NoScans: Madoka and Yuuna – mutual fascination

[leahandillyana]

Magical Girl Madoka Magica and Yuuki Yuuna is a Hero are two examples of magical girls stories for adults. While ‘for adults’ usually serves as an euphemism for erotic material, in this case it means mature stories with dark themes appreciated best by adult audiences (as well as some cutesy that can put off many teenagers). In fact, Madoka is credited with polishing the genre, and many manga and anime series that followed suit imitated themes established by Madoka – and Yuuki Yuuna followed them particularly closely.

 

Yuuki Yuuna is a fascinating case for in that its spiritual inspiration from Madoka is so close it’s borderline plagiarism. The characters of the first arc have direct counterparts in Madoka: Mimori is Homura, Fu is Mami, Itsuki is Madoka, Karin is Kyouko, while the titular heroine resembles more the ‘idiot hero with huge apetite’ archetype popular in shounen manga rather than Sayaka, fifth member of the Holy Quintet. Furthermore, story beats go similar, from older girl introducing her friends to the magical girl system, through appearance of unfriendly magical girl who makes friends with the team, an uncomfortable truth being revealed, weighting on a magical girl’s mental state, to an even more awful truth being revealed. It’s kinda fascinating. (It’s the only magical girls series I know of that features disabled characters, but by the end of the third arc all of them are magically cured.)
And then Magia Record, a Madoka spin-off, was released, and we could observe the same phenomenon as earlier but in reverse. Magia Record has a much larger main cast than Madoka, even when adding characters who appeared in later arcs of the manga, and many of those main characters have direct counterparts in terms of personality, relationships, appearance and even in some cases magic in Yuuki Yuuna franchise. Yachiyo is Mimori, Momoko is Fu (just compare their designs!), both Sana and Kaede were inspired by Itsuki, Rena is Karin, and in Yachiyo’s backstory Kanae is Gin and Mel is Sonoko (thought while Sonoko eventually joined main Yuuna cast, Mel wasn’t so lucky). The first arc even follows the story beats of the first arc of Yuuki Yuuna more than the first arc of Madoka! (There’s also one more equivalent character in Magia Record, but mentioning her would be spoilers to material not covered by either manga or anime so far.)

Comments

Mod Note

[icon_uk]

If you're posting video links that's fine, but please put them under a cut.

Re: Mod Note

[leahandillyana]

Done but each edition keeps messing up the text (parts of which disappear) so I think I'll just remove all the videos.

[doodleboy]

My opinion on Post-Madoka stories still remains is that I wish the lessons creators learned from Madoka was that the Magical Girl genre was flexible and they could push it into a lot of new directions. Instead we got dark edgy magical girl shows.

The most interesting "Post-Madoka" stuff has actually been in the webcomic space. Sleepless Domain has clear influences, although influenced by Steven Universe as well as a few of it's own ideas. Four Leaf on Webtoon also took some cues from Madoka as well but spun it into its own thing.

It's an interesting genre. There's something cathartic with stories about literalizing emotions, where hope turns into magical weapons that fight monsters made of despair and depression. I just wish there were more interesting things made from the corporate side of it outside of the versions made for kids.