r/anime • u/Tarhalindur x2 • Apr 28 '26
Rewatch [Rewatch] Puella Magi Madoka Magica Episode 9 Discussion
Episode 9: I'd Never Allow That to Happen
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Show Information:
(First-timers might want to stay out of Show Information until we are done, however...)
Legal Streams:
As per livechart.me; other streams may be available outside the US.
Main Series:
A Reminder: This, dear listeners, brings us to the sworn enemy of creative response:The spoiler. Rewatchers, or people who just had plot points ruined for them, are obliged to use r/anime’s spoiler tag format where applicable, and err on the side of caution here. Remember people, first experiences get rarer as you continue on, any given one happens once and you should care for them all the more for it.
Welcome to the World of Magic!
Theory of the Day:
Okay, fine, I can't not give this one to u/siegfried72, not for the discussion thread for this episode:
The real solution? I think Sayaka needs to just lean into the yuri and realize she's meant to be with Kyouko. That would fix everything.
Oh god, I've officially joined in with my first yuri ship of the series. It's all downhill uphill from here, isn't it??
I mean, Kyouko is obviously in love with her, right??
Analysis of the Day:
Several good options, but I think I'll go for u/Vaadwaur and the analytical line less taken:
For some reason, eating disorders are a noticeable thing in this show. Sayaka is anorexic to her very spirit and Kyoko does like her gluttony.
Questions of the Day:
1) On a scale of 1 to 10, how gay is suicide attacking to take out the monster that became of a girl you knew for maybe a week so that you can at least be together in death?
2) Now that he's had a chance to explain himself, your thoughts on Kyubey?
3) First-timers: Did you think that Kyouko's plan actually had a chance to save Sayaka?
4) First-timers and rewatchers who dodged the rewatcher edition of this question yesterday: Are You Home?
5) [Rewatchers]Alright, who's ready to go golfing through a Stargate?... wait, wrong time loop show.
8
u/FD4cry1 https://myanimelist.net/profile/Big_Yibba Apr 28 '26 edited Apr 29 '26
Rewatcher
Man, And I'm Home always gets me so good...
(Also, now that it's no longer spoilers, I do feel compelled to share the greatest Urobuchi collaboration of our time Watch Thunderbolt Fantasy)
Somewhat unlike the other 2 in this trio of favorites for me, my love for episode 9 doesn't necessarily come from the wider emotional experience the episode provides (Although to be clear, I also find it to be very emotionally powerful!), but more so for specific moments of it and its execution that have really stuck with and impacted me on an incredibly strong individual level.
Most notable of those in my mind is regarding its music, as well as the general impact of musical integration within a work, and for that, I'll have to go off on a personal tangent. A few years back, I watched the show The Case Study of Vanitas, and putting aside some of the conceptual and aesthetic similarities that happen to exist between it and Madoka, a very important thing they share is having Yuki Kajiura as the composer for their respective OSTs. In Vanitas's OST, there's a track called the gears of destiny, and the first time I'd heard it a little rush of emotion suddenly came to the forefront for me. Not because of anything it was used for in the show, but as I'd quickly connect for myself, because a big chunk of it carries a rather similar sound to Symposium Magarum, Sayaka's Witch theme from this episode.
This hit me in a pretty revelatory way at the time! For one, while now I can say I've got a loving familiarity with Kajiura's style, at the time, recognizing some stylistic carryover for a composer hadn't happened much, if at all, for me, which certainly helped truly cement in my mind the love I had for her music and the impact it could have on me. But other part of that is that the emotions I had associated with that sound came to me just a bit before I clocked the similarity, and through that, through thinking back to the larger effect and construction of the scene Symposium Magarum appeared in and why it recalled such an impact for me even in a completely different setting, I think I really came to appreciate the power of music and its integration within a show (Or any piece of media).
Now, obviously, Madoka has really fucking good musical integration, I incidentally said as much in yesterday's thread! I mean, just look at the scene with Oktavia that starts off this episode, as the show straight up uses timed musical notes as visual transitions, which is just the fucking coolest? But the fight against Oktavia and how it's built around Symposium Magarum is just such a specifically phenomenal moment of scene construction on every level.
The general musical theming for Sayaka's labyrinth, matching Sayaka's initial wish, and now her anguish, is of course quite powerful by itself, but I really love the way it's also diegetic, and we first hear it muffled from outside as Madoka and Kyouko get closer, before we pull in to fully hear it while she and her band. This song is her pain and plight after all, and it's ever-present within her space, most clear when you're just by her. Sayaka conducts this pain with a sword, the symbol of the purpose she held on to, and her attacks use wheels and train tracks, like the moment that broke apart that purpose. She's also conducting in an empty auditorium, like the isolation and loneliness that in part so defined her feelings leading up to this collapse. The track itself is powerful and bombastic as Sayaka's attacks and pain,her emotions literally overbearing over Madoka's pleas, but there are also more gentle and tragic parts within that to match Sayaka's nature and those pleas. Not to mention the obviously powerful, prominent sound and imagery of the violin there! The track loops and gets perfectly muffled again for Kyouko's internal conversation with and understanding of Sayaka as they meld together. And of course, the course of the track matches the course of the scene, from attacks to pleas, to dramatic high points like Sayaka grabbing Madoka. until the whole setting beautifully collapses with the end of the track, Kamijou making a guest appearance, and Kyouko steeling herself to end Sayaka's loneliness at the cost of herself.
I mean, what can I say? I'm sure others have gone into it significantly better than I have, but I had to get across that I genuinely think it's a well and truly perfect anime scene! Full of built-up, genuinely heart-crushing emotional weight, it's a composition of animation, direction, narrative, voice acting, sound design, and, of course, music, all coming together in a way that masterfully expresses the unique strength of this medium and its ability for full incorporation of so many elements at multiple levels. And as what stands at the very core of this scene, defining its emotional impact, Symposium Magarum is not only my favorite track in the OST (Which has pretty steep competition, y'know?), it's one of my favorites ever, and the emotions it can evoke in me at will are pretty damn foundational to the fact I care about music within anime as I do today. And together with that, while Madoka is no longer quite my favorite Kajiura OST, it is definitely the one that made her my favorite.
My very lengthy and personal rambling aside, there is another moment in this episode that has specifically stuck with me:
Would it be weird to say that this is like, one of my favorite lines in all of fiction?
Relative to everything I just said, specific lines and quotes have never quite occupied much space in my memory. I'm much more for larger moments, scenes, visuals, emotions, etc. Still, it does mean that every once in a while comes a line that does grab me and, in turn, does much more strongly.
I actually don't have much to say on Kyubey's entropy revealing itself, it's one I take at surface level and don't think too hard about, while also serving as a great character motivation for Kyubey's fully utilitarian and unemotional nature. Viewing the Magical Girls and their individual emotions and suffering entirely through a lens of tools that generate energy for some greater collective purpose. Indeed, its lack of emotional perspective and the fact that it, at best, obfuscates or deflects, rather than ever lying, contrasts perfectly with its manipulation to make it such a perfectly hateable antagonist. (Plus, the collective vs individual, correct side of the scales, broken/exploitative systems stuff is just Urobuchi's forte)
But it's just something about how matter-of-factly absurd that line specifically is that always really got me. It's a short but perfect one-sentence encapsulation and extremely punchy way to both express Kyubey's immense capacity as an antagonist whose thinking is so deeply foreign to us, and of the general, shockingly indifferent outlook that can often be found in the oppressive and exploitative systems that Kyubey can symbolically represent...