I'm in Love with the Villainess

Episode 6

Let me state right now that this episode is a god damn tease. You can't start by promising a cross-dressing maid cafe in the very first scene, and then make us wait until next week to see it. You're just dangling the prospect of seeing Claire and Rae in full butler get-up, and then telling us we have to sit around for seven whole days? That's just rude! The nerve! The gall!

I bring that particular bait and switch up because it represents how scattershot most of this episode is. I'm in Love with the Villainess has never been heavy on plot, but this week we are all over the place. We've got goofy shenanigans involving a supposed ghost, tragic backstories, and secret desserts all thrown together in an order that is frankly pretty confounding. The individual segments are fine, varying from fun diversions to necessary character building but I could not tell you why they're arranged in this order and proximity.

The most immediately pertinent sequence is Claire's flashback. While not revelatory, it does a good job of presenting who Claire is underneath all that bluster and nobility; a lonely kid who wanted to feel loved by her parents, and reacted in anger when they seemed to ignore her. It's easy to see how those feelings, and the regrets they spawned after her mother's death, have shaped her into who she is now, crafting the defensive impulses that leave her starved for attention but too insecure to honestly ask for it. It gives Claire much-needed texture beyond her archetype and goes a long way to explaining why Rae would get so attached to her both before and after passing over the Isekai event horizon. Plus, seeing her comfort Claire in her sleep is another one of those rare, unguarded moments of sweetness between the two that keep this whole boat afloat.

The weird part is that such a pivotal flashback is sandwiched between two largely silly sequences of Rae and Claire investigating a supposed haunting, and Rae introducing the horrors of mayonnaise to this world (Why is it always mayo?). Those two moments at least have a connection, in that both revolve around Rae secretly creating recipes for a nearby restaurant, seemingly to get money for unknown ends. That continues the plot line that Rae is secretly prepping to protect Claire from something in the future, presumably a Bad End scenario, but it also means they lack any real satisfying payoff. Without a more concrete through-line or a more tangible sense of progress with our leading ladies, this episode feels incomplete on its own.

There are enough knowing looks and lingering glances to tell us that Rae is up to something and enough gags to keep the episode light but it feels like an assortment of necessary scenes stapled together, rather than a cohesive episode on its own. Being light and cute is this show's M.O. but if it insists on hinting at more serious drama and mysteries, it needs to start doling out some answers before too long. Also, give us those butler outfits ASAP, dammit.

Rating: I'm in Love with the Villainess is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.