somnia's manga / #Reincarnation(194)

Reinelle is reincarnated as a crow, yet she still finds herself meeting a main love interest of the otome game she used to play. Honestly this one's good. It's more of a light read, but it also has more serious moments to hype and cry along to. Lore-wise it's also holding up well. The only thing I was gonna complain about is this cliche anxiety of Reinelle. You know this moment when the FL feels like she "stole" the ML, or feels their relationship is in danger bc of the incoming original FL. Now, I'm glad that was dealt with nicely here. She brought up here and there, but her life was moving along and didn't have to take up chapters of dialogue. Thank god. Speaking of og FL (Spoiler) I love that they made her into a bestie rather than some, idk, evil demon witch sent in as a spy or what have you. It's cute. Kinda sneaky how now that Reinelle and her future hubby are solid cannon, the author introduces a new type of possessed character with her own romance in sight. Me likey.

I don't like this at all tbh. It's not entirely trash, don't get me wrong... but especially the first chapters are confusing and FL is very dislikable and inconsistent. The vibe of the story over all is confusing me. To start, this is more on the lighthearted, funny side... but even saying that feels wrong because it randomly switches from being borderline caricature-like and ridiculous, to serious, and dark/deep within one chapter. The way this is being pulled off just makes the scenes bite at each other in the end. There are also these logical errors, like how the first few chapters have MC acting like she knows little about this world when her backstory tells that she must've lived within this world for quite some time already. From the 18 or so chapters I read it was never specified either. To put it short: Exposition which all characters should already know of, is still being discussed in real time (Take the very first chapter, with how MC didn't have a clue about the og MLs' shitty and undesirable traits and FL's disinterest, although she must've been following her around for some time now). Some of the jokes are also SO overused, I'm sick of the scenes where nothing happens besides MC being showered in riches and money from her sugar mommy and daddy. Talking about inconsistency, a great word to describe this whole wanhwa so far btw, MC is all over the place. At first, she is clearly portrayed as a dumb good for nothing, who has no shame in being a useless parasite and leeches off of her friends' wealth... But when the plot calls for it she just makes a 180 turn and characters describe her as eloquent and charming all of the sudden. It's so jarring if you add the sudden atmosphere shifts. I couldn't stand whenever she talked to whatever character, and the dialogue suddenly went into this borderline poetic and vague direction. "Flowers can think too", my ass. Whatever they're saying is so on the nose, why the hell can't it just be a normal conversation? Or even better, include more than just try-hard Mary Sue "she has it so good haha"-comedy and dunk on these serious plot-heavy scenes. So much time is wasted with vain jokes where MC is doing stupid faces at being given so much, so why not make this entire thing a waste of time that's actually entertaining? By the way, the whole thing about being awkward around men and shiny with women is also more of a plot device than anything. For whatever reason it all just randomly appears and disappears as the story progression needs it. I have more to complain about, but I'm afraid I'll never finish this TED talk if I had it my way. To put it short: It's a bad and inconsistent take on "Beware of the Villainess!" - If you thought this had potential then you'll have a feast with this wanhwa for sure.

Plot in a nutshell: FL was abused by her family both in her first life and now in her 2nd life as a minor side villain of a fantasy "biography"/novel. She was killed by her own husband for poisoning his sister. But now she is set on gaining everyone's favor, or at least her hubby's, to hopefully not be framed for anything and get away from her abusive family for good. Kind of spoiler, literally just me ranting: I love this so much, but I lowkey hurt from the angst that we got going on sometimes. At first it felt random for Ruby to be yeeted away by monsters so randomly, but in hindsight it was needed stress-relief for the readers. It wasn't that out of no-where too, since Ruby seems to have some kinda connection to monsters. Gotta praise the author too, it would've been very easy to find Ruby's insecurities annoying were it not for the amazing writing. I never doubted Ruby and never will, I feel.

First you think the premise is good. Like, FL is the daughter of a villainess hated by a lot of people and has to live with that reputation. Ofc, she has memories of her past life, where she read the novel which tells the story of the main power couple and their kids. With these kind of stories you normally look forward to a lot of salt being given out, but honestly it's just FL being a punching bag for a few chapters and then turning into a sensitive flower that refuses to the least bit of brutality or revenge. By the time I was at chapter 17/18, I was rolling my eyes because it started to reek of basic Mary Sue who refuses to recall any other details (or interesting personality traits) from their past life, besides the plot of this one shitty novel she reincarnated into. There are some cute moments here and there, but honestly it doesn't stand out from any other of the dozen basic I-was-reborn-into-xyz-stories. Characters that exist can be categorized as followed: 1. Bullies who hate FL's mom and therefor FL. 2. good people (mainly her family rn) who support her. And 3. the important people from the novel she read which are on either side of the spectrum.... and the only reason why they get their own category is because they have a backstory unlike everything else. BTW, the unreasonable violence from strangers is just not explained, like why FL's mother was hated by literally everyone and stuff. Magic also just happens, no system, no nothing. It's just chain thing magic circle summon here, hypnosis mind spell there, fuck it, figure it out yourself and goodnight. Maybe these will get explained later, but this is basic stuff that typically requires an explanation or some form of attention right away to give readers a deeper understanding of the world and the story. Honestly, the whole villain mother thing just feels like an excuse to make FL an uwu abused woke baby archetype. You'll be satisfied by this if you just want to project yourself onto an FL who was off bad and then spoiled to death by her loving adoptive family.

This gives cliche vibes, but I'm trash and totally here for it and the art.

Overall this is okay, I think. The art does a good job at keeping you patient, and honestly the premise is interesting. The main issue with this story is that there's this big moral hole concerning FL. Well, she is also kinda boring personality wise, but her situation makes her look so disingenuous and vain -which I'm pretty sure the author didn't intend. She lies constantly to people who seem to really care about her. Kind of spoilers from here on out: Nevermind the Duke, who she thinks may harm her (more on that later), but she - with the mind of a grown up - basically gaslights (or at least manipulates) her underaged husband into doing whatever she wants. And she does so to get away from him and the Duke, while they've done nothing but show her sincere affection. How is she so oblivious to that when she was supposed to be an affection-starved orphan? Not to mention there's NO real evidence that would make the reader, or FL, think the Duke really is a total heartless asshole who'd kill his daughter in law. He's framed in a sympathetic light actually, the father who closed himself off and tried to drown himself in a puddle of greed, in a vain attempt to cover the pain of his wife's passing. FL just looks like a snake who's out to take advantage of her position, and make herself a cozy playhouse, while waiting on her chance to dip out with cash-filled pockets. And the most annoying thing is that she is basically a Mary Sue and every character sings her praises for being nothing special at all. It's not even funny that they think her cheat sheet knowledge makes her a genius, it just adds onto the pile of hypocrisy she's hiding behind her greasy eyeballs. Who the hell put "strong female lead" into the tags??

A good shoujo, but one of those that start falling off the longer they're going. There's basically one main villain here as of now, which is a wealthy, jealous hag with no depth or other traits worth mentioning, literally just a log placed specifically there so FL has an obstacle. At first her whole spiel is ok, but for some reason the story's stuck there giving her more spotlight and credit than is worth my time.