Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica

I'm slowly falling for Mami, and that episode definitely with that. Her fight against the witch was wonderful, and I love how she keeps her gracefulness even when wielding all of those guns. It's a nice contradiction.

And it's also interesting to note that the main character, Madoka, still has not decided to become a magical girl yet. If my memory serves me right, both in HeartCatch Precure as well as Sailor Moon, both main characters became magical girls about half way through the first episode. I find this deviantion to be quite refreshing, and it's neat to see a girl who's more hesitant, especially with all of the responsibility, and is actually thinking it over.

I also find it neat that the witches are barely visible monsters, instead of simply being a dark version of the heroine. That also helps with the unique art style during the fights.

Madoka Magica is indeed the darkest and most sinister mahou shoujo anime I have ever seen. And as you've said, this show is completely deconstructing the mahou shoujo genre.
It brings to mind many doubts and conspiracy theories surrounding what a magical girl truly is.
I have very very high hopes for this series. Don't disappoint me SHAFT.

Episode 3 is the most intriguing episode by far (out of all anime airing this season).

The main thing I really got from episode 5 was how Magical girl's abilities are based on the wish they made. With that in mind, I question what was the other girls wishes. Does the life wish for Mami gave her more abilities than just summoning guns? What sort of a wish gave Homura bomb and maybe time travel powers?

The main thing from this is that Madoka's wish must be one hell of a wish that would make her overpowered.

I seriously thought for a second Madoka was going to contract with QB, however Homura ended that. I see why now, she was trying to kill him, but seems not to do any good. Quite interested in her backstory. In Sayaka's case, I almost foresaw her going witch mode since never did try to replenish and cleanse the Soul Gem and even refused Homura's good will (or what seemed that way). Wondering why Kyōko stopped Homura....

So it seems that ImperialX's predictions were dead on. Although it was getting pretty obvious starting in ep 5... Can't criticizes the predictability of this episode though. The execution of the events were impeccable. This series is actually paced really well.
Can't wait to see how this anime resolves.

Man, Sayaka just backed herself into a corner and didn't want to come out no matter what. And so she turned into a witch. Really though, trying to save everyone means you're saving both good people and bad people.

Homura is ... interesting. She has time-manipulation and various weaponry magic and blew Kyubey away. What's of particular interest is that she was crying in front of Madoka, at this point I thought she might have been Madoka's friend. However, the moment Madoka left, Homura had no tears. We don't even know if the "vision" at the beginning of the series was the future of was of Homura's "other timeline".

"Incubator" would be a more interesting name if this were, say, Shugo Chara, but it doesn't have much impact here. It isn't enough that Kyubey eats Grief Seeds, he also eats his own corpse.

In-Kyubee-tor?

mind was completely blown this ep. Everything makes sense now... Grant wish/recruit Mahou Shoujo->eventually turn into witch->recruit new Mahou Shoujo to take out old ones->lather, rinse repeat

Ok well right off the bat my guess is Homura = future Madoka.
[size=7]yea I know the age thing is off huh, aren't they supposed to be same age or something, but meh anyways[/h]

Why? My support towards this?

Well for starters, look at the OP, starting from ~0:42 the transformation sequence, I never could figure out who the other person is, or is it just a silhouette there meant to mean something else? Either way, the only character I can recall seeing so far that resembles that silhouette is Homura, so her being a part of the scene must mean something then right?

Next, if we look at Homura and Mami's exchange of words in episode 3, one could see it as Homura trying to prevent Mami from being around Madoka, and also from fighting against the witch that ultimately kills her.

Lastly in the recent episode (8) once I heard kyuubey say "you aren't from this timeline" it all started to add up. Kyuubey always kept saying that Madoka has potential for great powers so time manipulation would be a small thing. It also adds understanding to why Homura knows so much. I could say a few more things, but I'll let you all add your 2 cents, that's all for now. Until I am proven wrong by future episodes, I just felt like getting my thoughts out there, fyi this is the only site I go to to discuss anime, so, no I didn't see this mentioned some where else.

Actually, didn't Kyubey absorb the grief seed into his back? I don't think he 'ate' the seed the same way he ate himself...

Mwahahaha. I LOVED Kyubey eating his own corpse. It had me in stitches for five minutes.

"Fuck you, Homura. I can respawn. Om nom nom delicious my corpse."

Though, I need to ask if anyone is really surprised by anything at this point. If you were paying attention, the whole "Grief seeds are fully corrupted Soul Gems, and witches are fully corrupted Puella Magi" thing was made obvious way back in Ep 2, and was anyone really expecting Kyubey to NOT either be the monster of the week, or else be harboring it?

I mean, look at that face. That thar' be an evil face.

Also. Is Madoka ever going to stop with the crying thing? It's getting annoying.

Also also. I wonder what Witch-Mode Sayaka's powers are, and how they differ from her old ones.

Wow I would've never guessed she had time travel and wow she just shot that little thing was epic sauce then he ate his remains and... oh god souls stuck in jewelry

I was really liking Kyoko and now she dead to stop Witch Sayaka ;_;
QB I know you're doing this to supply energy but come on!
Homura and Madoka are left with the task of the great witch gathering and I expect it would be like how that dream was in the first episode.