Besides the fact that both of them have pink hair.

Our titular characters both a have unique relationship with other lead female characters, Anthy and Homura respectively. Both relationships can be viewed many different ways: sisterly, platonically, or romantically.

Both shows have references to fairy tales. It’s much more general in Utena, as it always talks about the character archetypes of a princess, a prince, and a witch. But has its own fairy tale, which is often retold in the storybook opening scene.

In Madoka, Sayaka can easily be compared to the Little Mermaid, mainly the original Hans Christian Anderson one: both are in love, make bargains with other supernatural entities to help or get closer to the guys they love, go through a lot of pain because of it, and end up dying in the end. To make things even more obvious, Sayaka’s witch, Oktavia con Seckendorff is titled the Mermaid Witch, and her nature is to fall in love.

The two series also contain biblical symbolism. Though it’s a lot more subtle in Utena than in Madoka.

During one of Utena’s first encounters with Akio, he mentions that his name is related to “The Morning Star” which is associated with Venus, which is associated with Lucifer. Akio is the corrupt half of Prince Dios. So Akio could be a metaphor for Satan, Lucifer after he fell, and Dios is still Lucifer as an angel.

In episode 30 of Utena, “the Barefoot Girl”, our heroine accidentally sprains her ankle, and Akio takes her to the hospital. When they arrive back at the school, Akio takes off one of Utena’s shoes, and subsequently seduces her and they begin to kiss. The more prominent reference of this event would be Cinderella, following the series’ fairytale motif. But if we view Akio as Satan, and Anthy as a Christ figure (sacrificing herself for Dios and suffering under the Sword of Hate), then this situation could be metaphorical to Judas (Utena) betraying Jesus (Anthy).

We all know the blatant biblical symbolism in Madoka: Madoka cleansed Puella Magis of their sins, died for our sins, and promptly became the goddess of the universe. But in addition to Christian references, there’s also Buddhist references too.

In Buddhism, a soul is reincarnated. Until all of your collected existences have done enough good deeds, you will continue to reincarnate until you can finally achieve Nirvana - free from suffering and reincarnation, or enlightenment. Every time Homura went back in time, Madoka’s magical potential increased. Viewing Homura’s resets as reincarnation, Madoka reincarnated enough to achieve Nirvana and transcend above it.

Finally, I noticed a couple of similarities between both endings:

At the end, both girls ended sacrificing themselves for something. Madoka sacrificed her earthly existence to make sure Puella Magis don’t become witches. Utena opened the Rose Gate and became the target of the Sword of Hate instead of Anthy.

In addition, the two were all but erased from everyone’s memory, save for one or two characters. Homura and Tatsuya in Madoka’s case, and Anthy and Akio for Utena. But neither of our titular heroines aren’t truly dead, or gone.

So did anyone else notice the similarities?