I watched the last five episodes yesterday (great timing!) and holy fuck I feel wrecked. Didn't expect that from the first few episodes, especially because this is only the third anime I have watched, after Spirited Away and Nausicaa (Pokemon doesnt count), and I had a bit of a difficult time getting used to all the squeaky high voices. But that's just personal.

One theme that I found interesting is about knowing yourself. Homura knew who she was and wasn't in the beginning, but slowly she lost herself, fading away as she redid the timelines. Madoka never knew who she wanted to be and kept looking for someone to tell her. Sayaka became more and more detached from herself after she realized her soul is in the gem and not in her body. In this regard only Mami Tomoe stayed true to herself and can be seen as a role model because of it.

I think Kyubey was the most antagonist-like, who caused most of the problems by not understanding mankind properly. She (it?) made some compelling arguments though.

What did you think of the opening credits? I didn't pay much attention to it. I'll rewatch it soon. I was more fascinated by the end credit song, whose lyrics can be interpreted differently after each episode it seemed. Really fantastic.

There were a lot of design elements that stood out, like the recurring teardrops / raindrops, the hair color & weapon choice of the characters and some more I'm forgetting.

I'm interested in the discussion here - I'm still not sure what I think of Madoka Magica.