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I've always been intrigued by the artstyles of the witches, love me some fun monster design.
But wondering what the show is like. As I get older I find myself having less patience for certain types of anime bullshit (libertarianism, loli, that kind of cringe)
So, is Madoka worth watching or is it 
It's actually good the whole show is a critique of how young girls desires are manipulated from a young age to participate in the systems of society that destroy them. Really great politics and interesting delivery of them
Also the 50s Russian(?) Animation influence is gorgeous and haunting and beautiful all at the same time
Sounds like my find of jam!
tv madoka portrays social democracy and is cringe
movie madoka portrays stalinism and is based
sadly you gotta watch the tv madoka for the film madoka
It's been at least a decade since I watched it, but it was one of the best I've seen. AFAIK it invented the Anti-Magical-Girl genre.
It's just a well done subversion of the popular tropes in its genre when it was made, which earned it a lot of points back when that was novel and you went into it just thinking you were going to watch a magical girl anime. When you know that that's not what it is it loses a lot of the magic, as it were. It's fine, but it didn't really blow me away.
It's not made for pedophiles though. Shouldn't be any risk of running into that sort of stuff.
It's just a well done subversion of the popular tropes
Do I need to watch 500 magical girl animes first for context? I've only watched the first two seasons of Sailor Moon.
I've only watched the first two seasons of Sailor Moon.
That's more than enough context
It was the first magical girl anime I ever saw, I'd say it stands on its own well enough. People like us just don't get the full context
Its very good also its packed with lesbean energy
Not just energy though, right? I always saw it as pretty on the nose yuri
Don't spoil the gayness! Gotta leave some of it as a surprise. But yes its super on the nose gay although you'll still find weirdos exclaim they're just friends
It's tough getting into details without spoiling some of the aspects of the show, but yeah there are definitely problematic elements. The character designs are overly sexualized for being middle school girls (case in point, Mami). A key subtextual theme is about how society exploits the images/bodies/persons of young women for cynical profiteering, but the show itself literally also does that as well. There are definitely parts of the show that feel edgy for edginess's sake, although it's probably not the most egregious anime in that respect.
To be honest, I've watched the show a couple times as well as listening to a whole (100% femme cast) recap podcast on the show, and I still have mixed feelings about it. I think it's certainly an influential show, and one that's worthy of critical discussion, but idk if you would have a good time watching it.
It is both worth watching and cringe.
To be serious I'd say it's not bad, but it's in my top 5 of all time so I'm obviously pretty biased. There's definitely some edginess but I wouldn't say it revels in it. As far as sexualization goes, their skirts are pretty short but imo that's about it and the magical girl outfits aren't really worse (see reference).
Madoka : Magical Girl :: Evangelion : Mecha
It's good
Madoka is great. Watch from the beginning, avoid spoilers. The only romantic bits are between characters of similar ages, and the show avoids male gazey upskirt shit IIRC.
All I know is if you like the art style of the witches you need to check out Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei
It has horny elements but it's also just incredibly jaded and cynical, maybe SHAFTS greatest work.
The cutout style of the witches was huge in later seasons of the show CW suicide and self harm
Edit
Ume-sensei, the character designer(for Madoka and hidamari), is of course on record horny, and her work isn't without the cheesecake that anime is known for. However it's (it's been a while since I've watched) way less service-y and gross than the average show. Granted I'm a huge fan of the SHAFT canon, and the horny service angles of their work (looking at you, monogatari) are always in tension with incredible storytelling and art.
Basically ymmv and don't force it. But SHAFT is always pushing the medium as medium and I'll always be looking at the positives
Love the way the pattern is static but the characters move in zetsubou
I found YouTube links in your comment. Here are links to the same videos on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
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By anime standards, it's fairly unproblematic as others have said. I reaaaaally like the Studio SHAFT aesthetic, and Madoka is a lot of people's first foray into it. Head tilts, really interesting blocking, wild visual metaphors. It's a shame that most of their other shows are filled with anime bullshit (except 3-Gatsu my love).
I haven't seen it but my understanding is that it pretty much created the dark magical girl subgenre
I don't know I checked out at the OP
It's good, folks
I'm not much of an anime fan but I enjoyed it.
It's short and pretty cool. My favorite girl x girl anime ever! I don't know what you usually watch but it's easy to love for most people.
it's very good, i would definitely recommend it
thematically it's doing a lot of really interesting things. ignore everyone who says it's the real dark magical girl show or it's deconstructing magical girls, it's ultimately just doing the same thing as sailor moon but all killer no filler. homura did nothing wrong etc
I think madoka is very bad. it has pacing issues and the characters don't really act like characters.
movie madoka is very good, though. i dont know if it's worth watching the series to get to the movie to be honest, but i really like the movie
You should watch ep 3, is very wholesome.
I heard it's pretty good but I never watched it.