You have been warned.
Mahou Shojo Madoka was a pretty solid show that I thoroughly enjoyed, in spite of its many flaws. The show was very captivating in its themes and storyline, and while it certainly isn't perfect, the show was undeniably a joy to watch from start to finish.
The moment I heard about Madoka's sequel, I was immediately skeptical. Not only was the show conclusive, it wrapped up its themes, characters, and did what it could in the short time it had. The show had no need whatsoever for a sequel, and I walked into it with the mindset that, well, it's a cash grab (as harsh as that may sound).
As you can probably tell by looking at the score I gave it, this stayed until the end of the movie.
I won't mention artwork, animation or sound, since they're very much the same as the show and I already wrote a review about my thoughts about the show.
What I do want to talk about, however, are the characters, theme-handling and story.
The tone in Madoka Rebellion is a complete whiplash from the rest of the show, but this isn't necessarily a bad thing. The show knew when to switch tones and when to be atmospheric and quiet. The problem, however, is that the movie doesn't; moods change really quickly with no real hint, from happy go lucky to sad to happy go lucky to sad and so on, with no real consistency or logic behind it.
You can argue that due to certain aspects of this movie's plot, this change in tone makes sense in the context of the story and it makes sense that the tone would change so often. I don't think it works from a storytelling stand-point. This movie has only one quiet scene that adds to the atmosphere, and every other scene is extremely loud for the sake of shock factor and whiplash, from the witch that bit Mami's head off being her friend to how abnormally close (you can practically argue they're a thing in this movie) Kyouko and Sayaka are.
This movie feels like fanfiction. Everything about the story flows unnaturally, and while there is foreshadowing behind the twists, they don't feel like twists. They feel like the writers were having a bet as how to surpass the original series in terms of being as dark as possible, which made me feel like I was constantly being made fun of the longer the movie persisted.
The themes of the original series are completely broken, and the ending of the TV series has been ruined for no real reason. Hell, I'm not entirely sure there even is a theme consistent with the original series. The only one I can think of which is consistent here is the selflessness vs selfishness theme, and that has been taken to such an extreme in this movie that it feels out of character and pathetic. The show balanced that theme exceptionally well, never feeling forced or contrived. This is completely gone here.
The characters are all acting completely out of character from start to finish, with the possible exception of Madoka. Homura acts completely out of character in the second half of the movie, and while the movie foreshadows this, her behavior is very out of character compared to the show. The other characters I already mentioned previously my concerns with, and Kyuubey is strangely thick compared to his previously cold and composed nature.
Overall, I don't like this movie. I felt like this was a middle finger to everything related to Madoka. The characters are not acting like themselves, nothing of real value has been added to the characters or themes, the story has advanced in a bizarre direction that hints that this is going to become more of an edgefest, and the directing is much weaker than the series.
As far as I'm concerned, this movie doesn't exist.
