(major spoilers for Puella Magi Madoka Magica and The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, minor spoilers for Sailor Moon and The Legend of Zelda - with possible major spoilers for Skyward Sword. you’ve been warned)
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I’m beginning to realize that I get absolutely enraptured by stories with main characters that are reincarnations of ancient heroes, and/or stories where major characters ascend from mortality to a higher plane of existence and become gods - stories where the lore stretches far beyond what’s explicitly spelled out in the story and what the characters themselves are aware of.
Like, the first cartoon I ever fell in love with as a kid was Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was all about this cheerful little boy trying to overcome his insecurities and live up to his destiny and the enormous expectations of the people around him, because he wasn’t just a little boy but also the latest incarnation of a god in mortal flesh. And because of that show, I developed a love of cartoons that led me to Puella Magi Madoka Magica, where the main character sacrifices her own existence to become a warrior goddess for little girls and the manifestation of hope itself who rewrites the laws of the universe; and Sailor Moon, which spent a lot of time on monster-fighting filler but centered around a group of teenage girls learning to live up to and surpass their past lives as magical planet warriors tasked with protecting their people from the forces of evil. By far the best book I’ve read so far this year was NK Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, about a young woman struggling to raise her own voice above the battles between enslaved gods and world-ruling royalty, who eventually surpasses them all and becomes a goddess responsible for holding together reality itself. And right now, the newest title that’s captured my interest is The Legend of Zelda, a video game franchise that has an incredibly complex lore buried just under the surface and features the same protagonists in every game, reincarnated countless times whenever they’re needed to save the world - one of whom, if the vague and hazy Skyward Sword spoilers I’ve seen are true, is actually a goddess in the guise of a mortal.
It’s hard to put into words, really, but I just adore that kind of legend because it’s so… vast. It speaks to something far beyond normal human capabilities, hints at thousands of years of fictional history, and explodes outward in climatic scenes that impact the entire world and the very fabric of existence. It’s grand and sweeping and changes everything.
god I love shit like that so much