one of the nice things about being absent from anime for seven years is that i don't have to scour each year for the good shows that stick out. time will do that for me.
anyway this show is fairly old, so please look out for unmarked spoilers, since they'll be kind of weaving in and out here.
i remember first hearing about this show in 2012. coworkers wanted me to watch it and i really couldn't. i saw the box art and kinda shook my head. i should have known then, having done the same to avatar: the last airbender that there was a reason they liked it, and not because of moe or whatever.
while 'catching up,' i saw psycho-pass on netflix and really enjoyed it. especially the ending, which was surprisingly bleak and went against my expectation in how it would end. i then learned that the same guy wrote the basis for fate/zero and madoka magica. i watched fate/zero. another action show why not. it was not bad. kind of unintentionally silly, but the final five episodes of the series were heads and shoulders what came before. so, really intrigued with urubochi's other offering, i saw the show as also on netflix.
i really don't like moe. i think it's weird and creepy. growing up, i never watched any magical girl show either (cardcaptors and sailor moon being the two i would have been able to see). so those first two episodes were rough. i had been aware of the show's reputation though, and i was interested in seeing how bad things would happen. early on though, i did at least like madoka's mom, sayaka, and some of the comedy (especially hitomi in episode 2 or 3 i think). given mami and homura's interactions with each other, i had expected homura to be a good guy and mami to be some sort of corrupting force, trying to trick sayaka and madoka into something sinister.
and nope.
that was the first of many swerves. i am familiar enough with cardcaptor sakura to appreciate kyubey and what he's supposed to be as the animal mascot character contrasted with how he is in the show. i had also expected a bad end for sayaka, and had grown to like her character the most by the time bad things started happening to her. there were little, somewhat predictable things if you were in the mindset of 'how can things go wrong,' like episode 9 where the voice of a friend doesn't revert someone back to their normal selves. there were fun little things too like kyubey being made into swiss cheese and then kyubey eating that swiss cheese. all of it was really entertaining though.
but episode ten. hooboy, that's what sealed this series as one of my favorites. i already like time travel stories quite a bit, but i never thought they would go that way to explain homura. it works so well and the escalation is just so great. first timeline, madoka's dead hand. second timeline, madoka's corrupted soul gem in her hand. third timeline, madoka's and homura's corrupted soul gems in their hands. just little details here work so well too, like homura slowly gaining confidence as she beats up the oil drum, or her happiness when madoka hugs her after blowing up a witch. but my favorite part is the stretch of time from when mami kills kyoko until homura mercy-kills madoka. i'm one of those sticklers for dubs. i prefer understanding the inflection associated with the words if i can get that. so i watched the dubbed version and it was great. homura's voice actor's anguished scream before the muzzle flash is one of my favorite parts of the show. i also really liked how madoka's voice actor was much more confident-sounding in the earliest timelines - at least the ones before homura shows up ahead of schedule. and tying into the flashback before episode 1 starts, and then tying into chasing kyubey but from homura's perspective - good stuff.
and regarding the ending... i really liked it too. i think the show sort of earns it. it's not exactly happy, but everyone involved is pretty much okay with where they are. kyoko and mami are alive fighting wraiths, sayaka and madoka have resigned themselves to their fates, believing in the power behind their wishes, and homura will continue to fight on madoka's behalf. to me it felt consistent with the tone of the show, and i had no idea what to expect from the ending, other than thinking it would be rather dark and depressing. so i was surprised to see that even that trend was kicked.
and overall i just really loved the 'joke' of the series looking like cardcaptor sakura so much and then making the main character basically a non-factor until episode 10, and then not becoming a magical girl until the very end of the show. the opening sequence and logo were great ways to keep me guessing for the first couple episodes, and i think it was only at episode eight that madoka still hadn't made a wish.
so yeah, it was pretty great. i know there's a third movie that sort of acts as a sequel to the series, but everything i've read up on it sounds like it undoes a lot of what the show ended on so well. and it also sounds like it gets caught up in 'who is the best girl!?' which is something i never really indulged in, or looked for from this show.
