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

Premise

Catarina Claes, the young daughter of a noble family, one day bumps her head and regains memories of her past life as a 17-year-old otaku girl. It is then that she realizes she has been reborn into the world of the otome game Fortune Lover as the game's villainess who, regardless of what route the player took in the original game, is doomed to be either exiled or killed. To avoid these routes that lead to doom, Catarina begins taking countermeasures. This, however, ends up having unexpected consequences on her relations with the other characters of the game's world.

Characters

Catarina Claes (カタリナ・クラエス, Katarina Kuraesu; nicknamed "Bakarina" by fans)

Voiced by: Maaya Uchida (Japanese); Jeannie Tirado (English)

A 17-year-old high school student and otaku who has been reincarnated as the real-life villainess character of the game Fortune Lover after she was hit by a car while heading to school. Having extensive knowledge of the game, she intentionally changes the most important game scenes, altering her own path to avoid as many bad endings as possible. Even though her earth magic is weak, she has excellent charisma. Her good-hearted nature leads to many of the main characters falling in love with her, but Catarina is too dense to understand their true intentions. In her mind, she has five Catarina personalities, discussing and solving problems whenever she's in a crisis.

Geordo Stuart (ジオルド・スティアート, Jiorudo Sutiāto)

Voiced by: Shouta Aoi, Asami Seto (childhood) (Japanese); Griffin Burns (English)

A prince who became Catarina's fiancé after he inadvertently caused her to trip and become injured, forcing him to take responsibility. In the original game, he either exiles Catarina and marries the protagonist, whilst the bad ending has him kill Catarina and abandoning the heroine due to guilt. Due to Catarina's continued efforts to improve her situation and avoid the bad endings, he now has developed genuine feelings for her and continuously tries to demonstrate his affection, only for her to remain oblivious of his feelings.

Keith Claes (キース・クラエス, Kīsu Kuraesu)

Voiced by: Tetsuya Kakihara, Sora Amamiya (childhood) (Japanese); Griffin Puatu (English)

Catarina's adoptive brother and an earth magic prodigy, who her father adopted after his father, a distant relative, died. In the original game, he grows up lonely and becomes a womanizer but abandons his womanazing ways for the protagonist. Due Catarina's efforts to avoid this, they grow up to become close and he falls for her instead.

Media

Light novels

The first light novel volume was published by Ichijinsha under their Ichijinsha Bunko Iris imprint on August 20, 2015. As of August 2026, sixteen volumes have been published. The light novel is licensed in North America by J-Novel Club.

Manga

There have been two manga series associated with the light novel. The first, My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!, has been serialized in Ichijinsha's Monthly Comic Zero Sum since August 28, 2017, and adapts the light novel series into manga format. The second, My Next Life as a Villainess Side Story: On the Verge of Doom! (乙女ゲームの破滅フラグしかない悪役令嬢に転生してしまった... 絶体絶命！破滅寸前編), was also serialized in Monthly Comic Zero Sum from November 1, 2019, to July 2, 2021. This manga focuses on the question of what would happen if Catarina were to recover her memories when she was fifteen as opposed to during her childhood, leaving her without the friends and relationships that she garnered as a result of early planning against her bad ends. Both manga series are licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment.

Ichijinsha published a yuri anthology of the series, titled My Next Life as a Villainess Side Story: Girls Patch (乙女ゲームの破滅フラグしかない悪役令嬢に転生してしまった... GIRLS PATCH), on June 26, 2020. The anthology is also licensed by Seven Seas Entertainment.

Anime

An anime adaptation of the light novel series was announced by Ichijinsha on October 19, 2018. The anime was later announced to be a television series on July 18, 2019. The series was animated by Silver Link and directed by Keisuke Inoue, with Megumi Shimizu handling series composition, and Miwa Oshima designing the characters. Natsumi Tabuchi, Hanae Nakamura, Tatsuhiko Saiki, Miki Sakurai, and Shu Kanematsu composed the music.

The series aired on Tokyo MX, BS11, MBS, AT-X, J Tele, and other channels from April 5 to June 21, 2020. Angela performed the series' opening theme song "Otome no Route wa Hitotsu Janai!" (乙女のルートはひとつじゃない！; "There's More Than Just One Route For a Maiden!"), while Shouta Aoi performed the series' ending theme song "Bad End". Crunchyroll streamed the series with subtitles. On May 15, 2020, Crunchyroll announced the series would receive an English dub, which premiered the following day. Muse Communication has licensed the series in Southeast Asian territories and released via Animax Asia.

A second season aired from July 3 to September 18, 2021, on the Super Animeism programming block on MBS, TBS and their affiliates, as well as BS Asahi. Angela performed the second season's opening theme song "Andante ni Koi o Shite!" (アンダンテに恋をして！; "Fall in Love at Andante!"), while Shouta Aoi performed the second season's ending theme song "give me ♡ me." An OVA was bundled with the special edition of manga's seventh volume, which was released on September 30, 2021. After the conclusion of the second season, it was announced that the series would receive an anime film. The film's title was revealed in April 2022; it premiered in Japan on December 8, 2023.

On May 18, 2021, it was announced that Sentai Filmworks had acquired the home video distribution rights.

Video games

Bonus DVDs containing demo versions of Fortune Lover, the in-universe otome game, were included in the limited editions of the anime's first season Blu-ray releases. A free-to-play mobile game titled Katarina's Farm (カタリナ農園, Katarina Nōen) was released on July 31, 2020, with an online trial version being made available from June 19 to August 31, 2020. A game for the Nintendo Switch titled My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom! Pirates of the Disturbance was released on December 23, 2021. The game has an original story that takes place beyond Fortune Lover's final graduation event, showing Catarina having evaded all the doom flags only to face a new doom flag related to a new meeting and encounter with a pirate. The game was released in English by Idea Factory International on November 28, 2023.

Merchandise

On September 27, 2020, Premium Bandai began selling book cushions which "feature art of Catarina and her four (main) suitors" from the series, which each cushion folding up like a book, "featuring the character's name on the outside."

Reception

The light novel and manga have over 600,000 copies in print. The manga adaptation was ranked 4th in the 2019 Next Manga Awards in the print category.

Some reviewers have described the anime series as focusing around Catarina Claes, who amasses a polyamorous, bisexual harem pining for her as she tries to avoid being a villain and becomes very thoughtful. Reviewers pointed out two queer female characters: Mary Hunt and Maria Campbell, all of whom have crushes on Catarina, as reviewer James Beckett of Anime News Network pointed out.

In May 2020, seven of the 10 spots of a "weekly favourite couple poll" by Anime Trending featured Catarina paired with most of the characters. After the first season ended, with a "friendship ending", one reviewer calling it a "very definitive ending for Catarina and Her Polyamorous Bisexual Harem of Doom," and the series was later praised by Rebecca Silverman and Theron Martin of the Anime News Network for being well-done, and offers "a rewarding bisexual power fantasy" which Catarina is unaware of due to her dense nature.

In a piece for Anime Feminist, Alex Henderson considered the series' "fantasy world [to be] accepting of queer love and queer identity," noting acceptance of female character's crushes on Katarina and the presence of queer romance novels being "seemingly mainstream" in the series' world.