The Everlasting Story

Also known as "Madoka Magica the Movie: Eternal", part 2 of the Madoka movie trilogy.

I thoroughly enjoyed this one as well, although I must admit that lining up at least 2 hours in advanced plus getting a poster could have added to my already biased views.

The movie felt like the last few episodes with more super nice transformation sequences, and additional scenes that tended to be on the typical somewhat creepy art side of things. Gekidan Inu Curry certainly had fun with those. Contrary to the previous movie, this one felt longer than usual because I don't think they really cut anything out of these episodes. They had a little less than 2 hours to fill, so that made sense.


Spoilers abound afterwards:
It started with the film reel countdown with a curtain opening. I don't remember the exact numbers, but it very much reminded me of episode 1.

This time around, I got to watch the new opening animation. I'm not sure what to say about the sound, as it sounds slightly similar to Connect, but I found the animation itself to be great. It pretty much half-spoiled many things if you hadn't seen the series though, although that number of people would be few. I really liked seeing all the happy Homura and Madoka moments, especially the somewhat infamous check to check snuggling scene. Too cute.

I quite liked the parts during Homura's long time travelling episode. Right before that, the obvious use of CGand/or strange foreground/background layers in the graveyard kind of threw me off, in addition to how drawn out that scene waas. At first I was hoping for the manga-only scene of Kyoko and Sayaka in the "afterlife", but sadly that didn't happen. Instead we feasted on even more imagery in Homura's time travelling travails, along with an even more eerie version of the countdown from the beginning of the movie, except it is counting up and distorted. It even ended in an altered, more happy version the anime opening animation, including "Connect" by ClariS. I'm not sure what to say about that.

The Kyubey entropy and thermodynamics of the universe lesson was always a great part to watch. Big screen Inu Curry visuals are great.

The episode 11 part felt very much the same as the TV version. Not much to say other than how crazy it is to watch Walpurgisnacht getting attacked by Unlimited Arms Works on the big screen. Also, the cleaning of the bloodied Homura's face by Madoka was really nice.

Then the changes start to get a lot more interesting in the final stretch. It could just be my imagination, but everything felt spiffed up when Madoka started traversing time and space. It was hugely apparent during the fantasticly sparkly galactic rift part where Madoka and Homura are having their one last time together. They added dresses! I absolutely love this addition, not only because it makes it slightly less awkward, but also because of how beautiful it looks.

Then of course it went back to the "present", but before that we had a detour of Madoka picking up Sayaka. This, and the parts where Madoka went to pick up the other girls, were the parts that almost made me teary eyed. I truly felt the sacrifices and the bittersweet happiness of them being saved by Madoka. Sayaka's story, though a bit less significant compared to Jeanne D'Arc or Cleopatra, still resonated strongly as being a great sacrifice for a good cause.

Now actually back to the present day, very much like the TV series again, though seeing Homura's happy face at a large size is great.

Then it strangely cut to credits filled with runes, in the obvious style of Inu Curry. I ought to search up what these mean, because they could be pertinent information for the 3rd movie or something. Or maybe they're just credits. I really like the orchestral version of Connect used here as well.

Then back to the "aftermath" scene with the winged Homura and the great quotable text, followed by the film reel ending showing silhouettes of the various magical girls of the ages. I was fully expecting a trailer or something to appear, but instead we are treated to the real credits with the new song by Kalafina.

And after that was done, I was still expecting something, but alas it did no come to being.

-end spoilers.


So overall, I quite liked the two movies, as they covered pretty much everything. Perhaps the one gripe (other than me missing out 10 minutes of the first movie) would be the odd pacing of the second movie. It was starting to feel like they had to pad some parts to make it longer, and it really felt like I was watching the episodes all over again sometimes. The total of four credits (minus one if you don't include the runes-version) felt a bit strange too. Though I admit that I liked the inclusion of Connect in two places, even if it was awkward.

And that's it. I look forever to whatever follows, though my hopes for it coming to Canada any time soon are low. Perhaps in 3 to 4 years at minimum.