Talk:Timelines

Note: Please always sign your name when editing talk page by putting four tildes (~~~~) at the end of your comment.

Magia Record Anime status as an anomaly

I'm not sure if we should consider AniReco to be an anomalous timeline in the same way the GameReco timeline is. I can't remember the exact story, but I've heard it was retconned from "APS existing is an anomaly and GameReco is the only timeline to have that happen" to "APS succeeding is an anomaly and GameReco is the only timeline to have that happen"...? EPF (talk) 08:35, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

GameReco is an anomaly caused by Iroha's survival. If I recall INU Curry's tweet correctly, AniReco is Madokami's attempt at recreating the same phenomenon and Doppel System. Sweet Beanie (talk) 09:56, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I checked his tweets from March 2020 to August 2022, I found nothing like that. EPF (talk) 17:39, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

This is a bit unofficial, as I can't find the interview/tweet where it's originally from, but I'd saved this conversation regarding how anireco can exist.File:Discord_stitch.jpg Sweet Beanie (talk) 22:15, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Both the quote and your conclusion sound like utter nonsense. I agree with your conversation partner in that the explanation isn't really worth hearing. A timeline isn't even remotely like writing an essay. It's simpler and more logical to assume the Magia Record timeline is a timeline that wasn't changed by Madoka's wish but had the same conditions of Kyuubey existing and making contracts. The concept of "subsuming every timeline" when she made her wish is a paradox to begin with, and a paradox is by definition something that doesn't (can't) happen. So logically all PMMM timelines should be split into "ones where Madoka became a god" and "ones where Madoka didn't become a god", Magia Record is one of the latter, and Madokami can somehow observe just that one from the latter category but for some reason isn't able to observe other similar timelines. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 01:27, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Conflating Puella Historia with the original timeline

I don't think we can be sure that Puella Historia events happened in a reasonably similar extent in the original timeline. While they technically are pre-pebble, ultimately:

• Many of the time travel shenanigans are inherently Magia Record exclusive, given that there most likely is no other timeline where Iroha, Ui, Touka and Nemu become one with APS and attempt to record history
• Some events are clearly contradictory to the main timeline. Most notably regarding Himiko and Cleopatra. Looking at Episode 11 around the 6th minute, Cleopatra, Himiko and Jeanne d'Arc are namedropped in runes, with relevant real-life historical events being displayed and just an episode later same figures are displayed in front, mostly being saved by Madoka.
  • Nobody objects to Jeanne d'Arc being Jeanne d'Arc thanks to Tart Magica (though pre-Tart material confirmed it as well)
  • See Talk:Minor Characters (Magia Record)#Inclusion of characters that existed in other forms in previous media and Himiko (Character) for explanations why Himiko is Himiko
  • There are three ways Cleopatra is confirmed to indeed be Cleopatra: first, the Witch Runes/Episode 11 say so, second, one of the events shown in that very moment is her death, File:Dead_cleopatra.png, which is by snake bite - which is the way Cleopatra VII died according to legend, third, File:Ep._11_Storyboard.jpg reads クレオパトラ (Cleopatra) in the third panel to the right.
    • See how I noted it's specifically Cleopatra VII? Well, here's a fragment from Puella Historia: Mirage of Alexandria, as translated by Magia Union Translations' BST/Antimony:

＜紀元前30年８月29日…＞
<On August 29 of 30 BCE,>

＜オクタウィアヌスに幽閉されていた@クレオパトラ７世は厳重な監視下にも関わらず@自死したと伝わっている＞
<it is said that Cleopatra VII, imprisoned by Octavius, committed suicide despite being under strict surveillance.>

＜その方法は、贈答品の果物に忍ばせていた@猛毒のコブラに自らを咬ませたというが…＞
<According to legend, she did so by allowing herself to be bit by a venomous cobra hidden in a basket of fruit gifted to her…>

＜真相は、定かではない…＞
<...But the truth remains unknown.>

FILENAME: 518620-12_0b1U9.json

＜クレオパトラの死から数日後…＞
<A few days after Cleopatra's death…>

長老: …で…
Elder: Hm…

長老: ファラオには会えたのか？@エボニーよ
Elder: So you met with the pharaoh, Ebony?

It's the very same Cleopatra VII! EPF (talk) 08:35, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I suppose that's correct, but it also brings some things to question. Are they actually the same timeline or is Homura switching universes? I say this because in one timeline Kyosuke played guitar instead of the violin. I've heard people mention that but I don't know if there's been any confirmation Sweet Beanie (talk) 09:56, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I'm not really sure what the official terminology is, but assumming Homura does timeline jumping doesn't necessarily eradicate other methods of timeline-branching. Same story with parallel universes, actually. EPF (talk) 17:42, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Also I suppose it kind of depends on how "atomic" we consider a "timeline" to be. Do we currently have 3 timelines: pre-madokami, post-madokami pre-akuma and post-akuma? Or do we have the supposed hundred from god-knows-which interview, each for every time Homura rewinds the clock, and then some that popped up with other spinoffs? EPF (talk) 17:44, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't understand what message you're trying to convey by dropping that translation fragment…? But I do agree there is some mild evidence for the Magia Record universe and the main anime universe not having identical histories. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 20:52, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I've seen people suggest before, not necessarily on this wiki, that the two Cleopatras could simply not both be Cleopatra VII (as there are multiple rulers by that name). However both the 2011 anime Cleopatra and MagiReco Cleopatra use the same myth about dying by snake bite, which is associated with specifically Cleopatra VII. EPF (talk) 08:05, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Ahhh, that makes sense now. Thanks. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 01:02, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Too messy

Even with nothing filled in yet, this page is a nonsensical mess. The inclusion of historical events here is just confusing at best, misleading at worst. Then there's the bizarre split of the Wraith Arc timeline into four parts (1, 2, 3, 4) for no apparent reason – I'm not aware of any evidence to suggest that the anime epilogue, Wraith Arc, and Rebellion don't all fit into the same timeline. Then there's the highly questionable inclusion of the Magia Record timelines in the Law of Cycles section when those timelines don't have a Law of Cycles. And what the heck is "Paradox" supposed to mean? None of the possibilities I can imagine seem like something that belong on this page. Finally, creating a page that's all structure and no content is extremely questionable in and of itself. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 20:59, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

I thought I'd include historical events that regard Magical Girls, which is why I included a lot of information about Pernelle and info from her MSS. I also included the stuff from Tart since it's not affected by Homura's time loops. The "final timeline" is the one which results in Madoka becoming Madokami. The Universal rewrite is the rewrite made by Madoka's wish and the timelines in its category are the ones that were changed after Madokami's rewrite, which is why both Magia Record timelines are included in it. The "forgotten timeline" is from Wraith Arc and it is important to note because all of Wraith Arc is undone by the end of it. Which is also why it is different from the Rebellion timeline, which is the one where Akuma Homura comes to existence. Paradox is the section that will include various parts from Magia Record where Paradoxes happened and also what paradoxes are and what they do (basically explaining why Mikoto was a threat in the arc 2 finale). I realize that the names are unofficial, but I simply added the ones I thought'd be most fitting for them. I do plan to explain what the page is for and what timelines change (such as when Kyosuke got a guitar and Cleopatra not becoming a Magical Girl), and how they were created, but I thought having a structure would be a reliable way to start out. If you think the page shouldn't exist, I understand, but I still think that the information that's meant for it should be somewhere that's easy to access. Sweet Beanie (talk) 21:16, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

That's a huge wall of text, but I'll try to respond to your points one at a time…

• Regarding historical events, including stuff from Tart: they're just going to clutter up the page. The historical events are identical for every timeline, except for the rewritten worlds and maybe Magia Record, so putting them on a page dedicated to discussing the timelines is just going to get in the way. The most obvious way it gets in the way is that having historical events means that every section must now have a Present Day subsection, which is amazingly terrible (having 30 sections with the same name on a page? Really?).
• Regarding the final timeline: There is definitely a clear line of causality from the final timeline into Rebellion and the upcoming Walpurgisnacht Rising, which I feel is enough to qualify that as a single timeline. But on the other hand, all of history was rewritten twice during that time, which perhaps is an argument to separate it out into three timelines.
• Regarding Wraith Arc and Rebellion: I just checked the finale of the Wraith Arc manga again, but I don't see where you get the idea that everything was undone. The climax of the fight against the Spindle Witch appears to break Homura's shield (without activating it), and a few pages later Kyuubey is looking at a fragment of that shield and spouting words that clearly foreshadow Rebellion. It may be the case that memories of the events were erased (though it's unclear), but that's very different from them having never happened. Though, the ending is not very clear at all, so probably any theory we come up with is no better than speculation.
• Regarding Magia Record: You said that "the Universal rewrite is the rewrite made by Madoka's wish and the timelines in its category are the ones that were changed after Madokami's rewrite, which is why both Magia Record timelines are included in it", but that makes no sense whatsoever. In fact, isn't the entire premise of the game that the timeline was not changed by Madokami's rewrite? And that fact of being unchanged is what drew Madokami's attention to it.
• Regarding structure without content: This approach makes sense if you're drafting something out in private – build the structure and slowly fill in the details. But this is a public wiki. Having structure without content just means that someone comes to the page and is disappointed to find nothing but air.
• Regarding paradoxes: Excluding the arc 2 finale which I haven't seen yet, I don't think any paradoxes have ever actually occurred in the Magia Record story. There was a lot of talk in the Tart Magica events about being worried about paradoxes, but I never saw evidence that the concerns were truly warranted. Indeed, as Iroha herself said in Maiden of Hope, "We were so worried the whole time about changing history, but… everything worked out in the end. So maybe it would have, no matter what?". But even if there are paradoxes in the arc 2 finale, what does that have to do with timelines? Or, at most, it would be a note in the specific timeline it occurred in, not a toplevel section of its own.

Ultimately my objection is not to the page's existence but to its structure and content. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 21:47, 3 January 2025 (UTC)

Maybe we could divide this page into multiple sections? Like, universal events go in the main Timeline Page, then a page for the original show timeline, then another page for paradox timelines? That might work. Amaterasu (talk) 19:03, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

That could also get messy. First, some timelines are intristically tied closer to one piece of media than others - I think the only timelines that are considered paradoxes come from the MagiReco game, some timelines introduced in one story get further reinterpreted or expanded upon in others (like Scene0 reinterpreting the 2011 anime, Tart Magica slightly reinterpreting the design of Jeanne d'Arc). But more importantly, I don't believe we can be sure there are events that are truly universal, we have evidence of events from as early as 2000 years ago being different between one installment and another (Cleopatra). Many installments are completely detached from one another (I don't think we have anything that references TDS, Wraith Arc, Homura's Revenge or NMS at the moment), many's only point of contact is MagiReco which is its own timeline even if the characters come from another spinoff. EPF (talk) 21:06, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

Um, isn't the page you're referring to as "the main Timeline Page" really the timeline for the original series? Though it does have a Magia Record section for some reason, but since Magia Record now has its own timeline page, I don't know if there's a reason for that to stay on the other page…

Anyway, as I stated above, I think this page should be limited to the timelines that stem from Homura's time travel, and should not even reference events that occurred before her birth. Logically speaking, there would be no reason to think that Homura's time travel could alter the history of the world prior to her birth (though that's assuming it really is time travel and not some sort of dimensional displacement type thing). So, from the perspective of historical events, we really only have two timelines – the "primary" timeline of the anime, and the "secondary" timeline of Magia Record. (The two rewritten worlds could be added as well, for a total of four, but that's only if we ever learn of any historical events in those worlds that differ from the primary timeline.) Thus, having a separate page for historical events will keep things that much cleaner.

And as for paradoxes, it doesn't count as a paradox just because characters say "oh no we're causing a paradox". The characters are not all-knowing, so their analysis of such a thing can't really be trusted (probably, not even if it's Pernelle or Kyuubey). Still, even if there is a clear paradox somewhere, I don't understand how you could separate that out from the timeline that spawned it. I would put it either on this page or on a historical events page, filed under the relevant timeline. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 01:15, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

The problem is - it appears that Homura's shield isn't the only source of time travel or timeline creation. For instance, Pax Romana's Sweetheart is directly stated to have two separate timelines as a result of Amaryllis' wish, Arc 2's finale has Iroha turning back the time after everyone dies fighting the Mirror Witch, Null Mahou Shoujo has Kosane witness her own suicide countless times as she's stuck in a timeloop. Or on an even bigger scale, Madoka's Episode 12 wish caused most of the timelines with Witches to be destroyed, creating new ones free of them, which later was once again changed by Rebellion's finale. The mechanics of all those events are often left somewhat vague, but limiting "timeline" to "something created by Homura" would make sense with 2011's installments, not now in 2024. EPF (talk) 16:07, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't see how that's a problem? Homura's shield is still the #1 primary source of alternate timelines in the franchise. The few you've noted here are the exceptions, and your list here is probably exhaustive as well. (You've omitted the Tart Magica time travel cases, but those appear to be stable time loops, so no new timeline is created.) So focusing on Homura-originated timelines still makes sense now in 2024. Amaryllis's original timeline and Kosane's loop (assuming it's an alternate timeline rather than a stable time loop) can be noted in a page on historical events, as both predate Homura as far as I know. (Even if Kosane actually postdates Homura, which might be the case if you take the original anime to occur in the year of its original broadcast, her events aren't entangled with Homura's in any way.) Iroha's time travel is entangled with Homura's, so it can be mentioned on the main page here. And the rewrites are similarly entangled with Homura's time travel, so I think it's fine to mention them here on this page. But including the historical events here just clutters things up. ~ Celtic Minstrel (talk) 16:22, 5 January 2025 (UTC)

Citing specific stories

I think it would be worthwhile to add from which part of a story instalment any given piece of information is from... This page plans on distilling information from two movies, 37 TV-sized episodes, a light novel, at least 6 different manga, multiple video games, one of which had nearly 7 years worth of continuous content, and probably some word-of-god. Something like (Tart Magica Chapter 2) or (Magia Record Event Story Hereafter) should be enough, I don't think we'd need to go down to the exact page (for manga), battle (for magireco), or timestamp (for anime). Just enough to track down where something is from. I don't think it matters if we do it with <ref>s or just a simple link with parenthesis, as long as we keep it consistent, it's just a matter of aesthetic. Without that it's difficult to fact-check/verify information, read further if someone's interested, or deal with story contradictions like Himiko/Cleopatra from above or the amount of timelines Homura went through via Scene0 (that kept the value under 20 iirc) and Nitro+ Q&A Panels at Animagic 2013 (that stated the amount was approaching 100). EPF (talk) 18:54, 4 January 2025 (UTC)

We should use Template:Reflist. I put an example in the Null Magical Girl info section I added. Amaterasu (talk) 19:01, 4 January 2025 (UTC)