Puella Magi Madoka Magica

I was gonna ask who that was, but thanks for explaining, Rob.

If you're a fan of Kamen Rider give Gaim a look.

It's also done by Urobuchi, and takes some concepts to the logical conclusions.

It's seen all around as one of the best of the Neo Heisei era.

One Strip! One Strip!

Though I've seen quite a few people really hate it, for some reason.

They usually cry "grimderp!", or blame the Unfortunate Implications that are only there because 1) the myths Gaim's based on have those same implications and/or 2) Values Dissonance.

You mean the whole thing with the Woman of the Beginning, her role in how the plot went down, and then (spoilers for Gaim! Do not read if you don't want to be spoiled) how she was conveniently shoved off to an alternate dimension so that the final fight could be between Kouta and Kaito over who gets the fruit, and how ultimately, her whole purpose is to be empowered so that she can choose a big strong man to rule everything alongside her?

......wow, I can see their point. And then there's Yoko. Oh poor Yoko.

Anyway........Who wants to be that when the Magical Girls rebel against Homura's Rebellion, Homura just shoots Sayaka in the face right off the bat to keep her out of the way?

One Strip! One Strip!

As Homura herself showed, shooting a magical girl in the head doesn't do a huge amount.

Yeah, pretty much. But again, it has its base in mythology to blame. It does get inverted though. Paris gives Aphrodite the Golden Fruit.

It would be especially ineffective against Sayaka considering her wish gave her superfast regeneration.

The Crystal Caverns A bird's gotta sing.

Yeah, but considering how Homura feels about Sayaka (disdain), she'd probably do it anyway just to shut her up.

One Strip! One Strip!

re hair colors:

I think what they're going for with blue hair is probably more stereotypically fit to characters with dark blue hair — best examples are probably Chihaya Kisaragi from iDOLM@STER and Tsubasa Kazanari from Symphogear.

Instead, Sayaka has light blue hair, while the dark blue hair stereotype instead went to Homura.

Incidentally, before I watched this series, I once referred to Homura as "the blue-haired Madoka character", and was surprised when people showed me pictures of Sayaka instead.

edited 17th Oct '14 9:50:00 AM by GlennMagusHarvey

But... her hair is... not blue? Or even close to blue.

I always thought of it as really really really dark purple.

The Crystal Caverns A bird's gotta sing.

It's okay.

I once mistook Homura for Mami.

This was before I'd seen the show.

I took a quick look at the main characters, and I presumed her hair was blue because she fit (in her looks and behavior) that (dark-)blue-hair stereotype — of being the serious, quiet member of the main cast.

(Incidentally, before I watched the show, I also didn't know anything about her also being the mysterious character. That caught me off guard.)

edited 17th Oct '14 10:43:59 AM by GlennMagusHarvey

This is a strange friendship that's more than a handful for me to keep in mind

The three finest things in life are to splat your enemies, drive them from their turf, and hear their lamentations as their rank falls!

Question:

If all five Magical Girls were a united team by the time of Walpurgisnacht's arrival, would they have be enable to win or would they get TPK'd?

Or at least with everyone except Madoka, who as we've seen can deal with Walpurgis solo (albeit as a double KO in timeline 1)

---

Kyubey is massive prick.

Does his explanation to Madoka about why and how his species try to prevent entropy count as a Breaking Speech or Break Them by Talking, considering she ended crying in the fetal position?

What was in your right hand is hope; And in another hand is something else to fade.

Heart of Stone

Probably not. I don't think things would allow anything that would let them win.

It's irrelevant anyway, because Homura is determined to never let Madoka fight (since if she does, she always becomes a witch or dies) and she's too stubborn and set on that method to consider other options.

One Strip! One Strip!

I was just wondering on how many non-Madoka Magical Girls it would take to beat Walpurgis.

Cos Kyubey went through the trouble of 'arranging' that Kyouko get taken out of the picture (via the Oktavia incident) in order to force Homura in an impossible situation (she can't handle Walpurgis solo), thus hoping to (and succeeding) in forcing Madoka to contract.

If Walpurgis is so powerful, there would be no need to 'arrange' Kyouko's death cos she'd just get killed/defeated by Walpurgis along with Homura anyway, which would still ultimately force Madoka to contract.

What was in your right hand is hope; And in another hand is something else to fade.

I mean, it probably depends on a lot of factors. Maybe Homura and Kyouko could have done it. Maybe not. Kyubey's not any more of an expert than anyone else.

To be fair to Walpurgis even if non Madoka girls took it on, I would say that some could win while others could fall hard.

"Eratoeir is a Gangsta."

We're only really given a glimpse of how powerful Walpurgis Nacht is anyway. Half of its power is just an informed trait. It appears to differ from other witches in that conventional physical means of destruction don't work, but it's really not all that clear what, if any, difference exists between Homura's conventional weaponry and the magical weaponry that the other characters use.

Furthermore, Walpurgis Nacht could just be a special kind of witch that has an unusual ability rendering it basically immune to physical attacks.

I think it might just be better to chalk it up to being mostly symbolic. Basically, its whole point is that it's meant to be impossible and meant to doom the characters to failure. Maybe its power is the sum of the main characters' frustrations and sorrows...and thus it's always more than any one of them can handle alone?

So I've been thinking about Homura, and how her power of Time Stands Still reflects her inability to move forward.

Look at the series:

She spends the whole time doing the same thing over and over again: TRYING TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD TRYING TO SAVE MADOKA.

It's the same story; Mami will freak out, so don't tell her anything. Sayaka is an idiot, so who cares about her. Kyouko is the only one she bothers to try to talk with, so get her on your side.

And she keeps dropping the ball. Because she doesn't know how to do things differently. Madoka keeps dying, everybody keeps dying, and Homura just does it all over again. She fell into a rut, and never seemed to figure out how to avoid many of the problems that led to failure. It finally ends when the very person she was trying to save Flips the whole fucking script on everyone and goes full goddess.

Now we come to Rebellion and everything has changed.

Once her memories start awakening, Homura goes in to full Homu-Homu the Avenger mode.....and accomplishes nothing, cause she's trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. She's acting based off vague memories of how things used to be, and she did a bad job when she did know what's going on.

All she manages to accomplish is filling Kyouko in on what is going on, but doesn't ask for more help.

Mami can't handle the truth so don't tell her nothing; as a result, they end up in a huge fight that Mami wins because she was twenty steps ahead already. Then Bebe / Nagisa just fills her in anyway, making Homura's worries irrelevant.

Sayaka is an idiot so who cares about.....'''Did she just block my fucking time stop?! Did she just retreat when she realized she couldn't win?! An actual strategy? And wait....is she still a fucking witch?!

So yeah. This time, Sayaka is the one who knows the score, and despite being limited by Kyubey's watchful eyes, does a better job of explaining things than Homura ever did. Unfortunately, Homura is as good as listening to Sayaka as Sayaka was to her (I can almost picture the latter going So that's what feels like) so it does nothing, but still.

The game has changed, but Homura hasn't caught on yet Eventually she sees the truth. She's not the one saving everyone (and thank god for that cause, awesome as she is, she really sucks at it). This time, she's the problem. And in the end, everyone has to save her, even though she thinks they should let her go.

In the end, the world moved forward, while Homura, just like her wish created power, kept either standing still, or repeating the same old shit.

How's that sound to you guys?

edited 22nd Oct '14 9:18:23 PM by HandsomeRob

One Strip! One Strip!

Yep, Homura has pretty much lost it. After all:

To paraphrase,

The definition of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expecting different results.

Ergo, Homura is batshit

What was in your right hand is hope; And in another hand is something else to fade.