eh why not?

#1 Sayaka NA

understands dickle comedy

HELLO FRIEND I HAVE BEEN DRINKING AND THEREFORE AM MORE AFFECTIONATE THAN USUAL. HOW ARE YOU FRIEND??? <3

VERY LATE HELLO FRIEND YOU CAUGHT ME AFTER I WENT TO BED!!! I HOPE YOU HAD A LOVELY EVENING

So there's one huge aspect about Sayaka that I've always been sort of opinionated on but haven't really bothered to formulate my arguments for until now.  I'm thinking about her wish for Kyousuke's health- her goals, motivations and the morality of the whole thing in a sense.

The common conception definitely seems to me to be that she was acting largely for the purpose of making him like her, and that she was more blinded by love/lust than she was actually interested in improving his life.  I think this is a sort of cheapening of what was actually going on there, and now I'm going to go on a long ridiculous rant as to why.  Because long winded ridiculous ranting is an important hobby of mine.

I think, personally, that there definitely was a self-centered component or aspect to her wish.  There's really no getting around that.  But I think that there was actually a positive willed sincerity going on as well- and not just from the "childish crush" standpoint.  There's a few key scenes/behaviors in general that I think support this viewpoint.

First I'd like to do a bit of general analysis of Sayaka's character and behavior.  She's definitely a textbook example of the White Knight, the Fallen Paladin.  She's overzealous in her desire to do good, and is somewhat blinded by her desire to sort of become "goodness incarnate" herself.  These are definitely strikes you can mark up as character flaws, but I think it's quite admirable as well.

To look through her history, she's a bit of a blank slate by the start of the show, aside from her crush on Kyousuke and friendship with Madoka and Hitomi, there's not much you need to know.  She's the energetic one of the group, that's about it.  She undergoes a lot of character development as well as what I would consider to be character revelation- I think some of the tendencies she displays later were sort of laying dormant in her personality due to the fact that she was never stressed out enough to let them show.

She speaks of her idolization of Mami, how she particularly respected her choice to fight witches with no personal gain all on her own.  When Kyouko attacks her around the shade, Sayaka is appalled to hear that someone would allow lives to be sacrificed in order to gain grief seeds.  A huge point here is that the two of them are literally so conflicting in their ideals that they have every intention of killing the other.

So I think it’s safe to say that Sayaka does care about doing good for good’s sake.  I personally didn’t get the impression that she was simply playing hero, considering she didn’t seem to showboat it too much.  Maybe a bit to Madoka, but not to what I’d consider an unbecoming extent, anyway.

To get back on track here, I think she definitely had a correct intention when wishing for Kyousuke’s recovery.  She definitely speaks to actually caring about him, and it seems that she actually does care about his music as well based on many of her themes/interests.  Yes, she wanted him to care about her, and yes you can tell she was fantasizing that her curing him would cause him to love her.  But I don’t think that puts her entirely into the realm of selfishness, in particular because of one of my favorite dialogue scenes.

Early in the series, Mami is showing Madoka and Sayaka the ropes of taking on witches, as they talk about what they might consider wishing for if they do decide to take the plunge.  Madoka just kind of rambles, but when Sayaka mentions she was considering helping out Kyousuke, Mami kind of asks her about what her intentions really are.  She’s subtly implying the same narrative, that Sayaka is actually acting selfishly to manipulate him into loving her.  Sayaka is immediately taken aback and defensive, to which Mami sort of raises an eyebrow.  Sayaka pauses and reconsiders, then admits that Mami probably does have a point, but she also does legitimately care about him, which Mami seems to accept legitimately.

What I love about this scene is that without talking about it at all, Gen made it absolutely clear to anyone paying attention exactly what was going on in Sayaka’s mind.  In the scenes with her and Kyousuke, we can clearly see that she’s being drawn towards trying to save him.  Makes sense, right?  She’s got a white knight streak, he wants to be saved, she particularly cares about him.  Seems like a win/win.  But her immediate defensiveness at what I felt was a sort of subtle jab from Mami makes it clear that she was already afraid of that perception.  Which means she was thinking about it herself.  She was clearly actively engaging with the idea that what she was doing might be born out of simple selfishness, and the idea bothered her quite a bit.  Enough to make her get a little snippy at her personal hero.  She sort of laughs it off and even admits that yes, her personal desire are probably a major factor in her wish.  But she also knows that she actually does wish to see him better for his own sake. 

write sayaka essays instead of school essays

oh god

you've done it

you've done it now