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A perfect example of this trope. You should totally give her a hug.
A young girl's greatest fear isn't monsters, or magical threats from beyond time and space. No, a young girl's greatest fear overshadows all of those things.
Her greatest fear is to be alone.
Normal Magical Girls have a good relationship with their family members, they make friends at school—they may be a little dim, but that's okay, and this all translates into the magical ability to defend what they love from external threats.
Dark Magical Girls don't have that. For them, Parental Abandonment is not funny or convenient. The relatively lucky ones have absentee workaholic parents; the others are actively abused. Sometimes the parent is one of the Big Bads. She doesn't have real friends or exploits past the academic because she doesn't know how to really communicate socially, if she goes to school at all. Or perhaps all of her friends died, turning her cynical, and she's afraid to make more friends because it'll only cause more pain. She's smart, but she doesn't understand what is wrong with her and what is wrong with the world. If she seems outwardly creepy, it's another unfortunate reason people avoid her. Because all loners are perceived as evil or otherwise abnormal, this translates into a power that's both similar to and the polar opposite of that of the Magical Girl. DMG's are immune to any stock-footage "healing" abilities the MG has.
Inevitably, the Dark Magical Girl will fight the Magical Girl as her Evil Counterpart or Shadow Archetype, and often as the Dragon or the Dark Chick of the Big Bad. It's usually because she wants approval from the Big Bad as a parental figure, or she's jealous of everything the heroine has that she does not. And she doesn't want the Magical Girl's pity.
She's also faster, smarter, and more ruthless. Don't be surprised if she often wins fights against the MG, who only survives because the DMG is holding back. (Something she may not do, when she gets more and more frustrated as time goes by.) The MG is also desperate not to hurt the DMG, and usually wants to save her from her inner darkness.
Eventually the MG will reach a level of skill to face her. But it's not enough... she has to get through and let the DMG know that she is a lovable person, and that they can be friends, and that the DMG doesn't have to be alone anymore. ...but she has to beat the tar out of her too.
Yes, the DMG almost always gets converted to the Good Guys. After this, despite pyrotechnics, the ultimate battle against the Big Bad (which the ex-DMG joins in) is almost anti-climactic.
Afterwards, the ex-DMG is loyal to the MG almost to the point of being Schoolgirl Lesbians. They rarely get depowered a la Good Is Dumb and will be an equal partner to the hero or heroine ( often knocking the other characters down a rank). She'll be the equal or above in physical attacks and is less naive, but will recognize that the MG is the one with the emotional power. (After all, she witnessed that personally.)
Younger Dark Magical Girls tend to be Little Miss Badasses (and at least something of the Elegant Gothic Lolita; see below), even if just a Cute Witch. If a Magic Warrior, she's frequently a Lady Of War.
One common way of noting the Dark Magical Girl is her outfit is usually slightly more fetishy (purples versus the usual white, stylized 'undergarments' versus normal lace), which might explain why a Heel Face Turn doesn't always mean a switch in costume.
Not to be confused with the Black Magician Girl or especially the Dark Action Girl (since the latter is almost, but not quite, exactly unlike the DMG).
It should also be noted that, despite being called the Dark Magical Girl, it is not rare to see a Spear Counterpart, especially in video games. In that case, expect a large amount of Bad Ass mixed in with the Dark Magical Guy in question's personality as well, and it isn't unlikely he's a protagonist, in which case the Dark Is Not Evil aspect is always emphasized.
Examples
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- One of the first DMGs is Karen, Sally's Shadow Archetype from the second Sally the Witch series.
- Pixy Misa from the Pretty Sammy series.
- Fate Testarossa from Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha is perhaps the quintessential example.
- Interestingly, the early designs seen in omake for the Triangle Heart series had Chrono as a more conventional Magical Girl villain, with his current black armor getup largely a holdover from that.
- Lutecia from Nanoha Striker S fits the bill pretty well, too.
- Einhart Stratos from ViVid seems to be a Glam Of Shazam take on DMC.
- Freesia Yagyuu from Jubei-chan season 2. She doubles as a ninja.
- Hotaru Tomoe (Sailor Saturn) from Sailor Moon is subverted. At first, the Outer Soldiers treat her as a Dark Magical Girl because they believe her awakening as Sailor Saturn would bring about the End of the World As We Know It. In the manga, it actually does, for once, but it turns out to be a good thing.
- Also, Chibiusa achieved Dark Magical Girl status temporarily in Sailor Moon R, as she is brainwashed by Wiseman who corrupts her with dark magic to believe that she is responsible for her grim future and that no one loves her. As a result she becomes Black Lady, an older version of herself, with longer hair and a very revealing outfit and becomes a servant of Wiseman. In the manga, she even brainwashes and seduces her father, though in the anime she actively hates both parents and tries to kill them (Usagi does have a vision of Black Lady and Tuxedo Kamen kissing, but it's a part of Wiseman's attempted brainwashing of her. Which doesn't work, by the way..
- Dark Sailor Mercury (aka "Darkury") from Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon is not just an ordinary Dark Magical Girl, but a former regular Magical Girl corrupted and co-opted by the bad guys. It takes Moon MORE than a mere I Know You Are In There Somewhere Fight to bring her back to the side of good.
- Nova from Magic Knight Rayearth has some of the elements of the DMG, but not quite.
- The "Tasogare no Miko" (Priestesses of the Twilight) in Asagiri no Miko.
- To an extent, Valkyrie Ghost in UFO Princess Valkyrie.
- Takako aka Fenrir the Princess of Disaster in Pretear, who is also the Big Bad. And Himeno's stepsister Mawata while under her influence.
- Mikoto Minagi from Mai-HiME is a true innocent, sweet and loving toward everyone she knows — but becomes a holy terror in the defense/service of the brother whom she has been seeking through the entire series, and who turns out to be the biggest Big Bad in the entire show. True to the form of the trope, Mikoto's convinced to do a Heel Face Turn via The Power Of Love from Mai, and then she frees her brother from his inner darkness by smashing his pendant with her sword.
- Also from Mai-HiME, Nao Yuuki, who travels the path she took because her father was killed and her mother was seriously injured by robbers. Unlike Mikoto, she doesn't get converted over as easily. Making Nao even more tragic, she was beginning to really warm to the group before Natsuki was tricked into attacking her. It's hard not to feel sorry for her when she leaves, screaming revenge and clutching what's left of her right eye, once you realize it.
- Nina (among others) from Mai-Otome.
- The most important other being Tomoe.
- Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch has the dark magical woman, Sara, who, in a slight subversion of this trope, turns out to be The Man Behind The Man herself, rather than the other way around.
- The Kiryuu sisters, Michiru and Kaoru, from Futari wa Pretty Cure Splash*Star.
- Setsuna Higashi/Eas from Fresh Pretty Cure
- Rue aka Princess Kraehe from Princess Tutu.
- The English dub of Tokyo Mew Mew made Renee (Zakuro) out to be a former Dark Magical Girl, or at least pretending to be one; this has caused some confusion, but that's nothing Mew (pardon the pun).
- Suigintou of Rozen Maiden is developed into this role in the sequels.
- Miyu of the Vampire Princess Miyu TV series starts out as largely this archetype — a reserved, lonely girl whose only companions are her Team Pet, Shiina, and her battle partner, Larva. However, she's a very atypical case, as she's the main character, and begins to grow out of it due to discovering friends, rather than being lured out of it by the main. Her rival, Reiha, is a more straight example.
- Lucy from Elfen Lied is a personification of this concept, although she may be quite a bit darker and brutal than most.
- Rubi Toujou from Rosario To Vampire starts off in this archetype, but since she's in an Unwanted Harem show, her move to the side of good is a bit different. Later on, she's the one who saves Tsukune from himself.
- Yuko Amasawa from Dennou Coil is a dark technological girl (though the way technology gets treated in the series, it could just as well be magic). Other than the fact that she is the closest thing the series has to a recurring Big Bad (she's more like a master-less Enigmatic Minion), she fits the trope to a T.
- Saint Tail's mother in the manga of Kaitou Saint Tail was a Dark Magical Girl named "Saint Lucifer" long before Meimi was born. Convinced to Heel Face Turn by Saint Tail's father, they settled down together. (In the anime, she was always good, though more morally grey than Meimi.)
- Crona the Witch Sword User from Soul Eater. His/Her mother, Medusa the Witch, "trained" Crona by forcing Crona to beat his/her pet rabbit to death, and locked Crona in a closet until s/he agreed to do so. Then they ate the rabbit. S/he also has the Black Blood taint and demonic sword Ragnarok.
- Naha Midori from Telepathy Shoujo Ran, who was Genre Savvy enough to do an immediate heel face turn. She then goes on to get practically adopted into Ran's Family, and spends the rest of the series living the good life. Ohara Momoko is a dark magical girl who grows up without going through the face turn, and is miserable because of it.
- Izayoi Aki from Yu-Gi-Oh 5Ds who disguises herself as the destructive and feared Black Rose Witch even though she is a Chosen One.
- This trait has been completely abandoned by season three as part of general Character Derailment and Chickification
- Utau from Shugo Chara is a recent example played straight. Though whenever Ikuto stops by, she goes from a serious and brooding dark magical girl to lovelorn and cutesy. After both of her Charas leave her, she gets some Epiphany Therapy and turns to the side of good.
- Saki Hanajima from Fruits Basket. She has the ability to sense denpa waves, which tell her emotions and let her sense things beyond normal ability. In kindergarten, she was often bullied by her classmates, and once a boy called her a witch and forced her to eat a live newt... so she thought so strongly about her wish for his death, that he almost did die. She was so scared that she started dressing in black and being as scary as possible in order to scare people away from her, until both Tohru Honda and Arisa Uotani managed to befriend her.
- The titular character in Jigoku Shoujo, Enma Ai.
- Kuesu from Omamori Himari, who also is a Black Magician Girl.
- Yukina from Girls Bravo is an extremely rare Big Bad example.
- Except for the male thing, Gaara from Naruto is the ultimate example of this trope. At first depicted as a cold blooded killer, the Chunin Exam arc gradually checks every possible box off the list of requirements, starting with the revelation that Gaara and Naruto are both Jinchuuriki (living containers to unstoppable magical beasts of mass destruction). We then get to learn that Gaara had the absolute worst up-bringing ever- whereas Naruto gradually found acceptance and friendship with his fellow villagers, Gaara was treated as a rogue weapon of mass destruction (which, to be fair, he was)- not only has his own father been trying to murder him since the age of six, but his uncle Yashamaru, the only character that had been close to him and claimed to love him up to this point, then tries to assassinate him on his father's orders. When stopped and mortally wounded, the uncle spends the last few moments of his life to tell this six year old child that a) he never loved him, b) his mother never loved him, c) nobody will ever love him, and d) please die now kthnxbye. And then tries to kill him one last time. The kanji for "love" scarred over his left eye is needless to say, ironic- his philosophy at the start of the arc is described as "love only myself", and "kill everyone who isn't me". Although he still calls the sand demon inside of him "mother" in berserk bloodlust mode. Cue big climactic fight with the protagonist which anviliciously invokes Gaara fighting for himself, Naruto finding strength fighting for his friends and family, and then Gaara realizing the error of his ways after being defeated. They even spend a lot of internal monologue time on screen musing about what they mean to each other later on. Plus there's the straight up statement from the author that Gaara was created to show what Naruto would've been like if some of the villagers hadn't decided to stop being such flaming asshats and show the poor kid some love.
- Nami in Sora Wo Kakeru Shoujo. Her powers are tech-based, but character-wise she fits perfectly.
- Mahou Sensei Negima has quite a lot of girls that qualify. First Evangeline, then Chao, and now Fate Averruncus' accomplices. Yue also qualifies, given recent events.
- Another Shonen example: Nico Robin of One Piece: Broken Bird, Lady Of War, Heel Face Turn. Tends to wear leather.
- Aversion: Miyu Edelfelt from Fate Kaleid Liner Prisma Ilya looked like she was all set to be this, then it turned out she was just The Spock instead.
- A pretty brutal and tragic version is Rosine from Berserk.
- Averted and subverted at turns in the Fate Stay Night visual novel. Rin seems initially a good candidate for the role: an orphan raised to obsess over her family's sorcerous legacy, who candidly admits (to the reader) that her entire school life is a crafted facade of vanity with little real emotional investment. However, she ends up becoming a more or less loyal and dependable ally of protagonist Shiro in all major branches of the story. No, it's her separated-in-childhood sister Sakura — sweet, nurturing, and devotedly in love with Shiro — who in one scenario becomes an unstoppably deadly force of darkness who supplants the would-be Big Bad that corrupted her. Remember, Beware The Nice Ones.
- Silvia from N. Perumov's "Guardian of the Swords" series. Powerful? Check. Lonely? Check. (Her father is a villain who killed what little family she had). Fighting good Magical Girl ? Check. Becoming good? well sort of...
- It could be argued that Charity Carpenter from The Dresden Files novel series is an example of this. As a teenager, she awakened to magical powers that she barely could control. She ran away from home and joined a coven of low-level magic users. After their leader went mad with fear over the White Council, she was chained to a rock to be fed to a dragon. Michael, a Knight of the Cross, rescues her and she forswears her former life and never speaks of it again. Until her eldest daughter begins to follow in her footsteps.....
- Apsalar from the Malazan Book Of The Fallen series manages to be a DMG and and Dark Action Girl at the same time? How you ask? After getting possessed by Cotillion, the patron god of assassins, as a young child she had years worth of skills and memories dumped into her head, giving her a rather twisted outlook on life. The only things holding her back from being an emotionless killer are her feelings for Crokus/Cutter, a Love Martyr if there ever was one, and Cotillion who tries to act as a father for her because he feels guilty for ruining her life.
- Faith from Buffy The Vampire Slayer is a good Western example of this trope, with a healthy dose of Dark Action Girl. Besides that she's a fighter, not a magician, she is a very lonely character, and has a father/daughter relationship (to mirror Giles and Buffy) with the season's Big Bad, one strong enough and real enough that Buffy's Power Of Friendship doesn't pull Faith back to the good guys (And, unlike your average DMG, this bond goes both ways: the only time the Big Bad in question sheds his Affably Evil persona and gets really pissed is when Faith is put in a coma by Buffy). Though Faith is eventually redeemed, she never develops the normal DMG devotion to Buffy; although they do establish a close ally relationship by the end of season 7 (which the season 8 comics undo, but not alot of people care about them anyway.)
- Also Amy, after her season 6 Character Derailment. Bad family life (abusive mother stole her body to become a cheerleader) and following history (stuck as a rat for 3 years), no care for the harm she does with magic, and very jealous of Willow's power, cursing her in season 7.
- And of course, there's "Dark Willow" during her magic-fueled Roaring Rampage Of Revenge, who even falls into the Dark Magical Girl pattern of jealously trying to prove that she's stronger than the heroine and her former best friend Buffy, before moving onto bigger plans. And like most Dark Magical Girls, she's eventually redeemed by The Power Of Love.
- Gwen Raiden from Angel, who's power prevents her from being intimate with anyone because it will kill them.
- Elle in Heroes is even closer to this: she's a bit more confident on the surface than the average example but she's deeply insecure and has a dysfunctional relationship with her father. Especially since he may even have brain-damaged her through persuading her to experiment dangerously with her power when she was a kid.
- Power Rangers usually prefers the Dark Action Girl route, but Marah & Kapri from Power Rangers Ninja Storm, Lothor's bumbling nieces, are more DMG-ish. They don't really want to be evil; they just want to be normal teenage girls, valued by their uncle ("By marriage," Lothor points out.). He finally leaves them to be destroyed in the Grand Finale, but Cam, Lothor's biological nephew, reluctantly decides to save them "because they're family." In the Reunion Show, they pretended to rejoin Lothor, but actually worked behind the scenes to free Cam's father, Kanoi... who then went on to save Cam, Hunter, and Blake... who then went on to save the Dino Thunder Power Trio from being wiped out by Ninja Storm's Three Amigos.
- Shadow from the Sonic The Hedgehog universe could be considered one of the rare male examples of this trope.
- She's not magical, per se, but Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops has a notable case in that the Magical Girl and the Dark Magical Girl are originally presented as twin sisters - the Magical Girl is devoted to her sister and talks about her a lot, while the Dark Magical Girl stalks around alone trying to read people's minds. It turns out that...well. Both 'sisters' join forces with the hero to destroy the Big Bad at the end - and give a prophecy together.
- Arietta the Wild from Tales Of The Abyss. Her parents were killed by a Tidal Wave that wiped out her home island. Arietta, however, was found and raised by Ligers, enabling her the ability to communicate with animals. She uses Dark Fonic Artes and is very, very morbid. Her attire puts a lampshade on the idea of a Dark Magical Girl.
- Sabata is a rare case of a Dark Magical Boy from the Boktai series of games; later acquires the title of "Moon Beauty."
- Solo/Bly from Mega Man Star Force. Whereas Geo draws power from the Brother Band, a "network of friendship" if you will, Solo draws power from the lack of Brother Band.
- Riku from Kingdom Hearts is another male example of this trope.
- Metis in Persona 3, although she's not really evil, and cares deeply about her "sister"'s (Aigis) safety. Mainly because Metis is the shadow born of Aigis' humanity that Aigis wished away in The Answer.
- Fire Emblem traditionally features a female magic user with an overwhelming sense of honor and kindness, but are tragically either in love with or trapped within said honor to the Big Bad. Examples include Princess Ishtar from the fourth game, Brenya from the sixth, Limstella from the seventh, and Selena Fluorspar from the eighth. Nino starts as a more innocent version of the Dark Magical Girl, but has a Heel Face Turn very soon (and brings Jaffar to the party along)
- Limstella seems to mix this and Dark Action Girl. She's very ruthless and cold to the point of utter cruelty in several interactions (like a DAG), but her outmost loyalty to Nergal and her heartwretching Famous Last Words put her in quite a different light (like a DMG).
- Marisa, Cute Witch of Touhou may be a marginal incarnation of this trope. Her original appearance was as a servant of "evil" spirit Mima, but Defeat Means Friendship for both her and her master. She had run away from home after her parents denied her the ability to study magic, so Mima was her only chance at learning the Art. She also isolates herself to practice her magic, because she doesn't want anyone to know how hard she has to work at it to keep up with Reimu's natural talents. The case is only marginal, however, as it is almost impossible to find a case of a truly evil Touhou character for HeelFaceTurns to occur.
- Megatokyo's Tohya Miho? It's as good a guess as any about her.
- Almost certainly now. No-one says it outright,but we've seen her flip a van with one hand,jump three or four blocks whilst carrying Kimiko and walk nonchalantly on telegraph wires. Dark and troubled past too.
- The held-back tears give it away, when Kimiko tells her that lack of emotional connection to others necessarily means lack of what it is to be alive.
- This Troper suspects Fred Gallagher of making Miho his version of 100% DMG.
- In the Mechagical Girl Lisa ANT, the character Pink Flash is quite a subversion: She is a mercenary who willfully works for evil alien invaders (as opposed to Lisa, who works for other evil alien invaders because she's too gullible), but she is anything but dark.
- Angel Moxie, itself a pastiche of Magical Girl and Anime tropes, had the character of Tristan fill in the role of the Dark Magical Girl. She even worked for the villain near the start, but she quickly changed sides after being betrayed.
- Bell from Bleedman's
 Power Puff Girls Massive Multiplayer Crossover.
- Ariel Val'Sarghess. A heroic example (kinda), but she still qualifies.
- W.I.T.C.H. features an interesting variation. The Dark Magical Girl, Elyon Brown alias Princess Elyon from Meridian, fights the heroines because she hates them personally — but aside from that, she's a very sweet and naive person. So much so, that the heroines have to pull punches against her... specially one of them, Cornelia Hale, who is Elyon's long-time friend. Good thing the misunderstanding are more or less cleared and they become friends again
- As is Raven in Teen Titans — especially after her rebirth as a troubled goth chick in the recent animated series. However, she neither actively fights nor delights in her role, merely accepts it as inevitable and quietly defies it.
- Terra can also be seen as a more antagonistic example, though her powers aren't strictly magic in nature.
- Prince Zuko from AvatarTheLastAirbender has this trope down to a science. Before the start of the series, his father permenantly disfigures his face for speaking out of turn and during the third season, not only does he join the protagonists but ends up giving the main character the training necessary to complete his skill set.
- Ex-Superhero Shego from Kim Possible is often thought of as being in this catagory, but the sheer joy she takes in her chosen lifestyle really makes her more of a Dark Action Girl.
- Demona from Gargoyles is what happens when you take this trope and mix in a healthy dose of Fantastic Racism and Dark Action Girl. Despite most of her misery being very much self-inflicted, the fandom still sees her as a big giant Woobie thanks to the epic, almost-Shakespearean tragedy of it all.
- For an extraordinary exploration of the Dark Magical Girl, check out Stefan Gagne's polymedia masterpiece Sailor Nothing.
- Who, ironically, is actually a heroic example of this trope. It doesn't comfort her much, though.
- Soyburger Patricia of the League Of Intergalactic Cosmic Champions sort of falls into this trope.
- Tami from the web novel Dimension Heroes is brainwashed into working for the evil Dark Lady Scortana, resulting in a radical change both in personality and wardrobe.
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