Anime Reviews (2020s): My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! (2020)

“My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!” is fun, hilarious and entertaining!

Click here to purchase this Blu-ray on Amazon

TITLE: My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!

ANIME TV SERIES RELEASE DATE: 2020

DURATION: OVA Episodes 1-12 (300 Minutes)

BLU-RAY INFORMATION: 1080p High Definition (16×9), English and Japanese DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0, English Subtitles

COMPANY: Sentai Filmworks

RATING: 14+

Release Date: January 4, 2022

Originally created by Yamaguchi Satoru

Director: Inoue Keisuke

Series Composition by Shimizu Megumi

Original Character Design: Hidaka Nami

Character Design by Oshima Miwa

Music by Nakamura Hanae, Sakura Miki, Tabuchi Natsumi, Kanematsu Shu, Saiki Tatsuhiko

Anime Production by SILVER LINK.

Featuring the following voice talent:

Uchida Maaya/Jeannie Tirado as Catarina Claes

Suzuki Tatsuhisa/Bryce Papenbrook as Alan Stuart

Masuda Toshiki/Chris Hackney as Sirius Dieke

Okasaki Miho/Colleen O’Shaughnessey as Mary Hunt

Aoi Shota/Griffin Burns as Geordo Stuart

Kakihara Tetsuya/Griffin Puatu as Keith Claes

Minase Inori/Kira Buckland as Sophia Ascart

Hayami Saori/Melissa Fahn as Maria Campbell

Matsuoka Yoshitsugu/Nicolas Roye as Nicole Ascart

My Next Life as a Villainess, All Routes Lead to Doom! contains episodes 1-12 of the anime directed by Keisuke Inoue.

Some people may treat life like a game, but when young noblewoman Catarina Claes accidentally bumps her head, she has a horrifying revelation. In a previous life, she was an avid otaku and game player, and the life Catarina is living is that of the villainess of the game FORTUNE LOVER… a character doomed to be either killed or exiled no matter how the game is played!

Forewarned and forearmed with the multiple plots of the game in mind, Catarina sets out to re-code her fate. Can she not do what she would have done, befriend people she’d never befriend, and change her entire outlook on life? And will even that be enough to roleplay her way out of her destiny? She’s literally in the game of her life!

Based on the popular ongoing light novels by Yamaguchi Satoru and illustrator Hidaka Nami, “Otome Gemu no Hametsu Furagu Shika Nai Akuyaku Reijo ni Tensei Shite Shimatta” (titled in the US as “My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!”, the series received an anime adaptation in April-June 2020 and a second season which aired in July-September 2021 courtesy of SILVER LINK.

And now the first season has been released on Blu-ray courtesy of Sentai Filmworks.

The series begins with a 17-year-old high school student who is an otaku who loves video games, especially otome games (games targeted to girls/women in which you choose a path and through each path, you can have one good ending, one bad ending but also many different endings. But usually for the main female character to find romantic love with a certain character).

Unfortunately, this teenager is killed in a car accident and she is reincarnated as a villainess, Catarina Claes from the game “Fortune Lover”.

Knowing how the endings happen in the game, Catarina tries to make sure that she takes routes avoid paths that lead to her exile or death, which means avoiding being a villain and establishing good relationships with everyone she meets.

But in this new world, Catarina’s presence proves to be uplifting to everyone she meets, men and women.

She may not be the smartest person, but her love of helping people and gardening, attracts others, despite her being oblivious to how people feel about her.

For the most part, “My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!” is a series that one can jump into and watch from beginning to end. It’s best to describe this series as a happy series, while there is a moment where the series does get a little sad. But I know things may change for season two, so I’m looking forward to that.

But one can see season 1 as a series establishing the characters and how Catarina touches everyone’s lives and setting up for what may become a darker season two.

If you are looking for a happy series, “My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!” is fun, hilarious and entertaining!

Click here to purchase this Blu-ray on Amazon