We here at oprainfall don’t just love video games: we’re big fans of anime, manga, and light novels, too. So in celebration of the medium, we’re here to give you our thoughts on what we’ve been watching and reading each week as we enjoy them. Old, new – anything goes.

Currently Airing:

I’m in Love with the Villainess

The set up is something that’s definitely been seen a lot. Poorly treated worker awakens in another world, in this case their favorite otome game. She takes the role of Rei, the game’s protagonist, and from here is where things begin to differ from the game. Rei isn’t interested in the three princes who are the love interests, but Claire who’s the antagonist as you can guess from the title. Claire is the stereotypical prideful talented noble who looks down on commoners and bullies Rei. However, Rei is obsessed with Claire and actually welcomes and enjoys the abuse. From her previous life, Rei has played the game numerous times and knows everything about the game world and of course Claire. I do like how a good chunk of the first episodes are Claire’s attempts to bully Rei and Rei finding the best way to get closer to her while avoiding the princes. While it seems pretty basic on the surface, I think it works and you can see some development like Claire starting to thaw a bit towards Rei. I wasn’t sure how much I would get into this one but, I’m enjoying it. – Walter

— You can watch I’m in Love with the Villainess on Crunchyroll.

Spy x Family

Finally, plot! And it’s Yor-centric, too! I love Spy x Family‘s little episodic moments, but having the story advance even a little is also a plus, and this is a two-fer where we actually get to see Yor’s work and her side of this family arrangement. We spend so little time with her it’s criminal. Anyway, she’s on bodyguard duty to spirit the widow of a gangster out of the country, so we’re already on some shaky moral grounds, seeing as Yor’s whole schtick is she kills “evil” people and a mafia boss’ wife would usually slot neatly into that category. She meets up with Yuri on her way home after being assigned her job, and has an epiphany that since her little brother is all grown up and living his own life, she has no real reason to continue being an assassin. While this makes sense in character, I have to say it fell really flat for me as a viewer because we’ve seen so little of Yor’s feelings about not only her assassin life, but how it interferes with and impacts her fake family life, too. With Loid we see him struggling to juggle being a spy and doing his work while also being a “normal” dad, but Yor has been somewhat sidelined here. Other than the butt episode, we’ve seen no real conflict between her job and her cover, so her suddenly wanting to hang up her assassination ways just didn’t hit that hard. That being said, I think it makes sense for her to want to stop since she’s such a good and kindhearted woman that killing others WOULD weigh heavily on her conscience. I’m curious to see what’s going to happen in the second half of this episode now that the bad guys are aware Yor’s client is onboard. I just hope it doesn’t end up being a Loid saves the day ending. – Leah

– You can watch Spy x Family on Crunchyroll.

What anime are you watching? What manga and light novels are you reading? Let us know in the comments!

You can read previous Week in Anime & Manga entries here!