Since the very inception of it, the Puella Magi franchise has been regarded as lesbian media, but despite its overall homoerotic tone and certain commentary, there has never been any explicit in-series confirmation of main characters’ sexualities and romantic interests. One might look at this fact and conclude that it means that the characters are not homosexual at all and the only reason for those elements existing is pure bait, however I will disprove those accusation by analyzing an event chapter from the game version of Magia Record and unveiling eye-opening subtext within it.
Before we begin, I will give a short overview of the story: one summer day Homura visits Kamihama City while there is a magical girl fishing contest happening. Homura wins by a technicality of having fished out her own glasses. Mitama, the person coordinating the contest, reveals she has hypnotized Yachiyo, the previous fishing champion, to participate against Homura in the final round. Hijinks ensue and Homura has to save Sayaka from drowning using a fishing rod.
While the content of the event isn’t very interesting or even that funny in and of itself, it does contain intriguing details that I believe are not only the master class of hidden symbolism but also the answer to that age old question of whether the Puella Magi franchise is actually about girls' love.
Case №1: Why fishing is symbolic
Obviously with gacha games there are many events that feature characters in new outfits with stories centered around them, usually those outfits and stories are cute or sexy in nature. Certainly some people might be entertained by Homura’s swimsuit given that it fits the traditional concept of cute and sexy, but why fishing exactly? It will be very important to answer this question before we are able to move forward with the analysis.
While tracing the exact roots of this allegory might be impossible in the current era, it's undeniable that a metaphor of fishing in terms of courting women has been engraved into our society for many centuries with such terms as “hooked”, “hookups” and proverbs like, “There’s plenty of fish in the sea”, as well as countless pieces of media making their own fishing jokes about dating.
Of course on its own the sheer act of fishing might not be an indication of something else going on, it must be acknowledged that fishing isn’t free from certain implications and connotations that will help us understand this story better when approached from a deeper angle.
Case №2: The Homura and Yachiyo parallel
Both the original TV show and the spin off story feature a cast of 5 main characters who share traits between each other. Some are more explicit - how the two protagonists share a colour palette and general personality type - others are more thematic like loss of family or pushing yourself too hard. From all the promotional material it is fairly easy to come to a conclusion that the character who juxtaposes Homura is Yachiyo, their similarities are:
- They share general bishoujo archetype characteristics
- They are stuck in a loop (though the defining qualities of the individual’s ‘loop’ are different)
- They have a very strong relationship with the protagonist that the vast majority of fans perceive to have romantic undertones
Now let’s take a look at all of that in the light of this particular story. Fishing doesn’t have anything to do with being a beautiful woman or battling your own cruel fate, but fishing has been, as we’ve established before, associated with having strong, romantic or sexual, feelings towards an individual. It's noteworthy that aside from this the two characters have not been linked directly or indirectly to fishing: they haven’t been portrayed as fishing or being interested in fishing, Yachiyo is in fact associated with water, but Homura is not and the only other character in this story who is associated with water, is not fishing.
Case №3: Homura’s arc
In the beginning, Homura seems to be doing terribly and doesn’t catch any fish, she drops her glasses in water but manages to hook and reel them back in, making her the technical winner, being that she is the only person participating that ended up catching at least something. Even without context, this should immediately strike you as somewhat peculiar: Homura, in this universe, at this point in time, is shortsighted and needs to be wearing glasses at all times to be able to see, so how could she have fished out a small object out of running water without them? Why would the writers intentionally put that in, despite it seemingly not making sense, when the object that Homura dropped could’ve been anything as long as it could serve the narrative purpose of being fished out. I believe this plotpoint makes a whole lot more sense when you cross reference it with Homura’s arc in the original TV show.
Just like in this event, in the original TV show Homura starts off as wearing glasses, being an anxious child who is bad at a lot of things in life until, upon repeating the time loop many, many times, she takes off her glasses and exclusively focuses on the goal of saving the one person who means the world to her. The act of losing glasses in fictional media is seen as a common trope to externally show an internal character change, usually to do with becoming less dorky and more confident. It is natural that this kind of change is caused by Madoka, the person that Homura is trying to save, who is widely believed to be her same-sex crush.
This association is further reinforced by the event's conclusion. At the end, Homura is alone and she expresses happiness for being able to save a friend but also fear as she wonders if she will be able to save Madoka when she is in trouble. It may be a little dramatic after such a silly story full of goofs and gaffes, but from the perspective of the fishing metaphor, it makes perfect sense.
Case №4: Yachiyo’s arc
Mitama states that she has used hypnosis to get Yachiyo to participate in the finals but we also know that Yachiyo has willingly and successfully fished in the past, which is apparent from dialogue cues and the fact that she cannot fish very well under hypnosis. While it is definitely in character for Yachiyo to be annoyed with Mitama’s antics and therefore refuse to do something pointless and stupid, something has to have happened to change her mind on fishing since the previous contest.
To me this appears to be, just like in Homura’s case, a reference to Yachiyo’s character and story arc. Yachiyo used to be very close to a woman in the past, but, as fans know, by the start of Magia Record, that woman’s whereabouts are unknown. This is a traumatic event for Yachiyo and as such gives reason for her withdrawn attitude and why she is hesitant to become close and intimate with another person: she is stuck in the past, unable to process feelings of grief.
This is the most logical explanation as to why she refuses to fish currently despite having in the past. Catching fish is a symbolic of her having caught a woman before and refusing to let go. Yachiyo is hesitant to cast a new reel even though she becomes more and more involved with a new woman with the events of the main story, and her being coerced into entering the contest may just represent her being unwillingly involved in Iroha’s search for her sister.
Conclusion
In conclusion, I believe the evidence is strong enough to confirm that both Homura and Yachiyo, in fact, were intentionally written to be fishing and truck-loving homosexuals, the level of detail in such a silly and one off story does not make sense if the writers were not trying to reach out to true and diligent fans of the franchise. And so this by proxy confirms that Ren and Rika are really lame characters who are really lame and, in spite of technically being the only characters to have been explicitly stated to be romantically interested in women, are not the only girls' love couple at all, and it's an insult to our intelligence if SHAFT truly thinks we, true fans, would ever fall for such an implicit lie.
