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Excuse me, I feel obligated to point out that just a few hours ago IC, that "Homicidal psychopath" walked into the house of the person she despised the most in the entire world, alongside someone we know to be a homicidal nutjob who specifically wanted to kill that person, and yet, somehow, that person is alive.

Two homicidal psychopaths who are working together walk into the home of somebody who they want to kill, and when they leave the house is ransacked but she's alive. Would you please explain to me how that is supposed to work, @The Narrator? It seems to me that one of the two must not be a homicidal psychopath, hmm? Or will your next suggestion be that they wanted to torment her before killing her? Is Hijiri not just a homicidal psychopath, but a depraved would-be torturer, seeking the death of her victim only after putting them through a gauntlet of suffering?

Tell me more about this, and how it's supposed to be probable (because yes, of course it's possible -- except it's incredibly unlikely and therefore we can't vote based on the premise of it being probable) that that is truly Hijiri's nature. And do it without backing down from calling her, in your words, a "homicidal psychopath." Let's keep the goalposts exactly where you set them down, because you know what, if you want to make these arguments, you had best be prepared to either back them up or admit being wrong.
 
@Kaizuki I think that it's entirely possible that Hijiri is not a nascent mass murderer in this timeline like she was in PMKM. But Aura seems insistent that she'd become a "homicidal psychopath" (his words) if she were gemmed, and that's why we have to let her go. People don't just flip a switch one day and go from normal to spree killer, the psychology has to already be developing. So is she one bad experience away from wanting to kill everyone or isn't she? If she is, then I think she's probably going to get there one way or another. If she isn't, then I don't think that gemming her is going to make it happen. Knocking someone out briefly to keep them from escaping custody is hardly the moral equivalent of keeping hundreds of girls disembodied and in stasis indefinitely, and the idea that she'd have the exact same reaction is hard for me to buy.

Also, yes, in PMKM canon, Hijiri did try to make the Pleiades suffer before killing them by doing shit like stealing their Kazumi clone. Ultimately she didn't even kill Niko herself but let one of the other villains she'd set in their path do it and then stepped in to take her place.

EDIT: It's also hard for me to buy that canon-Hijiri was motivated by any sort of moral outrage regarding the Freezer, because when she gained access to it, she didn't free those girls, she witched them out. You're assigning a nobility to her motives that isn't present in the text.
 
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People don't just flip a switch one day and go from normal to spree killer, the psychology has to already be developing. So is she one bad experience away from wanting to kill everyone or isn't she?
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People DO experience psychotic breaks, do something they wouldn't otherwise do, and relapse later. It happens literally all the time; whether Hijiri remains consistently homicidal doesn't matter, it only takes lashing out the once.

Also, yes, in PMKM canon, Hijiri did try to make the Pleiades suffer before killing them by doing shit like stealing their Kazumi clone. Ultimately she didn't even kill Niko herself but let one of the other villains she'd set in their path do it and then stepped in to take her place.
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That was explicitly because she was a coward and didn't believe she could take Niko and the other Pleiades in a fight. This circumstance of her attacking Niko to knock her out already means her psychology is notably different.

EDIT: It's also hard for me to buy that canon-Hijiri was motivated by any sort of moral outrage regarding the Freezer, because when she gained access to it, she didn't free those girls, she witched them out. You're assigning a nobility to her motives that isn't present in the text.
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Uh, I wasn't accusing her of moral outrage so much as being hit right in the issues so hard she snaps over it and decides they're all just as bad as the person she thinks is responsible for everything wrong with her life. She didn't do it out of empathy.

And I'm not going to hold what she did in that final bit against her TOO hard because she was grief-spiralling so excessively she was hysterically talking about killing all humans and that Kazumi was the only person she loved and they were gonna be clone-married and stuff. She literally had snapped beyond recovery at that point.

Also, uh...

If Oriko was really going to be so dead-set on being a dangerous loony-toons as you guys seem to think she would be, Oriko would have warned us. But Oriko seemed confident we could handle the situation even knowing about Sabrina's naive methods.
 
Keep in mind that Hijiri in canon didn't immediately go from 1 to 100 instantly. Her plan (and insanity) escalated in stages as time went on. Her plan started off with just Niko, then the Pleiades, and then the entire world as her plan reached its climax.

At first, her role in the revenge plan was extremely passive, as she started with only supplying two unstable Magical Girls with the Evil Nuts in hopes that the Pleiades would waste magic fighting the Magical Girls and fake Witches, and mostly stayed out of the way. Only when Yuuri and the Soujos were out of commission, and when Niko transformed into a Witch, did she take a slightly less passive role in her plan as she replaced Niko to keep a closer eye on the Pleiades. Even then, she mostly just watched the Pleiades self-destruct. When the remaining Pleiades planned to kill the degenerating Kazumi, she finally decided to take an active role in her revenge scheme, saving Kazumi, causing the Witchout of Saki, and then going crazy with her plan by creating a super Witch to kill all humans.

The point is, she's not going to from how she is to homicidal in an instant with one bad choice on Sabrina's part. This sort of mental/emotional escalation happens over the course of an extended amount of time, but if she's allowed the time and opportunity to transition between these stages of escalation, then she'll become a possible worst case threat. That being said, this is why we can't let her leave. If she's allowed the time, and the possible validation, for her negative feelings to continue to fester, then her mental state might just end up worse like how it did in Kazumi Magica. Yes, she'll probably dislike or possibly hate Sabrina and/or the Pleiades for not letting her go, but that's alright as long as she ends up better in the long-term. Anything's better than her mental state entering a self-perpetuating downward spiral.
 
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AuraTwilight said:
Also, uh...

If Oriko was really going to be so dead-set on being a dangerous loony-toons as you guys seem to think she would be, Oriko would have warned us. But Oriko seemed confident we could handle the situation even knowing about Sabrina's naive methods.
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One too many Oriko in there, but yes. One would think that if Hijiri had a "developing mass murderer" psychology, Oriko would have mentioned that, since if, as you say @The Narrator, she is one action away from becoming it, well, precog.

AuraTwilight said:
That was explicitly because she was a coward and didn't believe she could take Niko and the other Pleiades in a fight. This circumstance of her attacking Niko to knock her out already means her psychology is notably different.
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No, I don't think so. Rather, if she'd already recruited Anri, it's entirely possible that this entire thing is a ripple of us pulling half the Pleiades out of town. It would've been the best opportunity for an attack that would be available for months, if not years -- Anri might've turned on her (or at least stopped following her lead) if she hadn't taken it. My standing theory is that that was what happened -- but I wasn't aware that Hijiri being a coward was canon. That clicks into place very nicely -- Airi forces her to launch an attack, she isn't willing to kill Niko for reasons (name it, cowardice, fear that it'd bring the rest of the Pleiades down on her, etc etc), she grabs the memory device to get away instead of the clear seed that would let her fight...

This is my model atm, selected for highest probability based on "closer to canon is more likely" and "closer to realistic is more likely":

At some point in the last couple weeks she observed the Pleiades fighting a witch, and was then contacted by Kyubey, who informed her that she was a clone created by Niko while helpfully omitting the "how" and "why," maybe even implying some horrible shit without actually saying anything explicitly. She contracted, making a wish to the effect of becoming connected to the Pleiades, which is why she has their powers, and planned some degree of malicious action against them, or perhaps just against Niko. She then ran into Airi and recruited her, figuring she'd make a useful, if batshit crazy, pawn. Then came yesterday, when very suddenly half of the Pleiades left town. It was too good an opportunity to pass up, she had to do something while they were away, or risk Airi deciding she was too soft. So she chucked whatever plans she had out the window and hit Niko's lab.
 
Kaizuki said:
One too many Oriko in there, but yes. One would think that if Hijiri had a "developing mass murderer" psychology, Oriko would have mentioned that, since if, as you say @The Narrator, she is one action away from becoming it, well, precog.
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Oriko lost her precog quite a while ago, and only ever looked in on Asunaro a couple times. There's lots she doesn't know.

Also, I think there's some confusion here. That Hijiri's one action away from going mass murderer is the base assumption of Aura's position, not mine. I don't think gemming her will turn her homicidal. I think she might throw a tantrum and lash out, but nothing to won't pass if she can't actually hurt anybody. But I'm also proposing that even if Aura was right and it were going to cause her to snap, then a) if she's that close to the edge then it's probably inevitable anyway if she's left running loose without treatment, and b) then at least if she snaps she'll be safely contained where she can't hurt anyone and we can try to help her.

I think that gemming her is the safest option for either scenario. If she isn't going to go psycho, then she remains in custody and we can keep trying to get through to her. If she is going to go psycho, then she's psycho where she can't hurt anyone, with an anti-magic enchantment on her and possibly even some psychiatric help if we can arrange it. If we don't gem her and she doesn't go psycho, then she's still a hostile and manipulative criminal meguca on the loose, who maybe will listen to us when we try to talk to her in the future. If we don't gem her and she does go psycho, then we've let a supervillain loose who's going to try to kill people, and possibly succeed.
 
Also, I think there's some confusion here. That Hijiri's one action away from going mass murderer is the base assumption of Aura's position, not mine. I don't think gemming her will turn her homicidal. I think she might throw a tantrum and lash out, but nothing to won't pass if she can't actually hurt anybody. But I'm also proposing that even if Aura was right and it were going to cause her to snap, then a) if she's that close to the edge then it's probably inevitable anyway if she's left running loose without treatment, and b) then at least if she snaps she'll be safely contained where she can't hurt anyone and we can try to help her.
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You know, for the record, I've also been arguing that even if she's just so fucking angry she never listens to us again, and that it does permanent or long-term emotional harm to her, it's still 100% unacceptable. I just find that her lashing out violently over it is too much of a gamble and shouldn't be dismissed because her possibly going violent is exactly why people want to Gem her in the first place.

Also, A) is bullshit and not at all how child psychology works, and is actually the sort of thinking we look for when we shut down care centers. For the record.

I think that gemming her is the safest option for either scenario. If she isn't going to go psycho, then she remains in custody and we can keep trying to get through to her. If she is going to go psycho, then she's psycho where she can't hurt anyone, with an anti-magic enchantment on her and possibly even some psychiatric help if we can arrange it. If we don't gem her and she doesn't go psycho, then she's still a hostile and manipulative criminal meguca on the loose, who maybe will listen to us when we try to talk to her in the future. If we don't gem her and she does go psycho, then we've let a supervillain loose who's going to try to kill people, and possibly succeed.
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"She might go psycho if we don't Gem her so let's absolutely guarantee that she does so that we can justify holding her down with force."

This is absolutely, positively putrid.
 
AuraTwilight said:
"She might go psycho if we don't Gem her so let's absolutely guarantee that she does so that we can justify holding her down with force."

This is absolutely, positively putrid.
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That putrid line of thinking is a strawman entirely of your own invention.

I don't think that gemming her is certain or even likely to make her go psycho. And I don't need to create a justification to hold her: she's already a prisoner who's attempting escape after we have been incredibly accommodating towards her. If she were using any method other than lightning travel and we could restrain her using ribbons or Grief, it wouldn't even be a question that we would be stopping her escape.

Your position seems to be predicated on the idea that Hijiri is somehow simultaneously too unstable to be gemmed without suffering a complete psychotic break, and yet not unstable enough to be a danger to herself or others if left to her own devices. I find it hard to believe that such a middle ground exists.
 
Draft, around 210 words currently. Still working on it. Thoughts on the approach?

[] Don't stop her, but open telepathy. Goal: social hard enough that she turns around; if not, give her something to think about.
-[] So she gave up on her goals because they couldn't be done for her?
-[] She knows that that's not what you meant. She can still have the life she wants, she just has to try harder.
-[] How much did Kyubey contribute to her conclusion? Omission and misdirection are its favorite tools. Its job is literally to cause distress.
-[] Your own creation remains a mystery, but you have great power. You've decided to use it to help and push people to achieve their goals. Whatever it is, you don't see how Hijiri's goal could be impossible.

[] Telepathy allies:
-[] Anri found. She has the clear seed. You're engaging.
-[] Hijiri's powerset is full Pleiades-union, she's running. Only excessive force could stop her, you're continuing social-fu - you don't know why she didn't run earlier.

[] Break to vote if Mami preempts social and grabs Hijiri.

[] Crush Anri.
-[] Physical KO, no gemming - don't lichbomb anyone.
-[] Hand tracking off to other sensors - grief telescope, ribbons, etc - and help Mami recover. If necessary, retreat to buy time.
-[] Don't let her gain telepathy.
-[] Body-kill is fine - good, even - if you can pass it off as unconsciousness.
 
We've long since concluded that that Hijiri isn't listening right now. No amount of words are going to stop her.


Also
AuraTwilight said:
And I'm not going to hold what she did in that final bit against her TOO hard because she was grief-spiralling so excessively she was hysterically talking about killing all humans and that Kazumi was the only person she loved and they were gonna be clone-married and stuff. She literally had snapped beyond recovery at that point.
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As it happens, we have just the solution for stopping a grief spiral.
 
It comes to mind that I should bring up Tetris as a relevant example of how a single event can make a spree killer.
 
Kaizuki said:
It comes to mind that I should bring up Tetris as a relevant example of how a single event can make a spree killer.
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Someone did bring that up a few hours ago, but I didn't think it was a fair comparison:
The Narrator said:
Mami thought she was putting her friends out of their misery before they inevitably died and killed others in the process. Oriko thought she was preventing the end of the world. It doesn't make it okay, but at least they had a reason that they thought would be worth the cost and were willing to make the same sacrifice themselves. PMKM Hijiri didn't care about the human cost, lashed out indiscriminately and had no real goal beyond hate.
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Tremble in despair mortals, PMKM is canon now.



Michiru/Kazumi, Umika, and Kaoru just hit Magia Record. There's also a girl with some kickass gun-tonfas.
 
Onmur said:
I think someone said it's Kazumi Subaru, rather than Michiru.
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Who cares?

The important thing is that there was a cool gunslinger magical girl, and we need Sabrina to drop what she's doing and go recruit that girl right now. Because she looked cool, plus pistols.

Also, this may just be me, but there was a disconcerting level of gratuitous quasi-nudity in those transformation sequences. I don't remember that actually being a thing in the Madoka show. Except for the "Naked Homura in Space" part at the end, aka "Don't watch these episodes at Panera Bread on your lunch break". Could have done without that.
 
Phigment said:
Also, this may just be me, but there was a disconcerting level of gratuitous quasi-nudity in those transformation sequences. I don't remember that actually being a thing in the Madoka show. Except for the "Naked Homura in Space" part at the end, aka "Don't watch these episodes at Panera Bread on your lunch break". Could have done without that.
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Pandering to the $$$ makes things worse again!

Phigment said:
The important thing is that there was a cool gunslinger magical girl, and we need Sabrina to drop what she's doing and go recruit that girl right now. Because she looked cool, plus pistols.
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Do you want to make mumi jelly?!
 
The Narrator said:
That putrid line of thinking is a strawman entirely of your own invention.
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You literally just said that if she's this likely to go crazy we shouldn't take pains to prevent it.

I don't think that gemming her is certain or even likely to make her go psycho.
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I hat3 to keep using this example but if you had this attitude in social services where I live you would absolutely get terminated.

And I don't need to create a justification to hold her: she's already a prisoner who's attempting escape after we have been incredibly accommodating towards her. If she were using any method other than lightning travel and we could restrain her using ribbons or Grief, it wouldn't even be a question that we would be stopping her escape.
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Sabrina isn't the fucking police. She doesn't have the right to be this careless because someone tried to escape captivity. We're not actually an authority figure, and by doing this we obliterate whatever social contract we have for helping Hijiri.

Your position seems to be predicated on the idea that Hijiri is somehow simultaneously too unstable to be gemmed without suffering a complete psychotic break, and yet not unstable enough to be a danger to herself or others if left to her own devices. I find it hard to believe that such a middle ground exists.
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So uh. We gonna ignore Sayaka literally turned into a witch and killed civilians over the lichbomb, basically? If there is any possibility of rehabilitating Hijiri you need to not fucking trigger her.

Also I'm not planning to leave Hijiri to her own devices, I've said this countless times, for pages and pages.

Romka said:
We've long since concluded that that Hijiri isn't listening right now. No amount of words are going to stop her.
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No fuck you, you can't make that conclusion. We have various pieces of social ammo people have wanted to use since before we caught Hijiri but people aren't even letting us try because they're making assumptions.


Also

As it happens, we have just the solution for stopping a grief spiral.
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Okay except not only can we not be with Hijiri at all times but also this is the same reasoning people used to justify threatening to witch Kirika.

It is actually motherfucking disgusting how completely dismissive and antipathic you guys are to the possibility of purposefully mentally scarring someone.
 
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Phigment said:
Also, this may just be me, but there was a disconcerting level of gratuitous quasi-nudity in those transformation sequences. I don't remember that actually being a thing in the Madoka show. Except for the "Naked Homura in Space" part at the end, aka "Don't watch these episodes at Panera Bread on your lunch break". Could have done without that.
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Also, the opening?
 
Phigment said:
Who cares?

The important thing is that there was a cool gunslinger magical girl, and we need Sabrina to drop what she's doing and go recruit that girl right now. Because she looked cool, plus pistols.

Also, this may just be me, but there was a disconcerting level of gratuitous quasi-nudity in those transformation sequences. I don't remember that actually being a thing in the Madoka show. Except for the "Naked Homura in Space" part at the end, aka "Don't watch these episodes at Panera Bread on your lunch break". Could have done without that.
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Did you see that frying pan? Between her, Mami, and Michiru, forgot making a meguca empire, we need to make meguca Iron Chef.

Also, you're misremembering; quasi-nudity in transformations was a thing in the original series (at least for Mami and Homura, off the top of my head), and has been a trope of the magical girl genre for basically forever.

It's interesting that-- although I know they did it for gameplay purposes-- all of the magical girls we've met do seem to gel with that five-elemental archetype system they're using in Magia Record: Fire, Water, Wind, Light, and Dark (of which Sabrina is the lattermost, obviously).
 
It's true, Frying Pan Girl has style, and potentially a place on the team. Also, Girl Who Doesn't Have A Weapon, She Just Punches Things.


Hmmm. I do remember the opening sequence being awkward. More for Madoka being put in humiliating clothes than nudity, but maybe my mind is editing stuff.

This is often a problem with anime. Knights of Sidonia is pretty cool, but before I can recommend it to anyone, I have to remember, "oh, yeah, there are a couple bits where female characters strip down for no particular reason, because anime", and decide whether it's going to be a problem.
 
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