maride's review against another edition

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adventurous funny tense medium-paced
  • 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

I am writing this without read the extras, so my thoughts maybe will change.

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 

 

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breemeup's review against another edition

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dark funny lighthearted tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

ultimately, scum villain is an answer to the age old question: what if we gave a giant overbearing demon puppy man acute separation anxiety and a crippling Oedipus complex and set him loose on a milfy repressed redditor who is assigned final girl at rebirth?

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

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saikiren's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny lighthearted mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • 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

loved that the system would constantly interfere within certain situations making them worse, or progress further in an unexpected way. Shen QingQiu's reactions were hilarious, there were many scenes that I couldnt help but laugh at or suddenly pause to reread since it was so unexpected. I still feel horrible for the original Binghe but was it necessary to have him in for just a couple paragraphs before he vanished away? and how was he able to transfer over to the current world into Luo Binghe's dreamscape in the first place? (im curious but im reading too much into this..)
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

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phenomenarwhal's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny fast-paced
  • 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


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vael's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? N/A
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

4.75


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frostingsuga's review against another edition

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adventurous funny medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

3.0


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s_s_kassab's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted medium-paced
  • 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? No

4.25


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lapetite's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional funny tense fast-paced
  • 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

My first time reading MXTX's work (though I've seen MDZS's live-action and donghua SEVERAL TIMES and I love TGCF's donghua) and I liked it! Admittedly, I was already a big fan of the SVSSS donghua so I think it made me biased to like this so much. Shen Qinqiu is a great character, a poster boy for opinionated millennials everywhere. Luo Binghe is the sweetest, most fucked up character ever and I am here for his problematic ass. All the side characters are great, too.

The story is so fast-paced that if you are not careful, you will end up binge-reading it in one weekend as I did. And you know what? You won't regret your choices at all.

It does have some problematic content, especially because of some of the words the fan translations used (but since I can't read or speak Mandarin, it's tough to know if it was part of the original work or a choice by the translators).

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wings_bl's review against another edition

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dark emotional funny mysterious sad fast-paced
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75


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thewrongalice's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted medium-paced
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

2.5


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