Charlotte
This section may contain major spoilers!
Please refrain from reading if you are not yet familiar with all the latest media released.Charlotte (CHARLOTTE) is a witch appearing in episode 3 of the anime.
Charlotte reappears in Puella Magi Madoka Magica the Movie: Rebellion, though she has a slightly different appearance. The other characters call her "Bebe", and she helps the magical girls in their fight against the Nightmares. Bebe eventually returns to her human form, a magical girl named Nagisa Momoe.
Charlotte appears once more in the mobile game Magia Record.
Witch Cards
お菓子の魔女。その性質は執着。欲しいものは全部。絶対に諦めない。お菓子を無限に生み出せるが大好物のチーズだけは自分で作ることができない。チーズさえ持っていれば簡単に隙をつくことが出来ただろう。
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The witch of sweets. Her nature is tenacity. She desires everything. She will never give up. Though she is capable of creating infinite amounts of any dessert she desires, she is unable to make the cheese that she loves most. One could easily catch her off-guard with a piece of cheese. | ||||||||||
お菓子の魔女。その性質は執着。欲しいものは全部。絶対に諦めない。お菓子を無限に生み出せるが大好物のチーズだけは自分で作ることができない。チーズさえ持っていれば簡単に隙をつくことが出来ただろう。
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The witch of sweets. Her nature is tenacity. She desires everything. She will never give up. Though she is capable of creating infinite amounts of any dessert she desires, she is unable to make the cheese that she loves most. One could easily catch her off-guard with a piece of cheese. | ||||||||||
お菓子の魔女。かつて執着の夢を見た。マミの家に突如現れた謎の生き物。「ベベ」と名づけられるが、その正体は円環の理からやって来たお菓子の魔女。出会った当初はかなり無口で無表情だったが、いつの間にか今のような有様に。ちょっとうるさい。新しい服はマミのお手製。巴マミは、この魔女が最後に見たこわい夢に出てくる人に似ている。
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The witch of sweets. Once dreamt of tenacity. A mysterious creature who suddenly appeared in Mami's home. Was christened "Bebe," but it is actually the witch of sweets who arrived from the Law of Cycles. She was expressionless and silent when she was first encountered, but took on its current appearance out of the blue. A bit loud. Mami made its clothes by hand. Mami resembles someone who appeared in the final nightmare the witch saw. | ||||||||||
Minions
お菓子の魔女の手下。その役割はチーズを探すこと。しかし過度な期待は禁物。
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The witch of sweets' minion. It's duty is to search for cheese. However, one shouldn't expect much from it. | ||||||||||
逃走中のお菓子の魔女とお菓子の魔女の手下達。その役割はチーズの探索とチーズの看病。ほむら救出時、看護師姿の手下はマミの空中ブランコの移動を手伝い、ネズミ型の手下はなぎさの周囲をとにかく回っていた。
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The fleeing witch of sweets and her servants. Their roles are to search for cheese and to nurse the cheese. When saving Homura, the nurse-like servant helped with Mami's trapezes, while the mouse-like servants generally ran circles around Nagisa's position. | ||||||||||
In Magia Record
Doppel Description
The Doppel of tenacity. Its form is sweets. The master of this emotion becomes thoroughly attached to any person or thing that tugs at her heartstrings even once. Her actions may seem wretched at times, but a deep love runs through their foundation. This Doppel isn’t a fusion type, but it does take the form of a mask that emerges from its host’s nose and wraps around her entire face. While using this Doppel, its master sits in place without moving a muscle, as if staring fixedly at the target of her tenacious attachment.
Witch Description
Same as anime's Witch Card
Pyotr
Minions of the witch of sweets. Their role is to search for cheese. You shouldn’t expect too much from them, though. They came to Kamihama in search of cheese, hailing from a place called Mitakihara. Their faces are actually stamps. They’ll headbutt anything that moves, instantly determining whether or not it’s cheese and marking it with either a “Cheese Approval Stamp” or a “Not-Cheese Stamp”. Since they didn’t have much luck finding cheese in their master’s barrier, they expanded their search radius to outside the barrier. (They got kicked out, in a sense.) Even if they succeed in finding some cheese, though, it’s a little doubtful as to whether they remember the route back home.
Observations
- The head of her first form is shaped like a piece of candy in wrap.
- Watching carefully one can see that when Charlotte's second form gets injured a new Charlotte comes out of the mouth replacing the old as if the layers are being blown away.
- Charlotte reveals witches' kisses differ from witch to witch.
- A line in the design for Charlotte's labyrinth in the Official Guidebook says "It's really a delicious cheese cake. My dying mother wanted to eat it, but maybe I should have cured her disease instead. However, that surely wasn't appropriate."
- A description in the Production Note reveals that Charlotte obtained "one single cheesecake" in strict accordance with her wish.
Trivia
- A charlotte is a type of dessert.
- Charlotte's head also bears strong resemblance to a Charlotte Mold, a cooking vessel used exclusively for the baking and forming of desserts.
- The name Charlotte could also refer to Charlotte Buff, a woman Goethe unrequitedly loved and that deeply influenced him. The central and homonym character from Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther was based on her.
- On the official website, mousing over Charlotte's card changes the image from the first to the second using JavaScript.
- Although official pronunciations of almost all witches' names are undisclosed, "Charlotte" is pronounced "シャルロッテ" (Sharurotte) like a German name (Shar-lot-teh) according to an official product's document.
- Pyotr is the Russian form of the given name Peter.
- Pyotr Ilyich Thaikovsky was a Russian romantic period composer who composed scores for The Nutcracker and Swan Lake. He also composed '"None but the Lonely Heart", based on a poem by Lev Mei which was in turn translated from Goethe's Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship.
- Polina is also a Russian given name, interpreted either as a short form of the name Apollinaria, or a variant form of the name Paulina.
- Polina Semionova was a ballerina who once played the lead role in Thaikovsky's The Nutcracker.
- Pauline von Metternich was an Austrian socialite who was important in the promotion of Richard Wagner's work; it was at her request that Napolean III invited Wagner to "substantially amend" his opera Tannhäuser, creating what would be known as the "Paris version", which failed and would become one of the nineteenth century's greatest musical scandals. Wagner also dedicated a piano composition to her.
- Tannhäuser "centers on the struggle between sacred and profane love, and redemption through love, a theme running through much of Wagner's mature work."
- Charlotte makes a brief appearance in Puella Magi Oriko Magica.
- Runes in Charlotte's card are styled like biscuits.
- The runes reading "MAMI MOGU MOGU GONBO" in Charlotte's barrier describe Mami's death, as mogu mogu is onomatopoeia for chewing, but also likely reference to a famous educational cooking TV show called Mogu Mogu Gombo.
- There is no significant difference between the Japanese pronunciations of gonbo and gombo, so gonbo is an alternate romanization.
- Mogu Mogu Gombo aired from 1993 until 2003 and was hosted by two famous comedians (Kobuhei Hayashiya and HIROMI). The main target audience was children, but many adults also enjoyed it.
- The cooking and eating themes of the show match Charlotte's themes of sweets and eating Mami. A children's show matches other aspects of the barrier: Charlotte looks like a doll in one form and a clown in the other, she has a tea party setup like what a little girl might arrange, and she fills her barrier with candy.
Charlotte in Rebellion
- According to the Movie 3 Brochure, Charlotte is called "Bebe" in Rebellion because the other characters can't actually read the runes.
- It's possible that Bebe's name was meant to contrast with Mami's name ("Baby" and "Mommy").
- It is suggested that Charlotte's design was changed to make her more expressive.
- According to Witches Guide, Mami found Bebe in her original appearance (looking as Charlotte does) and was quiet. Mami sews Bebe new clothes and over time her appearance continues to change and she becomes even more interactive.
- Bebe actually talks to the other characters. When she speaks, bubbles with katakana appear from her mouth, though the noises she makes are just gibberish. The other characters appear to understand her just fine, and subtitles appear to let the viewer know what she's saying.
- Bebe is shown to be extremely close to Mami. Mami even says that if she didn't meet Bebe she would have fallen into despair long ago.
- In Magia Record, Charlotte is the first witch to appear as Doppel and then a proper witch.
Gallery
See also
External links
- Charlotte card at official website (Japanese)
- Pyotr card at official website (Japanese)
- Charlotte pixiv fanart
- How to make your own Charlotte!
- Käse, Käse, wo ist die Käse? ("der Käse" would be correct here)
- 【MMD】Charlotte is sleeping /Puella Magi Madoka Magica 魔法少女まどか☆マギカ
- Fan-Made Charlotte Connect Opening. (Puella Magi Ver.)
- Fan-Made Charlotte Connect Opening. (Witch Ver.)