#21 Otome Game no Hametsu Flag shika Nai Akuyaku Reijou ni Tensei shiteshimatta…
watched while sewing. ive always been fascinated by the modern isekai+villainess boom because its so clearly based on rpgs+otoge respectively but barely ever feels like the writer actually plays those thing. theyre genres born on narou, an site for publishing original fiction owned by kadokawa where the most popular works feel immediately launched into a light novel, manga and anime deal. the result seems to be an immense number of works imitating the most popular ones, with minor modifications, using principles of evolution to create the lifeform most suitable to thriving in that kind of space.
hamefura is, to my knowledge, among the first villainess isekai that breached containment into worldwide success, and possibly thanks to that the events that happen with it seem to actually follow a logical throughline, rather than appearing from nowhere because its expected from the genre. classic story, girl dies, isekaid into unnecessarily mean romantic rival in otome game [a role that does not actually exist in most of them], decides to become nice so she doesnt get brutally murdered at the end of the story, accidentally replaces the heroine as the protagonist.
the fascinating thing in hamefura is that she regains the memories from her previous life as a child, which means she fundamentally changes the personalities of all the characters by fixing their childhood traumas. she also did not actually play all of the routes which still gives it a certain sense of uncertainty near the end.
the comedy isnt bad, although it does rely too much on a few basic jokes about katarina acting weird. its fun to watch while doing something else but i couldnt devote my full attention to it. i liked the secret evil boy. i wonder what s2 is like because i dont think theyll pull the "and there was a sequel/fandisc she also played!!!" card. these types of stories are generally more fun to me when you reach the point where the protagonist cant actually anticipate whats going to happen anymore so i might like it more than s1