Hidamari Sketch

Hidamari sketch embodies and balances its creativity and silly lighthearted nature extremely well, and I believe it's a really enjoyable and soothing slice of life series.

The animation, while feeling a little low budget, works fine but could be better. I find the art style extremely appealing. Verrrrrry 2000s moe cuteness with big eyes and simple designs that express the girls' character well. I love that this anime does the thing where it makes the characters all wide and chibi, but like cranks the WIDE factor to 100%! It's so silly, and I find it so funny and endearing xD.

Being a show set at an ... art school, Hidamari Sketch consistently has a plethora of inspired and unabashedly unique direction that studio Shaft is known for. The show makes heavy use of colorful abstract patterns, solid color as backgrounds as well as imitating Ben-Day dots, those polka-dot patterns on comic books, as backgrounds. Much of the direction of the show is very artsy and bizarre, especially in the dream sequences which happen occasionally. A lot of unconventional camera movement and framing is part of what I think makes Hidamari Sketch so unique. The constant use of real photos of objects in place of a more traditional drawing just adds to the slightly odd and artsy vibe I think the direction is going for. Almost like a collage!

On the other side, Hidamari Sketch is a goofy anime full of dumb gags and humor focused heavily on character interactions at heart. It's pretty standard slice of life silliness, and I love that kinda thing, though it doesn't innovate much on the character front. Still, the characters are all endearing if not a bit tropey and their interactions are fun to watch! Much of the humor is based around Japanese wordplay and puns, some of which I got and others I didn't fully understand. It could be a bit perplexing to those who don't know Japanese wordplay and culture very well.

In conclusion, Hidamari Sketch is a pretty run-of-the-mill yet still quite fun and charming anime with a lot of value to be found! Being a simple slice of life comedy anime about cute girls being silly and doing quirky school and art class things, there is no real overarching plot, and that's okay. If you're watching this anime you're just here for some good vibes and silly banter that is constantly a joy to watch! If slice of life anime is your thing, I think you'd get a lot out of the show and even outside of that, I find the striking direction reason enough to watch ;P

Hidamari Sketch commits to the idea of slow television, or at least the anime equivalent of it, which to some might be a good thing, but true to its name, slow television is sluggish, my eyes, ears, and thoughts all move much faster than the onscreen characters, and it leaves me wanting more. Within a slice of life where ‘nothing’ happens, enough has to actually happen to keep me focused and engaged with the characters, but Hidamari doesn’t quite do that.

It’s not a bad anime by any means, the basic components are still functional enough, I’ve certainly seen a whole lot worse, but if there ... is a single issue I have, it is that of the main cast, nobody is of any particular interest. Yuno is okay, I guess, but she’s not got any memorable lines, and for a supposed comedy, there is a considerable absence of any real jokes, an issue compounded by the fact most the jokes you do see are just kanji puns, which of course, don’t make any sense when they’re translated. Compared to Lucky Star for instance, you had various archetypes, which while basic, worked well with each other, making one main character an otaku, and another a hard worker is going to create humorous interactions, but nobody in Hidamari Sketch has any distinctive traits, and while you can compartmentalise them, a lot of the time, they end up slipping into the roles of each other – Sae is meant to be ‘the shy one who gets embarrassed easily’, but Yuno acts embarrassed in the exact same manner plenty of times, which means none of them are hugely distinct. When it comes down to it, the most memorable character was the teacher, whose performance seemed to have a whole lot more energy put into it than any of the main cast, which certainly isn’t a good thing, considering she’s a side character.

In actuality, these flaws are not major, while they aren’t something that can be entirely ignored, they also aren’t something that I should give more prominence than is necessary. Hidamari Sketch certainly does a better job than most at providing a relaxing atmosphere, the characters are not particularly distinctive or expressive compared to most anime, but that is because it would conflict with the overall aesthetic of the show, which is to provide a relaxing atmosphere, and it does that well, the colour palette, the seiyuus’ enunciation, and the music, which is probably the best part of the show, all contributes to a calming atmosphere. Hidamari Sketch is an anime you could have an easy time falling asleep to, whether or not that is a bad thing depends entirely on what it is you want from it. And that summarises it rather well, the characters aren’t that great, the comedy even less so, but it’s definitely relaxing, I wasn’t particularly impressed, but it is good at what it does, and maybe if you’re some crackhead who wants to watch anime and try and sleep at the same time, maybe you’ll like Hidamari Sketch more than I did.

Hidamari Sketch definitely fills the role, "A Splice of Life." With four girls hanging out as friends for life, this anime creates a relaxing atmosphere where one can just settle down and enjoy watching the dasy which our main characters live through.

I'd like to give a thorough review which allows the readers of my reviews to decide whether they want to watch this anime or not, but unfortunately, I will have to be rather bias for this particular anime.

Story - 3. As an anime of "A Splice of Life," nothing particular happens within this series. In fact, so much so that there really is no ... Build Up, Climax, then Falling Action like the series I'm much more adapted to watching. There is no plot, just four girls going through ordinary lives as they attempt to make it through Art School.

Art - 1. The drawings of the characters themselves are rather well proportioned, and definitely brings out the term, "individualism." However, the animation aspect efficiently lacks any effort in work. Each episode consists mostly of text or isolated animation objects in order to avoid actually animated the full scene.

Sound - 1. The music felt misplaced, and quite a bit of "dead air" was introduced during the course of this anime. Dead air tends to make the moments animated rather stale and bland to watch.

Character - 7. For a splice of life, these characters definitely fit the bill, and the voices certainly play out their parts. I've no complaints here.

Enjoyment - 1. I have learned that I cannot handle animes dwelling in the field, "A Splice of Life." While others may enjoy it, I live to find animes where plots develop and characters continue to "fight." This genre of anime does not fit that bill, because the random events leading towards no climax drove me nuts to the very end.

Overall - 3. That's the average. I've never rated an anime so low before, but there you have it, my bias review to those who don't know what they're getting into. I've never felt the need to drop an anime so badly in my life. It may be a rather entertaining anime for those who don't hope for a plotline, but I certainly could not handle it.