Madoka Magica - Character Discussion - Akemi Homura

[stormy001_M1A2]

Originally Posted by sa547

Wait till you see Episode 11. It's Homura at her best.

Yeah, that's one of the highlights of the series for me. Too bad it is not enough to kill the super witch.

[BaKaBaKaOtaKu]

Originally Posted by Snork

Sounds plausible to me. Can't wait to see more of her in action. Oriko Magica, we're STARING at you! Don't you dare being a prequel now!

yeah. i hope it's not a prequel as well. it's so seldom of me to like a prequel. DX

[Liddo-kun]

Saw someone on youtube post a video listing names of modern weapons that Homura used in the final fight against WN.
I had no idea at all about weapon names, so I was sort of suprised.

AT-4 and RPG-7 Rocket Launcher
L16 91mm Mortar
Type 88 Surface to Ship Missile
FFV 013 Mine

[Snork]

And I saw a blog somewhere discussing them, too. What's more, as the blogger mentioned, there were ACTUAL official reports of these weapons being STOLEN from military depots in Japan.
Remember, somewhere, someone is fighting for you...

[Snork]

After a neighbouring thread's discussion has recently touched upon the topic of the girls making wishes when not in the right mind to do that rationally... It suddenly occurs to me that Homura might be the most tragic example, for all we know...
Your friend, pretty much the only one who cared for you deeply, has just died fighting a witch. Kyuubey says you can change it. What are you doing? You look at her body and wish you died in her stead. You wish you could protect her. So you WISH to go back in time and protect her.

Now, this has never been tried in the plot, so we don't know the possible complications or monkey-paw-ness of it, but... wouldn't wishing to bring Madoka back to life have been a bit less troublesome?
Haters will be happy to pick it up and blame the show for illogical decisions. But these illogical decisions making perfect sense in context, I only find it tear-jerking.

[Jimmy C]

Or maybe her subconcious was faster and decided that, if she could redo the past month, she'd have a chance to save Madoka and Mami, maybe.

[Snork]

Good point. Although phrasing the wish as "bring them both to life" is not too hard. All it required was a bit of time and calm[er] logical thinking. But of course, it was not to Kyuubey's benefit to give Homura either of them.
Of course, on a grand scale, it ended for the better, with the whole mess resulting in Madoka becoming a considerable pebble in the system's gears. But it was thanks to Madoka's personality and her power acquired thanks to Homura... and to Kyuubey who, bringing all his cards to win this fuel drum, ended up giving Madoka both information and time - a bad move on his side. It's possible that if Homura revived Madoka and Mami, they would just go on fighting until death, and that would be pretty much the whole story. So in terms of the plot this all works brilliantly, but it's so damn sad nonetheless...

[Seitsuki]

Originally Posted by Snork

Now, this has never been tried in the plot, so we don't know the possible complications or monkey-paw-ness of it, but... wouldn't wishing to bring Madoka back to life have been a bit less troublesome?

Homura didn't just want Madoka back so that she could be under her wing. She wanted her back and also be strong enough to protect her so that such an event wouldn't ever happen again.

[Jimmy C]

Not to mention, perhaps she thought they might have a chance of reducing the damage to the city on the redo.

[Witched]

Originally Posted by Seitsuki

Homura didn't just want Madoka back so that she could be under her wing. She wanted her back and also be strong enough to protect her so that such an event wouldn't ever happen again.

If Homura did wish for Madoka to revive, then if she dies again, then all hope is lost again. Basically, you're just wasting your time because everyone grows old or insane at one point that you can't save them again after an incident happens.

It's better to protect somebody while being young instead of protecting them until they grow older, it's more harder, although they will mature and takes things more seriously at the adult age and not wish for anything.

[Snork]

Wait, I'm not sure I'm following it. Homura wants to protect Madoka instead of just reviving her, is that what you mean? But she may as well do it AFTER reviving Madoka, since the wish will make her a Puella Magi anyway. And the nature of the wish could have even given her a more solid power... up to retaining ressurection abilities or becoming immortal herself (except that magical girls are already next to immortal). Or getting an indestructible Soul Gem... no, let's have mercy on Kyuubey, the poor twerp will go insane. Make it a Soul Gem immune to outer physical/magical attacks - now THIS can make a magical girl as immortal as a magical girl can can be (not counting Madoka's case here).
So it all comes down to the same point - the grieving, sobbing Homura-chan wasn't ABLE to process such logical assumptions at the moment, and Kyuubey probably knew it. Also, he didn't care for Madoka herself - maybe her magical powers were not so high above average the first time she contracted.

[rantuyetmai]

Homura's wish is the single wonder that kept me pondering for a long time after the series ended. If we look at the wishes 4 other magical girls made, we can see the logic behind them quite clearly given the mental state, personality, and the age of the characters:

- Mami: she didn't want to die and thus wished to live. Understandable.

- Sayaka: it pained her to see Kyousuke suffered. The little fit Kyousuke threw at episode 4 is the final straw and in her most earnest moment to save him, Sayaka made the choice of healing his arm. Understandable.

- Kyouko: her family is facing porverty and starvation, in her young mind everything can be fixed if her father's career had gone better and thus she wished for that. Understandable.

- Madoka: having all the information needed, she made the wish that is true to her kind and empathetic nature - saving magical girls from their damned witch fate while still allowing the QBs to collect energy for their cause, and reserved most of human history. Understandable.

What is common between those wishes is that they reflected the wisher's deepest belief at the time they make the contract. These girls didn't have the right experience (or time in Mami's case) to think about long term benefits and only act out of their situation as perceived by a teenage mentality. Keeping this in mind, what do we learn about Homura?

First of all, I'm sure I'm not the only one who thought the apparent wish should have been to "revive Madoka" or "undo all the causalities/damage Walpurgis had caused". That is not a sophisticated wish that required a collected mentality, that is actually more instinctual. Those who have had their close relative or friend passed away will understand what I mean. Yet Homura didn't do that, instead she chose to "redo the meeting with Kaname Madoka, not as someone who is protected, but as someone who will protect her".

Watching the anime 3 times, ep. 10 5 times, listening to the 2 drama CDs twice, it finally came down to me that Homura's deepest thought was not only to save Madoka, but along with that is the desire to have a different standing in their relationship. The time she made this wish was in TL1 and drama CD 1, where Homura was a shy girl who has weak constitution, had trouble with academic and being bullied. She met Madoka, being drawn in by her friendliness, being attracted to her kindness (selflessly wished for a cat's life while she didn't have the time to think, being afraid but still fighting witches to help people, did not run away when the city is in danger), and being related with Madoka's fears and insecurities. She liked, loved, and adored Madoka, letting her become the most important person in her life and treasured this relationship they had. All the while, Homura deeply disliked the person that is herself, weak and useless, she even thought of suicide (granted, being affected by the witch manifested this, but everything has root). She disliked being protected by Madoka and can't do anything beside watching her die. All of this is had result in the wish to change herself so that she could be the one who fights, the one who keeps Madoka safe instead of the other way around. If she succeed in this adventure, not only Madoka and the city is saved but Homura would also gain respect from Madoka from a totally different angle, as the latter would have never seen her weak self before.

Did she succeed? First of all, Homura had been able to shed her meek personality behind and grew up to be a strong and competent fighter over the time. She failed and tried again, constantly learning and thinking up better plan for her mission. She was able to protect Madoka if only for a short time. I'd say this is a big achievement a person could have done because changing yourself is no easy deed. However, not unlike Kyouko's and Sayaka's, Homura's wish had to show its down side. The battles and failures negatively impacted her emotion much like a war did its soldiers, the turning point was at TL3 where she had to kill Madoka and from there on things only got worse. Her feeling and experiences gradually alienated Homura from Madoka, an experienced and damaged soldier from a normal middle school girl. Then the biggest tragedy to Homura is that all of her karma ended up accumulating on Madoka. QB had cleverly revealed this right before Homura went to the battle with WP, thus pushed Homura to the inevitable despair over the things she caused Madoka to suffer. The rest is history.

In conclusion, I love Homu to death. She wanted to be a protector and she grew up to realize that dream by herself. I'm proud.

Spoiler for truth:

Not to mention good taste in women.

[Jimmy C]

I really like this analysis. And it shows an interesting pattern. Sayaka and Kyoko directly wished for things to happen to other people, and ended up disappointed when the wish seemingly appeared to be wasted.
But Madoka and Homura worded their wishes differently. While they truly wanted to benefit others with their wish, what they actually wished for was the ability to carry out their wishes by themselves. As a result, they held on to their hopes far longer than the others.

[Snork]

It goes in unison with Kazumi Magica, too - all of the Seven Saints wished for support in making their dreams come true rather than instant results.
It should be noted though that Sayaka and Kyouko's wishes backfired through psychological and social factors. Sayaka couldn't get over the fact that she's technically not quite human now, thus digging a canyon between her and her love interest. Kyouko's wish worked fine until the truth got exposed (we don't know if she naively blew her cover or if the wish mechanics just made people come to sermons against their consciousness - the priest might have easily seen there's somethng wrong with them).
The only best remedy for such factors is, alas, socializing less. Mami and Homura (and Kyouko after she was all alone) were quite efficient, while Sayaka suffered through her ties to normal life. Double identity and dual life is a tough option for magical girls in Madoka universe.

[Sokolov]

Random Question:
Homura cannot actually travel in time right? It's more that she can "reset" back to the day when she first met Madoka?

[Jimmy C]

And that isn't time travel because...?

[Sokolov]

Well, certainly it's technically a form of time travel. However, "time travel" without context generally would be understood as free to specific restrictions like only being able to "reset" to a specific date and time.

So the question is... is she limited to this very specific act of time manipulation or can she more freely travel but simply chooses not to? I am leaning towards the former based on what I saw, but I am not entirely convinced either.

(I hope that my question is clear now.)

[Solace]

She's limited. She can only go back as far as the small window before she met Madoka for the first time. It's likely she can do this as many times as she wants (of course each time adds to Madoka's "karmic load"). As a time traveler she is/was not bound to time and space itself, this is why she continued to exist in that window between the universe ending and then being recreated as per Madoka's final wish.

Not being bound to time and space is now what Madoka's existence is as well, but in a different manner. Homura exists in one time and space at a particular moment, but Madoka is/was everywhere/everywhen simultaneously. However in that brief moment between universes, they could see each other one final time due to the nature of their existences.

It remains to be seen if that provision still applies to Homura, given that she no longer has her old powers and instead has powers that are very much like Madoka's (before she went all existential).

[Scarletknive]

Originally Posted by Solace

She's limited. She can only go back as far as the small window before she met Madoka for the first time. It's likely she can do this as many times as she wants (of course each time adds to Madoka's "karmic load"). As a time traveler she is/was not bound to time and space itself, this is why she continued to exist in that window between the universe ending and then being recreated as per Madoka's final wish.

Not being bound to time and space is now what Madoka's existence is as well, but in a different manner. Homura exists in one time and space at a particular moment, but Madoka is/was everywhere/everywhen simultaneously. However in that brief moment between universes, they could see each other one final time due to the nature of their existences.

It remains to be seen if that provision still applies to Homura, given that she no longer has her old powers and instead has powers that are very much like Madoka's (before she went all existential).

So it is something like Steins; Gate? Where u can only go back to a time within a time frame??

[Solace]

Originally Posted by Scarletknive

So it is something like Steins; Gate? Where u can only go back to a time within a time frame??

Sort of. Homura wished to redo her encounter with Madoka, with the goal of being the one to protect her instead of the other way around. So her time travel is specific to that: she can only travel back to just before they met. This allows her to redo how she meets Madoka, and gives her the chance to protect her.