2011-01-27, 23:05 | Link #122 |
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A bit of a post mortem of observations on Mami and some new observations.
Mami protected Kyubey and the others for the time she knew them. Mami tried to be diplomatic toward Homura. Mami did not attack Homura despite warning Homura several times. Mami warned Sayaka and Madoka against making a hasty decision about becoming MGs. Mami was elated that Madoka wanted to be a MG like her. Kyubey left Sayaka and Madoka on the rooftop to seek someone who "needed" to form a contract with him. Kyubey appears when Sayaka was at an emotional low despite saying he was going elsewhere. Kyubey advertised a MG vacancy when Mami died, but did not advertise the position was filled. Homura has known of/seen many MGs die. Homura reinforces the concept of the "cost" of becoming a MG when she speaks to Madoka. Homura was not in the barrier (?) when Madoka was in danger. (This may have been because she saw Sayaka go in and judged her to able to finish off the witch.) To go with this, some interpretations: If more magical girls was a good thing, there wouldn't be concepts like MGs having their own "territory" unless some hunt in packs. The city they live in seems to be a desireable place to find witches, but Mami was the only MG there at the start of the story. Mami may have been strong enough to chase off other MGs like Ryoko since Ryoko seemed to have known Mami. Mami and Homura probably did not clash over Mami's territory because Mami seemed to have a forgiving disposition and Homura never initiated hostilities against Mami, Sayaka, or Madoka. Ryoko's appearance suggests to me MGs seem to be free to roam. This may suggest a cost that affects their families. Perhaps being a MG or merely being chosen by Kyubey attracts witches to them, eventually destroying the people they are most connected to in the world. Seeing Ryoko's disposition, however, she may just be like a bandit who left home and used her powers to provide for herself. Going back to system analysis, I'm starting to think it doesn't matter of Kyubey needs to be able to make witches to be an immoral being. Creating an MG essentially grants one party a wish and a large amount of power, as long as they fight witches till their dying breath. Being an MG does not necessitate a moral existence, as Ryoko will probably demonstrate. Corollary to this is the cost of the wish--the contract spend the rest of their lives as MGs who fight thankless battles and die in paper cutout worlds, leaving nothing behind. MGs must fight witches to restore their Soul Gems. Past this, there is no restriction on if they use their powers to kill/harm people or save them from being killed/harmed--they only need to worry about how much that depletes their Soul Gem, which can be restored by hunting witches' Grief Seeds. Building on Homura's experience of knowing many MGs who have died, you can probably think of MGs being "dead" after they make their contract as they seem invariably destined to die. Along this vein, I see Kyubey as a hateful little creature who goes around signing girls' lives away for a wish which he can grant at what seems to be no cost to himself, and the people he contracts have no moral obligations to fulfill. edit: Slow night, huh? Homura's been dead set against Madoka becoming a MG, and Kyubey sees great potential in Madoka. I don't think Homura's trying to cull competition stronger than her, but her focus on Madoka even as Sayaka becomes a MG probably ties into some witch mechanic--either strong MGs attract strong witches or MGs become witches with proportional strength (and appropriate collateral damage), so Homura does not want a witch with the kind of potential power that Madoka has to appear. Before someone jumps on this as misreading cues about some personal relationship either from a future or a past, I am going about this from the "they never knew each other" perspective because I find it hard to rationalize either sort of timeline without considerable timeskip details to trip out on. Last edited by Decagon; 2011-01-28 at 05:14. Reason: to avoid double posting |
2011-01-28, 06:36 | Link #123 |
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Anyone had the idea that Homura might have had been a cat?
That she used to be Madoka's pet kitty, and somehow transformed into a MG. What cat? This cat from OP: Things that I think are in favor of this idea: 1. Homura isn't very good at communicating with others. Well, if she isn't a human at first place.. 2. Personality-wise I think she is kind of cat-ish, too. She only cares about Madoka, but pays, I would say, very little attention to Sayaka, Madoka's best friend. 3. She also has the kind of "I am proud and good of being just myself" atitude that one might sometimes get from cats..(yeah I know I am somehow sterotyping cats, but anyways). 4. OP makes it seem like the cat is Madoka's final and best friend. Seems like a suitable position for Homura to me. 5. Try image Homura with nekomimi!!! I know this is a wild guess, but oh well.. |
2011-01-28, 07:42 | Link #124 | |||
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I would actually raise a my extension to the conundrum, and that is one Gen could use instead of the repetition of this cycle.
Technically, I agree with Mentar that Madoka will become a Mahou Shoujo and with that everyone else would be wished into normal lives, but given that the story writer's background, what is more likely to happen from my perspective would be far more bitter, in the sense that having this reset does not prevent Homura, Mami and others from tragedy at all. In fact, what I envision is that Madoka will her friends suffering, if not dead, after Madoka resolved to prevent tragedies by being a MG and wished the reset to happen. Triumphs she will have, but she will have them with collateral damage all around. She will find happiness and solace, but those will be fleeting. Quote:
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I am of the camp that unless Madoka realizes that she cannot really give salvation, even if her intentions are just, in being a "true magical girl", she won't find any closure. In short, I seriously question if Urobuchi Gen would come to think that one decides to shoulder the weight of the world at their will will necessary simply succeed. I do not know however if Gen would actually pen Madoka realizing her own limits yet still act in the face of such grim realities. It would even to questionable for me as to whether or not if Madoka would actually find satisfaction just in doing all that she can. Worst of all, I cannot say for certain that Madoka will bear to live on and come to such realization... If I were to develop how others might view of Madoka's good intentions if they've gotten wind of how it came into being, it shall be as thus: Quote:
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2011-01-28, 08:45 | Link #128 | ||
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Of course the question becomes what Kyubey actually gets out of this entire drama if he really doesn't care what method the girls use to kill witches. His comments at the rooftop before claiming to say goodbye to them is a highly suggestive, if not manipulative, statement as if to entice them to make the pact in light of Mami's death. The bigger question becomes what his stake in all of this is if perhaps he only sees MGs as expendable tool for some result, a result that he would gladly grant even seemingly impossible wishes to obtain. It must be something gigantic and enormous akin to, say, the Holy Grail from Fate/Stay Night that any wish is granted by sheer power it possesses. Quote:
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2011-01-28, 09:01 | Link #129 |
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In reply to Decagon and MeoTwister5, I think that the matter of what Kyubey gets out of this and what price he pays is not something we can realistically speculate. We just know too little of him. There is not sufficient information for us to even paint a profile of him.
About the part of what Madoka possesses, I have two assumptions. The first being that it is not so much in the significance of Madoka's considerable power, but in that of Mephistopheles' wager with God about corrupting Faust Madoka. The second being that Madoka possesses either virtues or tangible power that would redeem so many. Virtue wise, we can see her innocence and her sensitivities to others, but I feel there's something more...
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2011-01-28, 09:18 | Link #130 |
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Btw, did anyone else noticed that, on episode 4, right before Madoka threw the bucket through the window and it broke, a glass cracking was shown? Like she was destroying the witch's labyrinth? Could this be relevant?
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2011-01-28, 09:22 | Link #131 |
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Well it might simply be that Kyubey is an agent, such as what Mephistopheles is as Lucifer's agent in the older versions of the legend, so in that sense his reasons don't really matter as much as his overlord's.
As for what she possesses: For the first well it doesn't seem to look like Kyubey has a bet that needs settling. To Kyubey's Meph, then the parallel God in this relationship might even be Homura who tries to keep Madoka from falling into his vicious MG cycle of death. Of course assuming Madoka falls into the cycle, will we get a Salvation end or a Hellfire end? For the second it does sort of remind me of say one of those old moral tales where God and Satan duke it out for the fate of humanity using one single person as the battleground, as the rise or fall of this selected person becomes the basis of whether humanity as a whole is saved or doomed.
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2011-01-28, 10:07 | Link #132 | |
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As for QB's goal I say he's farming grief seeds, although we did not see what Mami did with them ultimately. |
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2011-01-28, 10:46 | Link #133 |
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Some key points were raised in Episode 4 that I think helps create a clearer picture of the world of Madoka, and of its key characters.
Homura: 1) Homura has seen a lot of magical girls die. This means that either she's been a magical girl for a considerable length of time (likely at least several years) or that magical girls get killed with a great deal of frequency (at least one or two a week), or both. If she's been a magical girl for a considerable length of time, that could mean that either she wished for eternal youth, or that magical girls don't age naturally in Madoka's universe. 2) Homura revealed enough about herself in Episode 4 to more or less confirm that she is a good-natured (albeit somewhat socially awkward) person who wants to save lives. However, Homura also demonstrated back in Episode 1 that she's willing to kill to protect the people that she cares about. As such, we can safely conclude, I think, that if there was a powerful being out there that Homura knew was evil and a serious threat to innocent people, she'd want to kill him. With this in mind... 3) There was a window of opportunity here for Homura to try to kill Kyubey if she still wanted to. With Mami dead, with Kyubey temporarily leaving Madoka and Sayaka, and with the latest magical girl not having arrived yet, there was a period of time in which Kyubey would have been more or less defenseless against another attempt on his life by Homura. The fact that she didn't try to kill him again strongly suggests that her earlier attempt on his life was based solely on a desire to prevent him from making contact with Madoka. So, Homura does not believe or know that Kyubey is evil. Now, this doesn't necessarily mean that he isn't, but it means that if he is, then Homura (and likely Mami as well, before she died) did not know about that. More on this in a bit. 4) Homura is clearly very desperate to prevent Madoka from becoming a magical girl. This suggests that Homura has a particular affection for Madoka, or that Homura knows what will happen if Madoka becomes a magical girl, or both. This strongly hints at time travel or time reset being part of the in-canon background for this anime. One possible alternative, though, could be that Homura wished to have the ability to see into the future, and has hence already seen what will happen if Madoka becomes a magical girl. Kyubey: Kyubey is either an amoral agent concerned solely with recruiting magical girls to fight witches, or he's running a Xanatos Gambit or something close to it. He does come across as manipulative and machiavellian. If he does have a grand scheme in mind, he's carefully running it behind the scenes, as I strongly doubt that Homura or Mami had much inkling of it. Whether this latest magical girl is in on such a scheme remains to be scene. Madoka: Madoka is deathly afraid of becoming a magical girl, but she also demonstrated in Episode 4 a willingness to take big risks in order to try to save lives. Now, consider the two following points: 1. It's highly unlikely that the female lead of a magical girl show will never become a magical girl. 2. Whether or not Madoka becomes a magical girl is very important to both Kyubey (very much wants it) and Homura (very much doesn't want it). So, Madoka will almost certainly become a magical girl, and the moment she does will be a very important plot point. I dare say that it will likely set in motion events quickly leading right into the climax of this anime. With this in mind, I do think that Madoka will become a magical girl, but I don't think that it will happen until the second half of this anime. I think that the stretch of time between Madoka becoming a magical girl, and this anime reaching its climax, will be pretty slim. Also, what will likely cause Madoka to become a magical girl is that being the only way for her to save the life of a person she cares for or likes, possibly Homura, but more likely... Sayaka: There's two key foreshadowing elements concering Sayaka in this episode. 1. Her calling herself "horrible" for the choices that she would go on to make. This suggests that those choices eventually cause serious, major problems that leave Sayaka feeling very bad about herself. 2. Homura being very displeased at how Sayaka has chosen to be a magical girl. The sense you get from Homura is that Sayaka's choice to become one raises the likelihood of Madoka choosing to be one. So, here's what I think will most likely happen: At some point, Sayaka will be in grave peril, and Madoka (still a normal girl) will be nearby watching on. The only way for Madoka to save Sayaka's life will be for her to choose to be a magical girl. Madoka will do so, and will go on to save Sayaka's life. However, this will also set in motion very dark events leading up to a chillingly clamorous conflict. There's an outside chance that an earlier speculation of mine could be wrong, and that this could occur even next episode (since the latest magical girl has stated a desire to kill Sayaka). But I think that Sayaka will win out in that struggle, but will not come out of it unscathed. This will horrify Madoka, and start her to second guess whether or not to become a magical girl, in order for her to better help out and support Sayaka. Sadly, I think that we might see a lot of angsting Madoka for the next few episodes, with her showing lots and lots of guilt over not being a magical girl in order to help out Sayaka. Now, all of the above is just speculation of course. But I wanted to put it out there since I think that I'm starting to get a clearer idea of precisely where this anime is going.
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2011-01-28, 14:47 | Link #134 |
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I'm sorry for being lazy and not reading the previous posts, but has it been confirmed that magical girls that die become witches? or are those all still speculations? since everyone seems to be talking about it with such confidence.
also i was pretty shocked with ep3.... first time seeing a loli die after watching anime for like 5 years. i guess theres more to come/ |
2011-01-28, 15:16 | Link #135 | |
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It has been established, though, that witches are a threat to normal people. Someone has to fight them, unless you're fine with people being slaughtered. For all we know Kyube was sent to give mankind a way to fight witches, and he's confined in what he can do. Maybe he seems a little heartless at times, but it could be explained along the lines of "doing what I need to do, so that we have people to fight witches." Because there is not enough magic to go around, Kyube can only give a limited amount at first, and thus MG's need to replenish it by taking it from witches. Thus, the sad state of affairs of MG's marking out territory and possibly fighting each other, is a byproduct. Kyube knows of this, but also knows he can't stop it. He's just part of the system, and can only continue trying to make sure there are MG's in each area to handle the witches. It's war, and war is not always pretty, and sometimes you bend the rules or cross the lines for the greater good. Unlike some here, I don't think he's downright evil, though he may be limited in what he can say and how he can act. Or is deliberately not sharing some things, because ultimately it would do no good. He could have told Madoka and Sayaka, "You could wish to bring Mami back to life" but instead he apologizes to them for what happens, and lets them go. If he really wanted them as MG's, that would be the easier thing to try first. Leave Madoka more conflicted, and if it that didn't work, arrange for her to get caught up in zombies later (if indeed he was behind that). That he didn't, speaks to me of someone who isn't particularly evil, but perhaps a bit more neutral. A tool designed to give humanity a way to fight witches. He doesn't really have feelings of his own (or perhaps he'd be overloaded with grief over sending young girls to die); he's been deliberately created without them. |
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2011-01-28, 16:53 | Link #136 |
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My predictions for the rest of the series at this point:
Between now and the final few episodes, everyone magical girl/major character except Madoka, Homura, and Kyubey will die. Then the events at the start of episode 1 happen. Madoka finally becomes a magical girl... at the very end of the series pretty much. Optional series of events: Madoka's wish is for everyone that died to come back to life. But either her or Homura dies in the process of killing the last witch. Such simple speculation, isn't it? |
2011-01-28, 17:09 | Link #137 | ||||||||
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Homura
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2011-01-28, 17:52 | Link #138 | |||
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Introducing more MGs into what was a stable system seems to only serve competition and conflict among the MGs in that territory. Quote:
You've likened MGs to soldiers to go with this war analogy, but I feel that is misplaced. Most militaries of the developed world are volunteer forces. These offer compensation to the enlisted for the duration of the term of service. Kyubey offers one wish. One wish which is supposed to be worth becoming a MG who must kill witches to cleanse their Soul Gems for the rest of one's life, a MG who is supposed to fight fight fight, and die. The wish is an illusion of choice. Quote:
Since Kyubey appeared at Sayaka's most desperate hour despite saying he had left, I find it hard to believe he wasn't fishing for a more opportune moment. |
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2011-01-28, 18:01 | Link #139 | ||||
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That doesn't sound evil, just capitalistic. Offering a fair price for services rendered. So the soldier analogy still holds, volunteer or not. In fact, it works better as a volunteer basis. It's only an illusion if you believe you have no free will. Quote:
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2011-01-28, 18:04 | Link #140 | |
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