Review of Villainess Level 99: I May Be the Hidden Boss but I'm Not the Demon Lord
Long paragraph incoming (sorry, not sorry): One of the worst letdowns that I had in a while, which made me surprised how fast I could switch from kinda liking the vibe of the anime and the story, to instantly realise that this was trash, the worst kind. I like some good thrash, but not when they are thrashing the source material's story in such an obvious way that even if I didn't read the source material or know anything about it, I understood instantly that something is wrong. It was pretty good the first half of the season, basic story, not that deep, pretty chill, kindaslice of life... then the animation kinda took a down turn that was off putting me pretty hard with the CGI... but it's not the first time I'm seeing stuff like that, so I can get over it... then, at the end... one of the most rushed episodes that I've seen in a while... Literally felt like I was watching someone making a summary of what happened in the source material. Again, okay, I've seen stuff like this done, while I do consider it a big problem that offputs me, I could still say that it's okay, cuz y'know, anime is sometimes, if not most of the time, an ad for the source material... but then I was starting to realise, for such a plot that was previous, this stuff just doesn't line up. I couldn't believe my eyes what I was seeing. Besides the fact that everything was rushed and there was almost nothing to justify anything the characters did, they introduced some stuff that I would never see it coming from an author that was able to write the story of the past episodes...
What did they introduce? Power of love. Power of friendship. Characters doing actions just because the original game had a certain story, so there is litearlly a "plot" controlling characters. Some improtant plot moves that I wanted to see and was waiting for to happen coming out of nowhere... And to remind you... all in a really rushed way, mach speed type of rushing, so the experience was made worse 10x. But I guess you're thinking now: "hey, that is acceptable, there are animes out there that do that". Oh no, my sweet child, my problem was the part where I heard what happens in the source material (light novel), and feeling like I had a really cool experience stolen just because. Now that's what made it 100x worse for me, to the point where it left a disgusting taste in my mouth. Why did they have to ruin everything like this? Literally just adapt the damn source material and don't just go off on a tangent so different that it changes everything, especially one so damn f bad... but hey, I guess they won, they made me get interested in the light novel... especially cuz from what I read, they adapted only the first volume of the light novel in this anime.
Story: 5
The story was an 8 originally, but then the last 3 episodes happened and everything changed... Thanks for the forced happy ending I guess, surely hope this was worth just not following the light novel at the end... Hey, at least the first part of the anime is pretty good. I like the comedy as well.
Art: 6
Okayish animated, but the CGI, especialyl cuz there were quite a few scenes of it, even the first damn scene in the anime was CGI, put me into a meh mood.
Music: 8
Probably the only redeeming thing was the OP cuz it sounded cool. That's it. ED? Meh...
Characters: 7
Again, originally and 8 or maybe even a 9 if I felt better, but no. They ruined it. Still like the FMC, but they just ruined my image of everything in the anime.
Enjoyment: 5
Ugly taste in my mouth at the end... wish it wasn't like this, I was really enjoying the anime, quite a bit, especially the comedic parts...
Overall: 5
Right now it has 7.15 from 47.765 votes Ranked #3522 Popularity #1900 Members 112,449 as of 02/04/2024. Overall 5. Ye, doesn't add up, but so does the mark of the anime, it for sure is not a 7+ anime, but it seems a lot of animes have high marks this season. It should be more around 6.3 imo, around there. Would have given it a 4, but I still enjoyed some of it, at least until around ep 8. But then, nose dive. Anyway, I cannot really recommend it to anyone, only if you want to see it for yourselfes. Better read the manga or light novel.