Madoka Magica -Walpurgisnacht: Rising- casts Maaya Sakamoto as mysterious upperclassman
Maaya Sakamoto voices Wasu, a Homura lookalike whose identity remains one of the film’s biggest unanswered questions.
Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie: Walpurgisnacht: Rising has added a very Madoka-shaped mystery to its cast. Maaya Sakamoto voices the unnamed upperclassman — identified as Wasu — a character who resembles Homura Akemi while apparently refusing to explain who she really is.
That is not a small bit of casting trivia in a franchise where identity, memory and catastrophic emotional decisions tend to share the same room. The announcement comes as the official sequel to Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie Part 3: Rebellion is already in Japanese cinemas. The film opened on August 28, with IMAX screenings available in Japan from the same day.
A familiar face with an unfamiliar name
Wasu’s introduction is deliberately slippery: she looks like Homura, but nobody knows her true name or identity. Sakamoto therefore joins a film that is keeping one of its most intriguing pieces off the table, rather than handing viewers a tidy character biography before the credits have even rolled.
The timing also gives the reveal extra bite. Rather than announcing a wholly separate newcomer, the film is placing Sakamoto behind a visual echo of one of its central figures. That keeps the story’s most important question firmly in the character’s shadow: is Wasu connected to Homura, merely resembles her, or is the resemblance another trap entirely? The announcement confirms the resemblance and the uncertainty, but it does not resolve the mystery.
The film is directed by Yukihiro Miyamoto, whose credits include Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story. Shion Wakayama voices the new magical girl Shichōka, while Tomoyo Kurosawa plays Selma Therese. The returning cast includes Aoi Yūki as Madoka Kaname, Chiwa Saitō as Homura, Kaori Mizuhashi as Mami, Eri Kitamura as Sayaka, Ai Nonaka as Kyōko, Kana Asumi as Nagisa and Emiri Katō as Kyubey.
The production also brings back the creative team behind the original anime and films: Magica Quartet, chief director Akiyuki Simbo, scriptwriter Gen Urobuchi of Nitroplus, character designer Ume Aoki, animation character designer Junichirō Taniguchi, composer Yuki Kajiura, alternate space designer Gekidan Inu Curry and animation studio SHAFT. FictionJunction performs Kajiura’s theme song, “Kanata”.
Commercially, Walpurgisnacht: Rising is hardly limping into this next chapter. It opened at No. 1 in Japan, selling 535,000 tickets and earning 939,647,100 yen (about US$5.95 million) in its first three days. The official film site has also linked an Aniplex One Focus promo video on YouTube, although the Maaya Sakamoto announcement itself does not embed a separate trailer.
Our opinion
Casting Sakamoto as a Homura lookalike with no confirmed name is exactly the sort of elegant torment Madoka Magica enjoys serving. It gives the film another question without pretending to provide an answer, and Sakamoto’s arrival adds serious vocal heft to an already stacked cast. The sensible move is to watch the official promo, avoid spoiler-heavy searching and let the film explain Wasu on its own terms. For once, the mystery is the marketing.