Madoka Magica the Movie: Beginnings + Eternal
Oh gosh. What a long event that turned out to be. How strange it was to get to the theater and find a twisting long line of nerds and dorks that stretched the block. Let me say this up front I guess: holy boloney put down the video games. When people are walking through the line with Hatsune Mitsu dancing around on a Vita pressed to their face you know something has gone wrong. I think it was probably worse though when you just see some asshole pull out the DS Mario from six years ago to have Luigi throw cards at them for two minutes because they can't live without entertainment.
Anyways, the showing was lively and fun. There were a bunch of people dressed up and cosplaying, some of the costumes being pretty impressive. Those people got called up to the front of the theater and the manager handed some of them posters, doing his best to distribute a very limited quantity to the people that went the most all out.
As for the movie itself it pretty much delivered exactly what it promised. It was Madoka on a big screen. The theater wasn't exactly super modern or anything so the experience came complete with some exceptionally tall (and fat) people sitting in front of me to block the subs. The selfish part of me wished for them to get the Mami treatment.
I found it rather amusing that most of the darker twists and turns of the movie received more bemused reactions from the audience. I realized people are familiar with the plot as it is, but it does make me question the resonance of the everything. Madoka is a movie/show I have fun with, but rewatching it has largely solidified the fact that I felt as though Madoka requires the viewer to be on its side to succeed. Conceptually the story is cool, but for it to work I have to simply set aside the numerous plot holes, poorly constructed world, and blatant plot devices.
On a second viewing, I have to say that I felt as though there weren't really any strong concrete themes that Madoka carries either. As such, there isn't a great deal of substance to what's going on. In many ways this is a bigger issue when it comes to the show's visual imagery. It is often captivating and enthralling and is, I believe, largely responsible for winning over viewers like I brought up before. But what does most of it really mean? Much of the art happening in the periphery to the characters feels overwhelming but also irrelevant. In other situations Madoka simply beats the viewer over the head with obvious imagery that doesn't really have anything of substance to say.
Still though, it was fun seeing anime in a theater without having to be subjected to a modern Miyazaki film and I had a good time all things considered. In this format the movies feel fairly exhausting, and seem to stretch on and on. My cousin came with me, who wasn't familiar with the series, and he noted that it sometimes felt as though the movie wanted to end but couldn't as it was chugging along. This sort of leads me to believe that some of the transitions between episodes don't exactly go over in a stellar manner, but things seem to work all around. Certain stuff like the original OP almost feel shoved in to check boxes, and frankly all the meta humor is distracting and just becomes more so when it elicits a reaction from the audience by tickling some strange spot on certain viewers.
Oh, also did not run into Thoraxes. For better or for worse. Crowd was pretty big so I'm not too surprised I guess.
