shaped Dark Orb. |
| 7 | ** This may be unintentional but reptilians in conspiracies and several mythologies (especially Zulu) are sometimes associated with the moon. In the intro she is seen falling towards said celestial object. |
| 8 | * When Homura introduces herself to the class and subtly reveals her soul gem Kyouko and Madoka are surprised while Sayaka seems utterly shocked. Knowing that Sayaka actually knew everything all along, this over-the-top reaction comes across as BadBadActing; Sayaka knew Homura is a magical girl but had to pretend to be surprised, overreacting because she's a poor actress. |
| 9 | * Homura telling Kyubey about Madoka's presence may come off as a [[IdiotBall completely idiotic move on her part]] (and it honestly was) but one must remember who we're talking about. On one hand we have a girl starved for companionship and desperately trying to keep Madoka's memory alive in her heart and on the other we have a creature who's proven a genius at burrowing into people's minds and twisting them, especially if they're already unstable. Homura may not have trusted Kyubey but as far as she was concerned he had no way to overturn Madoka's wish and she needed someone, ''anyone'' to talk to. Surely there'd be no harm; [[SchmuckBait what's the worst he could do?]] |
| 10 | * Homura dragging down Ultimate Madoka despite her begging to stop was insanely out of character, there's no way that Homura would harm Madoka like that in a million years. But then it hit me, I was right. It was extremely out of character because Homura WOULDN'T do it. But Homura had already turned into a witch and we only need to look at Sayaka in the classic series to see that turning into a witch messes with your moral compass. Homura would never hurt Madoka but ''Homulilly'' would. After all, just five minutes since she was trying to kill Madoka and company with a familiar army. And because Madoka only saved Homura after the transformation rather than before the transformation like the other girls, Homura as we know her had pretty much already died and been replaced with a witch-like persona. [[NiceJobFixingItVillain Nice one, Kyubey]]. |
| 11 | ** This also creates what could be the biggest {{irony}} of the series. Homura spends ''dozens'' of [[GroundhogDayLoop repeated time loops]] fighting to save Madoka only to wind up becoming her greatest enemy. |
| 12 | ** This actually fits her character. Throughout the series the sole reason for her existance is her desire to protect Madoka, the only problem is that a Goddess doesn't need protecting. So her very existence is invalidated. She took away Madoka's divinity and made her helpless to fullfil her desire. It also fits in with her being the Devil to Madoka's God. Madoka is the embodiment of selflessness while Homura is selfish to the core. |
| 13 | ** As the troper above said it fits perfectly. Homura actually hurts Madoka more than she protects her during the actual series. Homura is so absorbed in her selfish concern for Madoka that in no moment she actually cares about what Madoka thinks, wants and values. She doesn't really hurt Madoka physically but sure as hell hurts her morally and psychologically over and over again. |
| 14 | *** The series also mirrors the fully amoral hard truth about Homura's actions: yes, they were selfishly motivated but if she hadn't taken them Kyubey would've won the long game. Without Homura's time-looping Madoka never would have been able to wish away the Witch system. Without Homura stealing Madoka out of the Law of Cycles there's nothing to protect her from the harm Kyubey can do to her now that he's proven she's an ultrapowerful magical girl and not just a law of physics. It's a necessary evil in a Judas kind of way. |
| 15 | ** Another piece of fridge that makes Homura's ascention to devilhood sensible? Her thoughts upon first witching out in Timeline 3 were her wanting to destroy everything that ever made her cry or hate, contrasting Madoka who wanted to preserve everything. |
| 16 | ** In addition, remember that Homura's prime motivation is to protect Madoka even if she neither needs nor wants it. She'd just had a long conversation with Kyubey about how the incubators were going to try to pervert Madoka's wish or possibly even capture and use her for their own ends. Homura fell into despair because her wish was no longer valid. But Kyubey just provided her with the knowledge that Madoka was once again in danger and Homura could do something to protect her. The catch was that Madoka was already caught in the trap. The only thing Homura could do to save Madoka was prevent Madoka from fulfilling her purpose so the Incubators couldn't see how Madoka operated. Homura has always prioritized her definition of Madoka's safety over everything else, but even if she did have a few last shreds of sanity that might have caused her to step away from that edge and trust Madoka becoming Homulilly probably destroyed those anyway. |
| 17 | * In the beginning scenes when the Nightmare goes through several windows before ''Mada Dame Yo'' gets played each window has its own wall around it and it uses several that refer to previous witches fought in the series. One more early foreshadowing that Homura is the witch of the labyrinth as she'd be the only one to remember witches and had fought them previously. |
| 18 | * During Madoka's transformation a few things are worth noting: |
| 19 | ** When she holds her soul gem the only parts of her body that are "normal" colored are her hands. Fitting, considering Homura steals her powers by grabbing her hands. |
| 20 | ** It's the only transformation where no runes appear. |
| 21 | ** While she transforms a film tape that passes horizontally appears where there are many Madokas holding hands, probably meaning she exists in parallel and everywhere. Also aided by the fact that she gets 9 screens showing her. |
| 22 | ** There's also a glass that breaks during her transformation, showing us how she broke the rules of the original universe. |
| 23 | ** Also, she hides most of her face with only her eye showing. It looks a lot like the "all seeing eye" as if she watches everything like an omniscient god. |
| 24 | ** The "dance" phase of her transformation is modeled after that of an idol singer which works on a number of levels: she's the focus of Homura's admiration and love (Homura is basically a Madoka fangirl), she brings joy and hope to all magical girls (who serve as her audience) and, tragically, she disappeared completely after a very short period of time after someone else drove her to a height of influence and power. |
| 25 | ** There's a lot of key and keyhole symbols in the background of her transformation - she's basically the 'key' to Magical Girl Heaven, the Incubators view her as the 'key' to the Law of Cycles and she's trying to 'unlock' the seal on Homura's soul gem. |
| 26 | * Madoka's [[RetCon flip-flop]] on whether or not she would sacrifice herself as she did at the end of the original series seems a bit strange. Then you realize this is Madoka without the psychological torment she sustained that drove her into a corner and it makes a bit more sense. |
| 27 | * With all the {{Fan Work}}s and {{Licensed Game}}s and other SpinOff[=s=], it's easy to forget that the beginning of ''Rebellion'' is actually the first animated appearance of all five magical girls fighting together. It's a big deal for a reason. |
| 28 | * While the level of seriousness varies, every entry in the Cake Song [[EverybodyIsJesusInPurgatory means something]] to the character singing. |
| 29 | ** Sayaka is a raspberry as a [[ActorAllusion nod]] to [[Anime/FreshPrettyCure Cure Berry]] and their matching elements. |
| 30 | ** Kyoko is an apple because it is now her TrademarkFavoriteFood with boosted significance from ''The Different Story''. The apple also carries religious significance, being the fruit that Eve ate in the Garden of Eden, and Kyoko's wish was for people to flock to her father's Christian church. |
| 31 | ** Mami is cheese, Bebe's favorite food. Bebe likes Mami, too, and has eaten her in another timeline. |
| 32 | ** Homura says she's a pumpkin. A story surrounding the pumpkin involves the origin of the Jack-O-Lantern, in which a man was able to prevent the Devil from claiming his soul by asking him to fulfill a last request, only to trap him with a crucifix. He could neither go to Heaven or Hell afterward. Some fans have pointed out the Dark Orb's shape resembles a pumpkin. |
| 33 | *** Alternatively, Homura's a pumpkin because she's really a witch. |
| 34 | *** There's also the fact that pumpkin has a thick shell protecting the inside filled with seeds and pumpkin "guts", the pulp. This parallels Homura's psychological state in the series. |
| 35 | ** Madoka says that she's a melon, split to bring sweet dreams. Now, what happens in the ending of the movie? Madoka is ''split'' from Ultimate Madoka and forced to return to her human form, though there is still an uneven connection to her goddess powers. |
| 36 | *** At the end of the movie, from Madoka's power, a 'sweet dream' - Homura's new world, in which everyone is happy was truly created... |
| 37 | * The line they each use to describe the cake and pass the song onto the next singer is equally significant: |
| 38 | ** Bebe starts with "Is the cake Sayaka?" Bebe is Nagisa; she and Sayaka are the only ones who actually know what's going on because they're agents of Ultimate Madoka. No one can understand what Bebe says, but Sayaka picks it up easily nonetheless. |
| 39 | ** Sayaka passes with "The cake is red" to Kyoko, whose theme color is, obviously, red. |
| 40 | ** Kyoyko passes with "The cake loves Bebe" to Mami. Apart from just being true in general, Mami really ''does'' care about Bebe, and she and Homura come to blows over it later on. |
| 41 | ** Mami passes with "The cake goes around in circles" to Homura. She has no reason to know that. As far as Mami ought to know, there's only ever been one timeline; this is a hint that Mami's memories have been manipulated by Homura, because only Homura would know about her time-looping. |
| 42 | ** And Homura passes with "The cake is sweet" to Madoka. D'aww. None of the other girls should know anything about Madoka at all, so having anyone ''but'' Homura pass the song to her would crack the illusion. |
| 43 | *** Also, take note that when Homura sings her verse, it passes by the other three girls. But look at what Sayaka is doing. In contrast to Kyoko and Mami, she's the only one ''singing along with Homura'' (specifically she's singing "Sweeter than Sweet") and moving her fingers like a conductor with his baton. This can be seen either as her also getting along with the lyrics or a subtle hint that she's trying to subtly ''guide'' Homura towards the truth. And also another foreshadowing of how Homura rewriting the world and making Kyubey eat karma will be cathartic. After all, revenge is ''sweet''. |
| 44 | ** One of the last lines in the song: "on the table/platter is a cat's dream". Homura's barrier is part of a larger scheme by the Incubators to trap Ultimate Madoka within their isolation field, and Kyubey [[CatsAreMean has been likened to a cat]]... |
| 45 | *** We later see Homura's body laid out on a funeral altar. She's ''literally'' on the table and, as the only magical girl capable of proving the existence of Madoka, she's a dream-come-true for the Incubators who want a bigger energy yield. |
| 46 | ** The song finishes with "it's round and plump, so everyone eat up!" Madoka's wish was made to fulfill the happiness of everyone. |
| 47 | * Speaking of the song, that scene seems to echo back to episode 3 of the anime, and especially to the first movie's rendition thereof: a bunch of girls sing a cute-yet-disconcerting song about food, then Charlotte proceeds to eat the "food" in question. |
| 48 | * The entire scene itself is about as weird and random as it gets, even for a MagicalGirl movie. It's one of the first clues that something is amiss in the setting. After all, people usually see weird and random things whenever they are having a dream. |
| 49 | * Even the accompanying hand gestures can be interpreted as symbolic, but this time in reverse: |
| 50 | ** Sayaka covers her face with her hands. Madoka's eyes were metaphorically covered by Homura for most of the series. |
| 51 | ** Kyoko taps her fingers in a rhythm on the table, as if she was keeping time to a song. Sayaka's crush is a musician, and her wish was to heal his injury so he could play his beloved violin again. |
| 52 | ** Mami puts her hands together in prayer. Kyoko's wish centered around her father's church. |
| 53 | ** When it's Homura's turn, the camera pulls away from her and focuses on Kyoko and Sayaka. Mami had less screentime than both of them, only appearing for 3 episodes. |
| 54 | ** The camera also makes it difficult to see what Madoka is doing, but she also appears to cover her face with her hands. This could be interpreted as Homura's true motive being unknown for most of the series. |
| 55 | * And then there's the fact that it's... well, a song about who the cake is. Charlotte's theme is "Wo ist die kase", which is usually translated as "Where is the Cheese?", but the cheese that Nagisa's wish centered on was a cheese''cake''. It's a callback to Charlotte's labyrinth. |
| 56 | * Madoka had the power to remake the universe as the raison d'être for countless timelines. She wasn't the only one. All of Madoka's massive karmic potential was just riding Homura's wake. |
| 57 | ** Equally brilliant is the call-back to the original series (and consequently the previous movie). When Kyubey discusses the reasons behind Madoka's huge magical girl potential, we see a shot of her with her body tied onto various strings, representing Homura's various timelines. When Kyubey pins the blame on Homura, we see the same shot ''with Homura replacing Madoka''. That's a really long-shot foreshadow, if not a downright lucky coincidence. |
| 58 | * In Episode 6 of the series, Kyoko tells Sayaka that, if she wants Kyosuke, she should "break his arms and legs so bad he'll never be able to use them again. Make him so helpless he won't be able to do anything without you. Do that, and this time, he really will be yours and yours alone. Both his body and heart will be all yours." In the end of the movie, although Homura doesn't do this literally, she does cripple Madoka by depriving her of her godhood and memories, trapping her in a GildedCage. |
| 59 | * After the bus scene, the next we see of Kyoko is her in the arcade, in her casual outfit from the series, playing a dance game. This could probably mean that she's quit school and gone back to her old time-wasting habits since she and Homura found out that they're in a fake world, and have had their minds tampered with to fit in. |
| 60 | ** In this world, Kyoko and Sayaka have formed some sort of relationship. They even live together. The reason Sayaka doesn't make a fuss over Kyoko skipping school is because Sayaka has known that the world is fake to begin with and she realized that Homura and Kyoko have figured it out. |
| 61 | * If one pays ''really'' close attention to the details in the beginning sequences, it's easy to tell it's a world of illusion made by Homura. Madoka's hair when down is longer in the movie than in the beginning of the anime, alluding to Ultimate Madoka. Similarity the classroom was a lot more golden in the movie. When Homura enters, she is confident rather than shy but still her moe self, alluding to the fact that she wants to be confident but not the ultimate protector. In hindsight it gives us a really good insight on Homura's psyche. |
| 62 | * At the conclusion of their battle with a Nightmare, the magical girls have to ''sing'' to it. They all sit in a circle and sing a cutesy, repetitive song about cake and fruit. It seems completely silly and ridiculous--Madoka isn't a musical!--until you realize it's a ''lullaby''. Only natural that you'd need one to defeat a Nightmare. |
| 63 | ** The same goes for the first Nightmare fight: while the girls don't sign themselves, the lyrics for the song [[http://wiki.puella-magi.net/Mada_Dame_Yo "Not yet"]] are very much akin to that of a lullaby. |
| 64 | * Remember in episode 6 of the anime when Madoka asks her mother for advice about how to help Sayaka? Junko tells Madoka that doing the right thing doesn't always create a happy ending, and suggests that Madoka do something wrong for Sayaka. Junko also warns that it won't be a neat and tidy resolution, and that Sayaka might misunderstand Madoka's intentions. Now apply this to the ending of ''Rebellion''. Homura believes that Madoka's self-sacrificial ascension is keeping her from being happy, and so she does something wrong - extremely wrong - in order to ensure Madoka's happiness. The resolution is not neat or tidy. |
| 65 | * Take a good look at Demon Homura's dress. There's a [[RuleOfSymbolism heart]], [[LoveHurts broken down the middle.]] [[{{Pun}} And she did have a heart condition...]] |
| 66 | ** And look above it. There's a bow and arrow. |
| 67 | * During the MotiveRant, Kyubey says that magical girls have infinite possibilities. He's right. [[LaserGuidedKarma Horribly]] [[GoneHorriblyRight right.]] |
| 68 | * It was mentioned in the earlier season that Sayaka is the only magical girl who dies in ''every single timeline'', either by turning into a witch or by overusing her magic. Even Ultimate Madoka couldn't do anything with it since then Kyosuke would land back in hospital. Homuniverse is the first timeline ever in which Sayaka is alive and yet Kyosuke's hand is still healed. |
| 69 | * That one thing tells you everything you need to know about the selfish love that Homura used to reshape the universe: Madoka couldn't change Sayaka's outcome without leaving Kyousuke's injury because Sayaka's wish was what made it possible. Homura doesn't just undermine the universe or condemn it to heat death, she negates the meaning of the magical girls' existences. It means that all the magical girls in her new universe gained nothing by becoming magical girls because their wishes have no meaning now. |
| 70 | ** It's actually pretty doubtful that there ''are'' any magical girls in Homura's universe. Kyubey didn't exactly look like he was in any condition to be making contracts, and considering the amount of horrible shit that Homura and her friends went through during the series, it's seriously questionable if she'd even allow him that much freedom in the first place. And while Homura's words imply wraiths are still around, it's not like magical girls are even strictly necessary anymore. Even if Homura isn't doing something like taking the stuff that would form the wraiths and shoving it in Kyubey before it has a chance to spill over and manifest, it's made pretty clear that the [[EliteMook Clara Dolls]] are still around. Each one of them is said to be as strong as a magical girl, there are at least 14 of them, they appear to be able to work in perfect harmony, Homura could probably resurrect any that die (since they're manifestations of her self-loathing and not actual people), and Homura can apparently send them wherever she wants, whenever she wants. Those odds are straight up overkill for anything short of Walpurgisnacht, and anything that strong would still have to contend with the Devil herself. From what little we see, everyone appears to be living happy lives, with whatever problems they had either not existing or not yet manifesting. So it's actually entirely possible that Homura didn't so much render the wishes meaningless as she did make them unnecessary in the first place. |
| 71 | * At one point Madoka says it's been a month since Homura transferred in. In the anime Homura says she repeats the same month (and a half) over an over. At the end of the month, Walpurgisnacht appears. In other words, Homura's search for the truth is the equivalent of Walpurgisnacht's appearance. |
| 72 | * Wonder how Homura's witch barrier LotusEaterMachine was able to alter the memories of Mami and Kyoko? Go back to episode 4. Remember when Madoka gets sucked into Elly's barrier? She gets caught by Elly's familiars and is then ''altered''. Her body changes to resemble the art-style of the barrier. Morever, Madoka is shown images of Mami's death, which suggests Elly is reading her mind. In fact, Madoka only returns to normal when Sayaka attacks Elly. The implication is that anyone "invited" into a witch's barrier is brought under their power. There's no reason to believe witches can't do this to magical girls...but it's easy to see they wouldn't want to since magical girls can fight back. In ''Rebellion'', when Kyubey is giving his explanation we see scenes of Mami and Kyoko doing ordinary things before Homulilly's Clara Doll familiars appear behind them. The Clara Dolls are powerful enough to take on a magical girl, so they must have been able to overpower Mami and Kyoko and bring them to Homulilly's barrier. Once caught by the barrier Mami and Kyoko were "altered" like Madoka was in Elly's barrier...but the alteration was done to their ''memories''. |
| 73 | * Some viewers get the impression that ''Rebellion'' betrays the point of the original series. ''Of course it does!'' With a movie titled ''Rebellion'', how could anyone expect anything less? |
| 74 | ** Besides, doesn't the resolution of the original series rather betray the theme of the series in the first place? This ending if far more thematically appropriate. |
| 75 | ** It seems like the perfect conclusion for the original series, if anything. Homura's obsession could only go downhill from what was shown in the anime series and if anything, Homura accepting Madoka's decision to become the Law of Cycles, without trying anything, is very out of character for her. |
| 76 | * It seems a lot of people were puzzled by the scene when Homura, during her last talk with Sayaka, was showing her hands a lot. She is showing that she doesn't have her contract ring nor the fingernail mark anymore, though she still has her soul gem (or whatever it is now) which could be summoned by Homura, as see in The Stinger. During her talk with Sayaka we're shown in a flash her new earring with a tiny purple jewel on it. It could be she can swap places and make the soul gem less noticeable as an earring. |
| 77 | * Overlapping with FreezeFrameBonus, [[http://wiki.puella-magi.net/File:D34c86d5.jpg this picture]]. It seems that Homura's wings were in part a manifestation of her barrier. |
| 78 | ** This makes sense because with Madoka gone, Homura's wish was useless and so she rapidly fell into despair. |
| 79 | * Take a good look at the teacup that falls in Homura's new world. Homura isn't dropping it, it's being pushed out of the way. In fact, she's moving her hand forward, towards where Mami is. Was Homura trying to bother Mami, or was she trying to reach out to her? And then there's the part where she refuses to let her familiars catch Kyoko's apple - as noted below, it's implied the familiars are expressing Homura's true thoughts. Is Homura trying to get Kyoko to waste food, or is she denying her desire for Kyoko's friendship?. One interpretation is that Homura resents them for saving her. Her familiars still represent and play out her self loathing, and she equates herself to the devil because she knows her actions are wrong. She was counting on the two to kill her and cried out against their rescue. Earlier, she confided in Kyoko and flinched over hurting Mami. Her actions are very much intentional, and this is her showing they are no longer on good terms. |
| 80 | * Here's something the show doesn't tell you but expects you to figure out yourself. By keeping her from Homura's soul gem, Kyubey's isolation field was blocking Madoka's omniscience. No wonder she couldn't see the movie's outcome. And even after the isolation field is broken, Madoka is still in the form of a human, experiencing time linearly and being unaware of the future. |
| 81 | ** Here's another thing. [[NiceJobBreakingitHero Kyubey learned about the existent of the old system and Madoka from Homura]], and [[NiceJobFixingItVillain Homura got the idea to bring down Madoka from Kyubey.]] |
| 82 | * Madoka wished to erase all witches with her own hands. Now where does Homura grab Madoka? |
| 83 | * Wonder why Homura "sent" Madoka to America? Because English was the subject Madoka had the most trouble with. |
| 84 | * Pay attention near the end. There's a Pyotr and a bunch of Anthonies in Homura's new world. Obviously they're like Sayaka and Nagisa and are unable to return to the Law of Cycles. This is clearly another part of the SequelHook. Heck, during the Homulilly battle we're shown familiars from every single witch seen in the anime... except Walpurgisnacht. And one of the girls who became Walpurgisnacht still sends the elephant afterwards. |
| 85 | * [[http://wiki.puella-magi.net/Puella_Magi_Madoka_Magica_LOVE!_Sayaka_%26_Kyouko_Version#Ume-sensei.27s_letter Here's some Fridge Brilliance]] [[Creator/UmeAoki courtesy of]] WordOfSaintPaul. Sayaka only knew about how much Kyoko cared about her after being taken by the Law of Cycles, just as Madoka only learned about how much Homura cared about her when she became the Law of Cycles itself. |
| 86 | * Near the end of the movie, Madoka's wearing yellow ribbons. The ribbons are most likely a reference to the first episode. Madoka almost puts on yellow ribbons instead of her signature red ones before her mother tells her that she looks good in red. And since Homura had her red ribbons this time around it seems that she had to settle for them instead. There's even a small echo to what Junko said after Homura gives them back and tells her that they really do look better on her. |
| 87 | ** She could also be wearing it in reference to [[Literature/HaruhiSuzumiya a certain other godlike schoolgirl.]] This may be [[WholePlotReference a nod to an oddly similar plotline.]] Spoilers for the ''Haruhi'' anime: The omnipotent girl's powers were stolen by a normally logical and dependable friend, who became emotionally unstable after an exceedingly long GroundhogDayLoop. The latter used the stolen power to construct a more normal and peaceful world for everyone, even though she knows it probably won't last. Is that the plot of ''Rebellion'', or ''Disappearance''? The pre-movie ending of ''Madoka Magica'' is somewhat like the "Haruhi's world" ending of ''Disappearance'', while ''Rebellion'' takes the "Yuki's world" and ''Manga/TheDisappearanceOfNagatoYukiChan'' route. |
| 88 | ** The ribbons could also symbolize Madoka's life as a regular girl (pink eyes, pink ribbons) and as Ultimate Madoka (yellow eyes, yellow ribbons). At the end of the series, she gives the pink ones to Homura, symbolizing that she's giving up that life to be the Law of Cycles. Homura wearing them symbolizes how she's living in Madoka's place. At the end of Rebellion, she's wearing the yellow ones initially, but they fall out when she almost remembers and Homura puts the pink ones in her hair instead. Homura is basically giving her her life back. |
| 89 | * During Madoka and Homura's conversation in the field of flowers, just before Homura turned into a witch, we can see that the states of the flowers practically summed up Homura's entire journey. Why? Because they are manifestations of Homura's psych, and it was at that point that the idea of becoming The Devil first came to her mind, along with the determination to make Madoka happy. The idea only got reinforced after she had become a witch. "No matter what sin I commit and what form I take, it's all right as long you are near me". This is the moment when Homura finally lose it and breaks down. And this is the moment in which Homura decide she will turn into Devil. |
| 90 | * Sayaka being an angel and summoning Oktavia references an ending of ''Literature/TheLittleMermaid'', where the mermaid becomes an air spirit and gets to go into heaven by doing good deeds. Notably Sayaka is working with the childlike Nagisa; the ending of ''The Little Mermaid'' indicated the behavior of children affected the amount of time the mermaid had to work to get into heaven. |
| 91 | * The classmates having a face in Homulilly's barrier during the redux of the Nakazawa scene might be weird, given that they are latter seen without a face like the rest of the fake city inhabitants. The reason? At the beginning of the movie, Homura isn't suspecting the masquerade yet, once she start having doubts, the first cracks in the illusion appears with the burned out face of the fake inhabitants. That scene is a subtle hint that the barrier is reacting to Homura's state of mind, foreshadowing that she's the witch who created the barrier. |
| 92 | * Of course Homura's soul gem changes shape: ''it's a crown''. Specifically, it's the king's crown as portrayed in chess symbols; meanwhile, the ordinary soul gem does resemble a pawn somewhat. Thus, it's perfectly fitting for someone stepping up to become the Princess of Darkness. ''Why'' does it do that? Because nothing, even Kyubey, can undo a wish already granted. If Homura's soul gem really had hatched into a grief seed, even the isolation field wouldn't have prevented Ultimate Madoka from reaching her because her wish was to defeat all witches before they're born, period. However, in the new universe, Homura is her same badass self she was, even though without a Madoka to protect, she has no reason to make the contract, so what did she wish for? ''She didn't get one''. Her contract was part of the old universe and it carried over, only her powers changed to reflect her new purpose. On top of that, her magical potential would be just as strong as Madoka's, for the same reason. In other words, her soul gem evolves into a crown and she conquers Kyubey because ''she granted her own fucking wish''. |
| 93 | ** Homura's new Soul Gem more resembles the crown of the queen piece in chess with the round ball in the center. Continuing with the pawn analogy, a pawn can become a queen by making it to the other side of the board, essentially invading enemy territory. Homura does this by usurping the Incubators and Madoka, essentially transforming from a piece designed to be sacrificed into a piece with the most power on the board. |
| 94 | * Kyoko isn't seen using her [[DoppelgangerAttack Rosso Fantasma]] technique in the movie, even though she's kinder and friendlier, and doesn't show traces of her old sour-natured and cynical personality, the reason is that in the pre-Ultimate Madoka universe, Kyoko lost that power when [[PaterFamilicide her whole family died]], years before Homura contracted and began her time loops to save Madoka, so she doesn't know that Kyoko has that power. So Homulily's barrier couldn't include the knowledge of this power when it altered Kyoko's memories, explaining why she still couldn't use it : she literally forgot that she has that power! |
| 95 | ** However, Kyoko remembers the extent of her own powers. She does use her magical move "Latticework Barrier" in tandem with Sayaka; in Different Story, it's revealed that Kyoko doesn't use her magic because the reason for her wish is gone. Since she doesn't have that reason in the illusory world, it stands to reason that she'd still use her magic. |
| 96 | * Homura usurping Madoka's rule makes a whole lot of sense when you reflect upon her wish. She wished, in its barest bones, was that ''she'''d be Madoka's protector instead of the other way around. Another way of looking at that wish is that she wished to switch roles. It also explains why Madoka is the transfer student instead of Homura. |
| 97 | ** The ExactWords of Homura's wish make her rewriting Madoka's universe much less of an AssPull when thought over from this angle. Sure, Madoka gained godlike powers due to the constant timelines focused on her, but the wish was still made in a timeline Homura created to redo their meeting...Conversely, Madoka's witch possessed the capability to absorb all life within its barrier. By stopping her from purifying her soul gem, Homura essentially does the same thing. |
| 98 | * To add more PoorCommunicationKills points to the flower bed scene: Homura is telling to an amnesiac Madoka that she had a dream about Madoka leaving forever, to a far away place, and that she, Homura, wasn't able to see her anymore. Madoka of course felt bad because she would never do something to make her that sad...but Homura didn't tell her that she did it "in the dream" because it was a necessary thing Madoka needed to do because ''it would save a lot of people''. Maybe Homura unconsciously kept that vital information from Madoka, because she wanted this Madoka, either an illusion or a fake, to sympathize with her and say that she would never leave her, forsaking the world's safety for Madoka's happiness. |
| 99 | ** It's not that she's omitting information so that Madoka will tell her she wants to hear, it's that as far as she's concerned, the information she's leaving out ''doesn't matter''. She already knows all too well how willing Madoka is to sacrifice herself for others; what she ''doesn't'' know is whether or not Madoka would choose AbstractApotheosis if she wasn't being emotionally blackmailed into it by one of Kyubey's engineered disasters. |
| 100 | * In Homura's despair sequence, after she fails in saving Madoka from falling down the chair and explodes into pink milkshake, some viewers may find the creepy Moemura-looking things that look down at an angsty and shocked Homura weird and unnecessary. This is actually a nice metaphor: failing to save Madoka from sacrificing herself, she can't forgive herself. That's why her creepy doubles look down on her: she's accusing herself. |
| 101 | ** Why does Homura pound against the place where she splattered? She's literally beating herself up over it. |
| 102 | * At the beginning of the movie, after Homura's brief soliloquy about Magical Girls and their endless fight, her soul gem falls into a open window that symbolizes her potential future salvation by the Law of Cycles, as well-demonstrated by an illustration that came bundled with the OST. At the end we see the same window, closed this time. The window is the way to the Law of Cycles (Madoka), but Homura has kidnapped her and stolen her powers; the Law of Cycles is inaccessible now. Note, however, that the window is not locked or barred shut. It's held together by the very same ribbon that, despite its apparent fragility, symbolizes an unspeakable bond of friendship. This implies that Madoka may recover her powers at any time - but to do so, she needs to renounce Homura's friendship forever, making her situation somewhere between "hostage of her own kindness" and "playing along willingly for Homura's sake". |
| 103 | ** It's also the same ribbon on Homulilly's head before the top half comes away, which hints that the Law of Cycles is being cut off by powers that Homura gained by having briefly accessed her witch form. |
| 104 | * The reason why the Holy Quintet feeds the Nightmare while singing a lullaby-like song, it's because, normally, you have bad dreams if you go to sleep with a empty stomach. |
| 105 | * The "Gott ist tott" scene. The original quote says "God is dead, and we have killed him" referring that, if there's a God, humanity has taken away his purpose with science. Homura is angry that the witch that created the barrier is making null Madoka's sacrifice for the Magical Girls' sake for making a world where their fight has no actual purpose. The Clara dolls, the witch's familiars shout that God is dead because their world has taken Madoka's purpose. |
| 106 | ** An interpretation of the full quote of "God is dead, and we have killed him. Yet his shadow still looms." is that humans didn't take his purpose, they took his ''power'' to fulfill that purpose and had nothing to fill the void leads to an interesting bit of alternate interpretation and possible foreshadowing for future continuation. |
| 107 | ** If you really think about it, both of the previous points are true in this case. What has truly taken the godlike Madoka's purpose and power from her, or is at the very least stopping it? The science of the Incubator's seal around Homura's soul gem. |
| 108 | * Take a good look at everyone's transformation sequences. Almost everyone has runes in them somewhere: Mami, Kyoko, and Sayaka's names, Homura's cryptic messages, and Nagisa's magical girl recipe. Who is the only one without ''any'' runes in her sequence? Madoka. |
| 109 | ** Another one from the transformation: Everyone's music style fits their original personality from the series, except Sayaka's, who switched from classical to break dance. Why? Well she did say that without Kamijou, she wouldn't have been interested in classical music at all... since she retains her original memories, this might be another sign (apart from the ruined moment with Kyoko) that she has moved on from him. |
| 110 | ** To elaborate: |
| 111 | *** Mami ice-dances. She has been likened to d'Artagnan, being a musketeer and all. And who did a stunning ice dancing performance at the Olympics in Nagano? Philippe Candeloro. |
| 112 | *** Kyouko does Bollywood dancing. These dances were originally for religious purposes. |
| 113 | *** Sayaka break-dances. Breakdance was invented as an alternative for fighting in gangs. Considering how much she fought mindlessly in the anime, it shows that she has learnt from this experience. |
| 114 | *** Homura does ballet. Her witch form is the Nutcracker witch. |
| 115 | *** Madoka does pop-idol dance, as innocent as she is. |
| 116 | * When Homura kidnaps Madoka, we see her split from her Goddess form. The Law of Cycles still exists in the world because Madoka's wish to defeat all witches before they're born still stands, it's just that in Homura's world, there are no witches. So what does that leave? Madoka, a goddess, in human, mortal form. Madoka's wish made her God, Homura's wish made her the Devil... and now Madoka, living in Homura's new world and possibly destined to become Homura's enemy, is Christ. |
| 117 | ** [[WildMassGuessing Doesn't that mean that Madoka will eventually die and come back to life?]] |
| 118 | * Akuma Homura tells Kyubey that the Incubators are necessary in her new world because something still has to be done with the curses. Then we see him curled up and traumatized, and we know that since he "eats" grief seeds and cubes, he can absorb curse energy. Homura is forcing him to absorb the grief of her new world in order to keep it a happy place. |
| 119 | * Homura [[GodOfEvil becoming what is essentially the devil]] using ThePowerOfLove makes a huge amount of sense when you consider that she basically turned herself into Madoka's opposite. As Madoka became the embodiment of hope because she loved everyone and wanted to make them happy, Homura became the embodiment of love for one's self, prioritizing one's own happiness over everything else. This can also explain why she can only seal Madoka's powers and not fully remove them from Madoka herself. As long as she can keep Madoka's selflessness in check, she can prevent Madoka from accessing her Goddess powers. |
| 120 | * There are a lot of instances where fire, or anything alluding to fire, is shown in the movie because [[MeaningfulName the name "Homura" means "flame."]] Homura also calls herself a demon after taking Madoka's powers, which is quite fitting because demons are mostly associated with fire, or to be more precise, burning Hell. |
| 121 | ** Even more meaningfully it can also be written as "heart on fire", "village protector", or "stride approaching happiness". |
| 122 | * Kyoko is such a FlatCharacter because everything is happening in Homura's soul gem. Homura didn't interact with Kyoko enough to know there's more about Kyoko than her brash personality, BigEater tendencies, her fondess to Sayaka being big enough to die for her so that's all the personal tracts she could give her in her witch barrier. This would also explain why to Homura, Kyoko's character seems strange. |
| 123 | ** An alternate explanation: Homura seemed to alter their memories so that everything was ideal to each of them. It just had the most noticeable effect on Kyoko. Mami was already a kind mentor, so she remained essentially the same. Madoka had all the psychological torment she went through erased, so she was her original, naive self. And Sayaka wasn't changed at all by the barrier, since her memories weren't altered. Kyoko, however, became a much nicer person in such an ideal world, because her character had been shaped by the terrible world she lived in. She acts so much nicer in the movie because her ruthlessness was rooted in the way the world worked. She likely remembers splitting with Mami on better terms (since she was able to just "call her up" and tell her she needed backup in Mitakihara), and would have had no reason to conflict with Sayaka. Having the others as her friends makes her a nicer person. |
| 124 | * Homura's actions in the end meant she was making just as big a sacrifice with just as big a consequence as Madoka did in the anime. Kyubey got what he wanted: he was able to observe the Law of Cycles and could see exactly how Madoka appeared. As long as he keeps making contracts, he'll have infinite opportunities to experiment with ways around it, which means that the chances of Madoka being destroyed, sealed, or otherwise manipulated jumps to 100%. And that would indeed be the case, if Homura hadn't slapped him down so hard he left cracks in the pavement. |
| 125 | * Sayaka says she sympathizes with the witch that created the barrier all of them are trapped in because as a former witch, she knows what it is like to want something so badly that a person falls into despair when he or she fails to attain it. This also foreshadows the fact that she knows that it was Homura who was making the barrier, since out of all of them, she never really got what she wanted, despite being the most dedicated to Madoka's cause. |
| 126 | * On the possible answer to the question of why the incubators would choose Homura over other magical girls as their lab rat for their isolation field, one could theorize that since they are already operating in a system bound by the Law of Cycles, so anything made within the system, such as MagicalGirl contracts and soul gems, would not be a good specimen for their experiment. They probably theorized that Homura, whose magical girl powers did not come from the current system and possesses knowledge of a system they had not known, is somehow connected to the "old" system. |
| 127 | * When Homura and Kyoko decided to go to Kazamino city, the reason they cannot get out of Mitakihara city is because Homura doesn't know what Kazamino city looks like, most likely because she has never been there. This also explains why the people have strange looking faces once she begins to uncover more of the truth, aside from the people she knows well, everyone is a stranger to her. |
| 128 | * From a logical standpoint, the incubators' plan of trying to control the Law of Cycles fits perfectly well with their characters as purely logical beings. Their quest for finding more efficient ways of collecting energy mirrors how humans are constantly searching for more efficient energy sources. |
| 129 | * Think about why Mami suddenly recalls the wraiths. It's Homura's barrier. Mami remembers the wraiths because Homura ''wants'' her to remember. |
| 130 | * Sayaka has the ability to summon Oktavia, and the familiars of all the defeated witches also participate in the final battle, because of the way the Law of Cycles works. Madoka defeats all the witches before they're born so they don't exist, so what are they even doing there in the first place? Because witches still ''do'' exist, they're just never released into the real world. When they become part of the Law of Cycles, their witch becomes their SuperpoweredEvilSide, just without the "evil" part. |
| 131 | * Homura's power to create the universe again is fueled by love. Remember that strong emotions are the power source for the magic they give to magical girls, and that hope and despair are considered opposing elements. Madoka's wish created a world out of hope and destroyed a world with despair. Homura's world is the product of Incubator magic, and she doesn't have a loophole like Madoka does. That's why she's hinted to have turned suicidal in the end: she gave everyone else all their hopes and dreams back and had to shoulder all that negative energy herself, but she's still the girl who relived an entire month and a half, for about a hundred loops, for one single friend and wouldn't hesitate to shoulder such a burden for Madoka's sake. |
| 132 | * TheStinger shows Kyubey in Homura's new world, looking battered, bruised, and with its eyes glazed as if it has been, for the lack of a better term, Mind Raped. Remember his words from the series? Amongst his people, emotions are considered a mental illness... and it was just exposed to a love powerful enough (and desperate enough) ''to usurp God and recreate the universe''. That must be the Incubator equivalent of a human getting a good look at the face of Azathoth. |
| 133 | * Madoka promised to reunite with Homura again at the end of the series. Homura's head was "planted" with that promise, but Kyubey's interference made her break it and thus Spider Lilies bloomed because the innocent and trusting part of Homura, the Homura that became friend with Madoka would never meet her again. |
| 134 | * On the background music, you can still hear parts (albeit slightly modified to fit the feeling of the scene) of the "Mada dame yo" song. Why? We can later see Homura lying on that weird Kyubey table as if she was sleeping. Not only that but the song says the "dream isn't over yet", and that "I wonder what color the morning will be". Of course! The movie isn't over yet and there's still much to see, and in the end, no one really knew what'd happen in the ending. |
| 135 | ** [[SequelHook "Mada dame yo" plays at the end of the movie, hinting that even now, the dream still isn't over yet...]] |
| 136 | ** Adding on to this, "I wonder what color the morning will be" can, aside from commenting on the general surprise of the ending, be a direct reference to a new color, previously unknown to Incubators and magical girls, appearing inside her soul gem.] |
| 137 | * Just before she turns into a demon, Homura puts her soul gem in her mouth, bites down on it, and breaks it...like a ''nutcracker.'' What is Homulilly's title again? |
| 138 | ** To address the gramophone detail: while this also may be the more common reference to a BrokenRecord that keeps repeating the same part over and over, phonograph needles are meant to be discarded after each play. Just like Homuras. |
| 139 | * During Homura and Madoka's conversation in the flower field, the daisies transform into dandelions. Many people believe that if you make a wish and blow on a dandelion to scatter the seeds into the air, it will come true. |
| 140 | * Nagisa was hidden as Bebe/Charlotte the whole time, and her Bebe/Charlotte form was akin to Charlotte's first form in the timeline of the anime. She eventually revealed herself, which was like how [[CallBack Charlotte's second form came out of Charlotte's first form..]] |
| 141 | * More Biblical parallels: Once Madoka's memories are erased, she basically becomes a Christ figure (and the pink milkshake scene doesn't hurt, either): a part of God in human form. What does this mean for her? In the series, she didn't know what would happen to her once she made her wish, and she didn't care. If she wants to become Ultimate Madoka again, she has to regain her memories, and consciously choose to sacrifice her mortal self... which also means rejecting Homura. |
| 142 | * Hitomi becoming a VictimOfTheWeek is not a coincidence. The time frame of when it happened falls slightly in place of when she became a victim in the anime's time frame. Afterwards, we see Kyoko in her JerkAss personality (which is reflected during the bus scene) and the KnightOfCerebus emerges (though it's ''not'' Kyoko.), thus leading to a series of tragedies and fights that end in the rise of a new goddess who forever changed the system. |
| 143 | * It always bothered me that Homura was able to stave off despair for as long as she could, because even though it was the same forty-five days over and over, for her, it was still ''years'' of being a magical girl with no end in sight; she should have run out of steam ages ago. But then I realized: Homura wanted to save Madoka, and that's all. It's not until she starts to think that it's impossible to save her that her soul gem starts to darken. When Homura tells Kyubey she never wished for the happiness of being with Madoka in magical girl Valhalla, she's telling the absolute truth: in order to keep from falling to despair, she had to stop hoping for anything but exactly what she set out to do in the first place. She can't be let down by a hope she never had. When she says she doesn't care what happens to her as long as it stops Kyubey from doing whatever he wants, ''she means it''. |
| 144 | * Looking back between the anime and the movie(s), despite being mortal enemies, Kyubey and Homura really aren't so different. Both of them are willing to muck around with reality for something more ideal, and both of them [[LackOfEmpathy understand jack squat about the emotions of others]], [[EvilCannotComprehendGood especially the capability to be selfless]]. Neither of them understood why Madoka became a {{God}} during the anime, they didn't understand it during the movie, and they didn't understand it afterward. |
| 145 | ** While we're drawing comparisons between the two, it could be argued that Homura actually ended up ''nastier than Kyubey'' by the end. Homura doesn't just not understand Madoka's selfless wish, she outright ''rejects'' it, and then takes her power for herself to remake the world to suit her own tastes. People may be legitimately happy in this new world - Madoka included - but with the Incubators under Homura's heel and her constant [[MemoryWipingCrew erasing of people's memories]] just to maintain Madoka's happiness, which makes Homura happy, it's clear that this new world is meant to make ''herself'' happy too, perhaps moreso than Madoka. Worst of all is that she ''knows'' she's JumpedOffTheSlipperySlope and she's entirely okay with it [[YouAreWorthHell as long as she believes Madoka is alright]]. |
| 146 | *** And it gets even worse when you realize that Madoka is still trying to regain her memories despite Homura's attempts to stop it. She says she's alright with Madoka being her enemy if she ultimately remembers everything as long as Madoka ends up happy in the end, but what if Madoka ''[[ExactWords isn't happy about that]]''? Well, then her entire reason for remaking the world goes [[InSpiteOfANail right into the crapper]]. Again, like Kyubey, her finely-crafted plans are nigh-perfectly [[HoistByHisOwnPetard set up to explode spectacularly in her face]] [[SpannerInTheWorks due to a single small detail she didn't foresee]]. |
| 147 | *** There's also the fact that Kyubey is physically incapable (so long as he's sane) of feeling or understanding emotions, so can't really be expected to know better. Homura the human, on the other hand, should realize what she's doing--and she probably does--but that doesn't stop her from doing it anyway, because it's what ''she'' wants. Which is a... less good motivation than "preventing the destruction of the entire universe". |
| 148 | * Alternatively to the above, there is the factor that what makes Kyuubey and Homura lacking in empathy arises from different circumstances and can ultimately make them {{Foil}}s as well. |
| 149 | ** While Kyuubey says he can't feel emotions, or at least he sees them as a mental illness, he has no qualms about manipulating girls even when he should know by all means how damaging it is to them. That despite them becoming witches throws them into an IronicHell, he doesn't seem to seek for any better methods like Madoka did. In short, he doesn't care for humanity (or any other alien races for that matter) in the first place compared to his goal of stopping entropy, and doesn't care who suffers so long as he gets that goal. |
| 150 | ** For her part, Homura has been repeating the same month for around 22 years. She's definitely tried to help the other girls countless times, from before she pulled her pigtails down to after she became much more cynical. But each time she's tried explaining the truth to them, or helping them with their issues, they just brush her off and say that she's lying or that she can't be trusted, or they just end up making the same mistakes again. The only person who gave her credit, believed her each time and who didn't go insane from it all is Madoka. Now if you take that and repeat it ad infinium, wouldn't it seem more realistic that Homura would just flat out stop helping the others when it proves to be a fruitless endeavor and focus on the one person who does positively affect her? This is not trying to apologize for her character flaws, but it does make sense that she'd end up the way she is. Furthermore, unlike Kyuubey, she does legitimately try to look out for the other's happiness and doesn't seek to cause them suffering when she got the means to as Homurakuma. |
| 151 | * Kyubey is more villainous than it was in the series, and more openly disdainful of humanity. There are two possible explanations for this: 1) it's been [[{{Flanderization}} flanderized]], and 2) its psyche has [[FreakOut begun to crack]]- and developed emotion. It's possible that Kyubey was already going insane, and Homura's alterations were just the tipping point. |
| 152 | * Homura's power is time, and what does she do at the end? Place Madoka back ''in the flow of time'' by rendering her mortal. |
| 153 | * Homura becomes the Devil, and she slaps down Kyubey with such outrageous pimpness that all he can do is curl up in a ball and stare blankly into nothing, with who-knows-what going on in his fuzzy little fucked-up head. And how, exactly, did they get into such a position for this to be the case? The Incubators had a system that would serve their needs just fine, but the allure of the witch system made them investigate this Kaname Madoka phenomenon in the hopes of making it happen. In other words: '''they were overcome with Greed'''. Knowing that the Devil is a fallen Angel, who else is fit to have absolute rule over someone who's fallen to such a grave and deadly sin? |
| 154 | * In the series, Sayaka is shown to have awful technique and little to no battlefield awareness. She simply slashes around and only survives because her healing magic means she can take more hits than most magical girls. In this universe, she is shown to be much more competent in how she wields her swords. She's more precise in her strikes and doesn't miss a beat when it comes to a fight. In her confrontation with Homura after the Homura vs. Mami battle, how does she stop Homura from stopping time? She first off has the foresight to predict what Homura was about to do, the reaction time to stop her, and she does so by employing a fencing lunge which is used to quickly close distance between one's self and an opponent. Notice Sayaka's legs right after she clogs Homura's gears. She's poised perfectly, legs bent and sword arm extended, and this form combined with her reaction time and foresight is about as far from her series' self as she can be. |
| 155 | * Homura's sand timer tells you everything you need to know about the plot. She shouldn't have it, and we see in the real world that ''she doesn't''. She has it in her labyrinth-dream world because, as she says, she was slowly forgetting Madoka to the point that it was as if she'd just made the whole thing up. She has a bow and arrow in the new universe to reflect her resolve to remember Madoka, but since her despair stems from the failure of that resolve, she manifests herself with her sand timer: the thing that made it possible for her to search for a way to save Madoka over the course of a hundred timelines. Heartbreakingly, that never dawns on her until Madoka appears and reaches out for her again. How could she have her sand timer if Madoka was never real? The fact that she's so consumed by her emotions that she never questions it informs her decision to take hold of the universe at the end; she's too powerful and too driven to stop and think about what she's doing, so all she can do is strive toward a single goal with all her might. And oh, ye gods, is she a mighty, mighty goddess. |
| 156 | * The reason why Sayaka could remember Homura's actions while Nagisa didn't. In a BlinkAndYouMissIt moment, Sayaka is quickly shown again while Homura's soul gem's corruption spreads all over the universe, implying that, somehow she got out of her grasp and fled. This is foreshadowed in the scene when she almost summoned Oktavia and Homura pointed up how Sayaka has gotten better at running away. |
| 157 | ** Since we never get to see ''how'' exactly Sayaka escapes, perhaps this is a CrazyIsCool moment? Anime/MagiaRecordPuellaMagiMadokaMagicaSideStory further reveals that she is ''incredibly'' fast, so perhaps she went so fast that she ''outran the re-modification of the universe!!'' Which also implies that she somehow went '''outside of it'''. Holy Madoka, Sayaka. |
| 158 | ** Nagisa's side story in Magia Record revealed that she wasn't particularly eager to return to the Law of Cycles, so it's also possible that she remembers exactly what Homura did and just doesn't care. |
| 159 | * Houmura is a Devil in many, many ways beyond the whole FallenHero gig. For one, she's defined by obsessive love fed at least partially by a sense of betrayal; Izanami, estranged wife of Izangi and Japanese goddess of the underworld. For another she tricked a god in order to bring happiness to humans (actually two divine figures; Madoka and Kyubey); Prometheus, the Titan who stole fire and bound his cousin Zeus into only taking the inedible bits of a sacrifice, and got to be gnawed on by a Stymphalian Bird for a few eons as punishment. Third, her tricks bring about a final battle and the rebirth of the world into a hopefully better form; Loki of the Norse Pantheon, whose murder of Balder and later impersonation of a giantess started up Ragnarok. Fourth, she creates and rules over a world where people labor in cheerful ignorance of reality in the belief that's what they want, mimicking the actual God in the process; The Demiurge, lord of the visible and physical worlds in Gnosticism. Fifth, she is an [[GodOfEvil "evil"]] GodOfChaos whose power and influence makes her effectively Madoka's [[TheAntiGod equal and opposite]] but who is [[EvilWillFail destined to fail]] because of her self defeating nature, Angra Mainyu from Zoroastrianism. Sixth, she is the ultimate obstacle of a buddha and her followers against enlightment, Mara from Buddhism. Finally, said obsessive love can be said to be a testament to virtues gone awry and a complete loss of restraint, and her ability to implement it showing her resourcefulness and raw power; the Tarot Devil. Really, she doesn't exactly have a small pedigree. |
| 160 | * Several versions of the Buddha story include the character Channa, a royal charioteer. At the King's orders, he tried to prevent the Buddha from learning about the existence of suffering (death, age, illness, etc). In the end, Channa failed, and the Buddha left his home and became spiritually enlightened [[note]]discarding his previous, ''mortal'', identity in the process[[/note]]. If we consider ''Puella'''s other Buddhist themes, Channa's story becomes yet another indication that Homura's utopian world cannot last, and Madoka too is destined to '[[AscendToAHigherPlaneOfExistence leave home]]', regardless of what Homura does. |
| 161 | * Madoka had enough power to make huge changes in the world, but instead, she opted only to make ''one'' change, and became the principle that destroys witches. She respected the contributions of magical girls enough to still let them make contracts, which inevitably assured their deaths. In other words, Madoka preserved their right to want something bad enough to die for it, aka, ''she gives them free will''. That's part of what makes Homura's crimes so terrible: she made a world where everyone has what they've always wanted, but she's taken away their free will in order to impose her own. It's the difference between selfless love and selfish love. |
| 162 | * The stinger from the end of the TV series, where Homura confronts a bunch of wraiths in a weird desert and sprouts her weird witch wings? Those wings are immediately followed by a network of strings made of light. It's the isolation field being put into place. In order to preserve the integrity of the experiment, Kyubey would've needed to take Homura away from all immediate outside influences so that he could be sure that no one got into it accidentally or caused any damage to Homura's physical body while she was under observation. At the end of the movie, the entire remaining cast ends up in that exact same desert. |
| 163 | * Sayaka's transformation music uses her old theme, "Decretum", but notably in a modern style and with modern dance. Why, when she presumably became a magical girl by healing Kyosuke here too and her earlier affinity with classical music was due to Kamijou? (She herself said, "I wouldn't even be interested in this kinda music if not for you.") Because she is over him, as evidenced by her being understanding and full of sympathy while helping Hitomi, who is currently going out with him... Especially since this is the Sayaka we know, the Sayaka who attained peace thanks to being able to listen to Kamijou play at a contest. |
| 164 | * Fridge Sadness. In all of the flashbacks during Kyubey's exposition about Homura's barrier, all girls are seen wearing casual clothes and doing things together and when Homura is seen with them, they're all in uniforms. Homura doesn't known about lounging. Her early life was first being in the hospital for her heart condition; then in her first day of school she met magical girls who became her friends but were busy fighting. When she got to became a magical girl herself, her time got reduced to repeating a month of fighting over and over, with some little school life in it. And when the cycle was broken, she just focused on fighting wraiths instead of witches. Homura's own focus on anxious schooling and desperate fighting were so strong in her subconcious that it was the way her barrier portrait her; and having such a peaceful life was so alien to her that it was the thing that made her realize something was wrong. [[TearJerker BECAUSE THERE'S NO WAY HOMURA CAN BE HAPPY!]] |
| 165 | * The TV behind Homura, when Mami is confronting her over attacking Bebe, shows teeth falling from the upper jaw of a mouth. It's the Nutcracker Witch's mouth, obviously, but "teeth falling out" is one of the most common types of all nightmares: anxiety, low-self-esteem, fear of major changes, and broken promises. It ties into her suffering as a magical girl in general, but in particular, a nutcracker cracks nuts by biting them in half, while Homulilly has no upper jaw and her teeth serve as mounts for her familiars. In other words, she can't perform her sole function (cracking nuts/saving Madoka) because, in becoming the thing that serves that function (a witch/a magical girl), she made herself incapable of actually performing it (missing the top of half of her head/wishing to go back in time). |
| 166 | ** Given the dream themes of the movie or mention of "who is dreaming", the context of teeth falling out of someone's mouth is also symbolic in another way to how the movie's whole situation began: Saying things that were better left unsaid. If Homura HADN'T told Kyubey about the old system, then he wouldn't have tried bringing it back and using Homura as a test subject. |
| 167 | * Mami's entire presence in the movie is chock-full of fridge brilliance. She gets relatively little screentime outside of the epic fight scenes, but they pack a lot of character into the details: |
| 168 | ** Mami and Bebe = Mommy and Baby, d'aww. |
| 169 | ** Mami being CrazyPrepared in the battle against Homura makes sense because she's the team veteran, but Homura has technically been a magical girl for roughly twelve years and has solo-killed more witches than Mami could possibly ever encounter, due to her time-looping. Homura can't beat Mami because Homura still thinks of her as an older, more experienced mentor figure. Mami deflects all of Homura's shots because Homura always fires first (in other words, Mami is only ''reacting'' to Homura's attacks, not attacking herself), and when Mami breaks out the red-lock ribbons, it's because Homura didn't have the stomach to shatter her Soul Gem. She didn't actually ''want'' to hurt Mami, she just didn't think it through before resorting to violence. |
| 170 | ** Most likely coincidence, but fun anyway: purple and yellow are complementary colors. |
| 171 | ** Mami doesn't remember that soul gems are {{Soul Jar}}s, which comes up twice in a row in her fight with Homura, who ''does'' remember this. Homura shoots herself in the head, causing Mami to freak out thinking she's killed herself, allowing Homura to break free of her ribbons and freeze time. Homura aims at Mami's head--because that's where her soul gem is--but changes her mind and shoots Mami in the leg. Mami still wins, and seemingly saw everything Homura did while time was stopped thanks to her ribbon-clone, but she forgives Homura because she saw that Homura chose not to go for a kill-shot. |
| 172 | *** And then... Mami starts to remember wraiths, from the real world. Why? Something was inconsistent--she saw Homura take a headshot and somehow recover unharmed, then take aim at ''her'' head, which presumably would have been just as ineffective. She must have realized, on some level, that Homura wasn't really aiming at her head, triggering some other memories from outside the labyrinth. |
| 173 | * The transformation sequences have plenty to say about the characters themselves: |
| 174 | ** Mami's is all figure skating, a sport famous for requiring a ridiculous amount of strength, flexibility, stability, and stamina while focusing on poise, grace, steadiness and beauty, and her magical girl self bursts from her own broken shadow as it hangs by a literal thread. In the series, she was working so hard on being a strong mentor and keeping up appearances that it masked how difficult her life really was, and she became a magical girl to survive what would have been a tragic death by injury. |
| 175 | ** Part of Sayaka's transformation sequences sees her charging into and merging with her magical girl form from a running start, almost as if she's chasing her magical girl form. Sayaka was the one in the show who was always trying to be a hero, or in other words ''chasing'' an ideal that she thought her magical girl form represented... and in doing so, she stumbles and crashes face-first into herself, which sums up Sayaka's character arc in the series. |
| 176 | ** Kyoko dances wildly and carelessly, then stares into herself and tears through her own reflection to reveal a [[NightmareFuel terrifying vision of herself]], and emerges as her magical girl self. Much like in the anime, she spends most of her time doing and taking whatever she wants with no particular aims, but then she takes a good, hard look at herself, recognizes and accepts her true feelings, and comes out a stronger person for it. |
| 177 | ** Homura dances around being followed by a shadowy after-image of herself that doesn't ''quite'' match up with her movements, reaching out and diving after something she just can't seem to touch; it references her dual persona as Moemura and the Homura we know, and her constant chasing after Madoka.. which is followed by a ballet death pose, foreshadowing her fall from grace and her becoming the Nutcracker Witch. |
| 178 | ** And Madoka, as mentioned further up the page, is all J-pop dancing and ''full'' of symbolism of her goddess self, with the added bonus that her 'performance' is especially appropriate, since Homura idolizes her the way one might do with... well, an idol singer. |
| 179 | * When Kyubey talks about a girl who "isn't recorded in past memory and doesn't seem to be a future possibility either," he's clearly talking about Madoka, but if you pay attention, in between the shots of Madoka, Sayaka and Bebe and the next shot of Madoka, it cuts to a shot of Homura in her glasses and braids as he's speaking this line. On a meta-level, this gives the line a double-meaning: Moemura is ''also'' not recorded in past memory (or, well, past memories that aren't Homura's), having only been part of timelines and worlds that don't exist anymore. Meanwhile, the idea that she "doesn't seem to be a future possibility either" is a cruel reminder for the audience that Homura most likely can't ever truly go back to girl she used to be, no matter how much her barrier indicates she might wish to do so. |
| 180 | * The Law of Cycles is referred to with window motifs. If you say Madoka's name slowly, it sounds like "Mado ka", which is Japanese for "Is it a window?" |
| 181 | * This troper was thinking about why Homura would end up as as The Devil. But then I remembered about Newton's Third Law: For every reaction there is an equal and opposite reaction. Madoka became God, so the opposite reaction would be that for someone to be the Devil. |
| 182 | * Homulilly the witch has a giant rainbow in her barrier. Homura's transformation into a waitch was mainly was due to her love for Madoka, which may be more than platonic. What symbol is used to represent romantic love between people who aren't heterosexual? A rainbow. |
| 183 | ** The same rainbow appeared before it revealed itself in Homulilly's barrier too. Where? At the end of Madoka's transformation sequence. |
| 184 | * Nagisa seems amazingly happy in the Homuniverse at the end of the movie, despite appearing in the background of Sayaka confronting Homura. Why? Here's a theory: could it be that Nagisa is being clever and is merely pretending to accept everything so Homura doesn't have a chance to suppress Charlotte within her or take away her memories of the Law of Cycles? After all, she's one of the two who've been holding onto Madoka's own memories and powers, so she'd know the importance of playing dumb. She and Sayaka even say that there were two of them "in case something happened to one of us". But then why doesn't Sayaka do the same? Because Sayaka, despite all her growth from accepting Kyosuke's love for her friend instead of her, is still going to be the same hot-headed girl she always was when ''really'' riled up. Nagisa never knew Homura in life and only has memories of the gem-contained barrier and Madoka/Sayaka's stories about the girl Homura used to be, so she has less reason to be angry at what Homura did and takes it a little less personally. Sayaka unfortunately let her old nature get the better of her, and so has lost access to some of her powers and memories. But Nagisa plays dumb and could easily upset things right under Homura's nose just as she once did right under Kyubey's nose. |
| 185 | * Sayaka summons Oktavia by stabbing herself in the heart. Makes sense, considering that the primary reason for her transformation into Oktavia in the show was her heart being broken. Additionally, when she does this, it appears that her heart got impaled on her sword and when the sword passed out the other side, her heart was removed from her body, just like how Kyubey removed Sayaka's soul from her body to make her a magical girl, which was yet another factor in her witchification. |
| 186 | ** Double FridgeBrilliance is at play here! In [[AllThereInTheManual the updated description of Oktavia for this movie]], it is stated that, fitting her mermaid-like form, "she can appear anywhere as long as there is water." [[ExactWords Blood is 92% water.]] |
| 187 | * During their fight against the nightmare, Kyoko and Mami have their tea and apples as usual, but the others have food that fits with their theme or story in the series. Madoka has bread - Christians see bread as the Body of Christ, adding to the symbolism of Madoka as a Messiah-like figure thanks to her sacrifice in the SeriesFinale. Sayaka has what appears to be a roasted chicken. In the original series, Kyubey described his relationship with humans as the same relationship we have with livestock. When Sayaka became a witch, she ended up like a "roasted chicken" on Kyubey's plate. |
| 188 | * Homura's Witch form, Homulilly, bears the epithet of the Nutcracker Witch. Her official character page calls her useless because she cannot break any more nuts. As a magical girl, Homura's duty was to kill witches, which were formerly magical girls driven to madness and despair. "Nut" is a slang word for an insane person, and so "breaking nuts," in this context, can be taken to mean killing witches and therefore putting insane former magical girls out of their misery. |
| 189 | * If the moon is supposed to symbolise Homura and Madoka's love (the moon being cut in half symbolising that a piece of Homura's life- Madoka, is missing), then Homura falling into the full-moon after meeting Madoka symbolises her falling in love. |
| 190 | * How did Homura vanquish Sayaka's Octavia? AllThereInTheManual states that Sayaka needs a body of water in order to summon Oktavia. However, because Homura made her cup overflow with her own magic substance, Sayaka lost a viable source of water to pull from. |
| 191 | * When exactly did Homura re-gain her memories, especially those of witches? During her transformation sequence, there are messages flashed in runes. Disturbing messages flash quickly during her transformation sequence, and a message, likely her familiars saying that they are bored (likely becauese the transformation sequence is long or they're just bored of Homura's transformation sequence). Because of the nature of the random flashes of disturbing scenery, perhaps this is the equivalent to having PTSD flashbacks ("they glorify death"). Furthermore, since Homura is a witch, only she would be able to actually read the runes! |
| 192 | ** It's not that she regained them, she always had them- that was the gift Madoka gave her with her ribbons, the ability to remember the old universe and Madoka's mortal self. It was when she started to doubt that her memories were real that she started to fall to despair, and when her Soul Gem went dark and she became Homulilly within her own Soul Gem, ''that's'' when she loses her memory of the ''current'' reality and just falls back into her old persona by default because that's where all her despair lives: you can tell because she has the buckler instead of the bow while inside the isolation field, but she has the bow and the red ribbon in the real world outside of it. |
| 193 | !!FridgeHorror |
| 194 | |
| 195 | * Homura's familiars have splendid names like "Arrogance," "Sadsack," "Liar," "Coldheartedness," "Selfishness," "Badmouther," "Dunce," "Jealousy," "Lazybones," "Vanity," "Cowardice," "Fool," "Bias," and "Obstinance." And the last familiar? Its name is "Love," and it has ''yet to arrive.'' One can naturally conclude why Homura would want to surround herself with representations of her perceived negative qualities but not one of love. |
| 196 | ** On the other hand, the eventual arrival of "Love" may actually point towards an optimistic ending in the franchise, and that hope still exists for Homura, preserving the original theme of the series. |
| 197 | ** Alternatively Love is Homura herself. This seems to be supported by the clothes "Love" wears is identical (except for being bald) to the one Homura wears prior Homulilly's resurrection. So either "Love" is marking redemption, or "Love" already died and the so-called arrival will never arrive. |
| 198 | ** The guidebook explicitly called Love "A Devil". It's probably safe to assume that Homura's Love herself. |
| 199 | ** Perhaps the reason that Love hasn't appeared is due to the factor that the Clara Dolls are representations of what she thinks of herself. She clearly doesn't love herself and as such the corresponding familiar wouldn't appear. But going with the above suggestion, Homura being Love herself could be fitting, given the possibility of it pointing to hope for Homura. After all, love is supposed to begin with the self. |
| 200 | * Homura's barrier has been extended to cover the entire universe. Considering what its inside is like, that's not a good news for anyone who lives in the universe... which is everyone. What if Homura's Nightmares begin to plague the entire cosmos? What if the Nightmares have become exacerbated due to Homura's extreme guilt? What if the Nightmare grow proportionally to Homura's guilt, which will eventually become too monumental for anyone to deal with, magical girls or no? |
| 201 | ** Actually, the new Homuniverse might be a good solution to the heat death problem. Both the old system with witches and Madoka's weren't very efficient. In both systems, the average magical girls on normal people ratio was about 2 on several thousands. The average lifespan of a magical girls could be anything between 1 month and 5 or 6 years after making the contract. In the old system, although the energy was harvested in both stages of witch and magical girl, most energy was harvested in the transformation between the 2 stages in which entropy was at its maximum. In Madoka's system, energy was only harvested in the magical girl stage, making it even less efficient. However, in Homura system, nightmares can come from every single person in the population of 7 billion and counting. With a little bit of despair from everyone, the collective energy would be HUGE, even with the generous way nightmares cleanse the soul gems. In addition to that, the energy from the magical girls and possible witches who would most definitely exist, seeing there isn't any Godoka there to cleanse the girls' soul gems, wouldn't hurt either. To put it bluntly, the old system was akin to the way a farmer from the Middle Age would raise cattle, the Madoka system was the more humane way that animal rights activists prefer at the cost of efficiency, the new Homura system was the way an industrialist would raise cattle: more humane than the old system but still crueler than Madoka's system, but above all, it treasures efficiency at the obvious cost of " environmental pollution" (i.e: the possible destruction of civilization). As [[Literature/GoodOmens Sir Terry Pratchett had put it: "... you had to think differently these days. Not big, but wide. With five billion people in the world you couldn't pick the buggers off one by one any more; you had to spread your effort."]] And if the destruction the nightmares cause goes a bit out of hand, well, that's neither Homura nor Kyubey's problem to worry about. Homura could always wave it away if Madoka's in danger, seeing as she IS the absolute dictator of the new universe. |
| 202 | *** Homura might have edited the way witches work as well. With Godoka's duty to cleanse Soul Gems and delete witches before they are born, Homura would have to improvise so that Godoka wouldn't have to enact her wish. |
| 203 | ** All this is assuming the new universe isn't simply immune to the laws of physics to begin with, because magic actively protects it from all possible harm. It also allows ordinary sentient creatures and those created magically to coexist freely, which is, at least in theory, a good thing given that familiars have been demonstrating numerous sympathetic qualities in the movie. The only problem is that Homura is this world's absolute master and thus it may change in accordance with her mental state, without her explicit volition. Considering said state's fragility, the prospect might be troubling. |
| 204 | * Take a look at the scene where Sayaka and Homura are talking in Homura's new world. Homura is acting every bit like a villain, but pay attention to what the familiars are doing. [[HeelRealization Not only do they throw tomatoes at her]], but before that there's a scene where the familiars are jumping off a ledge with empty shoes on it. In Japan ''[[DrivenToSuicide this is a metaphor for suicide.]]'' It's suggests that Homura is just putting on another persona, and that she's really in her own SelfInflictedHell. |
| 205 | ** It's also assuming that this world even has nightmares or wraiths or whatever. Given what happened to Kyubey, they might not exist at all. |
| 206 | ** And just in case that wasn't obvious enough, in TheStinger she willingly falls off a cliff. |
| 207 | *** This is also the only time where she seems truly happy. Make of that what you will. |
| 208 | * [[NiceJobFixingItVillain A possible reason why Homura was able to become The Devil and not a witch was because of the Incubators' interference. In the old system, when a girl's despair reaches a certain point, she will become a witch. In Madoka's system, Madoka will cleanse the soul gem before that happens. However, the isolation field, on one hand, prevented Madoka from interfering, on the other, also prevented the creation of a true witch by preventing the complete corruption into a grief seed of Homura's soul gem. In other words, it accumulated Homura's despair PAST critical point, even more so after Homura overflew it.]] Human will always cling to some kind of reasoning, to some purposes when pushed to the edge of insanity. Homura's wish was to protect Madoka. Homura's curse was to destroy herself for Madoka. It would only be natural that Homura would cling to her love for Madoka, the only constant, for any semblance of sanity she had left. Homura was telling the truth when she said that became The Devil out of love. |
| 209 | * The Clara Dolls are Homulilly's familiars and their role is playing mourners for the witch's execution. Homura is an orphan, has no other friends aside the Magical Girls and she's convinced that they will be more focused in killing her than crying for her death. She's believes that she will be DyingAlone and nobody will mourn or lament her death, so she created the Clara Dolls to give to herself the illusion of someone sad for her. |
| 210 | ** What's worse is, they won't even do that. The tears they shed are fake, as evidenced by their permanent SlasherSmile expression, and in Akuma Homura's new world their job is now to mock their mistress forever. Really, there's something very wrong with this girl. |
| 211 | * Nagisa running around and frolicking in Homura's new world is adorable, until it hits you: it's not unreasonable to assume that considering her nature she, like Sayaka, remembers what had just transpired. But unlike Sayaka, ''Nagisa is over the moon''. Does that mean she's okay with what Homura did...? |
| 212 | ** It's more likely that Homura already altered Nagisa's memory, as she did to Sayaka; unlike Sayaka, Homura has no real connection with Nagisa, so she'd have no reason to converse with her the way she did with Sayaka before wiping her memories. |
| 213 | *** Still, she seemed WAY too happy considering the circumstances. This wasn't her just skipping all carefree down the road on her way to school, she was out-and-out cavorting: running full speed with her arms outstretched, spinning around, dancing and laughing her head off. And then she becomes pretty much 'normal' again when she meets up with who I assume are her classmates. She was also in the 'wine world' alone with Sayaka and Homura: she could probably see it. |
| 214 | *** It's easy to forget that Nagisa is the Charlotte of the post-Madoka wraith world. Since Kyubey would have contracted with her without needing her to become a witch, her wish probably didn't tragically and since she's alive now, she never used up her magic. She isn't sad because she doesn't have anything to be sad ''about'', and all the things that would have ruined it for her have been edited out of her memory. |
| 215 | ** She's probably incredibly happy because she '''finally''' gets to eat cheese again. Is this a TearJerker? |
| 216 | * If the Law of Cycles is now broken thanks to Homura, what happens to the magical girls who were taken to Magical Girl Valhalla? They're essentially trapped there now, since only Madoka has the power to send agents back to Earth. Consequently, no MagicalGirl will be able to go there now as well, and as Homura explicitly states, those who have returned from that place, like Sayaka and Nagisa, can never go back. It is also implied that Homura essentially created a universe-wide LotusEaterMachine, since she's able to alter the memories of '''everybody''' including Sayaka, Nagisa, and especially, Madoka. |
| 217 | * There's new information on the Puella Magi wiki about Homura's seemingly decorative earring: it's the place where Madoka's powers are sealed, and the thing actually acts as a communication trinket between Homura and her familiars, but what makes it scary it's that it's ''partially sentient''. But it doesn't end there. That tiny jewel dangling from its tail? ''It's Madoka's soul gem'' and its eye is ''Homura's''. |
| 218 | ** If you made it this far, you know this means Madoka will start decomposing and die if she's ever away from Homura for an extended period of time. |
| 219 | *** Considering that the universe is Homura's ''entire'' Labyrinth, [[NightmareRetardant range may not be an issue now]]. |
| 220 | * The whole final battle is, unknown to everyone but Homura and Kyubey, a last-ditch effort to keep Kyubey from learning more about and subsequently enslaving Madoka via HeroicSacrifice. Other than losing a few expendable bodies when containment fails, it's an unqualified victory for the Incubators until Homura makes her final play. Her actions may have subverted Madoka's sacrifice, but not doing it would have led to the benefits being completely undone. |
| 221 | ** On top of that, much like in the original universe, their efforts are ultimately doomed to fail without Homura interfering with Madoka. Think about it: what, exactly, would keep the incubators from doing the exact same thing to other magical girls until the Ultimate Madoka squad screwed up and let her get captured? The Law of the Cycles was doomed to be undone by the incubators from the moment Homura foolishly told Kyubey about the old system. As selfish as it was, Homura's actions at the end of the plot were likely the only way to truly save Madoka. |
| 222 | ** As well Homura probably realises who would be the next Magical Girls to become gem-trapped Witches in the Incubators' experiments. After all, they're both watching her about to be taken by the Law of Cycles and were in Homulily's barrier. |
| 223 | * There's a couple of different ways to interpret the ending, but if you take it as Homura re-ordering the universe so that magical girls get wishes but don't have to fight because Homura is forcing the Incubators to absorb the equivalent despair this raises some disturbing possibilities about Kyubey. If Homura ''is'' forcing the Incubators to absorb despair, does that mean they'll be forced to develop emotions? If they do... will they be able to make wishes? |
| 224 | ** Even worse, if Homura is forcing the Incubators to absorb despair, does that mean that Kyubey could become something similar to but technically distinct from a Witch? Statements from the creators of the series have suggested that, at least on Earth, there's really only one Incubator in several bodies. Considering that it is ultimately behind everything that has happened so far (the creation of two universes, the existence of at least all of the timelines Homura created, etc.), its karmic potential would have to be absurdly high. Something like that would be completely incomprehensible. |
| 225 | *** [[WildMassGuessing What if that's its true goal?]] I mean, think about it. With a system like that eventually Kyuubey would get to that point... |
| 226 | * How much of the truth about Kyubey does Homura actually know? Obviously she knows what happens to magical girls and witches and the balance of hope and despair, but what about entropy and the heat death of the universe? Kyubey only told Madoka about that in private, and Homura has no real reason to ask. If she has a single tragic flaw, it's that she's constantly throwing her whole being into a single specific goal without all the facts. What if she doesn't know why the Incubators want to collect the energy of human emotions? What if she knows, but doesn't understand thermodynamics enough to really get it? What if she just plain has no idea? It would mean that she's not selfishly damning the universe just for Madoka out of greed or spite, she's doing it out of ''ignorance'', and she's already removed or cowed almost everyone who could correct her... |
| 227 | ** The question is, what does ''he'' really know? His entire plan is to harvest the power of emotion, and ''he doesn't understand emotion''. He knows enough to manipulate girls into becoming magical girls and ultimately witches, but is so inconsistent it seems like he figured it out by trial and error. Seriously, he's been doing this for centuries and ''he doesn't know what love is.'' For that matter it would be completely insane to trust anything he says about his motivations, speaking in half truths and purposely omitting crucial details is his entire schtick. |
| 228 | *** How much does it matter? Homura's running the show now. Kyubey's understanding is practically a moot point now. |
| 229 | *** It matters a ''lot''. Homura's running the show, but we don't know what's going on in his head now, except that he's probably traumatized. The whole point of seeking a race of creatures where each has its own emotions was to harvest them for grief because, although the Incubators don't fully understand emotions themselves, they ''do'' know that emotional energy is a potentially limitless power that isn't bound by the laws of thermodynamics. If that means Kyubey, being forced to endure whatever Homura is doing to him in a way that ''teaches'' him what it means to feel (and since emotions are a mental illness for Incubators, that would mean Homura is torturing him ''into insanity''), he's still the only character who knows how Incubator technology actually works. Madoka and Homura use it to ends he can't fully grasp in the moment, but only he can make the contract. And if he has emotions, if he's willing to sign himself away for the sake of the universe, what's stopping him from doing exactly that? Considering that no less than ''four entire universes [[labelnote: Which are…]] Original Series, Magia Record, Law of Cycles, Homuniverse[[/labelnote]] and a hundred timeliness'' have been created and destroyed ''solely'' because Kyubey came to earth, his karmic destiny is greater than the karmic destiny of literally ''all'' other magical girls '''combined'''. There is nothing in the universe that could be more frightening than a Kyubey who is capable of making a wish. |
| 230 | * So, the whole point of this was to isolate Homura's soul gem within a barrier so that the Incubators could have proof that "The Entity Called Madoka Kaname" exists, with the knowledge that if it exists, it can one day be manipulated. But here's the kicker: the Incubators only wanted that because they wanted to bring about the witch system, because it would be more efficient than grief cubes. Madoka knew exactly what Kyubey was doing and divided herself up between three ordinary magical girls, choosing only to show her true form once the isolation field was gone and the Incubators were no better off than they were at the start; with Madoka appearing only within Homura's soul gem, the Incubators would have no way of knowing if she were real, or if she was just a figment of Homura's imagination. Madoka's wish ensured that witches could never come about again, there was no chance of that ever changing. But then Homura jumped the gun and split her off from herself, and it's all downhill from there. So, bottom line? ''Homura lost her faith''. |
| 231 | ** That makes it extra tragic that Sayaka blabs the plan to everybody in earshot... |
| 232 | * Homura made a new universe with magic. Thing is, Homura is removed from the hope/despair equation. She does it with ''love'', but it's still Incubator technology, and we know that every application of that technology has its price that the magical girl has to pay no matter who gets the benefit of her wish. And what's the opposite of love, but ''hate''? That's why she's implied to be suicidal, why she cuts off contact with her friends, why she openly transgresses against Madoka just for the sake of protecting her and making everyone happy. She loves Madoka enough to create an entire universe... which is also enough hate to destroy one. |
| 233 | * It's stated that after becoming part of the Law of Cycles, Sayaka gained the memories of previous incarnations which explains her knowledge of the witch system and her improved fighting techniques. However, besides turning into a witch in other timelines, its implied that she also remembers ''being a witch'' as indicated by her comment about how Homulilly is suffering the most. This would mean that she has memories of attempting to crush Madoka as Oktavia and Kyoko committing a HeroicSacrifice to take her down. One has to wonder how much guilt she must be carrying. |
| 234 | ** No one but Madoka and Homura are ever shown to remember the pre-Ultimate Madoka timelines, so it's unlikely that Sayaka can remember trying to kill Madoka as Oktavia or Kyoko's HeroicSacrifice. However, her comments about Homulilly suggest that Madoka's trip into Homura's soul gem is more complicated than usual due to the isolation field, but ''not actually different''. When Madoka comes to fetch a magical girl home to Valhalla, what she's really doing is fighting and defeating the witch inside the soul gem in a super-compressed IKnowYouAreInThereSomewhereFight. |
| 235 | * The isolation field itself carries some terrifying implications. Homura's descent into despair begins when she begins to doubt herself, thinking that Madoka was imaginary, right? We don't know when she started thinking that, but we do know that the isolation field itself is something of a prism-like seal around the illusory world inside the soul gem, and that no one can get into it without being drawn in by a witch. Think about that for a second: the Incubators put a seal over Homura's very soul, one that couldn't be breached until she accrued enough despair or used enough magic to turn into a witch in the first place. Homura may have been rendered completely inable of having emotional connections to anyone not in her soul gem. Of course she came to doubt Madoka, she was completely and utterly alone within herself. |
| 236 | ** It's extremely likely that the beginning of the movie was indeed the beginning of the ''Labyrinth''. Evidence for this is that most timeskips in the movie are actual timeskips in-universe (Homura skipping to the scene when she was with Madoka on the grass, Homura skipping from her fight with Mami to suddenly being on the boat etc.), adding this is the fact that we only ever get to see two Nightmares in the entire movie. If the magical girls fought more Nightmares as they have implied "the Nightmares have been getting stronger lately.", then we should've seen more Nightmares. Homura figured it out because she couldn't remember her adventures before the events of the movie. |
| 237 | * During her final dialogue with Sayaka, Homura says something along the lines of "if you continue to act confrontational all the time, even ''she'' might come to dislike you." Given the show's almost entirely female cast, the precise identity of "she" is a bit ambiguous. If you assume that Homura's referring to Madoka, it's suggesting the loss of Sayaka's closest friend and the absolute failure of Sayaka's goals. However, if you interpret Homura's threat as referring to Kyoko, that's when Homura's psychological beatdown reaches a new stage of fucked-up. In the context of Sayaka's confession not thirty minutes prior, the implications are curl-up-in-the-corner-hugging-a-pillow inducing. Homura isn't threatening Sayaka physically, she's threatening her relationship with the person she cares most about. |
| 238 | ** Jossed as of the English dub: Homura explicitly names Madoka in that snippet of dialogue. |
| 239 | *** The English dub also says that Madoka might end up ''hating'' Sayaka. Jeez, the idea of [[AllLovingHero Madoka]] hating anyone is a bit of fridge horror. We never really see Madoka angry or bitter in the show or the movie, even with all the [[TraumaCongaLine terrible stuff]] happening around her. |
| 240 | * Homulilly's endless funeral procession. Of course there's no peace for her, that's not really what a witch is all about, but Homulilly's awful fate is to simply walk. Forever. Being mocked and disdained by all she passes, never able to make a true end of it. Her hands are shackled to her purpose, but a part of her claws the ground in her wake in a futile attempt to stop herself. Sound familiar? She was fortunate enough to retain her human form the entire time, but essentially, Homura's life as a magical girl was only cosmetically different from her life as a witch. |
| 241 | * Homura is clearly in control of her self as a witch. She created her labyrinths to create a better world for her close friends and their close friends and never curses anyone. She later tries to commit suicide by magical girl so she was still in control the whole way. And Sayaka implies this is the case for all witches. In other words the witches have never been mindless monsters. The attempt to save Sayaka didn't work because she already knew who Madoka was and targeted her anyways for her own reasons. |
| 242 | * Kyubey's intentions for the Law of the Cycle. His reasoning is that if he can observe it, he can interfere with it, and if he can interfere with it, he can control it. He doesn't realize that the Law of the Cycle is literally the law that the entire universe was built around, he only sees it as a physical law. While that ''is'' technically correct, it means he doesn't know that that law can't be broken because he views Madoka as a person, not a principle in human form. So why is that bad? Because he has undeniable proof that Witches still do ''exist'', they just don't manifest in the real world. He originated all this SufficientlyAdvancedTechnology, all he has to do to keep Madoka out of the equation is adjust the Soul Gem formula so that the witch ''stays'' confined inside the Soul Gem ''and can't get out''. Madoka's wish specifically granted her the power to defeat all witches before they're born and she only appears when magical girls are on the brink of despair, if the Incubators simply change it so that witches can't be born at all, then they can just go into the Soul Gems (like we see him do with Homura's) and do whatever they want with the witch trapped inside. |
| 243 | ** And, possibly worse, that would be an extremely easy thing for Kyubey to sell to magical girls. He'd be able to tell them "Your friend has something truly dangerous growing inside her Soul Gem. If you don't do something to stop it, the Law of the Cycle will kill her!" and be telling the absolute truth. |
| 244 | * Homura's most insurmountable hurdle is getting the other magical girls to believe anything she tells them. At least with Walpurgis, her attacks actually ''landed'' even if they didn't cause her much damage; the girls ''never'' believe anything she tells them, so she just doesn't bother anymore and accepts that she'll have to do everything alone. Now think back to the epic Homura vs Mami battle over Bebe. The first thing Mami does is to tell Homura that she ''wanted'' to stay back until she understood what was going on, but had to intervene to protect Bebe, and then just straight-out asks her what she's trying to do. Keep in mind, this is the first time ''anyone besides Madoka'' has honestly asked her to explain herself instead of immediately judging her for not being nice. Homura hesitates, but you can ''see'' her make the conscious decision to have faith in her friend-- while the giant TV display shows a procession of lonely Homuras marching across an empty void-- and tells her the truth....and Mami not only doesn't believe her, she not-so-subtly says she thinks Homura's not right in the head (which is true, but not for the reasons Mami thinks). After everything she's been through and all the pain she's in at that moment, Homura took ''yet another chance'' on trusting her friend, and yet again, her friend let her down. Homura gets a lot of crap for never explaining herself and always trying to do everything on her own, but the other girls never listen to her. There's no point in asking for help when they repeatedly show her, in multiple timelines, that they will write her off as a liar if she tries. And now, the proper FridgeHorror part: Kyubey is frequently interpreted as a trafficker or child predator. What's the most common reason abuse victims don't report their abuser? ''They think no one will believe them.'' |
| 245 | * Nagisa gives her reason for coming back as wanting to eat cheese again. Sounds cute and innocent, right? That is, until one recalls that as Bebe she refers to Mami - or at least her Magical Girl form - as "Cheese" twice,[[note]]When Charlotte senses Hitomi's Nightmare, she tells Mami to "Turn into cheese!"; and during the Cake Song she looks at Mami and says "Cheese?"[[/note]] and Mami refers to herself as "the cheese" in the Cake Song. Remember what Charlotte did to Mami in the third episode of the original anime? Not so cute and innocent now, is it? |
| 246 | * Homura has been cycling through time... a lot. And she looks as young as she ever has. Until she turns into a witch. And then you realize that she's old. Really old. And obviously, she sounds really depressed: sick of cycling over and over just to do one thing, and only after succeeding after countless failures, she has nothing more to do. Maybe Homura gives up on hope just because she's unimaginably tired. She literally can't keep going. After all, nobody is meant to live that long. When you take the falling teeth and severed head literally... |
| 247 | ** It makes sense that she'd be tired of going over the same month again and again so many times, but even 100 loops of 30 days is still only a little over eight years. At the absolute most, Homura can't be more than about 24 years old. |
| 248 | * Despite existing in the closest thing to Heaven, Nagisa has to come back to earth in order to eat cheese again. ''[[FauxHorrific There's no cheese in Heaven.]]'' |
| 249 | ** It's possible that there's just no ''food'' in Heaven because everyone's dead and they don't need to eat, but that still lends a bit of creepiness to the concept. Madoka's whole thing is supporting the right of magical girls to make their wishes without succumbing to despair, but that doesn't actually fix Nagisa's cheese dilemma; she wished for a ''last'' cheesecake, so she can't have cheese anymore, but a witch's labyrinth in Goddess Madoka's universe is a technically non-existent reality whose only rules are governed by the witch itself, and ''this'' labyrinth is ruled by someone who wants everyone they care about to have what would really make them happy. Homulilly's labyrinth (and possibly Akuma Homura's universe) might actually be the only place Nagisa ''can'' have cheese again. In a way, it sums up the whole movie's sympathy for the devil themes pretty succinctly, no? |
| 250 | * Homura's labyrinth was inside an isolation field, and she kept bringing in people from Mitakihara who she knew, meaning the real Mitakihara was intact. If she brought in all of Mitakihara's Puellae Magi, who was fighting the wraiths in the real Mitakihara during that time? |
| 251 | ** If it's any consolation, the Wraith universe doesn't produce grief energy as efficiently as the Witch universe, so there's no incentive to limit the magical girl population to produce Grief Seed scarcity. Chances are, this version of Mitakihara has plenty of other magical girls to protect it from Wraiths, they're just missing a few veterans. Which also sucks, but isn't nearly as bad as an un-defended city. |
| 252 | * Homura's transformation into a witch features a landscape of an overcast sky with a glimpse of dawn on the horizon. This closely matches the Rider–Waite's rendition of the Ten of Swords Tarot card, symbolizing everything along the lines of pain, betrayal, despair, mental anguish, being overwhelmed, defeat, lowest point, inevitable end, the end of a cycle and a new beginning. |
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