Beware the Villainess! Review: Melissa Spent the Entire Story Aura Farming

Spoiler Warning: This review contains major spoilers for Beware the Villainess!, including the ending and side stories.

Beware the Villainess! is actually a pretty good story. There were definitely some parts where I got a little bored, and I would not call it one of the greatest manhwa I have ever read, but after finishing everything and thinking about it properly, I can comfortably give it a 7/10.

The biggest reason this manhwa works for me is not because of some insanely complicated plot. It is Melissa. This woman spends almost the entire series aura farming while refusing to follow the story she was thrown into.

Melissa wakes up as the villainess of a romance novel filled with terrible male leads, but instead of desperately trying to survive by making everyone fall in love with her, she basically looks at the original storyline and decides the whole thing is stupid.

Then she starts taking control of it herself.

Melissa Does Not Need Your Male Leads, Thank You Very Much

One of my favorite things about Beware the Villainess! is that Melissa does not depend on the male characters to solve everything for her. Actually, most of the time she treats them like dirt.

And honestly? They deserve it. 😂

The original romance novel is supposed to revolve around several powerful and attractive men pursuing Yuri. Melissa takes one look at these guys and basically goes, “These are supposed to be the male leads? Seriously?”

From that point onward, watching her destroy their confidence becomes half of the entertainment. She walks into situations like she owns the place, insults someone, pulls out a sword, destroys whatever stupid plan they had, and then gives them one of the funniest facial expressions imaginable.

Melissa's expressions alone deserve their own collection. I genuinely want to make some of them into stickers because there are so many perfect meme reactions.

Ian Looked Like a Lost Puppy

.

Ian Basilios might be the Crown Prince, but whenever Melissa is around him, that title does absolutely nothing for his dignity.

Early in the story, Melissa is trying to end their engagement because Ian is a womanizing idiot. One of the funniest moments for me was watching Melissa confront him about cheating right in front of her.

This man went from Crown Prince to lost puppy almost immediately. He genuinely looked like he was about one inch away from crying.

Melissa did not even need some complicated revenge plan. She simply told him exactly what she thought about him and completely destroyed him.

That basically summarizes Melissa's relationship with most of the original male leads. They arrive with massive main character energy, and Melissa removes it.

Jack Just Wants to Fight

Jack Forton is very simple to understand.

Bro wants to fight.

That is basically my opinion about him. 😂 He has this wild idiot energy where fighting seems like the perfectly reasonable answer to every situation.

His scenes can be entertaining, but I never became particularly attached to him. Most of the time he is just contributing another layer of chaos to Melissa's already chaotic life.

Jake Has Two Things: His Rifle and Social Anxiety

Jake Foddebrat might be one of the funniest representations of an introvert in this story. His entire life basically revolves around his rifle and Yuri.

He is ridiculously talented with his weapon, but socially he is a complete disaster.

I do like that some of these male leads slowly become slightly less terrible after Melissa repeatedly beats common sense into them.

Very aggressively.

Peacock Somehow Became Melissa's Personal Bank

Peacock Melody is a scheming, cheating 🍩. This guy genuinely thinks money and manipulation can solve everything.

Then he meets Melissa.

Bad decision.

Watching Peacock constantly try to scheme around her only for Melissa to turn everything against him was hilarious. At some point, it stopped feeling like Peacock was Melissa's enemy and started feeling like he had accidentally become her personal bank account.

The man tries to play chess while Melissa flips the board over and takes his wallet.

Mizen Forton Had One Massive Nine Problem

Mizen was a little more interesting to me because his problem with Nine felt much more personal.

My impression of Mizen is that a lot of his behavior comes from his need to prove that he is superior to Nine. Nine is supposed to be the weaker brother, and Mizen wants him to remain that way.

That is why watching Nine slowly gain confidence and become stronger was satisfying. Their relationship begins changing because Nine is no longer willing to remain beneath his brother forever.

Which brings me to our actual male lead.

Nine Forton, Our Beautiful Princess

Come on. Nine is the princess of this story.

I don't care what anyone says. 😂

He is cute, beautiful, emotional, loyal, and spends a good portion of the story being protected by Melissa. The usual gender roles are basically reversed, and I love it.

Melissa is running around with a sword threatening people while Nine is standing beside her looking beautiful.

Perfect relationship.

But I am also really glad Nine eventually had his awakening and became powerful. If he had remained completely helpless throughout the entire story, I think his character would have eventually become boring.

Giving Nine his own strength and allowing him to protect Melissa too made their relationship much better for me.

He is still the princess though.

Sorry, Nine.

Melissa Basically Hijacked the Entire Novel

This is probably my favorite thing about Melissa. She doesn't simply change a few events in the original novel.

She hijacks the entire 🍩 story.

There is a predetermined plot? Melissa doesn't care. The male leads are supposed to be important? Melissa definitely doesn't care. Certain events are supposed to happen in a specific way? Good luck explaining that to her.

She takes control of major events, protects Yuri, changes Nine's future, defeats people who were supposed to be important and eventually even claims her father's position as Duke.

Melissa basically goes from “villainess who is supposed to lose” to the main character, hero, Duke and emotional support system of half the cast.

Maximum aura farming.

Yuri Was Actually the Emotional Heart of the Story

Yuri surprised me because at first she looks like the usual perfect heroine. She is beautiful, kind, innocent and basically everyone loves her.

But once you understand her situation, her character becomes much sadder.

To me, Yuri is basically a bird trapped inside a cage. She keeps getting pushed through the same story, surrounded by the same male leads and forced toward the same predetermined future.

Then Melissa appears.

For once, someone isn't trying to romance Yuri, control her or force her into some predetermined ending. Melissa simply wants to help her.

That is what I loved about their relationship. Yuri gives Melissa her full support, and Melissa becomes the person who finally changes the story that had been trapping her.

There is comedy everywhere in this manhwa, but Yuri's situation gives the story some genuine emotional weight underneath all the memes.

Yona Is Constantly Doing Side Quests for Money

Then we have Yona Whitefall.

Absolute legend.

Yona's entire operating system is basically this:

Money available?

Task accepted.

This woman would probably participate in a bank heist without asking a single question as long as Melissa told her how much she was getting paid.

What makes Yona more interesting is that the side stories eventually give more context to her obsession with money. Once you learn about her past, her connection to the temple and the person she cared about, all of those jokes about her constantly chasing money start hitting a little differently.

She is still hilarious, but there is an actual emotional reason behind some of her behavior.

That made her one of my favorite side characters.

Yuri and Nine Competing for Melissa While Yona Gets Paid

One of my favorite dynamics in the whole story is Melissa, Yuri, Nine and Yona.

Nine wants Melissa's attention. Yuri also wants Melissa's attention.

Meanwhile, Yona is somewhere in the background doing another side quest for money.

Perfect.

Yuri and Nine competing for Melissa is especially funny because Melissa sometimes seems completely unaware of just how much these two adore her.

And Yona?

Yona would probably sell tickets to their argument.

Melissa's Dad Was Secretly Hilarious

I also need to mention Melissa's father because this running joke killed me.

Every time this man wants to have some serious father and daughter conversation with Melissa, somehow the room looks like it belongs to a five year old princess.

He will be sitting there trying to maintain the dignity of a powerful Duke while surrounded by the cutest decorations imaginable.

The contrast was perfect.

The Ending Was Simple, but I Liked It

The ending was nice. Melissa and Nine finally get together, and I especially liked that Melissa still takes initiative in their relationship instead of suddenly transforming into a passive romance heroine just because the story reached its ending.

The side stories also introduce Chelsea, who ends up becoming part of Melissa and Nine's little family.

When I first saw Chelsea, I genuinely started making theories immediately.

Was she Melissa and Nine's daughter? Was she secretly related to Melissa's father? Did that man have some affair somewhere? Was she somehow connected to the original Melissa because our current Melissa came from the real world?

My brain went everywhere. 😂

Even though those theories were wrong, seeing Melissa, Nine and Chelsea together still gave the ending a really sweet family feeling.

After watching Melissa spend the entire story beating idiots with common sense, she deserved some peace.

So, Is Beware the Villainess! Worth Reading?

Yeah, I think it is.

There were definitely parts where I was bored, and I don't think Beware the Villainess! is perfect. Some sections drag, some conflicts are much less interesting than others, and Melissa herself carries a huge amount of the entertainment.

But when this manhwa is funny, it is genuinely funny. And when it gives characters like Yuri and Yona some emotional depth, you realize there is actually a pretty good story underneath all the memes.

Melissa is easily the biggest reason I enjoyed it. She doesn't enter the novel and desperately try to survive by making every male lead fall in love with her.

Instead, she looks at the male leads, realizes most of them are idiots, protects the heroine, finds herself a beautiful werewolf princess, steals control of the entire plot and eventually becomes the Duke.

Respect.

Final Rating: 7/10

It is not perfect, and sometimes it gets boring, but overall I still think Beware the Villainess! is a genuinely good and very fun villainess story.

And Melissa? 10/10 aura farming.