I watched some Sailor Moon as a kid but was never hugely attached to that show.
As a young adult I watched the Nanoha series and very much enjoyed it. A number of its characters are quite admirable and perhaps even could be seen as role models. I've seen the three main seasons (first, A's, and StrikerS), and ViVid Strike!, though not ViVid.
I also watched Magic Knight Rayearth. In fact I've played (the SNES version), read, and watched it.
I've also seen some Pretty Cure, including all of Fresh, which I enjoyed. Been meaning to watch Futari wa and Heartcatch but haven't gotten around to it.
While I don't gravitate toward magical girl series in general (I don't feel any special desire to watch Cardcaptor Sakura, for example), I can certainly enjoy it.
My opinion of MadoMagi is a bit odd in that I'm a huge fan of Homura but can't say I like the show's story itself, because of a couple reasons, the second of which is that I disagree with how it turned out. In fact (I feel) I'm sorta in Homura's shoes when it comes to going "wait, what the hell just happened, this wasn't supposed to happen" at the ending of the TV show. And perhaps as a result, I haven't watched Rebellion, since I'm not yet done disagreeing with the show. But Homura herself is an inspiring character, for me. She represents the concept of "things weren't supposed to go wrong like this; they were supposed to happen this other way", and the desire to rectify such wrongs.
(The other reason is that I feel the show didn't do a good job connecting me emotionally with the characters and giving me a good understanding of the world, beyond just laying out the setting's rules in many words.)
More recently I've watched Yuki Yuna Is A Hero (Yuuki Yuuna wa Yuusha de aru), and I appreciated it. While I could see superficial similarities with MadoMagi, it certainly took things in a different direction and is a pretty distinct story in its own right.
(Amusingly, I have a friend, whose opinion of these latter two shows is sort of the opposite of mine. He has a very low opinion of YuYuYu and a high opinion of MadoMagi.) |