Lian watches Puella Magi Madoka Magica: Episode 8
In episode 8, Sayaka continues to disintegrate before our eyes.
Episode 8: "I've been such a fool"
1. Sayaka's loss of hope has brought her to the point of self harm. The recklessness with which she fights mirrors her crumbling mental structures. Hope, purpose, justifications, values, her sense of duty and the satisfaction she got from being a protector - all of these unravel one by one.
"I'm just a lump of stone put here to defeat witches."
Oh Sayaka, what have they done to you.
Her attempt to emotionally manipulate Madoka into becoming a magical girl shows how utterly destroyed this poor girl has been because of Kyubey's machinations. She has been sucked into the soul crushing magical girl machine, and it is her purity and refusal to compromise her values that has led to her burning up like a piece of paper inside a furnace. And yet she still regrets her words immediately after uttering them. Kyubey's words have planted the idea in Sayaka's head that Madoka would be a great magical girl, and Sayaka reached out for them in her moment of despair. At this point, everything that Sayaka does or says is so quintesentially human that it's impossible for me to blame her for it.
2. Homura's attempt at saving Sayaka fails partly because of Sayaka's lack of trust in her, but mostly because Sayaka is so deep into suicidal territory that Homura's coldness and strangeness are not enough to reach her.
"You always look like you've given up on everything. You're always speaking empty words. Even now, you say you're doing it for my sake, but I bet you're really after something completely different."
(Note from the future: This is where Sayaka's intuition is dead on. Homura's numerous attempts at changing the future have left her traumatized and emotionally exhausted. Her anchor, her beacon of hope and only reason to keep going is Madoka. She does not have the energy to fight for the others as fiercely as she does for her beloved friend. Her most important goal is Madoka's salvation. "Everything revolves around her," says Homura, and the statement carries more weight than anyone could hope to understand. In a way, it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy, as Sayaka feels that Homura can't bring herself to care anymore - and thus rejects her help.)
3. "Madoka, if you wish, you can become an omnipotent goddess."
(Note from the future: I think this timeline might be where Kyubey gave the girls the most information, including this little bit, which ultimately proves to be his undoing, as Madoka decides to become just that. Information is one of the most important elements in this story. Kyubey closely monitors how much information the girls receive, and his preferred method of deception is giving the girls just enough knowledge to let them draw the wrong conclusion and then simply not bothering to correct them.
Thanks to Homura's constant interruptions, the girls have now managed to gather enough to figure out that Kyubey is not on their side, that magical girls are actually litches and that the price of making a wish is steeper than they ever thought possible. All this happens at the expense of Mami, Sayaka and Kyoko - but now Madoka is now in possession of almost all the facts, which should constitute a great advantage for Homura. And yet Kyubey slithers in again with a trade, and this time it almost works. He tells Madoka that she would become so powerful that she could return Sayaka to normal, and it is only through Homura's intervention that Madoka is saved. Homura is distraught at the close call, and her behavior makes Madoka wonder if they had ever met in the past. The scene where Madoka runs to find Sayaka and leaves Homura, who loves her and sacrificed so much to save her, is heart-wrenching once you know the whole story.)
4. KYUBEY HAS CLONES OF HIMSELF. WHICH HE EATS.
I wish I could say something other than "good Lord, what a creepy character" about Kyubey because I sound like a broken record when it comes to him, but there isn't anything else to it in my eyes. While it makes sense for him to auto-cannibalize himself for conservation purposes, I assume, all I'm left with is a pervasive, lingering feeling of dread. He is absolutely horrible.
This explains why Kyubey always seemed to pop out at the right moment: he is everywhere, watching everyone. He is even able to sneak into Homura's space. You can't get away from this sinister creature. He only leaves because he wants to.
5. Magical girls turn into witches when they fall into dispair.
MAGICAL GIRLS TURN INTO WITCHES.
THEY HAVE BEEN KILLING FORMER MAGICAL GIRLS ALL THIS TIME.
Oh God, this show. Every episode keeps adding layers of retrospective horror onto the previous episodes.
Sayaka's fragile state deteriorates rapidly over the course of the episode, but she still has enough strength to have one final conversation with Kyoko (of all people), in which she admits defeat. She openly admits that she has made a mistake, and that she has miscalculated and misjudged everything. The moment she labels all her efforts, her good intentions, the fight she fought so bravely, her ideals and her humanity as a mistake... that moment is when she becomes a witch. Tricked into losing her human body, abandoned by the boy she did it all for, traumatized by the things she had witnessed and deeply disappointed by the pettiness and casual evil of this world. This is how Sayaka Miki dies, and it is a monstrous injustice.
The cruelty of what happens to her is monumental. And to make things worse, something similar happened to every witch. Every single witch must have reached a point of despair where nothing was worth it anymore. This is a show about great human beings being broken by a terrifying, omnipresent creature who doesn't seem to particularly care about anything other than its mission. It's not as if we ever see the Incubator express any attachment to the universe it lives in and supposedly wishes to save - his race simply decided that the state of existence is better than non-existence and left it at that.
Episode 8: "I've been such a fool"
1. Sayaka's loss of hope has brought her to the point of self harm. The recklessness with which she fights mirrors her crumbling mental structures. Hope, purpose, justifications, values, her sense of duty and the satisfaction she got from being a protector - all of these unravel one by one.
"I'm just a lump of stone put here to defeat witches."
Oh Sayaka, what have they done to you.
Her attempt to emotionally manipulate Madoka into becoming a magical girl shows how utterly destroyed this poor girl has been because of Kyubey's machinations. She has been sucked into the soul crushing magical girl machine, and it is her purity and refusal to compromise her values that has led to her burning up like a piece of paper inside a furnace. And yet she still regrets her words immediately after uttering them. Kyubey's words have planted the idea in Sayaka's head that Madoka would be a great magical girl, and Sayaka reached out for them in her moment of despair. At this point, everything that Sayaka does or says is so quintesentially human that it's impossible for me to blame her for it.
2. Homura's attempt at saving Sayaka fails partly because of Sayaka's lack of trust in her, but mostly because Sayaka is so deep into suicidal territory that Homura's coldness and strangeness are not enough to reach her.
"You always look like you've given up on everything. You're always speaking empty words. Even now, you say you're doing it for my sake, but I bet you're really after something completely different."
(Note from the future: This is where Sayaka's intuition is dead on. Homura's numerous attempts at changing the future have left her traumatized and emotionally exhausted. Her anchor, her beacon of hope and only reason to keep going is Madoka. She does not have the energy to fight for the others as fiercely as she does for her beloved friend. Her most important goal is Madoka's salvation. "Everything revolves around her," says Homura, and the statement carries more weight than anyone could hope to understand. In a way, it has become a self-fulfilling prophecy, as Sayaka feels that Homura can't bring herself to care anymore - and thus rejects her help.)
3. "Madoka, if you wish, you can become an omnipotent goddess."
(Note from the future: I think this timeline might be where Kyubey gave the girls the most information, including this little bit, which ultimately proves to be his undoing, as Madoka decides to become just that. Information is one of the most important elements in this story. Kyubey closely monitors how much information the girls receive, and his preferred method of deception is giving the girls just enough knowledge to let them draw the wrong conclusion and then simply not bothering to correct them.
Thanks to Homura's constant interruptions, the girls have now managed to gather enough to figure out that Kyubey is not on their side, that magical girls are actually litches and that the price of making a wish is steeper than they ever thought possible. All this happens at the expense of Mami, Sayaka and Kyoko - but now Madoka is now in possession of almost all the facts, which should constitute a great advantage for Homura. And yet Kyubey slithers in again with a trade, and this time it almost works. He tells Madoka that she would become so powerful that she could return Sayaka to normal, and it is only through Homura's intervention that Madoka is saved. Homura is distraught at the close call, and her behavior makes Madoka wonder if they had ever met in the past. The scene where Madoka runs to find Sayaka and leaves Homura, who loves her and sacrificed so much to save her, is heart-wrenching once you know the whole story.)
4. KYUBEY HAS CLONES OF HIMSELF. WHICH HE EATS.
I wish I could say something other than "good Lord, what a creepy character" about Kyubey because I sound like a broken record when it comes to him, but there isn't anything else to it in my eyes. While it makes sense for him to auto-cannibalize himself for conservation purposes, I assume, all I'm left with is a pervasive, lingering feeling of dread. He is absolutely horrible.
This explains why Kyubey always seemed to pop out at the right moment: he is everywhere, watching everyone. He is even able to sneak into Homura's space. You can't get away from this sinister creature. He only leaves because he wants to.
5. Magical girls turn into witches when they fall into dispair.
MAGICAL GIRLS TURN INTO WITCHES.
THEY HAVE BEEN KILLING FORMER MAGICAL GIRLS ALL THIS TIME.
Oh God, this show. Every episode keeps adding layers of retrospective horror onto the previous episodes.
Sayaka's fragile state deteriorates rapidly over the course of the episode, but she still has enough strength to have one final conversation with Kyoko (of all people), in which she admits defeat. She openly admits that she has made a mistake, and that she has miscalculated and misjudged everything. The moment she labels all her efforts, her good intentions, the fight she fought so bravely, her ideals and her humanity as a mistake... that moment is when she becomes a witch. Tricked into losing her human body, abandoned by the boy she did it all for, traumatized by the things she had witnessed and deeply disappointed by the pettiness and casual evil of this world. This is how Sayaka Miki dies, and it is a monstrous injustice.
The cruelty of what happens to her is monumental. And to make things worse, something similar happened to every witch. Every single witch must have reached a point of despair where nothing was worth it anymore. This is a show about great human beings being broken by a terrifying, omnipresent creature who doesn't seem to particularly care about anything other than its mission. It's not as if we ever see the Incubator express any attachment to the universe it lives in and supposedly wishes to save - his race simply decided that the state of existence is better than non-existence and left it at that.