My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom Season Review

“I’m having a lot of fun. I’m glad I was able to find you again and spend time with you, but… This isn’t your world anymore, is it?”

Carrying on with an idea from my Listeners review, if I were to bestow a personal award to My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, it would be the award for “Show I Most Regret Not Doing a First Impressions Review Of.” This proved to be the series that I most looked forward to revisiting each week, and I almost skipped it entirely. It was only due to Digimon and Appare-Ranman! being placed on hiatus that I felt my schedule had become open enough to check out another title, and by that point we were already several weeks into the Spring Anime Season. Still, My Next Life as a Villainess exceeded all my expectations by proving to be a wonderful viewing experience filled with charming characters, a surprising number of poignant moments and a surplus of side-splitting humor. Frankly, this might be my favorite comedic anime to date, and, without a doubt, Catarina Claes is my favorite character of this past anime season.

The narrative follows Catarina, a young spoiled noble girl in a fantasy kingdom who, while being escorted around a garden by a young prince, trips and hits her head on a stone, leading to her making a terrible discovery. She was once a high school otaku who was hit by a vehicle on her way to school and has since been reborn as the villainess of the dating simulator Fortune Lover. Catarina is mortified to realize that many of the game’s likely endings lead to her being either exiled or killed, so she commits herself to avoiding the various events or “death flags” that could lead to her meeting a similar fate in her new reality. She has one major advantage and one major handicap in this venture. The advantage is that she played the game enough to have a decent familiarity with the characters and events so that, in theory, she can plan accordingly. However, the handicap is that Catarina is a complete and total dumbass, so any plans she may develop prove to be inconsequential at best. This earnest idiocy proves to be a defining characteristic of My Next Life as a Villainess, as both Catarina and the series itself have been fondly nicknamed Bakarina by fans. Dumb characters can be tricky to pull off, but My Next Life as a Villainess tackles the issue head on, by allowing viewers to not only be privy to Catarina’s internal monologue, but also presenting the back and forth debates she has within her mind as silly board meetings carried out by her various impulses. It is this inept planning that leads to the central joke of the series. While Catarina tries to circumvent or plan for doom, she unwittingly conquers the heart of every character around her, all while remaining completely oblivious.

The rest of the cast is as charming and varied as one might hope. It consists of the various romantic interests from the game, which includes Geordo, the prince whom Catarina was with when she was injured, Geordo’s brother, her adopted brother and a soft-spoken but charming upperclassman. On top of that, we also have the original protagonist from Fortune Lover and two of the other potential romantic rivals from the game, a shy albino reading-enthusiast who is the younger sister of the aforementioned upperclassman and a gardening enthusiast who is the fiance of Geordo’s brother. Watching the characters politely spar in the background over Catarina’s affections while she remains completely unaware is another of the show’s recurring gags. I’d love to go in depth with each of the characters, but, as one might guess from glancing at that listing, there just isn’t enough time, and such a discussion is bound to meander. I will say that my favorite of the romantic interests was probably Maria, the game’s proper protagonist, as her interactions with Catarina were a lot of fun, and watching Catarina blindly stumble into romantic events and only realize afterwards they were events from the game is always worth a few laughs.

The production for the show was handled by Silver Link, and they proved to be a really solid match for this material. I’d noted in my review of BOFURI’s first season that I didn’t have a particularly fond view of Silver Link due to their work on some less than stellar series, but they added some nice touches to My Next Life as a Villainess. The animation doesn’t really rise above standard, but that’s not bad when it comes to comedies and the backgrounds are outright gorgeous. The OP is notably charming as well, capturing the madcap comedy of the narrative perfectly, and I found myself rarely skipping it. I’m still wary of Silver Link on the whole. The Ones Within came out less than a year ago, after all, but I’m eager to see where the studio goes from here. When I reviewed BOFURI, I noted that Silver Link had done well with the production, but I hadn’t been interested enough in the characters, world or comedy to come back for season 2. In this instance, I couldn’t be more on board for the already announced second season. When Bakarina makes her triumphant return next year, the show will definitely be on my watch list for the season.

Before I wrap up, a few Notes and Nitpicks:

• Despite its comedic core, it’s surprising how My Next Life as a Villainess doesn’t forget the inherent tragedy of a vibrant young student passing away. This is effectively employed at a few points this season.
• I don’t dislike any of the romantic interests, so trying to pick out my “least favorite” would be tricky. I mentioned before that my favorite is Maria, with Sophia the bookworm holding the second place position. Prince Geordo and Nicol, the upperclassman, could both use some more examination, though in Nicol’s case he’s defined by an aloof nature, so the distant quality & limited screen time may be fully intentional.
• Best Comedic Moment of the Entire Season: When Catarina is falsely accused of being behind a conspiracy, each of the romantic interests come forward to defend their beloved by proudly proclaiming, “This idiot could never come up with such intricate schemes!”
• I’ve seen Catarina’s name spelled both as “Catarina” and “Katarina,” but I like to go with the repeated consonant, so I use the Catarina Claes spelling.