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I didn't like how the movies presented the show actually. I especially didn't like them removing that intro segment that the first episode starts with.
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Mar 31, 2015 14:10
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ViggyNash posted:I didn't like how the movies presented the show actually. I especially didn't like them removing that intro segment that the first episode starts with. I highly agree with this. I was very disappointed by that. I can't remember if the movies made Kyoko and Sayaka more obvious and natural...
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Mar 31, 2015 15:07
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The idea that the recap movies are the series from Homura's perspective is interesting and I guess removing that opening makes sense. It's a shame though because it was so cool.PerrineClostermann posted:I highly agree with this. I was very disappointed by that. Not really. In fact, they kick their weird friendship up a notch. I blame Aoki Ume, who was literally shipping the two during production.
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Mar 31, 2015 15:33
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That's disappointing as well. I don't have anything against the idea of them together, I just want it done well, dammit.
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Mar 31, 2015 15:35
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ActionZero posted:we're going to watch Rebellion soon.  I think I need some time to think about that movie before I can use words properly, my head is blown open and I don't know what to say. Though I do have to say, apparently all my life I have been waiting to see Sayaka breakdance but I just never knew until I actually saw it. ActionZero fucked around with this message at 16:45 on Apr 2, 2015 |
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Apr 2, 2015 16:37
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ActionZero posted:Though I do have to say, apparently all my life I have been waiting to see Sayaka breakdance but I just never knew until I actually saw it.
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Apr 2, 2015 19:23
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Blaziken386 posted:Sayaka being an utter dork in both her transformation sequence and during the cake song is the best. Sayaka is the best meguca in all things 
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Apr 2, 2015 19:25
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HellCopter posted:Not really. In fact, they kick their weird friendship up a notch. I blame Aoki Ume, who was literally shipping the two during production. How so? Beginnings and Eternal changed nothing about Kyouko and Sayaka, their relationship stayed the same from the series. Edit: ActionZero posted:
I'm curious about your initial reaction to Homura's Betrayal, how you interpreted that scene and such. Also, I'd recommend rewatching Rebellion at some point if you haven't already, the film changes quite a bit once you understand what it's doing, at least in part. Lord Justice fucked around with this message at 22:31 on Apr 2, 2015 |
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Apr 2, 2015 22:16
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Lord Justice posted:How so? Beginnings and Eternal changed nothing about Kyouko and Sayaka, their relationship stayed the same from the series. Rewatch Episode 7 please, and then rewatch Rebellion.
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Apr 2, 2015 23:22
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If we’re including Rebellion as part of the set of movies, then, yes, Kyouko and Sayaka’s relationship does change. However, I don’t feel this relationship shift is out of place or out of character, and flows naturally from the series and how it worked. My previous short essay touched on this subject, but not in as much as depth as it should have, so I’ll attempt to rectify that here. To do so, we’ll first need to examine Sayaka’s arc in the series, and how she interacted with Kyouko, as well as Kyouko herself and her arc. Sayaka is defined by her sense of justice, of how a Magical Girl should be and how they should act. Magical Girls are defenders of the weak, destroying the witches and their familiars, who prey on humanity. They are meant to bring hope, in comparison to the despair wrought by witches. This is the crux of her entire arc and her eventual fall into despair, she is attempting to uphold an impossible ideal. This ideal is in part passed onto to her by Mami, and reinforced by Mami’s death. Sayaka is attempting to fill Mami’s role, and is turning Mami into a martyr for her cause. However, in Rebellion, Kyuubey makes a salient point about Magical Girls and their real purpose for existing: “You magical girls should all fulfill your purpose by transforming into witches!” Magical Girls were never intended to bring hope and justice to the world. They are explicitly designed to create energy through despair and transformation into witches, and fighting against this only leads to a quicker end. These elements plays into her wish, a wish to heal a boy she likes. However, the inherent problem of wishing for someone else is your motivation in making a wish, and while Sayaka attempts to wrap up her wish into her idealism, that she did it for him and not herself, we see the end result of this. Sayaka debates making her wish for him at the beginning of episode 4:  “If I used my wish to heal his body, what would he think about that? Would he just thank me? Nothing more? Maybe I just want him to say something else. I’m such a horrible person.” Much of Sayaka’s despair is predicated on Kyousuke, both as a character in relation to her, and his actions as well. While it would be unfair for him to be with Sayaka due to Sayaka’s wish alone, his actions towards Sayaka are markedly callous. While he is unaware of Sayaka’s disposition, his actions do play a part in Sayaka’s eventual destruction. Hitomi here plays as a part as well, serving as the unaware catalyst of Sayaka’s eventual transformation. Due to holding herself to an impossible ideal, her brief regret over saving Hitomi eventually spirals into total despair. Sayaka relates this to Madoka in episode 7: “For just a moment, I wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t saved Hitomi. Some hero I turned out to be. Mami-san would be ashamed to have known me.” As well, She made a wish for Kyousuke, but finds out that wish has essentially crippled her, in her view. This is part and parcel with her regret over saving Hitomi, as she cannot be with Kyousuke because she is no longer human, as she tells Madoka in the same scene: “I’m already dead! I’m a zombie! How can I ask him to hold this dead body?” Interestingly, although this regret over Hitomi and her unlife is part of her despair, Sayaka never really regrets making a wish for Kyousuke. And while yes, she did become a Magical Girl for Kyousuke, I feel the motivation and the result are separate enough that this distinction can be made. Regardless, These are the essential elements of Sayaka’s despair. She is wrapped up in her idealism and her regret, and this then informs her interactions with the other characters. From this, we can lay out two important factors which the series creates and Rebellion draws on. The first is Kyouko herself. While she puts on the persona of an uncaring and selfish girl, it is just that, a persona. It is an attempt to mask her own despair over her family’s death, to survive as a Magical Girl. Her selfish actions and callous methods are simply a means to live on and avoid the eventual fate of Magical Girls. She lives for herself, because doing otherwise hurt the people around her. To Sayaka, then, Kyouko represents the opposite of her ideal, a Magical Girl who has abandoned the cause of Magical Girls and lives only for herself. Kyouko, in essence, is what Sayaka is fighting against internally, she does not want to be that person, and yet her wish pushes her in this direction. It is thus no surprise that she acts in a hostile manner towards Kyouko in the series, as she represents a threat to her ideal. In a way, Kyouko rejects both purposes of being a Magical Girl; the impossible ideal of Sayaka’s and the true purpose of their creation by Kyuubey. Kyouko brings this up with Sayaka in her father’s church in episode 7:  “My wish destroyed my entire family. Because I made a wish for someone else without knowing what he really wanted, I ruined many people’s lives. That’s when I swore to myself that I’d never use magic for others again. I’d use my powers only for myself.” But the important part here is that Kyouko is acting out a facade. In reality, she is just as much an idealist as the rest of the cast, wishing to be a hero and save the day. This is what her wish was based in, and why it was so catastrophic to her psyche when it failed. Her idealism was smashed, and she was forced to retreat into herself. But during the series, and in attempting to save Sayaka, Kyouko finds her ideal again. She can be a hero and save people with her magic, or, at least, she believes she can. This is a fundamental part of what makes Kyouko who she is, as she relates to Madoka in episode 9: “It’d be like one of those stories where love and courage triumph over all. Come to think of it, I probably became a magical girl in the first place because I loved stories like that. I’d totally forgotten about it, but Sayaka reminded me again.” In the end, Kyouko is willing to die for her ideals, assuming she has found a cause to believe in. Within the series, this cause is Sayaka, and she sacrifices herself in an attempt to save her. This is important, because it simultaneously lays bare who Kyouko really is, and sets up the progression between the two in Rebellion. It is only within Rebellion that Sayaka is aware of this sacrifice, after all, and who Kyouko really is. The second factor involved here is Sayaka’s disposition. It is not just a question of clashing ideals between the two, their relationship is more grounded than that. In the series, Sayaka is dealing with a monumental burden, which only gets worse and worse as time goes on. Her ideal, her regret, and her perception of unlife, collude to bring Sayaka down and ultimately destroy her. What’s relevant here, however, is that it is not instant, it is a process occurring over time, and it affects those around Sayaka, and how Sayaka interacts with those people. She is emotionally unwell, and thus we cannot create a baseline for Sayaka here. This is not how Sayaka is normally; this is Sayaka at her lowest, and at her worst. The crux of the argument then is that we cannot use Sayaka’s interactions with Kyouko in the series as indicative of a normal relationship, because it isn’t. Sayaka’s attitude towards Kyouko is based in her emotional breakdown more so than anything else, and thus using it as a base with Sayaka in Rebellion does not work. Consider her scene with Madoka in the bus stop in episode 8:  “why don’t you fight them, then?” “Huh?” ... “If you want to do something for me, why don’t you try and do what I’ve done? But you can’t. Of course not. You can’t just give up your humanity out of pity.” The example here shows how far Sayaka has fallen. Madoka is her best friend, and yet she lashes out at Madoka. This isn’t normal for Sayaka, and even Sayaka is aware of it, as she elucidates in the scene right after: “I’m such an idiot! How could I say that to her? I’m beyond help now.” As we know, this all leads to Sayaka’s eventual transformation into a witch, and her later redemption through Madoka’s wish. Going into Rebellion, Sayaka has moved past the problems of the series, growing as a person and letting go of what brought her down and destroyed her. She is a better person now, with more experience and knowledge, and the capacity to act on it. This is exemplified in the first act as they’re about to fight Hitomi’s Nightmare: “Hitomi’s really having a hard time, isn’t she? No surprise, considering she made Captain Oblivious her boyfriend.” “Wow, I could feel some emotional baggage there, coming from you!” “Yeah, well, you could say I’ve got some life experience.” Which now raises the question, if Sayaka was able to get past her problems with Kyousuke and Hitomi, should she not be able to get past her problems with Kyouko as well? Within Rebellion these two are actually acting far more naturally, Sayaka is no longer an emotional wreck and Kyouko no longer selfish and callous. Within this new environment, we can see that, yes, they can be good friends, and nothing in the series indicates they can’t be. Whether Ume Aoki or the fanbase ships them is, I feel, irrelevant, as the work does not devolve into yuri pandering. Rather, it is a friendship defined by hardship and regret, and an attempt to move out of that into something better. Sayaka came back to make up with Kyouko, for how she acted in the series, and to address Kyouko’s sacrifice. Sayaka knows now that Kyouko is not the selfish girl she thought she knew, nor the villain who represents the opposite of her ideal. Kyouko is, above all else, Sayaka’s friend, who will fight and die for her if necessary. If Sayaka is capable of growing as Rebellion shows us, would she not reciprocate in a similar manner? Thus the relationship between the two in Rebellion makes perfect sense, and works as both a conclusion to, and an expansion of, what the series started: “It was a rough place, and a lonely one, but we joined our hands.“  “No matter how many times you feel that way, there will always be warmth here. Even if it was a mistake, I don't care, I'll always be by your side. With the sound of tears and the looks of a sigh, I'm sure this is where we are now. A jestful everyday life; I want to see it, I want to see it, that future.” - And I'm Home.  Edit: Made some revisions to make the piece flow better. Lord Justice fucked around with this message at 06:06 on May 17, 2015 |
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Apr 5, 2015 01:09
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So I was on your side before when people were saying stupid poo poo because your posts were too long, but you've gone seriously overboard and even I can't be bothered to make sense of all that. Try to compile your thoughts into a more condensed form or try to organize it somehow.
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Apr 5, 2015 03:18
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ViggyNash posted:So I was on your side before when people were saying stupid poo poo because your posts were too long, but you've gone seriously overboard and even I can't be bothered to make sense of all that. Try to compile your thoughts into a more condensed form or try to organize it somehow. My apologies, but I'm not really sure how my post is disorganized. There's only three parts to it (the MG and Sayaka's background, the two important factors, and how this relates to Rebellion), which I attempted to keep fairly succinct. Much of my post is more so laying out the facts as presented in the series, to better support the argument I'm making. However, proper explanation here does require some investment of words, so that's what I did. Edit: It would probably be best to avoid "posting about posting" beyond this point, so if someone wants to discuss that aspect of my posts with me, it would probably be best to use either Skype canadian-pirate, Steam The God Emperor, King of Magi, or PMs. This thread should be focused on discussion of Madoka, after all. Lord Justice fucked around with this message at 04:27 on Apr 5, 2015 |
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Apr 5, 2015 03:38
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Hello there thread, been a while. Only recent development has been that SFDebris finally got around to watching Rebellion (5 times, even) and recorded his thoughts, which are really close to what everyone else have been saying. He also addresses how divisive of a work it has been. http://sfdebris.com/videos/anime/madokarebellion.php For an supposed outside, I think he's really loving this series, but I hope we get another season any year now. But I dunno if my heart can take it.
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Jun 16, 2015 14:25
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Mordaedil posted:Hello there thread, been a while. Ah, that was pretty well done all told. I credit SFDebris as one of the guys who got me thinking about Madoka initially, and his analysis of Rebellion was quite interesting. He seems to have a good understanding of the surface level interpretation of Homura's betrayal (her sin and her role as protector), but misses the more hidden truth of Rebellion (Homura's Stockholm Syndrome and her revolutionary actions against Madoka's ideology) which is the continued screed against wish fulfillment. Essentially, his analysis is coloured by Homura's own interpretation, which I've brought up before. His interpretation of Demon Homura as being a mixture of a Magical Girl and a Witch wasn't something I had considered, but does make a sort of sense with his analysis. His analysis of the final scene diverges from my interpretation (perhaps because Mada dame yo and Kimi no Gin no Niwa didn't have subs in the version he watched? I didn't see any for Mada dame yo or Colorful, but that may have been due to editing), where he uses it as an indication of Homura's witchhood. Essentially, dancing under the moon is a witch trope, and since only half is present, Homura is half a witch. Makes sense, although the scene is moreso meant to be paired with Mada dame yo (the song in the background is an instrumental version, and Homura hums it to herself in the first take Chiwa Saito did), which is focused on the concept of the morning, what that morning will be, and what morning Madoka will see. As well, the chair on the hill represents the separation of Homura from Madoka and her jouissance, as it is referencing them sitting in chairs in Luminous. There's more interesting stuff in his review, but that's what I found to be the most interesting in a first watch. To be honest, I was expecting him to hate the movie, I've seen parts of the English dub and it's...not great. Both in terms of delivery (it kind of feels like they're reading off a script and failing to "hide" that properly) and translation. The translation especially has issues, such as Kyouko and Sayaka's resolution in the third act, as seen here. Sayaka's regret in the English dub has been completely changed from her regretting leaving Kyouko behind and thus everything flowing from that (Sayaka's actions in the series, Kyouko's sacrifice, and Sayaka's growth in Rebellion), to Sayaka "missing" Kyouko, which makes no sense and doesn't work with the series at all. This is interesting, because SFDebris's interpretation is basically what the Japanese version was getting across, which makes me think he watched it like that at least once. Lord Justice fucked around with this message at 22:14 on Jun 16, 2015 |
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Jun 16, 2015 19:43
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Sfdebris is good
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Jun 16, 2015 19:56
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"Any more times and I'll have to have brain surgury to remove the cake song from my head." I like this guy (I've not watched any of his previous reviews/analyses). e: "Mami does, in fact, have a face." I could quote this guy all day long. e2: Ultimately, a really solid analysis and review. ViggyNash fucked around with this message at 21:12 on Jun 16, 2015 |
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Jun 16, 2015 20:23
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I'm just touched to see a review of Rebellion that doesn't use the phrase "character assassination".
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Jun 16, 2015 22:50
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJ-dnuFItAE
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Jun 17, 2015 12:41
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Space Flower posted:I'm just touched to see a review of Rebellion that doesn't use the phrase "character assassination". What does that even mean?
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Jun 17, 2015 15:05
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ViggyNash posted:What does that even mean? As a disclaimer, it's not like I've seen many, but the ones I did watch/read (example) all make the claim that the main issue of the movie is Homura's climactic rebellion. According to them, it's a complete 180-degree turn from her previous character. I have no idea how someone is able to call it a 'sudden twist' after sitting through 90 minutes of scenes showcasing how Homura is constantly tortured by cognitive dissonance, unless they were never paying attention to begin with. My best guess is that Homura is seen as a one-dimensional character to people who see the series as a neatly resolved happy ending. To them, Homura in Rebellion is seen as 'betraying' the ending they idealized.
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Jun 17, 2015 15:59
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Do people really see the end of the TV series as a happy ending?
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Jun 17, 2015 16:04
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The thing is Homura's constantly shown as kind of a bad person. Not evil, but completely obsessed with Madoka. She's tied pretty much all of her self-worth to Madoka - the only way she can be a worthwhile person is by making Madoka safe and happy. The ending of the TV series isn't bad for the world or the cast as a whole, but it's awful for Homura. It's no surprise she'd go completely off the deep end. I think the TV series ending is a fine place to end the series, but Homura's actions in the movie make total sense for the character. Endorph fucked around with this message at 16:11 on Jun 17, 2015 |
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Jun 17, 2015 16:08
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Endorph posted:The thing is Homura's constantly shown as kind of a bad person. Not evil, but completely obsessed with Madoka. She's tied pretty much all of her self-worth to Madoka - the only way she can be a worthwhile person is by making Madoka safe and happy. That's about what I've been thinking. I doubt she is very sane after all that has happened. I'd probably be at least a little crazy myself if I had to watch my only/best friend die over and over and over, and mercy kill them at least once.
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Jun 17, 2015 16:34
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Another thing is that people get caught up in the supernatural setting of the series and Rebellion when they have very down-to-earth, human themes. "Homura becomes a demon and tears down God" is simply allegory. What really happens in Rebellion is that a lonely fourteen-year-old girl rejects her own idea of personal happiness because she completely lacks any sense of self-worth. She's not insane, she's just broken. That is, basically, why I see so many of these reviews just trip over themselves. It's like trying to review Animal Farm without knowing that it's about the history of communist Russia. If you have a copy of Rebellion, go to 00:27:30. That moment encapsulates what I want to say. I think it breaks my heart more than the you-know-what moment from episode 10.
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Jun 17, 2015 17:30
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i dont think it's much of a surprise that anime reviewers don't understand allegory
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Jun 17, 2015 17:36
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The first time I watched the series I really identified with Homura as a then suffering now recovering codependent. Codependents are some of the most selfless and dedicated people you will meet to those they become attached to. The end of the show painted Homura's attachment to Madoka in a positive light (relatively speaking). However, the ending of the movie exposed one of the nasty and less pleasant sides of attachment in that Homura wanted to save Madoka even if Madoka didn't want to be saved and would do anything she could to achieve that end. At first I hated what they made her out to be in the movie. However after reading a bit more and thinking on it, Gen merely took her feelings for Madoka to their ultimate tragic end. If you thought Homura was a "good" person and not suffering painfully from an interpersonal problem you would have every right to be mad and claim "character assassination" but, would be very wrong in doing so.
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Jun 17, 2015 18:49
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Sakurazuka posted:Do people really see the end of the TV series as a happy ending? I see it as bittersweet because of where Homura ended up. Endorph posted:i dont think it's much of a surprise that anime reviewers don't understand allegory It's why I find the existence of Madoka Magica to be such a strange thing because it could only have been done in this medium, but it doesn't fit what anime generally is. No anime reviewer could possibly handle the narrative complexity of Madoka because all they care about, and all that they've been expected to care about, is that Madoka has cute girls and crazy plots.
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Jun 17, 2015 18:58
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ViggyNash posted:It's why I find the existence of Madoka Magica to be such a strange thing because it could only have been done in this medium, but it doesn't fit what anime generally is. No anime reviewer could possibly handle the narrative complexity of Madoka because all they care about, and all that they've been expected to care about, is that Madoka has cute girls and crazy plots. Man, there's a fair amount of anime that fits that billing. There has been complex anime made before the 'dokes.
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Jun 17, 2015 19:13
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Srice posted:Man, there's a fair amount of anime that fits that billing. There has been complex anime made before the 'dokes. I never said it's the only show like that, but it's certainly the most prolific recent one.
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Jun 17, 2015 19:24
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Phrasing it as anime reviewers only care about cute girls and crazy plots, and implying they don't run into anything complex, is a weird way to say it then! Especially since there are a fair amount of shows in that category that are or were super popular.
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Jun 17, 2015 19:28
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When a lot of anime fans compare Rebellion to School Days, is when I think anime fans have a really long way to go in terms of undoing their own boxed environment. This series is at its best when it asks the uncomfortable questions and a lot of people just can't seem to deal and it makes me somewhat jittery.
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Jun 18, 2015 05:34
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Mordaedil posted:When a lot of anime fans compare Rebellion to School Days, is when I think anime fans have a really long way to go in terms of undoing their own boxed environment. Tell me this isn't a thing. Also, uncomfortable questions? What uncomfortable questions does Madoka ask?
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Jun 18, 2015 05:45
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Madoka's probably been compared to like everything that's remotely edgy also it doesn't help that the only thing most people know of school days is that dude gets his head cut off and ZOMG THAT HAPPENED IN MADOKA TOO
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Jun 18, 2015 05:48
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PerrineClostermann posted:Tell me this isn't a thing. PerrineClostermann posted:Also, uncomfortable questions? What uncomfortable questions does Madoka ask?
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Jun 18, 2015 07:19
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Mordaedil posted:When a lot of anime fans compare Rebellion to School Days, is when I think anime fans have a really long way to go in terms of undoing their own boxed environment.  Uhhhh...what? I mean, if you're going to try to compare Rebellion based purely on "genre-shredding shock value OMG!", wouldn't you compare it more to Narutaru?
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Jun 18, 2015 12:37
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AlternateNu posted:
People really aren't smart.
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Jun 18, 2015 12:41
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Also nobody remembers Narutaru.
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Jun 18, 2015 13:18
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I can't forget it.
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Jun 18, 2015 14:07
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Mordaedil posted:I've seen it on imgur while just reading comments and I am often drawn to Madoka as discussion, but it's often dismissal in vein of "grim-dark Madoka Magica poo poo". It gets pretty farcical when people try to criticize (or idolize, if you are a producer at Aniplex. Haha) Urobuchi's writing as being edgy and grimdark when that's not even where his talent lies. You can't even form a proper response to a warped viewpoint like that. Too much anime and not enough paying attention in lit. classes, I guess.
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Jun 18, 2015 14:59
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Honestly considering he went on to write Gargantia which was about a soldier learning how to chill out and live on a cool boat, and the original intent for Aldnoah was that everyone lives happily ever after instead of having to nearly die halfway through, I'm reasonably sure the moniker oft given to Urobuchi is fairly inaccurate.
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Jun 18, 2015 16:21
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