As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.
- A subtle one right at the start: After the first Nightmare is defeated, the movie essentially replays the opening of the very first episode, with Madoka rousing her mother, getting ready for the day, and enjoying breakfast with her family. It's all cute and heartwarming, but then you remember that this is the exact sort of life Madoka gave up when she made her cosmic wish. Not only that, but the entire thing is a facade (granted, Madoka's family is very much real as they are among those who are rescued from Homura's barrier). One has to wonder what would have gone through Madoka's mind had she not been hit with Laser-Guided Amnesia.
- Madoka's transformation in the Holy Quintet sequence. Sure, it's cutesy and bubbly and sparkly and whatnot, but one of the most heartbreaking aspects of the anime is the fact that the cute, brightly-colored, beautiful and powerful aspects of being a magical girl are only a cheap varnish on an ugly, ugly reality, and one of the most uplifting aspects is that Madoka gives up not just her life, but her very existence, to give them all some of that hope and light back. Where Mami breaks out of a delicate-looking shell, and Sayaka runs full-force into herself, and Kyoko tears through her own burning, enraged reflection, and Homura leaps after something out of reach, a chorus line of infinite, yet distant, Madokas dances and cheers them on. She always said being a magical girl would be enough for her, and that scene does a beautiful job of showing how right she was. Her character theme was already a fast-track to messy crying, the bubbly, happy version is even moreso.
- Homura's suicide bluff. The look on her face as she pulls the trigger, and Mami's reaction. And finally, Homura raising the gun to Mami's head. Obviously, things weren't quite as they seemed, since fans already knew that Homura wouldn't die from a headshot, and Mami turned out to be a double. And yet, for a couple of seconds, it is an absolutely heart-wrenching scene.
- Another one immediately afterwards, as Homura levels her gun at the now-frozen Mami's leg. She first aims at Mami's Soul Gem, she cannot do it. Even when she instead aims at the place that she knew Mami will recover from, it takes her a few moments to steel herself, and then even after she fires, she can't even watch the bullet hit, looking away and closing her eyes before undoing her time stop. Again, this is Mami she's clearly reluctant to hurt, and right after the two had been emptying clip after clip at each other to boot.
- The Flower Field makes it painfully clear that Homura had not found peace with herself and Madoka's sacrifice as suggested at the end of the anime. She kept on keepin' on purely in the name of her friend, but shows a very different truth when given the chance to say with full candor what she herself thought of the situation. And her tone saying those lines is heartwrenching.Homura: I was so lonely and sad... but no one understood how I felt! I started to think all my memories of you were just things I'd made up! I thought I was going crazy!
- Then Madoka tells her that she would never have wanted to leave everyone behind, and Homura crumbles entirely. Just look at the picture. Look at her eyes, the look of horror on her face as she realizes the extent of her failure: she may not have saved Madoka's life, but she was content with Madoka's sacrifice so long as Madoka was happy. Now she finds out that Madoka did it out of her sense of duty and was NOT, in fact, happy with her situation. OUCH.
- Depends on if the audience buys the idea that the two misunderstood each other in this scene; given that Ultimate Madoka is around everyone, all the time, she technically wasn't far away from her friends at all. Which means that she was okay with her decision, but Homura misreads her and comes to the conclusion that Madoka wasn't happy with her fate. Double ouch.
- Then Madoka tells her that she would never have wanted to leave everyone behind, and Homura crumbles entirely. Just look at the picture. Look at her eyes, the look of horror on her face as she realizes the extent of her failure: she may not have saved Madoka's life, but she was content with Madoka's sacrifice so long as Madoka was happy. Now she finds out that Madoka did it out of her sense of duty and was NOT, in fact, happy with her situation. OUCH.
- Noi, the creepy little song the Clara Dolls sing as Homura's becoming a witch. Despite sounding rather chipper, it's pretty much the Clara Dolls singing about how everything Homura did was utterly pointless, that Madoka's gone for good and they'd never be reunited, and they might as well end it all. In other words, Homura's Despair Event Horizon in musical form.
- Homura transforming into a witch is a cross between this and Nightmare Fuel. You can see her drowning in despair and slowly losing her humanity. In the end, she becomes unable to do anything but suffer, while everything about her Witch shows how much she yearns for death.
- Tying into that, Homura slowly realising she is a witch. Her voice when she says it out loud is so full of grief and despair.
- The line "Madoka! I just want to say thank you for coming here to this god-awful place. I can't even say "goodbye" to you in the end." is truly heartbreaking.
- Tying into that, Homura slowly realising she is a witch. Her voice when she says it out loud is so full of grief and despair.
- Spider lilies, the flowers heavily associated with Homura's witch form can mean: never to meet again, lost memory, or abandonment. All of these meanings are equally valid for Homura's mental state and equally tragic.
- The image of Kyoko with a Homura with a severed head after Homura has transformed into a witch. Throughout the film Kyoko has grown to really care for Homura and the image just symbolism there is nothing she can do to stop all the pain and tragedy her friend is going through.
- The witch's familiars are reflecting the soul of the Magical Girl. Homura's familiars are seen committing suicide. How much must a girl hate herself to imagine something like this?
- It gets worse as you think more about it: Homulilly is the witch with the most familiars, counting 18 with Clara Dolls as a whole, and each one of them
represents something Homura thought or felt about herself. All of this was in Homura's heart, she hates herself this much. - The Clara Dolls all have such delightful names: Prideful, Sloth, Liar, Heartlessness, Gloominess (again, all of these are things Homura considers herself), and others. But one that really stands out is Stupidity. According to the artbook, Stupidity goes around telling everyone she can find something that, by definition, Homura considers truly idiotic: that she 'heard a story about a goddess. The goddess who glows so beautifully is sure to love us.' Oh Homura...
- Perhaps worst of all when it comes to the Clara Dolls? The last of them, the fifteenth, is named Love. This one has yet to arrive, and possibly never will. Even after everything she's done to save Madoka, Homura feels that she never really had love in herself at all - or worse, that her love for her best friend was nothing more than an excuse, and that her wish to save her was just as selfish as any other wish a magical girl has made.
- The runes in Homura's transformation sequence aren't much better. They translate to "Kill me!!" and "Glory to Death."
- It gets worse as you think more about it: Homulilly is the witch with the most familiars, counting 18 with Clara Dolls as a whole, and each one of them
- Of the heartwarmingly sad variety, Madoka finally reaching Homura on top of Homulilly's head. When she tells Homura she doesn't have to be alone and she'll always be with her, we have a shot of Madoka caressing Homura's face while the latter cries and asks for forgiveness.
- Homura's and Sayaka's last meeting after Homura steals Madoka's god powers leading to the universe resetting once again, with the latter confronting the former on why she stole the hopes of all Magical Girls. Due to becoming a part of the Law of Cycles and gaining memories of all the previous timelines, Sayaka had gained a deeper understanding of what Homura went through and even sympathizing with her, which could be seen in her interactions with her throughout the movie. She's friendly and amicable toward Homura, and as noted in the Heartwarming page, tried to reassure her that the events of the barrier were not her fault and only proved that she was a good person. During the final battle, Sayaka even mentions that Homura had been working hard and deserved a reward, in stark contrast to her hostile interactions with Homura in the original series where she believed the latter was a cold-hearted bitch who only cared about herself, only for Homura to prove her initial assumptions right by removing the Law of Cycles, which had granted hope to Magical Girls. The confrontation ends with Homura erasing Sayaka's memories but not before she calls Homura a demon. If Sayaka ever gains her memories back, their relationship is bound to be even worse than it was in the series.
- All the talk about whether Homura did nothing or everything wrong, or even whether you thought this was a worthy sequel aside, what we still have here is a horribly lonely, mentally destroyed, suicidally self-hating and depressed train wreck of a girl who declared herself the devil because that's how she sees herself, and even worse, unlike Sayaka, couldn't find peace after death. By the movie's end, she's completely and utterly alone in a self-inflicted purgatory of self-loathing and fathomless, crushing guilt, and as far as she's concerned, she deserves it.
- And even more so, she did it all for the sake of someone who had simply showed her a little kindness. This how broken she must have already been when it all started if she did it not even for a friend or a family member, but simply for the one person who was kind to her. And in the end, she is still doing it all for the same reason she made her wish, to stop that one person from sacrificing herself, because she doesn't want to lose that person, that bit of kindness she got, and now it's kindness she doesn't even think she's worthy of, making everything she did in the end pretty much completely pointless. The friendship she sold her very soul for the sake of is now, as far as she's concerned, completely and irrevocably ruined.
- Remember, this all came from a person who was already in an ugly position: fragile confidence, medical issues including heart problems, no known friends or even family, as well as inconsistent education. Even without the magical girl truama, she's already more than qualified for a therapy.
- The image◊ at the very end of the movie shows a window, tightly shut by Madoka's ribbons. A perfect representation of Homura shutting herself off from anyone else willing to help her.
- When Homura gives Madoka her ribbons back and tells her that the two will someday become enemies. The manga◊ version◊ of the scene is particularly heartbreaking.
- The ending credits sequence. Kalafina's "Kimi no Gin no Niwa" sounds Gothically poignant (in spite of its Yandere-ish lyrics), and the video features outline figures of Madoka and Homura facing each other across a gap. They eventually reach out for each other, and the song ends with them running together into the distance. Of course, this comes just after hearing Homura say she and Madoka will someday become enemies.
- On the other hand, there IS a more optimistic interpretation: that after spending so much time with a gap between them, Homura and Madoka may very well reconcile and truly be together. Only time will tell.
- Arguably, the last shot we see of Kyubey: He's collapsed in a field of flowers on the edge of a cliff, something Homura did to him having reduced him to a battered, frayed, quivering wreck, up to and including his pupils and irises turned broken and ragged, as Homura smugly bandies around the Dark Orb and dances a mock ballet around him. If not tragic for him, it's tragic for the fact that Homura has sunk so low that she turns to what can only be an incomprehensibly excruciating form of torture just to break Kyubey for her own satisfaction when her attempts to keep Madoka placid and at her side become too thankless to stand.
- Kyubey is flat out immune to physical and mental abuse. However, in this scene, his appearance might suggest he's scared out of his wits. It would be very much in Homura's character to make him go through what she and other magical girls experienced - and so, the worst punishment for him would be making him able to feel emotions. Raw animalistic fear would be a fitting reaction once he realizes just how badly he's screwed. Who knows, he might very well feeling remorse and thinking "My God, What Have I Done?".
- After the events of the movie, watching the "Colorful" opening is heartbreaking.
- Even in context, the symbolism in "Colorful"'s imagery is devastating. As Madoka and the other girls skip cheerfully through the happy scenery of amusement parks and fertile landscapes, Homura visibly oscillates between warily taking Madoka's lead and drifting in a Troubled Fetal Position. A particular stand-out is where Madoka, Mami, Kyoko and Sayaka are dancing happily together (an Anime OP classic) while a catatonic Homura can only slump in the center, which neither the girls nor the visuals acknowledge. The final segment has Madoka giving Homura a Take My Hand! moment, only to collapse into sand the moment she reaches back.
