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rafacolog's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
4.0
Graphic: Blood, Torture, Gore, War, Child abuse, Death, Sexual violence, Emotional abuse, and Sexual harassment
97reads's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Torture, Blood, and Death
Moderate: Death of parent
daisy923's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.0
I told myself i wouldnt read it bc i hate teacher/student relationships but I did end up caving and like read it so I’d at least have some idea what ppl were talking about bc I do like a lot of the fanart of it I see. Basically it was so incredibly mid that I couldn’t tell you like anyones names off the top of my head except the main ones, or like 60% of what happened and I just never had the motivation to write a review about it, but I do now ig and I love complaining/reviewing things so yeah.
Like tbh 80% of it was kind of boring or made me uncomfortable so really I did just skim a lot of it but I did have fun with the other 20% lol ig.. but to start with the bad.. like as i said I hate teacher student relationships so for really a lot of the bingqiu scenes I was skimming and pretending that all it was was just platonic. Like I do like sqq I think he’s funny and I know he’s too dense to figure out that he’s not straight but reading him call lbh (his 14 year old student!!!) a little sheep all the time and babying him and then knowing how it goes just! Makes me uncomfy! Like not everything has to be a romance and it would be much more interesting and not weird to me if this wasn’t a romance between them, even if they only get together when they’re both adults. And don’t even get me started on lbh. Like again. I like him. But he is just a walking red flag like I don’t think there’s anything wrong with writing characters who aren’t like. Healthy perfect people obviously but just idk I don’t like, think it’s cute or funny or whatever to have a character be like you’re mine and no one else’s and that possessiveness is just treated as a joke and something for sqq to just have to accept in the end. just kinda wish that were addressed. And a lot of the scenes that didn’t make me uncomfortable I was just so incredibly bored. If you asked me what happened in any given arc I could honestly not really tell you 80% of the time.
Now let’s get into the ✨misogyny ✨ like I know that’s a given with this genre and author but it’s still annoying. Like I was prepared to really like the little demon girl and the girl with the veil and the other girls but they were just like. There ig. Like HONESTLY….. the best female character imo was lbhs mom and she wasn’t even PRESENT in the actual story. But anyway. One thing that annoyed me is, that they only have one (1) female sect leader, and one (1) female head disciple in the 12 peaks, but they don’t even have the dignity of competing against men to gain these positions, mxtx does the cowardly thing and just makes them heads of an all female sect. All the other sects, which are presumably coed (tho iirc nyy is the ONLY female disciple of sqqs sect and I don’t remember there ever being any female disciples of Jiang cheng 1.0’s sect) are all led by men and their best disciples are boys. It’s so incredibly lazy and annoying. And this female sect isn’t even ranked highly on the peaks either. Like what’s the ranking criteria and why are they ranked so low? Huh? Mxtx? Like I get this is a satire of a really bad stallion novel but seriously? Mxtx? You couldn’t even include one female character in a position of power without also being a servant/subordinate/lower ranked to some dudes? even in sqq's fix-it version? Bc the whole point of the book is to fix pidw but neither mxtx or sqq as an extension of her seemed interested in fixing the rampant misogyny. Anyway and bc like that demon girl was
Also the constant feminizing of sqq. Like again. I know that’s a given with this genre but it’s still so annoying.
Now the WORST offender. That™️ sex (read: rape) scene. No. Bye. Completely skipped as soon as I realized what was going on. Spiritually barfing the entire time.
And to the things I liked. in no particular order:
1) lbhs family and backstory: I rly liked the story of his parents. not sure if some of this counts as spoilers but ill just put it all under spoilies just in case.
2) mobei jun and shang qinghua. Okay I went into this liking moshing from all the fanart and the idea of god marrying the dude he created in the image of the perfect guy while being a weird little hamster of a man himself is super funny, also the demon tits. anyway idk where I was going with that, but! I was rather disappointed that they were barely in the book.
3)
4) system and sqq - hilarious. Next.
5)
6)
7)
8) snek!! He was cute
9) and of course.. airplane bro and cucumber bro. I love them. Everything about them. They’re such clowns.
Anyway 4/10 at best probably bye
Graphic: Death, Violence, Toxic relationship, Torture, Rape, Blood, Body horror, Child abuse, and Sexual content
Moderate: Death of parent
heyphaora's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Graphic: Child abuse, Classism, Death, Homophobia, Rape, Blood, Abortion, Body horror, Emotional abuse, Sexual harassment, Abandonment, and Bullying
rensreading's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
as for the actual story, it was enjoyable up to a certain point. i mean it was literally a self-insert fic come to life in a novel with the protag going through quite a lot before deciding what he’ll stand by. and that is luo binghe, ladies and gentlethems.
i loved that plot holes were filled and that sqq was such an otaku and the final chapter was sweet but the climax before it was strange enough to kind of sour everything else for me.
fuck the system though lmao
this gets 3.5 stars from me (:
Graphic: Sexual content, Sexual violence, Cursing, Confinement, Blood, War, Suicide, Medical trauma, Kidnapping, Injury/Injury detail, Gore, Death, Child abuse, Bullying, and Body horror
Moderate: Abandonment
Minor: Homophobia
There is only one sex scene and it is at the climax of the novel and is extremely graphic. It includes dubious consent, body horror, (unknowing) sexual violence, a lot of blood, and what some people (including me) may consider gore.moonmagister's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
I personally really enjoyed this novel, despite flaws in plot and translation. I’m looking forward to continuing the official translation in the following months!
Graphic: Abandonment, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Gore, Homophobia, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Murder, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Torture, Violence, and War
maride's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
How I can describe this story? Weird possibly is the word for me... because that's how I felt reading the whole story, but not in a bad way of weird ... more like a ´ wtf is going on? This is so cool´ form of weird.
If i need to be honest even when i understood all the story I felt like I was losing something, perhaps was the translation that I read (I am not complaining ... thanks for the translation) or maybe was me that had the mind in the clouds.
I really like the story, was fun to read, specially was new to read for me, I really enjoyed read about Shen qingqiu and all his complaining, I enjoyed so many characters ... Liu Qingge was so far one of my favorites.
Luo Binghe was adorable but excuse me my Spanish Como me sacaba de quicio este pana... but i love him.
I would have love that the author explore more the relationship between Luo Binghe and Shen Qingqiu (romantically talking) because i felt (maybe again ...I was lost in translation) that the development was so fast (specially the development in Sqq).
The CHANGE between the female characters in the main story and in the Sqq story was so BIG and cool ... 1point for that
Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Deadnaming, Death, Emotional abuse, Torture, and Violence
breemeup's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Joke's aside, here are my messy thoughts about the novel:
1. I think that if people had made it more clear that scum villain is a dark comedy psychosexual horror story rather than pretending that it's a romance novel, I probably would have gotten into it a lot sooner.
2. By giving shen yuan so much agency and such a rich inner voice, mxtx builds such a fun exploration of like the inherent horror found in so many heterosexual romance novels and the ways in which we take for granted the mistreatment of female love interests in these novels. I adore binghe but his love is so monstrous and all consuming and terrifying in such a classic bodice ripper romance novel kind of way!!! mxtx masterfully uses framing and the protag's awareness of romance tropes to subvert/satirize this romance dynamic that women are subjected to
3. And that's not even getting into shen yuan's epic genderification arc and how the fact that he's subjected to this horror both makes him feel trapped but also gives him the liberty to experiment with and explore his relationship with gender and feminity and sense of self. (Transfem shen yuan real!!)
4. the way women in this novel become their own people/are given the freedom to be less classically "feminine" and instead become selfish/brutal/even a bit ugly because of their exclusion from binghe's desire? WOW... liberty from the inherent horror of compulsory heterosexuality methinks.
5. This book is about gender!!!!! It's about the complex intersections between sexuality and gender identity and it's absolutely incredible. I was NOT expecting that a AT ALL. I'm blown away. Like you know how that dude gave a copy of undertale to the pope? im gonna do that except it's gonna be Judith Butler instead of the pope and im giving them a copy of svss instead of undertale
Anyway, I really thought that this was gonna be my least favorite mxtx book I thought I was gonna be put off by the romance but oh my god the fact that the romance is DELIBERATELY off putting has made this one of my favorite novels ever. I'm going to be thinking about it for a long long time
Graphic: Body horror, Blood, Child abuse, Murder, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Stalking, Suicide attempt, Toxic relationship, and Violence
saikiren's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I liked how everything clicked in place at the end though, Shen Qingqiu really did fulfill all plot holes and as the reader i was able to finally be informed on some of the character's backstories. it still didnt right the original Shen's abuse towards the og Luo but it gave an understanding of where his envy had been brought up from, and made me switch up my mindset about him a little bit. I love this book so much, its my go-to comfort novel
Graphic: Sexual violence, Sexual content, and Violence
Moderate: Blood, Child abuse, Physical abuse, Confinement, and Emotional abuse
Minor: Bullying and Death of parent
phenomenarwhal's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Blood, Body horror, Bullying, Child abuse, Death, Gore, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Abandonment
Moderate: Death of parent, Emotional abuse, and War