This may be a nostalgia rating, I'm not sure, because I think this is my first isekai ever back from when I was a teenager. I bought every single volume, which I still have, and I have re-read it at least once every 3 years. Are there a lot of romance trope's? yes, but the characters are likable and honestly it's worth a read.

I remember hay I use to love this as a teenager. Fantasy, great characters, strong female lead, time travel to ancient times, romance. But boy, this does not age well. Too rapey. Spoiler; And I always hate that we dont know what happend to her family.

The main heroine is kind and strong. She isn't like the girls in other manga that cry all the time and depend on their lover. The main guy is cool, hot, and loves Yuri (Main female). The couple's love is something I envy. The girl has two guys who like her but in the end they are not really in the way. The enemy is kinda sad. Her backstory is depressing and really hoped she could have had a better ending. The ending made me cry the whole entire manga did. It is cute, sad, funny, and it really is an emotional roller-coaster. The book is great and I recommend it to people who understands these kind if travel back in time historical manga. In fact I am going to reread it after I finish watching Detective Conan

This manga could have been good, if it didn't have so many bad points. The main ones include:
- repeated attempted rape by several men
- actual rape
- the MC, despite being from the modern age and knowing that rape is not ok, never does anything about it. She never properly fights back or tries to prevent it
- whiny and weak MC; the "strong female character" tag is a laugh, she's oh so weak one minute, then suddenly she's courageous and strong and the next second she's weak again and needs to be rescued
- stupid MC - a lot of the bad stuff that happens to the MC wouldn't have happened if she just had a single brain cell her head and listened to the people around her; she puts herself in those bad situations herself
- "goddess" MC - even before being named a goddess, people (even those who don't know who she is) seem unnaturally attracted to her, to the point where it became ridiculous. The whole nation celebrates her, everyone who meets her falls in love with her or worships her for no reason.
- never ending story - The story is the only good thing about this manga, but it got very repetitive and boring quickly. A guy sees MC, kidnaps her, attempts to rape her, she is rescued, queen schemes, MC attempts to thwart the scheme, is kidnapped again and so on... The political power struggle was interesting at the beginning, but after volume 10 or so it got boring. The story was stretched unnecessarily.
- Plot holes - I can't comment much without spoiling, but the ending just didn't make sense. The author established the rules of things at the beginning, then broke her own rules at the end... Tragic.

This is one of the better fleshed-out historical time travel comics I've come across. The various problems and unique solutions the MC face are fascinating to read about. It's also refreshing that the MC doesn't wait until the very last chapter to profess her love for the male lead. We actually get to see a lot of their relationship dynamics after they confess their undying love. However, that being said...there are some problems too.

1. Main girl Yuri comes from a happy family and has a nice boyfriend. It's sad the author never shows how they dealt with the aftermath of Yuri disappearing.

2. Occasional Expospeak. The villains and good guys all have giant paragraphs of speech bubbles where they explain every detail of their plan. So unrealistic. This comic breaks the "show, don't tell" rule. As a result, things initially seem cheesy and artificial.

3. Fetishizing sexual assault. This happens from Chapter 2, and keeps happening until the end. Unwarranted kissing happens in completely uncalled for situations and are explained away. Her clothes are always conveniently ripped off in battle. Rape, sexual assault, and abuse is forced upon the main girl repeatedly from both villains and, initially, even her primary love interest. Even if this was normal 3,000 years ago, Yuri should not be okay with any of it. Yet there is no attempt to explore and resolve potential trauma/PTSD. She cries and then the scene ends, and everyone including her seem to forget she ever said no.

4. Yuri doesn't have consistent character portrayal. In Ch.6, she's never ridden a horse before, yet she is able to leap onto one and even pull a grown adult onto the horse one handed? She's shown to be smart, but then next thing you know she's barging into enemy territory without collecting intel beforehand--leading to her allies' deaths. Even tho she has no military training, she somehow succeeds as a military commander. This is sloppy writing. The only reason she isn't dead is because plot armor. Her characterization does stabilize towards the end, luckily.

5. everyone looks the same. Why do they all have bangs? And why is EVERYONE in love with the main girl Yuri?

... Last updated on May 29th, 2020, 10:36am

I picked this up for my 1990s project to study its aesthetic and such, I had a few thoughts running from first to its last on my four days binge of this whole thing.



Aesthetic wise, it had typical 1990s drawing so I guess it served me well.

In short word, it left me meh because again, nothing remarkable.

... Last updated on December 30th, 2019, 4:41am

This manga is amazing . it's the best historical manga I've ever read , I really recommend it
I love the romance , and all the characters are unique and have their own personality . The story is very interesting and I love it . Sometimes it makes me cry sometimes it makes me happy
For the art style , it's an old shøjo and the lover is an European

... Last updated on December 17th, 2019, 9:00am

This is one amazing manga. The plot is really good and the romance is really great too. FL is really clever and ML is really devoted to her. I'm not too particular about art style as long as the manga has a good plot. I really do highly recommend this.

Seriously, I gave it a try. I tried to read it despite the art is too old for my taste. Although I grew up with this kind of manga's style, but this is too much. Kail is too feminine and Yuri is so freaking ugly with that kind of hair.

Talking about Yuri, how a what so called "Strong Female Lead" be so weak?? She's so Mary Sue! She almost got rape in almost every chapters. If you are a strong female, you should do something about it! And not begging to be helped every single time!!! Imagine this: YOU almost got rape, what will you do? I'd try to kick that sh*t head's d*ck while screaming for help and RUN away! If the rapist arrested, I'd NEVER forgive IT!! I'd let them rot in hell since they already a RAPIST!! Would you like to marry a rapist?? NO!!! But not in this manga's. This sh*tty character mc almost got rape and she forgives them like nothing happened before. This is so Mary Sue!! All she does is being unique since she's a teenage Japanese (moronic) girl in an ancient Middle eastern country.

All this rape and forgiving the rapist thing is like a brain wash to young gullible lonely teenage girl or woman. Like: forgive the handsome rapist and he will become your prince charming. If you got rape by an old hobo, I bet your ass you will be very disgusted. The hell with people who said this is a good manga. For me it's like that 50 sh*ts of turds! Useless and garbage!

And Yuri always, ALWAYS makes a lot of decision that makes people suffer in the end! All just for the sake for her to SHINE in this turd manga!

Now about Kail. How a Middle Eastern man looks so Japanese?? All he does is: I'm a king so hear me out!!! I want to rape you, so you will become mine!! What? You don't want me?? Screw that! Here comes my d*ck! That's it!! Now you love me don't cha? Now make love to me every day even though you are not in the mood!! Because I'm the king and my d*ck makes you forget everything and only thinking about me!!!

There!! I summarize this manga for you already.

My conclusion: Don't waste your time to read this turd.

... Last updated on February 6th, 2019, 7:14am

Let's be frank here: Red River was made during a younger, less progressive time in the world, which honestly shows with the genuine lack of basic social decency evident everywhere in the manga.

However, despite its social issue problems, it still has honestly very frustrating, hypocritical, and badly-developed characters. Kail, at times, could be cold and uncaring, but he was, ultimately, a pretty solid, moral character and someone strong for Yuri to partner with.

Yuri herself was a pretty emotionally strong female character. Many people have said she's rather unrealistically strong, given her age and her several accomplishments, but you have to consider how she was forced into her situation and still was able to make the best of it. The mangaka handled a lot of the emotional turmoil that Yuri had to go through nicely. However, there were some points that I felt the author completely glossed over and only added in for dramatic or shocking effect when she could have harnessed it to groom Yuri's rapid and ever-changing character development. Nevertheless, Yuri's humble, kind, mature character is a fairly good role model for all female readers to follow.

I did not care too much for the side characters, as there was a large cast of them. Several of their storylines felt unnecessary or rushed at points, . But I will give the author some credit, as she was able to incorporate quite a large amount of characters with ease and still introduce them at appropriate times. As for the villains, the mangaka was really good about giving them emotional backgrounds and histories. Though some smaller characters and 'evil' characters may not have had too much time, they still seemed like real people with emotions and histories hidden within themselves.

Besides some of the complaints I have against the social issues and the characters, the manga is overall a very long epic with really interesting arcs, engaging dialogue, and a hard-to-put-down aura. The mangaka has really amazing storytelling skills, for sure. The bits of history infused with battles, romances, heavy suspense, and a large amount of magic were incredible! Though there are still some points that I felt she could have expanded on , it was still a very smooth, almost flawless storyline. For once, I couldn't identify any immediate plot holes or inconsistencies because the author covered it all.

TL;DR: Conclusively, I cannot recommend this manga in good conscience, especially to a younger audience. Though this is definitely considered one of the most famous, classic staple pieces of historical romance mangas, it has many character flaws that were poorly addressed, several missed opportunities that made for a bad world building and emotionless build-ups, and a horrid view on literally basic human rights. But it does have a very engaging story with several well-executed and enormously interesting arcs, a strong female character (which is a lot more than every single shoujo out there), and very clean art. On that note, I still am divided on what matters more: giving a manga a good review because it’s a long epic with a lot of prestige, or giving a manga a bad review in order to dissuade younger readers from being pulled into a toxic manga? Therefore, 2/10.

... Last updated on March 24th, 2019, 1:04am