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These days, shows/manga/light novels about people getting transported into the otome game they're playing after a dime a dozen. They all have to have some unique spin on the idea, and this time it's that the protagonist has zero interest in the game's canonical male love interests. Instead, she's obsessed with the villainess character. I started watching because I found the basic premise amusing, and I appreciate that this one, unlike many of the others, does not dance and tease around possible lesbian couples without ever actually going there, this one actually makes that final leap. However, as if often the ... case with these type of shows that were mostly based off a single gag, it's obvious that the single gag won't have enough steam to keep an audience engaged for a whole 12 episodes. So of course they're forced to then have some sort of larger story eventually. And, unfortunately, I'm in Love with the Villainess is just pretty bad at that. It can't figure out what it wants to do, so the episodes just get very hodge podge, and none of the stories are all that interesting. And even when the plot isn't all over the place the writing just is... Not good.

Already, you've got the sort of problem where part of the initial gag is Rae is being one of THOSE types of sexual harassment gag characters. Think a bit along the lines of Mineta from My Hero Academia, or Zenitsu from Demon Slayer. Frankly, because she's a woman, I found it easier to laugh at, because it felt to me a bit like a parody of that character type, but I could also see someone just being turned off. But then, the show becomes rather progressive (for Japan) by the characters actually discussing that Rae really is gay. But then they try to shame Claire for reacting negatively to Rae, as if her problem was she was being homophobic, rather than she was avoiding Rae for sexually harassing her (even if the show obviously is intended for the watcher to not take any of the sexual harassment seriously.) So already the writing is kinda off. But then it even at some point the characters comment that "incest is another type of forbidden love," as being gay is on the same level. Lastly, when a rival character appears, Claire openly gushes about how much she loves the rival, which just utterly ruins the relationship they're trying to set up. It makes it come off as Claire isn't treating Rae coldly all the time because she's a tsundere, since here she is openly declaring her love for another person, but rather she's treating Rae that way because the way their relationship started out, with Rae constantly harassing her. It makes me think that pairing Claire off with the rival makes more sense. They're just objectively a better couple. Top this off with a very mediocre presentation, and there really isn't a particular reason to watch this show. But I decided to give it an average rating rather than a downright bad one, because at the same time, I never found myself utterly bored by it, unlike the anime I find completely terrible.

"Yubisaki to Renren" or "Sign of Affection" is a romance manga where the female protagonist is deaf. It's fairly rare to find manga dealing with disability, and when they do, it's often not done well. One of the problems is that it feels more like educational material about the disability than an actual story. I think "Yubisaki to Renren" has a bit of that, but mostly it does a really good job of just being a very cute, low-drama romance. The points I particularly like about it:

-The author clearly has done their research about what life is like for someone who is deaf, as the ... every day problems Yuki has are not always the types of problems hearing people would think about, such as her setting down dishes too hard (which a hearing person wouldn't do, because the noise makes it obvious you're being too rough with them.)

-Though there is some of the standard conflicts, like love rivals, this is handled in an unusually mature way, rather than the usual dramatic fashion. It makes Itsuomi look like a super good boyfriend.

-A lot of time is spent on Itsuomi's passion for languages and travel. I've noticed the more flimsy manga romances don't really pay much attention to the characters besides their relationship, and as a result the characters lack depth and their relationship feels superficial as they have nothing to talk about except how much they like each other.

If I have any criticism of it, I suppose it would be that I wish a bit more time were spent on developing Yuki's character beyond the fact that she's deaf. Unlike Itsuomi, as far as I've read, she isn't given any hobbies or passions of her own. Though at least she does have the ambition to get a part time job, so at least that's something.

The basic premise is that the protagonist, Kuroitsu-san, is a regular employee at a super villain organization on their monster development team. It's obviously a parody of sentai shows such as Power Rangers and Ultraman. I've never really watched those types of shows, but they're ingrained enough into even American pop culture and have enough similarities to American superheroes that you'll probably get it anyways. Or at least I do. What I wasn't expecting is that it's also a spot on parody of office work and product development. The funniest part to me is that despite being a super villain organization, they have a really ... wholesome work culture. Kuroitsu really believes in her work. I would too if I worked at a good company like that, haha.

Anyways, if the basic premise sounds amusing to you, then you'll probably get the humor. Humor is subjective, and on top of that, the subject matter is a bit niche, so I'm not surprised the ratings are low.

The downsides are 1. I could see the premise running out of steam, such that it can't keep up the laughs through the whole show 2. There's some content that those sensitive to LGBT issues might find offensive, especially those sensitive to transgender issues. 3. There's some of the usual straight male targeted fanservice, which some might prefer to avoid.

I'm personally of two minds about Skip Beat. On one hand, I adore the protagonist, Kyoko, who's very vibrant, entertaining, and pretty unique. I love the initial set up of her becoming a rage beast and seeking (a mostly harmless) revenge on her sort-of-ex, Sho, for his having used her to be a maid that also provides free room and board. Revenge manga can easily be screwed up by making the protagonist too much of a bad person, but the author generally strikes just the right balance of providing good reason for Kyoko's righteous rage without it being too awful, and making sure Kyoko ... mostly doesn't cross the line into becoming a bad person. And I love the parts about her acting struggles. The author does a great job of giving her very plausible acting dilemmas that need to be solved, and then having Kyoko solve them in unexpected and brilliant ways that make you really want to cheer for her. So all those things are great about it. But then, there's the not so great... Namely, the romance.

I generally love romance, and read a ton of shoujo for romance, so I'm not saying this because I generally dislike romance. The problem I have with it is that literally all the men chasing her are trash, and I can't help but feel that Kyoko's absolutely right to think she should never fall in love again, even though part of the point of Skip Beat is supposed to be that she needs to learn to love again cuz love is just so important or something. Sho is made to be a cad from the beginning, so it's not really unexpected that he's a terrible potential partner, though he also rather majorly escalates his terrible-ness around chapter 150, so that in my mind he's no longer just a completely selfish jerk taking advantage of her, but more of an actual abuser playing mind games on her. Then there's Reino, a literal stalker that attempts to rape her. Then there's the cannon love interest Ren, who for me is also a giant no. It's common with romance for the romances to be unrealistic such that if look at it critically at all, the relationship is creepy or even abusive (Twilight, anyone?), and Ren X Kyoko is DEFINITELY in this category. So plenty of people will read it, and not be bothered by it, but I'm sure there will be others like me who will pick up on the fact that 1. Kyoko is constantly scared of Ren 2. Ren is VERY possessive of her even when he has no reason to believe she's even interested in him at all 3. Ren constantly uses textbook gaslighting and emotional manipulation on Kyoko in order to make her do what he wants. It's the kind of thing less critical readers get into, because they like the dark, tragic, even a little dangerous, love interests, but I just can't like this relationship, because Ren is just so often mean to her, or not looking out for her best interests, rather he prioritizes his own jealousy and desire of maybe winning her over someday over anything else, and I feel like Kyoko deserves a NORMAL relationship, when her only other sort-of relationship was actually her just being used very badly.

Other negative points include:

* The silly subplot where the grudge Kyokos are actually real and can be sensed by others, when the rest of the story is grounded in the real world, and all the other silliness is just comedic exaggeration.

* The art. It gives the impression at first of having pretty good art for shoujo, but once you notice the character's proportions are pretty inconsistent and often exaggerated to the point of ludicrousness you can't unsee it. The male characters in particular tend to have comically long torsos and even more comically long limbs topped with teeny tiny heads.

* Details about living as a half-Japanese/half-caucasian person in America are crucial to the plot and completely, ridiculously wrong, which also makes it hard to take seriously. Though admittedly, this part hit me harder personally because I AM a half-Japanese/half-caucasian person living in America.

I found 31 Ai Dream to be rather disappointing. I've seen these types of middle aged person re-living their youth fantasies before, and often I find them awkward because they don't hold up from the standpoint of an older person, often because they feature a romance between the secretly older protagonist and an unwitting teen. Because let's face it, as the author herself admitted, to a 31-year-old a 15-year-old seems like a child. At first I came away with the impression that this one wasn't going to be like that, as despite what any of the other characters might feel, she didn't seem romantically interested ... in the younger characters. Instead, it seemed like she might relive her youth by being an idol, which I feel like would have been a direction with potential.

Bizarrely enough, this manga instead defied my early expectations, and opted for option "C": maximum drama. It seems like it spends more time setting up potential love interests and shooting them down (and possibly bringing them back) in the most dramatic way possible than in her being an actual idol despite the title. I feel like the drama isn't even executed that well because it's too fast paced due to the sheer number of dramatic events it's crammed in for it to even hit very hard emotionally.

The author said the intent was to write a magical girl manga for adults, but I feel like it fails at the type of wish fulfillment that adults would actually be interested in, and instead we ended up with a dramatic josei soap opera, but with a magical girl hat.

You've probably already pieced together that Takane no Ran-San is yet another sweet, sugary shoujo romance set in high school. I think this one is better than the average, primarily on merit of its characters, which are fleshed out and unique enough that they don't completely disappear into the crowd of the hundreds of manga that come before it. Though there's really isn't any story beyond the romance, and the other characters aren't very well developed, as is generally par for the course, but Saeki and Ran's interactions were sweet and interesting enough to keep me engaged.

There's a trend now in shoujo that instead of ... (and to the frustration of many readers) artificially prolonging the will-they-won't-they phase of the relationship, as used to be the standard for shoujo, now they let the couple get together at the natural time. I feel like this change is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because no one enjoyed the ridiculous contrivances authors would force on their protagonists to keep them apart, but also a curse because it seems the alternative is hundreds of manga that all have their protagonists go on the exact same dates and have the exact same relationship problems over and over again, with very few exceptions. So unfortunately, I feel that Takane no Ran-San falls into the same trap, becoming distinctly less original after a certain point.

Still, if you're looking for a sweet, heartwarming romance that's low on drama, then Takane no Ran-San fills that niche decently enough.

Night of the Beasts is about a spunky girl named Aria who meets a guy named Sakura who is possessed a demon. Aria gets caught up in his plight, and is eventually forced to fight the demon in order to save him. Though this is shoujo, this is very much in the action genre, with a dark fantasy/supernatural type of plot and quite a lot of blood and violence. If you're familiar, this manga feels to me like it's trying to be in the style of X/1999 by CLAMP.

I found the story interesting enough, though for the type of story it was trying ... to tell, usually I'd expect it to be quite a bit longer. I think it could have used more length too, for having more time to flesh things out or have more detail. As it was, I felt it was sometimes rushed. There's also a major tone shift after the first act, when I think the tone could have been more consistent if it were less rushed.

There were also times where there were confusing jumps from one panel to the next. Some of this was because the characters literally had teleportation powers, but it also didn't really make it clear when these powers were used, or often why they were teleporting, so it felt to me it kind of felt like suddenly the location changed for no reason. It didn't help that the art is also overdone. Don't get me wrong, the artist is clearly talented, but they have a tendency to overload every panel with so much texture and detail, that the panels no longer "read," that is, you can't make out easily what is visually happening anymore.

Still, Night of Beasts is a decent enough read, even if there is also room for improvement. If nothing else, it's refreshing to see a woman be an action hero.

Only read Akuma to Love Song if you like over-the-top melodrama.

On the positive side, it starts off pretty strong by daring to be different. Rather than the typical nice but insecure protagonist, Maria Kawai is so blunt and abrasive she's described as having an "acid tongue." Rather than the usual romance, the first half mostly focuses on Maria's interactions with her class. Of course she ends up making a lot of people mad at her, but eventually she manages to make them understand her in her own way. It gets pretty melodramatic at times, especially with its depiction of their teacher who's beyond ... terrible to his his students, but it didn't personally bother me.

What killed it for me was the second half, when it changes focus to Maria's various romantic relationships. The melodrama got to be too much for me when there was a plot twist to force Maria and her love interest apart that doesn't actually happen in real life. Everyone treats it so seriously, never really questioning this, but I just found it infuriating because I no longer found the story at all realistic or even plausible. It feels to me very similar to Fushigi Yuugi, where there was some silly melodramatic plot twist to force Miaka and Tamahome apart, except being a fantasy, Fushigi Yuugi had a fantasy world explanation for the silly melodrama. Akuma to Love Song, however, is supposed to take place in the real world. It's also, by the way, a really obvious retcon because actually the thing they're all worried about actually happened before, but absolutely nothing happened as a result.

It also makes it objectively less good because Akuma to Love Song was mostly good in the first place for feeling really different from other shoujo for having a really different type of protagonist. But at this midway point, it mostly becomes the usual love polygon antics, and Maria's character shows less and less, as she's being forced into the role of the shoujo protagonist who's the center of all these love polygons. Such a story wouldn't really work if Maria is allowed to act a hundred percent as she had been, since she's normally so abrasive that it would be really hard for anyone to be in a relationship with her, even if they do understand her. The author might have intended to have a character arc where Maria changes, but if so, it didn't really come off that way to me, as much as just her character was just getting out of character.

It has nice art, but the writing is very unoriginal and tropey. The set up is yet another shoujo protagonist is made homeless due to a sudden emergency, so she ends up living secretly in some place where she comes in frequent contact with hot boys she wouldn't normally interact with.

The hot boys in question are frequently used character types too. One is the "sadist" in the Japanese sense of the word -- that is he likes being a little mean and ordering the protagonist around just to see her squirm. The other is the mothering type -- the protagonist is so incapable that he ... ends up giving her advice and taking care of her all the time.

Personally, I dislike both of these character types, so this manga has very little interest for me. Perhaps for someone who likes these character types it would be enjoyable even if it's not very original.

I love stories about going back in time to fix your past mistakes, and I love shoujo, so I was thrilled to discover Katayoku no Labyrinth (also transliterated as "Henyoku no Labyrinth" as the Kanji out can be read either way.) But honestly I found this one a little disappointing.
Admittedly, it could be because I'm comparing it to other media of this type that I found really great such as Steins;Gate, Again!!!, and Orange. But I also feel like it's a legitimate criticism that with Katayoku no Labyrinth, the writing just lacks that something that could make it truly great.

It's hard to ... quite put my finger on it, but definitely some of it is a show-not-tell problem. There's a major plot twist that should hit the reader like a punch to the gut, but I felt like it fell flat. Probably because the way its revealed is the protagonist is simply told the information about what happens in the future, and she doesn't even react to it with the level of shock I would expect. It would have been way more shocking to the audience to actually SHOW the alleged event. Furthermore, I think the author pretty objectively screwed up in that this future event was written to be the entire driving force of the story, and yet already in the current timeline it feels like it has zero chance of happening. So what exactly is the characters' motivations at this point?

Also, the fact that the protagonist is simply told by other characters about what her sister has been up to, which feels like a very bizarre writing choice. If the sister had told her herself, that would have been much stronger from a storytelling perspective, and they could have had an emotional sister bonding moment. With the sisters not talking to each other about important things like that, it makes them feel more distant, when it feels like the sisters' relationship is supposed to be rather central to the story.

I also found the choice of which character to make the pov character a bit unusual given her place in the story. I think it could have the potential to work really well, except that the writing around it is not as strong as it could be, and as a result I think it contributes to this show-not-tell problem. In other stories, she would not be the pov character.

If it seems like I'm nitpicking a lot, it's because as I said I really like these types of stories, and so I get disappointed when I see one that I think could have been better. Don't get me wrong though, Katayoku no Labyrinth isn't bad. It just doesn't quite live up to its potential either. But, compared to other shoujo, it's also better than most, simply by virtue of being different by having a plot around time travel.