part of a sadness
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With Walpurgisnacht Rising coming in 2024, I want to talk about something that has been bothering me since Rebellion. It was never the “plot twist” of Homura separating Madoka from her godhood nor her taking those godlike powers for herself thus becoming the devil. It was always people's reactions to Homura doing this and the way they based her entire character around this specific moment that really rubbed me the wrong way. Saying she's a selfish monster who's trapping Madoka in a fake world for her own personal gain or that she's taking Madoka's agency away from her and making decisions for her that directly rebel against what Madoka wants... And, to that, I just want to know.... do literally any of you know what Madoka actually wants or are you just basing her character around her sacrifice?
Yes, it was for the benefit of all Magical Girls and yes it freed them from their cycle of selling their souls in the name of hope just to die at the hands of their own grief and despair, but Madoka didn't plan to abruptly cease to exist at the cost of it?? She didn't want to be stuck between life and death only existing as a deity meant to eradicate Witches for all of time. Madoka wished to erase Witches before they are born from the past, present, and future. Going back years upon years in time, destroying Witches and mercy killing Magical Girls; fighting forever, past and future, for all time. Ceasing to exist as an individual, only able to materialize and interact with someone when they're dying of grief and sadness and pain; relieving them of that pain so that their last moments won't be in agony, so they can die in peace, but there's none of that for Madoka. There's no death, no closure, no release, no freedom from this hell of being a weapon and nothing more.
But, Madoka would never voice these struggles and frustrations. Because Madoka isn't that kind of girl. She's the kind of girl who shoves all of her problems down and bases all of her self worth on how much she can do for others, how happy she can make others, and how useful she can be. She forces a smile and masks her pain because she doesn't want to burden anyone with her problems. She puts herself down constantly, risking her life trying to help others because she cares so little for herself. Without being useful, she believes her life has no value. And Homura knows this. Because Homura knows her. I feel like most people take Madoka's bright pink colors and smile at face value and don't realize she's chronically depressed. That's why in the first timeline, she and Homura naturally got along so well: they were both girls who hated themselves and based their self worth on how they made others around them feel, both self-loathing girls who deem themselves worthless if they're not useful in some way. Madoka was just better at hiding it than Homura was. And she still is by the 100th loop.
But, in Rebellion, when her memories of being a god are taken away from her, and she's given a hypothetical scenario of her fate, she says "wow that sounds awful and scary and lonely and I would never do something like that." The Flower Field scene is one of the most brilliant and misunderstood scenes in all of anime. Majority still to this day argue that, since Madoka doesn't have her memories, her words hold little to no weight, and Homura is simply hearing what she wants to hear. So, naturally, they disregard what Madoka is saying, assuming it's just Homura being selfish. And that's where they mess up. Because, the fact that Madoka doesn't have her memories here is the whole point! Homura is already well-aware that if Madoka had her memories, her self loathing would result in her caring so little for herself that she sacrifices herself every time which is why immediately after Madoka's words, she assures Madoka that she is indeed "strong enough to make that decision." Homura just wanted to confirm if Madoka would still miss her life pre-godhood in spite of that, which she outright says she does.
There are also arguments that Homura was somehow influencing Madoka in the labyrinth aside from just not remembering becoming a god, but Shinbou already stated in an interview that this wasn't the case, and that these were Madoka's honest words. In fact, Madoka's true feelings regarding her godhood are revealed for the first time within the lyrics of Madoka's character song (sung by her VA Aoi Yuuki) that played as the ep 1-2 ED titled “Mata Ashita”. The song is about Madoka post-series which consists of Madoka wandering around aimlessly, quietly observing as humanity resumes without her, lamenting on the life she lost after becoming a god and wishing she could have been more honest about her feelings to Homura in ep 12, asking her to realize she's lonely.
[I'm pretending that I'm used to being alone, but I'm not really that strong.
The scenery is the same as always, the city is the same as always.
Even though I think everything will stay unchanged.
I still feel like I'm the only one who's tiny. Instead of "See you later."
I should've said, "I'll stay for a little longer."
I wanted and hoped that you would realize it.
But with the words "See you later,"
I lie to myself again.
And hide my true feelings beneath my usual smile. Saying, "See you later," I wave my hand.
Cracking a smile, yet I'm feeling lonely.
The truth is, I still have more to talk about.
But even my voice saying, "See you later"
is so near yet far from you that it can't reach you.
So let me say this like I always do, just once more: "See you tomorrow"]
This is definitive proof that even BEFORE Rebellion, this was already confirmed to be Madoka's true feelings.
The second time Madoka's true feelings post-godhood are adressed is via Madoka and Homura's concept movie quotes explaining that the God (Madoka) is clearly suffering in her “heaven”, which is more like a prison of isolation. The lizard girl (Homura) takes pity on her and separates her humanity from her godhood, thus making her human once more. Here are also some direct quotes from Magia Record which provides even more context for what Madokami is experiencing:
All of this, with the addition of Madoka's words in the Flower Field scene being confirmed to be her real and honest feelings, puts the whole “pulling madokami down from heaven” scene into a different perspective. Considering the entire reason why Madoka even became powerful enough to become God in the first place was because Homura's 100+ time loops linked multiple parallel universes together with Madoka at their center, and it's confirmed Madoka was suffering as a god, I would think people would be happy to see Homura reverting Madoka back to a human being and rewriting the entire universe to be a world where Madoka is happy and free, surrounded by her friends and family???
The fact that Homura's love for Madoka was so strong throughout 12 years of 100+ time loops, it turned Madoka into a goddess but when Homura was able to see just how isolating and lonely godhood was for her, she took her godlike powers for herself because she loved her and was willing to take on the exhaustion and isolation of immortality as the devil to spare her of anymore pain and sadness. Homura freed Madoka from a nonexistential purgatory prison and a decade later she's still demonized for it, how insane is that??
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Guess what day it is 🎉🎉🎉 🎂
If he’s putting candles on a cake, does he just put one so it’s easier or does he try to fit 200… (we all know the answer but realistically lmao)
And as a little extra:
They then sat there for an hour as Ling tried to count to 200 before Greed couldn’t take it anymore
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Monsters learning to be human is one of my favorite tropes in stories and I love the way Malevolent handles it. Yes, John learns that he’s more than his past and learns to love Arthur and humanity, but not only does he “become good” he is also gains all the selfish emotions that come with being human.
Take lying for example. In seasons 1 + 2 he lies because that’s what he knows as the King in Yellow. He lies and manipulates for his own benefit. He does so uncaring how that affects Arthur because he is just an end to a means. And it’s hard to tell when he’s lied as he only points it out when he knows it would hurt Arthur.
Compare that to season 3 + 4. Despite lying being the core of who he was as the king, he gets kinda bad at it. It’s pretty clear that John is hiding things from Arthur about what happened to him when they were separated and why John wants to go to New York. He begins to sound so unconfident in his words because he now understands what he’s doing is wrong. Instead of lying to manipulate and hurt Arthur, he’s lying to try and hide the fact that he’s hurting him. He’s so scared of the repercussions of the bad thing he knows he did, that he lies to cover it and pretend it will all blow over. It takes a lot of guts to admit your own guilt, and deciding to shrink away from it instead is so human.
When John admits all his lies to Kayne in part 40 he just sounds so desperate. He truly believes that he’s in the home stretch. That just a little more lying and everything will be done and he won’t feel guilty anymore. He decided he’ll tell Arthur when it’s over because he believes Arthur won’t be that mad, that he’ll think “you did something bad, but it all worked out in the end so it’s okay”, but we all know that’s not how that works. He’s so horrified when it’s revealed Arthur heard his confession because he knew what was coming, all of Arthur’s feelings of betrayal, disappointment, and anger, and he wasn’t ready to face it. He feels so guilty that he probably can’t imagine Arthur understanding and forgiving him.
Of course Kanye’s deal makes this worse. John once again knows that this is wrong as he hesitates at the beginning. But once Arthur begins to threaten him to not take the deal, John decides to take it, once again trying to run away from the repercussions of his actions. John doesn’t know yet that lying more only makes things worse, and Kayne knows this and gives him one more bump to trip on before leaving John to the fate that he has been avoiding for so long.
Of course it’s enjoyable to see John gaining his humanity. Him showing compassion, sympathy, and enjoying the mundane parts of life like admiring the view or wanting to watch a movie. But humanity is a double sided coin that comes with emotions like jealousy, selfishness, and envy. It’s frustrating to see John make all these decisions that we know are wrong and will have bad consequences, but he hasn’t been in this position before doesn’t know how this will all play out yet. And we just have to watch him learn the hard way.
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Ppl going "waaahh unpopular opinion but Alice is kind of annoying and obnoxious and I don't think I'd like be her friend irl" is so funny to me bc like.
God forbid a cast of characters be multifaceted and have actual flaws and unpleasant aspects other than "grr angsty hero" and "whoops i'm so clumsy". Sometimes character dynamics and arcs need to be prioritized above "who would i personally be niceys with irl"
2. bro just WAIT until you hear about season 1 jon lol
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[POTENTIAL MURDER DRONES SPOILERS AHEAD]
Felt impulsy and fan service-y, so I drew a few more screenshot redraws of MD Episode 7 but with @lumineary-arts ‘s Murder Drones Swap AU, since it’s a lot of fun! However, I mainly went along with what we know about her AU so far, tho, so I didn’t include other details like Swap!N and Swap!Cyn’s other parent (who would take canon Nori’s place). I’d leave it to the AU’s creator.
I HIGHLY doubt Nate/Swap!N would tell Z/Swap! Uzi to “die mad”, I feel like he would apologize and genuinely feel guilty for sacrificing himself in front of her after she witnessed T/Swap!Thad do the same thing. Also I honestly loved how the solver symbol turned out! It isn’t perfect, but it sure looks great tbh! Also as some of you might know, backgrounds aren��t my strongest suit 😂
This one was pretty simple, but I am SHOOK at how in-canon this turned out to look. If you zoom out really far, it almost looks like a photo from the actual show! This particular screenshot probably isn’t highly significant in the plot, but I thought that Maid V’s appearance in the episode was an excuse to draw Butler Thad (since V and Thad switch places), who of course is just a mere hallucination produced by the Solver here (unfortunately). Since the artist stated that the solver was Russian-speaking in this AU, I guess that it would imply that Butler Thad in this episode would speak the same language!
Finally (my favorite one so far), the girl bosses ever! I’m kinda proud of how this turned out but HOLY HELL drawing the school bus was hard for me. I kinda got a little lazy and mostly blocked the majority of it with clouds 😂 I originally planned on having Swap!Tessa stand alongside Swap!J and Swap!V with a weapon in hand to reflect on her leaderlike personality, but I decided to put her up on the bus to make her look like the lady in charge. I kinda feel like I made her look a bit too intimidating, but I wanted her to have a “girlboss” expression. Look out, SD-L!
I wish I could draw a few more, but I ran out of ideas 😅 Also reminder: I tried to stay as in canon as possible, so PLEASE don’t hesitate to correct me if I made any mistakes!
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Something I wonder about Simon and Betty's relationship is how long they were together before the whole crown ordeal. But they were engaged, you say. My aunt (in)famously met my uncle and had a ring on her finger in 8 weeks. We've seen that both Betty and Simon were both weird outcasts, crazy determined and a pinch insane. I would not be surprised if they decided they'd met their one true love and got engaged super quick.
My point being, Betty's shifting to revolve around Simon and Simon's rose colored glasses of their relationship feels very much like New Love. They're people who love each other and love being a couple but still haven't quite figured out how to coexist together, as two people in a partnership. I feel like if they'd known each other longer, lived together longer, some of the issues we're seeing would have probably self resolved.
I don't think their relationship is toxic nor is it totally perfect. It's two lonely, most likely neurodivergent people in a relatively early relationship still figuring out how it works. Everything that happened afterwards: the crown, the seperation, the time travel, the magic/madness/sadness just exemplified issues they had both as individuals and as a couple.
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Do you write stories?
occasionally, but mostly i just come up with ideas that never make it past the worldbuilding stage
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its so hard to watch time pass when things like careers and assignments exist. what do you mean im supposed to take that seriously
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so i know it was literally just a bg set piece but i cant stop thinking about sophia, katya and this fucking painting godbless
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it’s kinda funny to me how that dumb scene in kiwami 1 of majima getting shot and left for dead in the harbor was basically just added as a half-assed way to explain majima not being around for a bit of the plot, but they accidentally(?) just made it seem like start of a chain reaction where majima ended up feeling slighted and heartbroken after being abandoned like that and then lashed out about it via smashing a big truck into the building kiryu was in. and yeah that isn’t inherently a romantic thing as-is but then they go and add the part where majima grabs a hostess and performatively hits on her as in-kiryu’s-face as possible, she says she’s already in love with someone, and majima lets her go immediately, no questions asked, making a big fucking point of it just to say see THAT kiryu? I appreciate when people are HONEST about their FEELINGS. people who won’t just BACKSTAB someone who CARES about them to save themselves. is that so crazy kiryu?? huh??? anyway make it up to me get down here and fight me right fucking now
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everybody stay with me im shifting back into speculation & analyzing mode, this time about everybody's favorite pair of besties. ill put this under the cut for everyone's sakes
and please, take all of this with a Hefty grain of salt.
so ive been... thinking about a thing. a maybe-possibility. which if this has some merit, the part of me that loves characters having a good time and feeling good feels is screaming in fear. but the louder part of me that loves angst and hurting characters is rubbing its little fly hands together.
short version: i think Barnaby is going to emotionally distance from Wally, if not outright grow to resent him. maybe temporarily, maybe not.
full version: *cracks knuckles* strap in folks. so.
first of all, an entire chunk of Barnaby's bio is dedicated to his character relation to Wally. everyone else only has one-off lines dedicated to their relationships to other neighbors - even Frank & Julie just have single sentences about each other (note that they're described as "partnered with" and "depicted with" respectively. more on that soon). even Wally's bio has his Barnaby mention tacked onto the end of his first paragraph instead of being its own dedicated section
and then there's their character designs - their bios explicitly point out that they share characteristics; color schemes, hearts on their soles, similar outfits.
they were made to be best friends. literally. this quote is what made me start turning this theory over in my mind (sourced from @ /theneighborhoodwatch's collected & absolutely fascinating livestream trivia)
it appears that Barnaby literally did not have a say in whether or not he and Wally are friends. their bios even say "illustrated pages note that they were best friends multiple times." they have to be best friends.
which brings us back to Frank & Julie. they briefly reference each other in their bios, but they aren't described as best friends. it's incredibly likely that they were meant to be a romantic couple - i briefly covered that theory in this post (dont read the first one i was going insane) but they managed to avoid that. Frank and Julie defied the script and chose to be best friends instead.
and then in the trivia document a few more character relationships are briefly touched on, like how Howdy considers Barnaby a close friend, and Sally considers either Barnaby or Poppy as her closest friend, etc.
everyone else seems to be choosing who they're close with. they're forming their own opinions and dynamics and relationships. & its interesting that Barnaby is stated for both of these - as if implying that he may return the friendship feelings, or at the very least he's developed enough of a relationship with them to earn their affection
Barnaby and Wally... i doubt they ever got that. they were best friends from the start, no development, no choice. it's written into them.
and then there's how their relationship has been portrayed so far. i believe i saw an ask where Clown stated that Barnaby is very polite to Wally, which struck me as odd. have you ever had a polite relationship to your best friend? have you ever seen best friends be polite? i'd be surprised!
best friends mess with each other! they tease and rib and roast! what is a best friend for if not mutual tomfuckery?! jesting around? playfully pushing boundaries? a Polite best friendship... that's a straight up oxymoron. no such thing. that sounds boring and exhausting.
not only that, but the fact that Barnaby is often used for Wally's painting segments, and is the go-to guy for teaching Wally something new, is kind of concerning. it gives me the vibe that a big part of Barnaby's literal reason for existing is to be Wally's friend & guide.
which would make the fact of him being described as polite to Wally make sense. of course he's not going to push their relationship or try to deepen it - he's forming his own dynamics with the other neighbors. with Wally... it's already established. that is how they are with each other. that is what they are to each other.
and it's not like Wally can be the one to introduce nuances. i don't mean that as a slight or anything - he's just the way he's been described and the things stated about him that make me think that he wouldn't really... know how to? it just wouldn't occur to him. he probably thinks his and Barnaby's relationship is what a best friendship is and is how it should be.
but they have to hang out. they have to refer to each other as best friends. and while i believe that Wally does wholeheartedly think that they're best friends, close as can be... i doubt Barnaby feels the same. like - yes, he probably does care about Wally. everybody likes Wally.
but it's gotta be frustrating for Barnaby, especially as time goes on and he becomes more himself as a person over just being a character playing a part. it probably stunts his relationship growth with others, since his ~best friend spot~ is already taken and who would want to encroach on that? especially since its taken by Wally mcfuckin Darling?
their friendship might become less of a role and more of a responsibility. Barnaby might grow to feel obligated to stick with Wally as his "best friend". someone invites Barnaby to hang out and/or help with something? sorry, he has to pose for Wally's painting. Barnaby is trying to do his own thing? sorry, Wally is knocking on the door and asking for help with something.
i wonder if Barnaby ever hopes that Wally will go to someone else, or feels relief when he does. and then does he feel irritation/guilt over that denied hope or that granted relief? then does he get angry at himself for those emotions?
how would this effect how he treats Wally and acts around him? this confusing muddle of emotions and this strange growing resentment for his painfully earnest friend who only ever means well, if he means at all.
it makes me curious whether or not this theory has merit. and how this could come to a head. what would Barnaby, in this situation, do if/when he discovers that they're puppets on a set, and he's literally written to be Wally's bestie while everyone else changed their scripts and chose their own relationships.
personally, i don't think he'd be happy, and i doubt he'd handle it well.
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Hiii, i love your stuff and kinda from a distance really look up at you for, in my perception, being able to express yourself without giving a fuck. Thats sick dude, Im so so afraid, of absolutely everything, its nice to think like i might grow into someone less apologetic of my existence. Nice to see people just being yknow
hey, thank you, this is really really nice. the secret that is probably not a secret is that i am also deeply afraid a lot of the time lmao -- but less than i used to be, and in ways that feel less stifling and self-suffocating, if that makes sense.
like, it used to be "i'm scared that if i express myself the way i want to, everyone will find me obnoxious, so let's just sand those edges down to be safe" -- now my fears are more like "now that i'm expressing myself in a way that feels natural and real, i'm afraid that it's all stupid/vapid/not worthwhile or meaningful" (<- specifically abt my art) or "i'm happy that i talk and act the way i want to now, but what if it makes me impossible to befriend," etc etc etc. which still feels bad and puts me in a funk a lot of the time but at least it's a fear that comes After/in reaction to doing stuff, rather than a fear that STOPS me from doing stuff, you know? like, it's evolved into a kind of fear that's less in my way.
anyway. i believe you'll experience something like this, because wanting to grow is the first step of growing. the fact that u hope or wish for something different means you're already on your way. to fewer fucks!! or at least distributing the fucks u give in a way that serves u better
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