There are spoilers abound in this post. I'll be doing a second (of three final Madoka posts in total) post as a review post for the anime as a whole, so that'll be spoiler-free. A series like this getting spoiled before you even watch it would really suck. The third will be a deeper look to further explain the anime more. So, anyway, onto the month-awaited two-episode finale.
There was so much that happened in these two episodes... I'll go chronologically with my outlook of them.
One thing I loved about this episode was that it confirmed many of the theories floating around. They clearly explained why Madoka was so powerful, but I guess that was to be expected. They did explain why Homura was so powerful, so why not Madoka? We also got mentions of Sayaka and Mami's death, which many people previously thought was odd to not mention.
We even got an explanation of the incubator's role in human history. I loved how they explained Earth as a farm for entropy, almost like how I explained earlier in my entropy post. However, the idea that all famous females in history were Mahou Shoujo was a bit...forced. Of all the historically-important Mahou Shoujo, Cleopatra wished to be the biggest whore most beautiful in the world, and Joan D'Arc wished to be...a pro general? So what did Anne Frank do? I guess I can forgive her, since she had to fight witches as she dodged Nazis. It still felt very forced to have them all be Mahou Shoujo.
One huge point I disagree with is QB claiming we would still be living in caves if it weren't for them. Their race claimed to see humans as sentient, so we obviously already had the slight brain capacity. We might have learned to harness weapons or the wheel slower, but I doubt we would still be primitive given so much time. We would just take longer without their help, unless natural selection managed to weed us out before we got a chance. We wouldn't exist anyway if this was the case, but to still be in caves after such a long period seems a bit farfetched.
The two scenes involving Madoka's mother (and teacher, in one) felt unnecessary. It wasn't bad, per se, but I felt these characters and dialogue had very little to contribute to the story. Both of them were side characters and didn't have any influence on any of the Mahou Shoujo. They should have been used to reveal more information about Madoka, but nothing was really revealed (the only real info was that Madoka seemed more mature). I wouldn't go so far as to call it filler, but it could have been done better, in my opinion.
The same info revealed by the adults (regarding Madoka being more "grown up") is already instantly displayed when she could tell that Homura was lying about fighting Walpurgis on her own. This scene felt good because it gave Homura the chance to unload her feelings onto Madoka (and us~ ^_^). We got the bittersweet explanation of why Homura had been acting the way she was. It was definitely a scene I loved.
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| I pray for unlimited gun-works! |
Now, enter Battle Homura. It was the first time we actually saw her transform. This was, by far, the best fight scene that I've seen in quite a while. Watching Homura unload all of her planned traps against Walpurgis was just beautiful. Alas, modern weapons proved ineffective against boss-level witches. It was portrayed that Mami and Madoka could beat her in the first timeline, so this probably means that Homura could not surpass that damage with conventional weapons. I guess that fits in with the general genre, where you wonder why no one uses guns. You need magic to beat magic for better witches; guns would only work on the small fry.
We finally arrived at the final touching scene of episode 11, where Homura's resolve wavered. QB's words created a rift in her logic, wherein no matter what she tried to do, Madoka would suffer from it. It was the first time in the series that you saw Homura's determination waver, which was heartbreaking. The hard truth that everything was done in vain weighed heavily. You prior saw this crush both Mami and Kyoko, and now Homura suffered from the same fate. Since Homura had been through so much more, it only served to be a more powerful scene.
There was a huge time gap between when I watched these two episodes, but episode 11 was undoubtedly living up to all my expectations. I was ready for anything...but the first five minutes of episode 12 made me go WTF, like many others. It felt like, after such a powerful season, they were going to throw it all away on the final episode.
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| Any wish? Why not become a god? |
The big thing that everyone had been waiting for since episode 1 finally occurred: Madoka became a Mahou Shoujo. The biggest revelation was learning Madoka had finally become so powerful that she could actually use her wish to become a god. I mean, there are only a few wishes that are usually "banned" in every wish-making story; for one, you can't wish for more wishes, and secondly, you can't become a god. This anime just broke one of the rules. XD
Did anyone else notice how Sayaka was the only one that didn't show up to eat cake? She still too busy being a sub-par character to make an appearance here. Good riddance. XD We got to see Madoka clearly following through on her wish and saving other Mahou Shoujo, too. I wonder if these are some of the witches they fought throughout the series, since the first one kind of looks like the first witch Homura actually killed.
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| Godoka is born... |
We also got the final touching scene of Madoka x Homura, which served to feed all the yuri fanboys. Getting a glimpse of Madoka's witch form was a very nice touch, and then we saw that her own wish was powerful enough to erase her own witch from ever being born. Homura's dream was finally realized, too: Madoka finally understood just how much Homura had done for her and told her what she wanted to hear. In essence, Homura finally got the acknowledgement she was seeking from Madoka the entire time.
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| We only ever got glimpses of Witch Madoka in other timelines, but we finally got to see it in full. |
I guess I'll talk about Sayaka's scene, too. She had a final redemption of her character, wherein she wished for Hitomi's happiness and blessed them. It was nice to see her finally acknowledge the fact that she truly just wanted to hear Kyosuke play the violin again. She just got a little lost along her journey. This helped her character a bit, but it still feels sub-par.
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| You shouldn't have let her steal your man... |
Sayaka dying in next scene worked in my favour, anyway. Sayaka's fate was sealed the second her wish was to help Kyosuke, whereas Mami and Kyoko were fine because, without witches, they wouldn't have died. It was nice to see that the world still seemed the same way (ignoring the fact that the timeline should have been more significantly changed). Mahou Shoujo were still required, and just the target they hunted changed. Entropy is harder to obtain due to the new method being slower.
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| Dem fingers!!! |
I found the little brother remembering Madoka to be the biggest "plothole" of this episode, the only unexplained thing that should not have occurred. It wasn't game-breaking, but still something of note. The chat with Homura and Madoka's mother was nice, though. At least, this time, the mother served to do something: she gave Homura (and us) the chance to reminisce about Madoka.
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| This is the new way to recharge soul gems. |
The clear change in the relationship between Mahou Shoujo and Incubators was also a very nice twist to the timelines. Without witches, there is no need to manipulate them for their own gain. They can actually work hand-in-hand to defeat the "demons". It was still odd that QB didn't believe Homura, as she should have been a Mahou Shoujo without ever having made a contract. Being an irregular that they would never be able to explain, her existence herself would prove to be a paradox...even more than when she could time travel.
Homura adopting the same bow as Madoka was a nice touch. She lost her shield because she could no longer time travel, since Madoka did not exist in any timeline to be protected. From there, I guess you could call it a "respec", since the Mahou Shoujo seemed to be able to control the weapon they manifested and she chose the bow. It's a slightly iffy explanation, but I'll stick with this for now.
The final epilogue left a lot of open speculation. The explanation of her wings changing could be interpreted in quite a few ways. I'll go into that further in the next post that I'll do a bit later today. For now, I'll leave it as a nice touch, which could pave the way for Season 2.
It was definitely an enjoyable series. The ending left me absolutely stunned after watching it but, with some time to let everything sink in, all the pieces clicked together. The major shock was that the expected tone for the ending was to stay grim-dark. When the ending differed so vastly from what was expected, I guess I was just dumbstruck. The ending didn't follow the general flow the anime had been moving in, but it was executed properly since they didn't have any major plotholes, which is generally the case when this happens. It made for the happy ending that we all look for in any story: Homura was finally able to protect Madoka and Madoka was able to end the vicious cycle of witches. To think, Mami wanted Madoka to waste her wish on cake. Tsk-tsk.
I'm severely backlogged on posts: Anohana, Denpa Onna, C, and two more Madoka posts. This is going to be fun! *falls over* Save me, Godoka!!!
~Pearz
I'm severely backlogged on posts: Anohana, Denpa Onna, C, and two more Madoka posts. This is going to be fun! *falls over* Save me, Godoka!!!
~Pearz
