CAUTION: REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. Now that isekai has inundated and permeated into every single genre readers are getting bored. The novelty is wearing off and if you really really look at this now overused trope you can see why so many of these stories have failed. Why is there even a need to isekai in the first place? Usually after about ten chapters in the main character has already forgotten all traces of their original identity and theyve become fully immersed into their new life. Sometimes even you as the reader would have forgotten that the initial plot was that of a character being called into a different world not of their own volition. And then you wonder to yourself why wasnt this story just told as a normal straightforward one in the first place? Usually the whole point of using isekai is stressing the precognition of future events. Youd have a lead character who transmigrates to another world recognizes this world as something theyve already read/seen/played/heard of and then theyll try to live out some semblance of a heroic normal or evil life depending on the protagonists original personality and goals. It will go well for them for a while until they reach the inevitable point of thinking Hey Why is this event not happening like its supposed to? or something akin to that not realizing that all their meddling or lack thereof has irrevocably changed the original story of whatever it was that they remembered. And this is where the isekai fails because these characters no longer have the benefit of falling back on their prior past knowledge of future events in order to advance. Yet somehow because all of these stories are usually badly written the protagonist rolls with the punches and they still get a happily ever after at the end. This is precisely the reason why the new standard of isekai does not work because it focuses too much on one world a world that revolves on too much telling and not showing. We are TOLD by the protagonist that this is what is supposed to happen watch this said event happen and then the lead character reacts accordingly to it then rinse and repeat. It completely takes away the element of surprise and we dont get immersed in the new environment like we should have been arent new worlds quite exciting? because if the protagonist isnt surprised why should we be? Theres too much information dumping and it often happens in large stretches in the beginning as the hero tells us how this different world works and what to expect from it. Sure sometimes something deviates from their deeprooted well of knowledge but its inconsequential because it doesnt impact the story much and if the character is momentarily fazed by it they move on rather quickly not letting readers process and digest it. Ultimately all those small gaps in their otherwise comprehensive understanding of this new environment dont make any difference in the plot itself and dont act as a viable source of conflict. By the time something completely throws the main lead off their tracks derailing their cushy life where theyre the center of everyones attention and/or affection it comes as an About time and we cant feel much sympathy for them because their journey thus far has been completely uneventful in terms of both character growth and exploration. Of course not all isekai stories are like this but it is most certainly an emerging trend Im seeing as I read through several popular webtoons that are popping up in this genre. The only story element that changes is what the exact role has our hapless protagonist landed themselves into and everything else is blandly predictable from that point onwards because invariably the author will fail to capitalize on that initial point of difference since there are only two scenarios its always either a heroine in a sweeping romance or a hero on a fantastical adventure. And that is why these types of stories are unsustainable as an isekai. There is no different world if the original world makes no impact on the experience of this new one. You should just write it straight with the protagonist already living in this current world to begin with if you will never ever address the first world again. If future knowledge is so important to the concept of your plot design then by all means do the secondchanceatlife stories that are also rising in popularity. While not always I find that these types of stories are usually better written than isekai ones because the character has FAILED AKA died and consequentially treasures this precious opportunity in a way that an isekaid character will never be able to since its deeply personal. A character popping randomly into the body of a different person is not. That is not to say that this type of isekai storytelling will never work but it largely depends on the skill of the author. However it seems that there are very few and far between because the only such isekai like this that Ive actually enjoyed reading is Trash of the Counts Family. Cale Henituse uses his prognostication to his advantage like every other isekaid protagonist yes but he doesnt smoothly cruise through life. There are often many unexpected events which happen yet he is able to react swiftly and accordingly to each one demonstrating his clever resourcefulness. He doesnt solely rely on prior knowledge as a plot armor crutch neither does he have the standard traits of a hero. While he is selfish materialistic and practical his heart retains the capacity to care for his companions albeit unwillingly at first. His reactions to this new world are genuine and despite knowing many key details about the original storys flow he has several backup plans in case the first one fails which make him unique as an isekaid lead character. Trash of the Counts Family is a breath of fresh air compared to the stale illconceived pile of garbage isekai has grown into. Even isekai webtoons where the main characters dont have any information about the world theyve been unceremoniously dumped into sometimes dont work because of awful conception. In The Twin Siblings New Life two fraternal twins died simultaneously in a freak accident only to be reborn together again as illegitimate twin children of the imperial family. Why did this fail? Because the author was unable to take advantage of utilizing dual protagonists effectively which is the main selling point of this webtoon in the first place. Look at the title. It says twin siblings but they may as well be the same character split into two bodies since there is virtually no difference between the girl Arien and the boy Arjen. Not only that but they are supposedly in their twenties mentally yet frequently act like their current bodies biological age which is five years old. This is yet another glaring flaw of these isekai stories because the author cannot make up their goddamned mind if they want their transmigrated character to act like an adult when theyre put into the bodies of a child. Its like they forgot how an adult acts in a normal situation but at the same time also dont recall how reallife children behave so in the end we get a confused bundle of idiotic childish protagonists. In this case it would benefit from writing the story starting at the point where theyre biologically near their mental age so this chaotic mismatch doesnt happen and we dont have either unbelievable child prodigies or intolerable petulant brats both of which are equally insufferable as character archetypes. The attraction of the isekai genre is that it offers an escape from the mundane. It is nothing new. People have fantasized about being transported into different unfamiliar worlds for a long time such as the tale of Urashima Tar circa 700 AD where a fisherman rides a turtle to an underwater Dragon Palace meets a beautiful mermaid princess and enjoys his new life there. When he returns to his original world above the sea he finds that several centuries have passed and everything has changed since his departure. More recently in the 1990s the isekai genre has been wellreceived in stories such as InuYasha and Fushigi Yugi both of which incidentally were my first taste of manga. These two series had it all action adventure romance friendship and most importantly worldbuilding. Both of the isekaid heroines Higurashi Kagome and Yuki Miaka are naive junior high school girls who unwittingly wind up in a dangerous fantasy world full of deadly threats as well as powerful allies. As they explore these foreign lands we feel their fear their struggles to adapt and their desire to save this new world that theyve come to love. At the same time they never forget their origins and they yearn to return home. They are caught between two worlds and ultimately its their decision on which world they want to live the rest of their lives in when everything is over. In all these cases it can be seen that wellwritten isekai juggles the memory of the first world with the happenings of the second one so as to put the protagonists dual identities and roles in perspective. It remains an important influence in their behavior their actions and most importantly their desires. They have the power to choose which world they want to belong to and staying may very well mean theyll never see their own family ever again which up until that point has been an important reason for their dogged pursuit of a means of returning when they originally arrived on foreign shores. To put it simply a character who has lived two lives in two worlds should retain at least a desire or a longing for what used to be no matter how engaging or consuming their present situation is. Even the divisive Sword Art Online: Aincrad puts the goal of returning to the original world as the top priority so both characters and readers dont forget what the aim of the game is supposed to be. Yet the onslaught of the newage isekai weve found ourselves consuming nowadays completely forgoes the good old past to wholly embrace the shiny new present even when the latter is not the least bit entertaining making me question why weve isekaid the hero in the first place. Okay so Ive ranted for eight paragraphs without actually addressing the webtoon that is the topic of this review but I promise all these points Ive brought up will come into play because I Raised Cinderella Preciously takes everything wrong about the current state of the isekai genre and just slaughters it with its inexplicably uneventful dullness. Or perhaps it smothers it with a whole lot of absolutely flipping nothing. Either way Im really flummoxed as to why this story exists at all. Trying to bring a new twist to the equally tired genres of Cinderella and isekai stories we have the female lead who ends up reincarnated as the evil stepmother. But this time shes going to raise all her kids right including Cinderella yay We will have a happy fabulous family joy to the world the story weve all been waiting for Hold on let me stop you right there. Lets just ignore the isekai part of the story for a bit. As a stepmother you really only have two choices on how to act. You can either dote on your own kids and mistreat the ones who arent related to you thats the original bad stepmother archetype or you can love all of them regardless of whose blood runs in their veins which is the selfless good stepmother archetype. I suppose you can also ditch all the kids and start all over again as an unattached free spirit but then that would make you an awful person and no one will want to read your story. Its also somewhat possible that youd mistreat your own children and love the stepchildren instead but only if you were a terrible mother to begin with and thats not a good image either. So discounting those two highly unfavorable scenarios we return to the two most likely choices of how a new stepmother would behave which is either selective favoritism or universal compassion towards the two types of children in the conjoined households. Okay now lets go back to this being an isekai. With the main character familiar with the story of Cinderella she knows that she gains nothing from mistreating the titular heroine so that further narrows it down she can only be kind to all of three of the children. Its not a complicated math equation. Thats all fine but this presents a new dilemma. Without the main antagonist present who will drive the story forward? The only reason why Cinderella is the quintessential wishfulfillment story is because a poor girl was able to rise from the cinders of yearslong abuse and mistreatment to find her happy ending with a handsome prince. She has a fairy godmother who shows up at the right time to completely change her life for the better as if finally rewarding her for having suffered enough to meet some arbitrary requirement to receive mystical assistance. The moral of that story is if you grit your teeth put your head down and work hard despite being treated as a doormat someone powerful will eventually come along and grant you happiness. When you take the evil stepmother and stepsisters out of the Cinderella equation all you really have is... a regular girl with a stepfamily. There is absolutely no reason why Cinderella will be saved like she was in the original story since there is nothing to save her from. Yet the isekaid stepmother character still thinks that future events will follow its former progression as she clearly doesnt understand the story of Cinderella. So in every other chapter we have the stepmother Mildred Barnes constantly wondering when the fairy godmother is going to show herself because she wants Cinderella or Ashley in this story to get married off as quickly as possible. This would reduce the financial strain on the rest of her family and perhaps if she treats Cinderella well enough her stepdaughter will remember her kindness once she becomes a princess? Either way its selfish and despite her efforts to be a good mother figure this underlying desire to push her kids off to rich men rubs me the wrong way. Why is she counting on some fairy godmother to help out Cinderella when the easiest and fastest thing to do to save her flailing household would be to marry again to the next available rich bachelor? Actually this makes me question whether or not shes even in the story of Cinderella because not only are all the names of the people different with stupidly uncreative ones like Mildred Sandra Iris Lily Ashley Gary and Fred but there is no other indication that this is indeed that same story. If I were her and had transmigrated into this world my first thought would not be the story of Cinderella simply because there are two daughters one stepdaughter and a dead father/husband. The only unique giveaway that a story is a Cinderella story is if the fairy godmother appears and she hasnt so far not even a tiny hint that she exists in this world which also has no signs of magic so my gut feeling is that Mildred is horribly mistaken and this is just the body of a regular widow with three young girls she must take care of. And there we have it. We have a new stepmother who has no idea how to take care of children because the protagonists former self never had children in her previous life before coming into this one. She has experience with baking and sewing though which her daughters dont question upon witnessing their replaced mothers newfound talents. Which is weird since theyre teenagers so they should know that their own mother has never so much as tied an apron on her waist before let alone picked up a sewing needle. Not to mention that her whole personality changed overnight. If this was indeed the stepmother from Cinderella there is no reason why her daughters would be okay with the 180 change in treatment of Cinderella Ashley in this story because at this point where the protagonist transmigrated into the four of them have been living together under one roof for quite some time now. There is zero indication that Ashley has been bullied by any of her stepfamily and when the new Mildred treats her gently the two daughters dont protest or point out this behavior is inconsistent with past practices further homing in on my suspicion that she is not in Cinderella. However if this is really Cinderella which I highly doubt it drags on far too long to be the same story. The brevity of the original story was the entire point with only one royal ball in which Cinderella meets her prince falls in love but then runs away to hide her real identity when the clock strikes twelve. Its due to the fact that there was one and only one single encounter with the prince that provided the reason for why a great epic search began for the mysterious maiden whose foot fits the glass slipper she left behind. Its a tale of love at first sight and the Grimm fairytale had the stepsisters cutting off parts of their foot in order to deceive the slipper tester which got them their just desserts. The slipper also serves to prove Cinderellas identity because without it she would have no means to show the prince that it was indeed her at that ball since I guess the prince is face blind or something. In short three elements make up a Cinderella story: a female persecutor or abuser a magical source of aid and an identifying item for the final revelation. Since none of these exist in this webtoon Im going to go out on a limb here and say this is not a Cinderella story so strike out that part from the title. What do we have left? Oh right that she raised her preciously. Please. The author of this story clearly has never had children. How can I tell? Because raising a kid is not the same as telling teenagers how to behave no youve skipped arguably the most frustrating yet joyful moments of motherhood and for what? For boring crap. Yes after 40+ chapters in I can tell you nothing of significance has happened between the first chapter and the most recent one. What do the main characters spend their time doing? They squeal over dresses go to an irritatingly high number of dull balls have some small petty arguments and a few guys flirt with some of the girls. There is zero conflict zero story progress and zero character development. The only character that is somewhat memorable is Mildred since we spend so much time in her head as she explains everything there is to know about this blandass world of hers. It really makes me wonder which part of this new life of hers is supposed to be appealing because the whole point of isekai is that the second world is more fascinating than the first yet I feel like Im watching paint dry whenever I read one of this webtoons inconsequential chapters. Which is all of them. Theres far far too much thinking going on in Mildreds little head while nothing is happening. Seriously almost every panel is filled with her thoughts. I dont care for any of the other characters theyre all bland and dont stand out so they may as well as be planks of wood. The only discernible traits of each girl in the household is that Iris is jealous all the time Lily is the mediator and the artistic one and Ashley is clumsy as fck spending all her time either breaking spilling or ruining something. Thank god shes not actually Cinderella or shell have burnt the house down with how terrible she is at chores. Sometimes I cant even tell the two daughters apart because they look the same and behave the same they may as well as be the same character except Iris is more combative. She and Ashley clash over being the recipient of Mildreds attention and poor Lily is the typical neglected middle child who spends the least amount of time with her own mother. I guess some things in real life dont change even in fiction. Mildred is a passive observer spending 90 of her time thinking about useless thoughts and information dumping us as per the usual isekai character but its so boring and unnecessary because everyone is already familiar with the Cinderella story if this is that. Oh and she pities the original Mildred for being in such a dilemma raising three kids on her own. Like we needed to feel sympathy for a character that will never appear. If you are an isekaid protagonist at least reveal to us your own past giving us a better understanding of you as a person not as someone who is just watching things unfold and only stepping in when necessary to save the day. As it is due to her inability to express anything of her own character prior to the transmigration her successful embracement of her new identity as Mildred completely becoming one with it and her absolute failure to predict the future I see no reason why this needed to be an isekai story. She could have simply suffered from temporary amnesia and this would still be the same story. Isekai just doesnt make sense here. She doesnt even bother to discuss how she ended up here. Was she a victim of Truckkun or Buskun? Which world did she originally come from? Why doesnt she think about her past life at all? Why is she completely melded into the Mildred character aside from expressing the occasional sympathy for the previous owner of the body? Is it to force readers to feel sorry for her in her current situation? Seriously this is one of the least isekailike isekai stories Ive ever read. The protagonist cant tell the future using their prior knowledge even though she thinks she can because she misidentified her role the protagonist has no special gifts or perks to make life easier or interesting there is no real goal or motive upon the heros arrival and this new world is even more mundane than the world that the readers live in. Id rather live out my own life instead of fantasizing being transported into Mildreds whod want to go to all these stupid balls all day? So congratulations youve failed at being an isekai. Then theres the timing of all of this transmigration action. I feel that an isekai stepmother story would have worked but not in the way it was framed in this webtoon. First of all get rid of the Cinderella construct because its tired and needs to be retired quite honestly. Look at the Disney live adaptation of the story and youll see that it completely takes away the magic of the animated one from 20+ years ago. When a reboot cant offer anything new to the table its time to hang up our hats and say goodbye. Secondly if your title promises the raising of children you must actually you know raise them? Starting from the late teenager years is NOT raising as anyone who has teenagers will know. By that point youre lucky if they still listen to more than half of what you say. Theyre filled with hormones and will be far more likely to succumb to peer pressure and follow the whims of people their own age not listening to their nagging parents who usually mean well. To properly raise a child you must at the very least start from their childhood if not toddler years and be able to watch them grow up thats how you can be proud of their success and your own for doing such a good job as a parent. Its like a planting a seed and watching it grow day by day year by year into a great tree it takes time but its worth the effort in the end. Instead we have the new Mildred suddenly popping in one random day and deciding to properly teach the parentless girls to be good ladies and shes even proud of herself for a job that she didnt do which was done by the actual Mildred. My daughters grew up well and with good manners she thinks to herself arrogantly taking the credit of someone who is no longer here. How can you say that the daughters grew up well when you didnt even watch them grow up? Youve only just lived with them for a few months at most The nerve of this woman Its like someone coming across a tree in the park and then saying Goodness me have I done such a good job in watching my tree grow up big and tall. Thus the timing is completely wrong. Mildred should have transmigrated into the story precisely when she married into the family. There is no specific age at which this could have happened so all three children could have been at the age where she can properly raise them like a good mother should instead of starting when theyre teenagers and therefore less receptive to a parents words of advice. Ideally the children should all be around 57 years old when theyre still cute and energetic as well as curious and pliable. This would even make it better for the supposed isekainess of this webtoon because we will then have an explanation of why the girls dont realize their mother has been replaced and itd be humorous to watch a fish out of water Mildred deal with young children because thats the hardest stage of being a mother being inexperienced and overwhelmed at the same time. With the children as teenagers as they are here Mildred is less of a mother and more of a wise friend that everyone listens to. The dynamic is not the same. Thats also the reason why she slips so comfortably into this role with no real effort or exertion on her part because its easy. Motherhood is anything but. Isnt it funny that the overused isekai turnedintoachild doesnt usually work but in the instance where certain characters would have been better starting off as young its not used to its greatest advantage? Besides the timing the genre of this is also wrong. Most authors like to press the fast forward button on their characters to skip to adulthood for the juicy bits which is the romance. I disagree though because I find that childhood and adolescence are so much more fascinating to read and harder to write well because its the backbone of a characters development which I suppose webtoon and webnovel authors like to avoid entirely due to either lack of skill or planning. After 40+ chapters the romance in this story has been stuck at a snails crawl so just dont even bother honestly. Id much rather read a story where a hapless girl gets unceremoniously handed the role of stepmother/mother who must raise three young children not teenagers on her own and watch their daily routine and activities which I expect to be filled with both hilarity joy frustration and various mishaps. That is the slice of life genre and it revolves around the everyday life of usually average people which all of the characters here are so it works out. Fred the clear male love interest can even be the surrogate father figure who comes around to help out and then the romance can slowly build up as he and Mildred work together as parents for the children. Instead we have this steaming pile of turd even flies wont touch. Sigh. Oh the lost potential I weep for thee. The key moment of Mildreds so far in these horridly bland chapters which comes to mind is when she refused selling the rights to her flower appliques for dresses to the Queen. It was supposed to be a powerful character event for her but it rang so hollow I laughed. Here she is supposedly broke or at least not doing so well financially and she immediately turns down a way to make easy money. Her reason? Because she needs to make sure her daughters stand out at balls and how can they if everyone else is wearing the same appliques? Really? What the hell is wrong with you? For someone who is quick to toot her own horn about raising the children well you sure lack confidence in your own daughters Mildred. If theyre all so beautiful talented and genial with good etiquette and manners theyd catch the eyes of many suitors. They dont need to rely on some stupid flower decorations to make them stand out. What happened to judging people by the quality of their heart? In this world do we judge people by the beauty of their dress? How preposterous. Later on everyone including the rejected Queen reacts to her decision like it was some noble and great sacrifice on Mildreds part when its nothing of the sort. Yeah Im sure your daughters will all stand out if theyre malnourished and frail from lack of food because you decided to turn down the good old money. And before you say that shes not that hard up since shes still got all those paintings to sell so she can afford to turn down the Queen I must point out that its completely uncertain how much money theyll be earning and it may take a while to authenticate the paintings so what are they going to live off in the meantime? Love flower decorations and the smell of bread? If she sold the rights to the Queen she can easily demand a price as high as she wants and see if the offer is accepted. If not then she loses nothing. She didnt even take the option of bartering for a good deal agreement meaning she lacks any business savvy. It doesnt hurt to see how much the other party is willing to bite. But no youve got to make this about some admirable reason about propping up your daughters with gaudy baubles instead of properly spending time teaching them how to attract the men you so desperately want to push them off to. All of which are awful and inherently selfish motivations might I add. She could also have just sold the flower designs off and come up with some other decoration not covered by the selling rights of the flower applique with how good her sewing skills are. When the Queen asks what Mildred would like from her as an token of her apology all she asks is for her support. How dumb is this woman? I understand its supposed to elevate her as a holierthanthou character but it makes no sense in her position instead making her seem like a vapid poser. Like someone who is clearly dying of starvation but asks to only smell the scent of food while its cooking. At least specify the type of support Seriously this whole sequence was horribly thoughtout and its a sign of bad writing. The art itself is ok but nothing great. The quality is mostly consistent between panels with no big sudden drops in detailing which really irritates me when I read webtoons in general. The daughters are ugly compared to Mildred and Ashley which is made more prominent by their oddly large noses that no other characters share. The character designs only stand out with Mildred and Ashley while everyone else is rather nondescript. There was a Crown Prince somewhere but I never recognize him when he shows up and I dont even remember his name since hes so unremarkable throughout. Many of the characters have eyelashes that match their eye color which Ive never seen before in a webtoon. Im not really sure what the benefit of coloring them like that brings but maybe its just an artistic style of the illustrator. The panels are simple the backgrounds are either solid colors or the same ornatelooking backdrops with flowery walls and doors behind the characters. There isnt much difference of depth perception going on nor is there a variety of camera angles making it more difficult to become immersed into the environment and its staging. There are large blocks of white spaces between each panel which also break immersion. Only the art for Mildred and Ashley are drawn with proper care and attention to detail everything else is secondary. Long story short I Raised Cinderella Preciously fails at being an isekai at being a Cinderella story and Mildred completely fails to raise anything. This is a story about countless balls fighting over dresses and their decorations and people who just like to sit and watch as the world passes them by. As a stepmother Mildred overcompensates as a mother she doesnt do enough and as a woman shes taken several steps backwards in defense for her own unworthy daughters. Overall Breakdown: Characters: 1/10 Story: 1/10 Art: 6/10 Lore/Worldbuilding: 1/10 Enjoyment: 1/10