Alternate Title: Explaining Madoka/Madokami’s actions

Warning: there will be Rebellion spoilers (big ones at that) in this series (this article is clean). Read on with caution, and watch the movie already, my word.

If you haven’t read my previous article on the deaths of Tomoe Mami, Miki Sayaka, and Kyouko Sakura yet, I encourage you to read it here, as I’ll be writing with the assumption you have. You won’t miss much if you haven’t but I still feel it’s a good preface to this article.

Today we’ll discuss why Madoka chose not to resurrect her friends and fellow magical girls, and instead chose to ascend to essential god-hood, in doing so freeing the souls of magical girls from becoming witches. After that, we’ll go over what the impact of the decision was, with particular focus on Homura. Without further ado, part two of Homura’s Solitude: “And Stay Dead!”

The Ascension to Godhood

So why did Madoka choose to become a God? It seemed for the longest time like her wish would simply be to resurrect the girls, they’d beat Walpurgis, live happily ever after blah blah blah. But that would be really boring, wouldn’t it (we wouldn’t want a happy ending now, would we)? So what motivated her to ascend?

Personality

Madoka’s a good girl, almost to a fault. She wants to do not just the right thing, but the rightest thing. When she was presented with the ability to use her wish for literally anything, she didn’t want to waste it making a few people happy. No, she wanted to make life better for all magical girls everywhere. Because it was the rightest thing she could do, it would make things the best for the most people.

Sayaka

Remember how I said Sayaka had to turn into a witch to show Madoka just what happened to fallen magical girls? Well the turning of Sayaka was a major motivation behind the ascension. Simply put, because Madoka saw Sayaka turn, she realized the pain involved in the slow descent into the madness of becoming a witch. She knew how horrifying the process was, and she decided that she didn’t want anyone to go through with that despair.

A Once in a Lifetime Opportunity

Madoka was, inherently, the only girl who had their life thrown into the blender by Homura so much that she could wish for literally anything and get it. It’s entirely possible that she didn’t want to make the wish she did, but realized that she would be the only one who could put an end to the witches and chose to act on it. Her contract with Kyubey “oppos(ed) the very laws of causality itself.” Her contract was supposed to result in her turning into a witch (read the fine print), but her contract terms (the wish) directly opposed the result and was only possible because of her heightened magical powers.

Why Remove Herself from Existence?

Following her ascension, the world resets as though Madoka never existed with very few differences otherwise. First, Sayaka remains dead. Second, only Homura truly remembers who or what Madoka is or was (Kaname Tatsuya can see her, though it was explained he only could see her because he was too young to know he shouldn’t be able to. He will forget her as he grows up). Finally, there are no more witches, only wraiths.

But why remove herself from existence in this universe? She may have lost her physical being following her ascension, but as an all-powerful omnipresent being, couldn’t she find a way to still exist, at least to the other members of the Holy Quintet… Quartet… Trio? (Keep in mind Sayaka remains dead and, obviously, Madoka is not “real” in this timeline). Could she at least communicate with the others? Why didn’t she exist to any living person in this reality except Homura.

The answer, sadistically almost, is that she cared for Homura just like Homura loved Madoka. Madoka didn’t know the extent to which Homura cared, so she thought that by maintaining Homura’s memory of who Madoka was, she’d leave Homura with the knowledge that Madoka cared for her. Ironically though, this plan backfired as Homura was driven more and more insane by the fact that she couldn’t be together with the one she loved most. And so that leads us into the topic of the next and final installment of this series, Homura’s Actions in the Rebellion Story.