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Make no mistake, this is definitely horror - but it's horror in the sense of total and utter despair, regret and hopelessness in the face of the inevitable. There are no monsters that jump out at you, and there are no gruesome character deaths to make you cringe. The remaining 9 episodes cover a nightmare-inducingly fatalistic and hopeless series of events that rank this show as among the emotionally darkest works of fiction I've ever seen. By the end of the third episode it is made abundantly clear that things do not go according to plan. The first two episodes are a brilliant but not entirely out-of-the-ordinary set-up for a magical girl anime. Like the other infamously existential anime 'Neon Genesis Evangelion', Madoka Magica starts out with the pretension of being representative of its genre so it can tear down those assumptions and tropes moments later. In reality, beyond the physical appearance of the characters Puella Magi Madoka Magica is a psychological-horror style genre deconstruction that has more in common with 'Faust' or 'Requiem for a Dream' than it does with anything else in the Magical Girl genre. The trailers and posters of this show are practically false advertising: When all they show is cute girls with wide eyes and colourful hair smiling and having fun, the show looks like it could be a shoddy clone of Sailor Moon.
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