Love Live! School Idol Project

*THIS IS MY FIRST REVIEW, SO PLEASE BE NICE! :D*

(TL;DR version at the bottom)

I stopped watching anime a long time ago (when death note came out and everyone was fonboying about it everywhere, it made me sick) and I though I wouldn't ever watch anime again. A friend of mine told me a couple of months ago "you don't have the amount of kawaii in your life you really need, kinda like Love live" so I decided to watch it.

I went into it knowing perfectly well that this was an idol anime, mainly aimed to teen audiences and fully aware of what kind of music ... I should expect. To put things into perspective, if you haven't guessed by my user name I'm mainly a fan of deathcore, hardcore, all genres of metal and hardcore music basically.

I then started the first chapter at around 11pm in the night. What follows is the total actual truth: next day I went to the office where I work at and watched the whole first season as soon as I arrived.

The story is simple, yet gripping, the school is about to close and the only solution seemingly possible is to start a school idol group to bring more students to the school and stop its closure. What is gripping of this plot is all that the girls involved in the group have to endure to get to their prime and make it so they get their name known to others and bring some joy and happiness to people while being happy themselves.

Each song has a meaning in how the plot has developed so far, and each song has its own unique sound and lyrics that all make sense and leave you thinking on what they mean and what they teach you. A total of 28 songs are played across all seasons/movie and you'll remember each and everyone of them, all the lyrics and you'll end up downloading the songs and having them wether on your smartphone or music player of preference and playing them over and over again (they actually have around 60+ songs, not counting the sub-units songs and they're all amazing).

Now, the characters, they all have their own distinct personalities and artistic direction. Their voices and ways of acting all make you love them more and more (fyi, Rin/Honoka best waifus <3). Some songs have a "main" singer for them which is related to what happened in the episode and you'll say "this is honoka's song" or "this is umi's song". All characters have hilarious reactions when the funny moments happen as well as their own emotional responses when the anime goes into feels land.

You never watched an idols/musical anime? Watch this, and none other will match it after doing so. It's not just a story of 9 girls trying to save their school from closing, it's a story about fighting for your dreams, a story about finding hope and strength when all is against you, it's about not letting anything get in your way and pummel through all the bad reputation, naysayers and making your dreams come true. I watched Clannad, Clannad:AS, Kanon, Angel Beats, etc. and as much as they have taught me valuable lessons, nothing comes close to what Love Live has taught me and what it has done to my life and my way of getting through each day. Perseverance, following your dreams, never back down and above all, love life and enjoy every second of it, wether it is doing what you like or fighting against all odds, cause in the end it's all worth it.

TL;DR version:

(watched LLSIP, LLSIP 2nd season and LLSIP Movie)

The music is impeccable, each song sounds different from each other and the dance routines for each of them will make you learn the lyrics in no time even if you don't know any japanese. The characters are all loveable and not one of them feels out of place (Rin-chan/Honoka-chan best waifus!) as they all have their own stories that are developed during the whole anime. A simple yet convincing and gripping story on how fighting against all odds to make your dreams come true can take you to the top and make your life what you always wanted it to be. Truly a masterpiece that makes your heart warm and happy all the time and leaves you with a beautiful life lesson after finishing it. Don't miss it even if you're not used to SOL animes, to tell you the truth I wasn't into them either, and Love Live! got me into them in an instant.
My only complaint: the 3D is kinda shitty at some points.

Love Live is everything you think it is from the outset. It’s a high school drama centered on a group of adorable girls becoming idols. It’s nothing new, it doesn’t strive to change the game; yet it still manages to beat the competition as far as I’m concerned. And I’m not familiar with all the competition because I’m not a huge fan of this slice of life/music genre that seems to have cropped up after the success of that one episode of Haruhi Suzumiya and the massive success of K-On. All I know of is the first season of K-On, which is massively hyped up. ... I reviewed it pretty decently though and in retrospect…I think it’s because I’m a sucker for this moe garbage. I fall for the cute girls just as easily as the rest and even when reviewing some titles I seem to relax my rating because I enjoyed following the cute girls as they do cute things. I’m pathetic, I know.

Why am I admitting my being a moe blob? Because that’s how I get caught up in these types of anime. My thinking that Azusa was adorable got me watching K-On. My thinking Nico was cute got me watching Love Live. And while Azusa was my favorite character from K-On, Nico is actually not my favorite character from Love Live because she’s kind of a bitch. But that’s beside the point…

Love Live has the same type of set-up as many of these high school drama-y anime. Just like K-On, we follow an idealistic, loud, clumsy, and annoying girl. In Love Live, she decides to start an idol group due to the popularity of these groups around Japan. It’s all a last ditch effort to save her high school which could possibly shut down. She recruits her two best friends, a very boring moe girl named Kotori and the super shy girl, Umi. Umi doesn’t want to perform in a short skirt because that’s embarrassing. Meanwhile, she wears the school’s uniform skirt that, in reality, would be as effective a piece of clothing as not wearing a skirt at all.

They face all kinds of obstacles such as a really unsavory girl named Nico and a student council president who keeps pushing them aside.

Story-wise, it’s nothing new. The only real plus I can give the story is the fact that the girls actually practice. There are lots of parts that have nothing to do with practicing but the sheer fact that we are given a group of competent girls that are actually trying to succeed at what they are doing makes the anime more enjoyable and gives the audience more reason to invest themselves in the group and hope to see them succeed.

That being said, this is a music anime and I believe that every music anime I’ve ever reviewed I’ve stated one thing:

NOT ENOUGH MUSIC!

This is the exception. Love Live contains a surprising amount of music. This is an equivalent to America’s High School Musical so it better well have some goddam music. But unlike High School Musical, we’re not subjected to Ashley Tisdale’s nose, which makes this anime a big plus in my book. We’re also not subjected to understandable lyrics, which is probably why I enjoy the music of these types of shows. Let’s face it; the music in Love Live is garbage. It’s bubblegum pop, the kind of stuff you’d expect teenaged girls to write. The meaningless lyrics and nonsensical English words or phrases thrown in are a staple of these types of songs. But it’s what you’d expect from sixteen year old girls and I guess that makes it alright. Start: Dash is pretty catchy and while none of the music may be memorable, at least there is enough of it going around that you get excited for the next piece.

That being said, the music is accompanied by an idol performance most of the time. The animation of this show is usually pretty good with very adorable girls, great backgrounds, and good movement. But the issue comes with these dance performances that become very shoddy CGI mixed with traditional animation sequences. While the animation looks good, the sudden use of something akin to Miku Miku Dance is frustratingly out of place and gaudy. I don’t know who decided to change the style, but fire that person for season two. Please. No more computer animation.

Even with a big cast of really likeable and adorable characters it still fails to impress with anything new. Every character is a stereotypical something-or-other. You have the tomboy, the tsundere (really two of them), the well-to-do upper classman, the pervert, the ditzy leader, the shy and fraidy-cat friend, and the girl with very little personality. Working together, these characters are fun despite some having very little depth. The show does give most of them a good amount of focus and fleshes them out a bit, but they’re, once again, typical. The development they’re given is the usual.

Now for some smaller tidbits of hate: Why do all Russian girls in anime and manga have to be ballerinas? I’m looking at you Black Lagoon, Love Live, and Gunslinger Girl. Also, why the beach episode? If one episode contributed nothing to the anime as a whole it was the beach episode. Also, the drama at the end regarding Kotori was forced and very predictable. The entire outcome was extremely easy to see from a mile away because the same plot device has been used before to the same effects.

So where does that leave Love Live? Despite the story’s predictability, the characters predictability, and the MMD style dancing, it’s still highly enjoyable. Watching this band of girls come together and work hard to attain a dream is actually kind of heart-warming. The pacing is a little rough and the music isn’t the best but there’s a good amount of music and a good amount of fun to be had. It’s not an anime to be taken seriously, you hop on this ride to meet some new friends and enjoy their interactions and triumphs. It’s no masterpiece by any stretch, but for what it is, it’s a good, though flawed, anime.

My first idol based anime was Idolmaster. To be honest I found it very boring and I didn't seem to enjoy the anime at all except for the singing. I quite enjoy their songs. Then I stumble upon another idol based anime, to be percise a school idol based anime. I thought that this anime is the same like idolmaster and I gave up too early on this anime. After being persuaded by my friend I start watching this anime and what do you guys know! This anime is flipping fantastic! The plot, The character everything was perfect, the song, the soundtrack, the character ... of each of the idol. This anime change my whole perspective towards idol based anime. This is by far the greatest idol based anime for me and I really enjoy it! Believe me guys, you won't regret watching this anime, it's a masterpiece

Just as much as we need a gateway anime to hook us up into this little world of colorful fights and beautiful blood rain, there comes a time when we have to watch something to remind us why we still like these things. And even if a series like Love Live, whose selling point isn't gore or a super addictive plot, isn't what we expected to end up watching when we started (I think my teenage me would frown If I told him I saw an anime about a bunch of cute girls singing in a stage), I think it has a lot of qualities ... that we don't usually find in anime in general. The problem is that its cover fits a profile that most people (myself included) would deem stupid, either for prejudice or for having actual experience with a show that looks similar to this one. But even though it shares some of the questionable tendencies of other series from a similar ilk (the so called "moe" genre), one needs to call out the fact that this one actually manages to avoid crippling itself with its own clichés and tropes.

Cute girls, sure. But is it as meaningless as the others? We'll see.

-Story:
The story is what you read in the synopsis. There'll be tropes and conventions you've seen before, even clichés sometimes, but it actually tells something. It progresses. It doesn't get stuck in: "Yo, gurl, it's so fun being in a club! All we do is sit an' talk shit, and be cute. No need to practice or deal with life issues. Sure being a teenage girl is a-ma-zing."

The thing's not written to make you go: "what a badass plot twist", but it takes itself seriously enough to follow a logical path to get things done, and there's the feeling that they're actually starting things from scratch and fighting for them, instead of, you know, succes brought forth by magic. This is actually surprising, at least to me, because when I see a title like this the only thing that crosses my mind is "K-On! again", which, for acknowledged people, means that the series will "preserve the flow of everyday life forever", or, in more common terms, focus in unbelievably trivial daily stuff and no character progression. It's hard to tell wheter that situation will suit a specific series or not, but the case being that this format can cause from idle entertainment to hellish boredom, seeing an idol show about idols actually doing idol stuff is refreshing. And when it's handled in a way where it gets its points across: laughter when you have to laugh and emotion when it needs emotion, then there's no way you can deny its quality.

But if all in all you still can't find the story compelling (or you just like to nitpick a lot, like me), at least the humor should make up for it.

-Characters:
In a genre where airhead MCs are the norm (and usually its curse), I believe this is the first time I can say: she's actually useful! Honoka might still be an airhead, but out of all the characters of the show, she does suit the role of the engine that moves the whole team, and she does it perfectly. She even gets proper character development, something that would seem otrageous in many shows like this.

The rest of the cast isn't bad either. It is true that is full of archetypes we've already seen a zillion times, but the writers manage to put a fresh feeling into them, and exploit their inherent qualities. You can complain that compared to other kinds of shows they're really not that fleshed out, but I find it hard to name many shows of this type that actually do this. The only bad thing is that some characters lose the spotlight as the show progresses (and thus become easy to forget), but it at least makes them likeable enough to not get annoyed at their presence.

-Art:
I wouldn't call it great (just cute faces everywhere), but it's very good. I'm not sure if there's a difference between the TV version and the DVDs, but from what I watched the animation is pretty solid, and the character expressions don't suddenly turn into eldritch abominations for a lack of budget. There's also CGI to help smooth things out when they dance and need a more 3D approach to their movements, and it looks good enough. Overall, I think the best animated parts are the ones when they're dancing, which is a HUGE plus considering this is an idol anime.

-Sound:
Opening, ending and insert songs are all pop (which means that if you like pop, you'll probably like them as well). This isn't a surprise considering what the series is about, but the actual OST of the show is also very fitting and highlights the moments in a timely manner. There's even some fantastic piano in some parts, which I couldn't help to like. The seiyuus also do a great job at portraying their characters, all with their incredibly high-pitched voices and token tsunderism in some of them.

-Enjoyment:
This is odd. After watching things like K-On! and other series of a similar ilk, seeing a DVD cover featuring a bunch of cute girls would usually cause me to go "nope, don't want it", not because I didn't like the previous ones (which I probably did), but because I've found myself unable to like more. It might come with age, but these kind of shows, whether they're comedies, club-based stories, or the most ridiculously simple slice of life, become more and more tedious to watch as you get by, and finding something that you can even praise for its actual effort in improving the genre's quality is quite the thing. Personally, I loved it. It was really fun, and all that "cuteness" crap was finally subordinated to the freaking plot.

So, would I recommend it?

Totally.

Have fun!

"Love Live School Idol Project huh?", that's was I'm asking myself and I think maybe I will give a shot since the movie will be aired on GSC so why not. After finished watching first season, I question myself "why i did'nt watch this anime earlier?". This, my friend is one of the most amazing idol anime,of course there are many more idol anime such as AKB0048, Wake up Girls, Idolmaster and many more. But, LL gives me something that makes me want to jump and clapping after they finished their songs.

Love Live School Ido Project start with main character,Honoka who adore idol since it ... was awesome but the happy moment did'nt stay long after hearing her school gonna shut down. With determination, she and her other two friend,Kotori and Umi decide to create school idol to save school from close. Their fun,sad moment goes on as they reqruit more member and create more songs. I would say, to protect-school-from-close story was not the strong point of this anime but the member of "muse"(their team name) since each of them have different personality with their own backstory.

For animation, I did'nt really sceptical about it and I find it pretty much satisfying seeing them dance and sing with full energetic. The producers did a good job handling 3D CGI when they dance and other scene which are fluid and nice. For music and OST, since this is school idol anime, I'm expecting it more energetic song and it did'nt dissappoint me. Moreover, it keeps getting better and more charater songs keep getting produce until now. One more thing, I recommend to watch with speaker or earphones to feel the music to the max.

Verdict: I would recommended this anime for those who want to watch some freaking cute and beautiful girls dance and sing in stage. To tell the truth, their dance and songs did gives me goosebump and speechless especially episode 3(trust me,you will feel that). For the rating, it easily get 10/10.

Love Live! is fun and lighthearted, but most of the appeal comes from getting invested in the community (seiyuus, the mobile: “game school idol festival”, and the fandom in general).

The school idol tournament “Love Live” and the plot of the school shutting down are not interesting by themselves, and so the show focuses on the characters. However, there are too many characters to develop so none of them end up getting developed anyway. Of the nine main cast members, Rin and Hanayo are forgettable, Maki, Kotori, Nico and Nozomi are one-dimensional, Umi and Eli are decent and the main character, Honoka, is basically just a ... shonen protagonist shoved into an idol show. Honoka is a complete airhead and just preaches loudly about friendship and idols. For a character-driven show, the characters are poorly developed and do not contribute much to the plot. Although the show is objectively bad due to the (essentially) nonexistent plot and weak characters, I really enjoyed it! It was still a fun show to watch and made me laugh a lot.

Overall, the production quality is good. Despite being poorly written, the characters are cute and quirky with colorful animation to support them, and at least have interesting visual designs. The music is above average, and the seiyuus did a good job singing and voicing the characters.

TLDR; Love Live! is a fun show to watch if you’re bored, and I would recommend it to new anime watchers if you’re into shows that aren’t too plot-heavy and focus more on entertainment. I wouldn’t watch it again but I don’t regret watching it either.

I finished watching this anime with a friend on new year's eve, and while she liked it, I was less impressed. Before Christmas I had just finished watching Sword Art Online II and Akame Ga Kill, so after Christmas I was still at a high from those two amazing anime. So maybe it's because I'm comparing it too heavily to other anime, but 'Love Live! School Idol Project' did not impress me very much.

Story - The story was clear and concise. Save the school from closing down by starting a school idol group as a publicity stunt. While it was easy to follow, it ... was also easy to predict. The show gave little in surprises or excitement and was just too basic for my liking. But I must commend them for staying on track. A short anime like this has to stay on track, because they don't have time for fillers and side stories. While the story was basic for my liking, I must admit there were times when I enjoyed the simplicity, when I knew what was going to happen, and it happened, it was kind of refreshing and I could sit back and enjoy the show.

Art - The art in this show is beautiful. 'Love Live! School Idol Project' is a slice of life anime, and therefore you can't expect real artistic spectacles like unique settings or amazingly detailed weapons or spaceships. It is standard for this genre; school, arcades, modern towns and students. The show is detailed though, and you don't get any faceless people in the crowd which is nice. The only place this anime really stands out in terms of art is the character design. I am not going to hide it, I thought the girls were stunning! They all had lovely hair and each girl had a different colour which distinguished the members of the group nicely. It was also clear that they were drawn with the purpose of being attractive, that typical pretty school girl look you get in a lot of slice of life anime. I would also like to commend the show's artists and directors for omitting panty shots, this show manages to avoid fanservice and for that I thank them. It really is unnecessary.

Sound - There isn't much to say on this. I watched the subbed version, and so the Japanese voices were the same old voices you get in anime. The girls all sounded fairly similar, young and cute and girly with few exceptions. The voice acting was on par, and I have no complaints there. The music was pretty good, not to my taste, but if you like the genre of music, idol music, then you'll probably like this. Personally I preferred the music in shows like Kids On The Slope and K-On! but hey that's just me. The music was catchy and upbeat and so no complaints there either.

Character - I rated the characters a 5 because I felt they were way too shallow. Love Live! is only a 13 episode anime, so maybe that was the reason, but I felt they could have developed the characters further. I feel like I hardly know them. Not a single character had back story and the only way we got to know them was through their interactions with the other members of the Idol group during the course of the anime.

Enjoyment - It was alright. Like I said in my introduction, I wasn't very impressed. I would only recommend this show to people who had expressed to me that they like idols or are really into music anime. But other than that, there's no reason to watch this show. It was a fun ride, with a few laughs here and there and the way the girls smiled throughout most of the anime had me smiling as well. Those damn contagious smiles :D

Overall - I am rating the show a 5 for mediocre. It's nothing special, but also it does do it's job. It's an idol show, and so people who like idols and the music that goes with it probably don't care that the story is generic and the characters are shallow.

A review about a GREAT anime. Recommend reading the whole review.

When I first heard about Love Live! School Idol Project, the name got me going. Is it a romance anime or a idol anime (maybe even both). Turns out it's just a idol anime.

Story: 3
I got into the anime very quickly after the first two episodes. They were what kept me watching, they were definitely not boring and didn't lack of many attributes that keep the audience from getting bored. Mainly the anime's structure was definitely strong in an interesting way. Love live didn't have an amazing story line as it fell off ... near the middle of the anime drastically and went nowhere but somethings kept me from watching it. The idol group (Muse) kept pursuing their dreams and becoming better while recruiting more members to their group. Muse's goal is to become popular, famous and successful, and hopefully one day surpass Arise (idol group) in the ranking ladder. Just that thought in mind was really exiting and i couldn't wait to watch every other episode.

Art: 7
The art is not so unique that you can recognize too easily from other anime's. What makes an anime's art work good is when it's original. I just feel like this art-style is being overused. Doesn't go too much into details.


Sound: 9
Sound is the strongest part of this anime. Stunning! Obviously, it's an idol anime. But this takes a step further from other idol. When the characters sing, it's so good it gives me the goose bumps! The reason i gave it a 9 was sometimes, the characters sound a little over-exaggerated and doesn't fit all too well with a certain character, but rarely. I really have not much to say other than "great!".

Character: 6
The characters are very unique from each other. Giving the anime a lot more space of room to toy with because there are 9 different characters! The main important characters are Honoka, Kotori, and Umi.
The rest are more of a side character but are each a big contribution to the idol group and the series with each character being important in an episode.

Enjoyment: 7
Enjoyable in two different aspects, comedy and singing. Love live gives me a smile in my face when i'm watching because in each episode there is something funny and not all anime's have that. The Singing is a big factor when reviewing this anime because it is an idol based anime. Each music is great, and they really mean a lot when singing.


OVERALL: 6.4
Didn't read because it was too long?
Summary:
-Story:3.
Had a good start but fell off in the middle of the series. Didn't have a good an original goal.

- Art:7.
Was good but wasn't original. It was good when it transitioned into 3d models when performing concerts but didn't have too much shading, effects...etc.

-Sound:9.
Obviously an idol anime would put itself in a good position when graded with sound. Really good and i can't get enough of their sound tracks!

-Character:6.
Each character part-took a good role in each episode leaving no characters mysterious and successfully gave each characters a good personality. Lacked of giving character with more time.

Enjoyment:7.
Love live gave one more thing just than an idol singing. Comedy. Each end of an episode would leave me with a good smile and wanting to watch more.

The storyboard of this anime is good! i love how the students gather support to save their schools from shutting down in an extraordinary way of becoming an idol, the flow is not rush and easy to understand, some part is predictable but somehow they manage to maintain the impact.

though i would say the song and PV's they gave is quite amateur and not as exciting as the song from anime like K'ON, but i believe they can improve. If the artist involve willing to hear the public comment, getting a high rating and a full support is easy as a smirk!

Overall,, recommended! ^_^

Love Live School Idol Project is a multimedia project. There were a lot of different companies behind this. ASCII Media Works, Lantis, Dengeki G's Magazine and Sunrise. The overall project included games, music, manga, light novels an anime series and an anime film. Today we'll be looking at series one of the anime brought to us by Sunrise in 2013.

Story:

Our heroines happily attend Otonokizaka Academy when they get some bad news. Due to a lack of interest in the school, it's slated to close with their current first years being the last class. The student council President and Vice President, Eri and Nozomi, ... are determined to find a way to gain interest, but have no idea how to go about it. Meanwhile, second year student Honoka is also trying o think of a way when she happens to pass a very popular school and notices something. One of their big draws is that they have a popular school idol group attending. Honoka decides that the best thing to do would e to form a school idol group for Otonokizaka and gets her best friends, Kotori and Umi to join her in the endeavour.

On the downside, the anime delves into artificial sources of tension overmuch. What do I mean by that?Well, they'll introduce a character and make a production about whether or not that character is going to join Honoka's idol group, μ's (pronounce Muse). And this is something they do thrice. Well, I saw that character with the group in the opening sequence but maybe that actually isn't going to happen said no one ever. To be fair, this is the first series and it is important to show how these girls all get involved in μ's. The problem is the pomp over whether or not they will. There are a lot of things done well in the series too. The pacing is really good and I like that the girls are allowed to actually fail at a few points. Which does create some genuine tension that actually really works. The story is simple, but it's effectively executed and it ends with a good note.

Characters:

The characters are pretty archetypical. I will say, to the series' credit, that several of them are allowed to develop and grow over the course of the series. I will also say that, in all fairness, they aren't poorly done archetypes, the execution does work in the context of a series like this. The characters are a lot of fun and there are some really good interactions. My biggest issue is with the character of Nozomi. To be specific, with her tendency to go into bad touch mode. She gropes the other girls without their permission on several occasions. The worst part is that most of them would probably totally allow it if she asked properly. I don't think Rin would since she only seems to have eyes for Hanayo, but the rest probably would, assuming she asked nicely. Even if they wouldn't, that would still be inexcusable behaviour.

Art:

To the series' credit, the costume and character designs are really well done. It's also really good at doing the lighting and dance numbers during μ's lives. The backgrounds are also nicely detailed. My only real complaint is that this is one of those series where noses don't exist. It may be a stylistic choice, but it's a really head-scratching one.

Sound:

The casting in this is really good. Due to the nature of the series, they needed ladies who were good singers and actresses. As such, we have the singer Hori Eriko (stage name Pile), Tokui Sora, Kusuda Aina, Mimori Suzuko, Nanjo Yoshino, Uchida Aya, Nitta Emi, Kubo Yurika, & Iida Riho. Most of whom gravitate more towards singing and don't really have many acting credits. Still, they all do well in their roles. The music and singing are both really good.

Ho-yay:

There's a lot of les-yay in this. It might just be on the level of Yuru Yuri. We've got Honoka with most of the other girls, particularly Umi, Kotori, Eri, & Maki. There's also the dynamic between Rin and Hanayo. Which is incessantly adorable. We've also got Nozomi and Eri, who come across as a couple who have been together for several years. There's also Nozomi in general with her totally uncool bad touch tendencies. Incidentally, she's another shrine maiden yuri girl.

Final Thoughts:

Love Live School Idol Project is an enjoyable series. The story is well done. The characters are mostly good. The music and acting are impeccable and the art is good. If you enjoy musical school anime, give it a go. My final rating for it is going to be a 7/10. In future, I'll look at the second series. But next week is going to be Divergence Eve.

Disclaimers: Spoilers, this review covers the Love Live! School Idol Project anime series, which means season 1, 2, and the movie, and this review will be a bit more personal than your typical review. This review is also long as fuck, and there will be a spoiler free TL;DR at the end.

Love Live sucks major balls.

Upon viewing my profile, one would probably witness a few Love Live memes here and there, a shit ton of Love Live characters in my favorites list, and possibly a Love Live profile picture, although I constantly change it so it depends. Seems like a typical Love Live fag ... to most people. However, believe it or not, I think Love Live is pretty god damn bad. Or at least, I thought. If anything, the only things that I actively like about it are the characters, usually because they are extremely entertaining, endearing, and lovable (with the exception of one character, which I will get to later.) The story of Love Live is mediocre at best, and one could argue that the story is completely garbage. With cliche and cringey moments, overly sappy melodrama, and with uneven character development to boot, one shouldn’t watch Love Live for a quality story. I can’t really say anything about the music of Love Live, since music is like the most subjective thing in the world, but I don’t like most idol music. There are only a few songs that I can listen to multiple times, but most of the time, I can barely sit through the songs even once. The art and animation are subpar as well, especially when the camera zooms out and the characters become barely recognizable sketches. So why do I still like Love Live so much, despite all the shit that it has?

After a VERY lackluster first season, I sat down and reflected on the past 4 hours that I wasted on this show and thought to myself: holy shit, I had a good time. Why is it that such a flawed story is able to leave me in such a satisfied state? No way is it because “it’s so bad that it’s good,” nor is it because “you’re a dirty memer Yuni, and Love Live is full of dirty memes.” I came to the conclusion that it’s because of how memorable Love Live as a franchise is. Despite my cringey experience watching the first season, I found myself thinking about Love Live constantly afterwards, and not about how bad the drama was handled or how gimmicky and cliche the characters were, but of how catchy that one song I actually liked was or how… gimmicky and cliche the characters were, but in a good way! I would then get flashbacks to a random scene, such as Kotori acting like a foreigner, Nozomi fondling little boobs, or Honk Honk doing the seal clap in episode one. Little scenes like that, although usually just comedic skits or filler, gave me such great satisfaction that I felt like it was worth sitting through Honoka dying on stage for no reason. Even so, I still wasn’t ready to say that I liked Love Live at the time. I simply liked a few of the scenes, a few of the characters, and a few of the songs. Everything else was still meh.

Then Season 2 reared it’s ugly head and that’s when my heart felt all the doki dokis. When it comes to “sequels that drastically improve the franchise’s quality,” people always think of Clannad After Story, or maybe Little Busters Refrain. I’d like to add Love Live 2nd Season to that list, for I never knew a sequel could change my opinion of a franchise so quickly. Not only was the drama much more tolerable, but it made me fall in love with the cast so hard, that even the ones I borderline hated during season 1 were perfect angels in my eyes. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever loved a cast this much since Aria. And I fucking adore Aria. Then there was the movie, which not only depicted Manhattan pretty goddamn well (I’m a New Yorker), but it also sent off μ's the same way they were introduced to us: with a long drawn out bang.

Story:

Love Live seems like your typical “AH! Dire situations and sparks of inspiration cause me to drag my friends into something out of the ordinary, something that causes us to start out as underdogs as well slowly rise to the top through the power of friendship!” kind of story, and that’s basically what it is at the surface level. However, by the end of the story, the viewer doesn’t give a fuck about whether or not μ's is gonna succeed in their next concert, instead, they are desperately holding on to their doki doki-ing hearts in anticipation and preparing themselves for the inevitable: Honk Honk, here comes the feels train! This is what causes Love Live to be labeled as a completely clone of K-On, a show where a group of girls are in a similar situation: they want to do something out of the ordinary and strive to improve, however the story really isn’t about that life. It’s all about the passage of time, and Love Live makes it extremely apparent in its narrative that time is not only limited, but running out FAST! This is what separates Love Live from the other passage of time anime, as while K-On and Aria are taking their time sipping tea and rowing gondolas, Love Live is dancing along at a breakneck speed. The thing about passage of time anime is that it’s really only effective if you love the characters. Both K-On and Aria start out with their characters in a very friendly environment, with all of the characters being lovable from the start and the only conflict resulting from the natural clashes between their personalities, such as Azu-nyan being put off by Yui’s laziness, or Alice being mad at Akari’s lack of IQ. Also keep in mind that passage of time anime usually have a manageable cast of main characters, with K On having 5 and Aria having 3 (4 if you count Alicia, and 6 if you count the other fairies).

However, Love Live has a massive 9 main characters, some of which were outright hostile cockblockers during their introduction. You would think it would be impossible for a story to take 9 characters, some of which are shown to be bitches, and somehow make them lovable by the end. That’s what I thought too at the end of season 1, where I was only fond of a select few characters. This is a big reason why season 1 was a fairly lackluster season, it failed to properly show that appeal of some of the characters. This isn’t solely due to the fact that some characters were prioritized over others, it also has to do with how poorly the drama was handled. The words that come to mind are: overly exaggerated, sappy, bullshit. The realism in Love Live is non existent, but that is to be expected. Anyone who expects realism in a show like Love Live needs to get a reality check. That doesn’t change how unnecessarily over the top some of the drama during the first season was, as well as how unbelievable some of the drama was resolved. Even if realism is limited, it still has to be believable, or at least, not bullshit.

What the 1st season does correctly is a few instances of character drama surrounding a few particular characters, those being Honk, Kotori, Nico, and Eli. For Honk, her extremely typical main character attitude actually works against her in scenarios that other anime would write as beneficial. For example, her focus on competing in Love Live actually ends up damaging her relationship with her friends instead of strengthening them, and while some events surrounding this drama and the resolution are iffy, it still gets the job done. Kotori also breaks the mold when she goes against what her character trope would normally do: hurt her best friend. Usually depicted as the typical friendly deredere, Kotori was revealed to actually be a very conflicted character whose problems end up hurting those she loves, which is contradictory to her normal character. Both Nico and Eli are also fleshed out as characters who chased their dreams and failed, which shapes them into the hostile characters that they were introduced as, and while Nico's hostility was shown to just be natural, Eli's hostility was much deeper, albeit the resolution was stupid. Love Live's major problem in season 1 is that the drama is there, and for the most part it isn't exactly bad drama, but it has absolutely no idea how to either execute or resolve it in a believable way.

Hmm, it would appear that Honoka is very ill and not exactly in a good state to sing and dance. What do? The overly protective Kotori and the wiser Umi would stop Honoka from over exerting herself, causing the performance to be cancelled, the fans to be disappointed, and Honoka would learn her lesson and taste what disappointing her fans would be like. That would be some nice development for her character! But wait, that’s not what actually happens.
What actually happens is that Honoka insists on performing, so she does. Honk has run out of PP for her dance moves! Honk used Struggle! Honk hurt herself in recoil. Honk fainted. And that leads to Honk being a depressed crybaby, μ's dropping out of Love Live, Honk nearly quitting the school idol thing, only to get bitch slapped by Umi, which leads to Honk not being a crybaby, which leads to literally no one learning anything and Honk continues to do stupid shit cause why not.

So Season 1 ends with μ's saving the school, and μ's miss their chance to compete in Love Live. Oh well, beggers can’t be choosers right? At least they completed their initial goal! As a result of her efforts, Season 2 starts with Honk being chosen to be the student council president. While this seemed like an unnecessary thing to do, this was the beginning of Love Live’s redemption! It’s all (mostly) positivity from here on out! Remember when I said that Love Live is a passage of time show? The moment Honk becomes student council president marks the beginning of this theme. While subtle, it did expand on the running out of time problem, as being the student council prez resulted in a lot of schedule conflicts between idol practice and council work. But wait, idol practice? What are they practicing for? A 2nd Love Live has been announced! With saving the school out of the way, μ's can finally focus on their real goal.

It is here, pretty early on in season 2, that it is made clear that time is running out. This pressure of time, first mentioned when it is made clear that the 3rd years are graduating soon, is constantly brought up, both within the show itself and within the viewer’s minds. At first it’s through subtle things, such as the previously mentioned schedule conflicts of being the student council prez, resulting in usually humorous but still important bickerings between Honk and Umi. A sense of responsibility is placed on Honok’s shoulders, as a leader of the school and of μ's.

Season 2 also makes it clear that time is passing by through the use of specific events, such as Halloween, Christmas, New Years, etc. Many episodes in Season 2 are based around these timed events, and result in a not-so subtle flow of time. By the way, the Halloween episode is one of my favorites, as it has some of my favorite skits in the entire series. Season 2 also uses this time to flesh out characters that didn’t have much spotlight in season 1, and while these moments of character development were touching, it was all the characters and their interactions with each other that made me adore every single member. Time didn’t just flow, it helped the girls grow to love each other. Episode after episode, you could tell that their friendship was subtly growing, and it’s all about the little things. Maki agreeing with Honk sometimes, Eli and Nozomi showing their more innocent and sensitive sides to their kouhais, even the most humorous of skits showed that the teamwork and bond between the girls of μ's were ever growing.

While the urgency of time running out is at first caused by μ's trying to do something before a deadline, eventually it became much deeper than that. While the story kept its style of μ's trying to get something done before a specific time, it became clear that both the characters and the viewers were actually bracing for the real deadline: the time when the 3rd years would graduate, and μ's would be split apart. This is what the entire series was building up towards. As the cliche line goes, all good things must come to an end. Even the mightiest of rivers empty out into the calm endless sea. Even a floating leaf in the wind will land someday. Whatever sappy phrase you want to use, this theme is so especially present in Love Live that it’s undeniably powerful. In fact, μ's spent so much of their time bracing themselves for this inevitable end that they didn’t even realize that they were missing an important answer: what do they want their end to be?

This is the entire theme of the finale, the movie. The movie is the perfect mix of cute grills doing cute things, cute grills dancing in cute ways, and borderline psychological drama. It even has hints of supernatural elements, which were used in very effective albeit confusing ways. After becoming much more famous than she could ever imagine, with expectations placed on every part of her being, Honk’s internal conflicts were at an all time high. To a normal viewer, the right answer isn’t clear at all. In fact, many people could have different answers when placed in Honk’s situation. There really is no right or wrong answer, and the decision that μ's came to at the end wasn’t right or wrong either. It was simply what they wanted. And that’s how the passage of time works. A very straight forward story, with a not so straightforward and possibly even thought provoking end. Even so, despite the melancholic passing of time and the internal conflicts, the ending was ultimately a positive one, and I can’t help but feel the ultimate satisfaction.

Characters:

Easily my favorite part of the franchise, as well as probably the make or break for anyone watching Love Live. To some, they are simply gimmicks and memes who are mildly entertaining once in awhile, and to others, they are precious waifus that we must protect from any sort of harm. What do I think? I think they are precious gimmicky memes that are mildly entertaining once in awhile, and must be protected from any sort of harm. So of course I will be going through all of them.

Hanayo: Despite the fact that she's at the bottom of my list, Hanayo is probably the most well written character in LL in terms of characterization. The point of school idols is that any normal girl can be one, and that's the whole theme surrounding Hanayo. She doesn't stand out at all, in terms of personality nor appearance. As a result, she views school idols as an unreachable goal and worships them from afar. The fact that Hanayo joined Muse in the first place is a groundbreaking development for the group and idol shows as a whole, for it highlighted the whole point of school idols. Also, her rice obsession is one of the most relatable parts of the show. As a Chinese person, rice is my entire being.

Rin: My appreciation for this character is always exponentially increasing. Rin is insecurities personified into a tomboy cat character. Unlike Hanayo, Rin has had experiences of standing out too much, having being teased for her femininity despite her short hair and boyish attitude. This caused Rin to embrace this boyish attitude and energy in order to separate herself from her insecurities. Rin was very hesitant in joining Muse since being school idols is hella girly and she feel like her lack of femininity will cause her to bring the group down. However, her joining the group ends up helping her come to terms with her insecurities, and her episode was one of the most heartfelt episodes in the series.

Maki: Maki's tsundere personality comes off less as a mental illness and more of a result of her upbringing. Due to being a sheltered rich girl, Maki isn't a tsundere cause she's mean, but because she's socially retarded lol. However, joining Muse helped her shed her awkward self contained self, and Maki is one of the few tsunderes who returns the favor to those who helped her break out of her shell. After being coaxed out by her senpais, Maki thanks them by helping Nozomi come out of her shell as well, and she made Nico out of all people cry. Her personality is also very similar to mine, as a withdrawn socially awkward yet passive aggressive sasser who isn't afraid to look down on you if you piss her off. I also share some frustrations she has when it comes to songwriting, for I am a songwriter myself, and I also say "what the fuck was that" a lot.

Honk: Honk is one of the more well written genki lead characters, due to the fact that her genkiness isn't one dimensional nor predictable. Her genkiness isn't always positive, as some of the time it's actually her own selfishness, and her overly determined nature actually ends up damaging her relationship with her friends. Honk isn't the perfect happy go lucky person she appears to be, as she is almost constantly internally conflicted and ends up coming off as an asshole more often than not due to her selfishness. Of course, Honk isn't the most consistent character, as her IQ switches between 1 and 100 constantly, but she's definitely deeper than what people give her credit. What makes her relatable in this regard is that she means well, and most of the time doesn't even know she's selfish. This also creates GREAT conflict drama between her, Kotori, and Umi, as Honk's characterization isn't just due to her own characteristics, but also her two closest friends.

Kotori: Kotori comes off as your typical airhead deredere, except she does what no other deredere is capable of doing: absolutely destroying her best friend's feelings. Her tendency to spoil Honoka is seen as cliche by many, for many think it's cause she's too nice of a character, but it's actually her own selfishness that is causing her to be so nice. Her refusal to hurt her friend's feelings isn't just cause she wants the best for her, but because she is too conflicted and unwilling to break bad news. Due to her selfish refusal of doing the right thing, her niceness actually ends up hurting Honoka even more than she could ever have imagined. Kotori is seen depressed more than people think, and her habit of putting on a deredere demeanor isn't because she cares, but because of her own flaws and conflicts.

Umi: Umi on the other hand is the opposite of Kotori. She calls Honk out on her bullshit constantly, and her tough love is a turn off to many. People view her as a sociopath due to her constant bullying of Honoka, but due to being brought up by Asian parents, I see the true intent behind Umi's savage nature. Umi's anger and unstable emotions show me that Umi probably loves her friends more than anyone else. She isn't afraid to completely fuck someone up if it's for their own good. Of course, since Umi is a hardcore dandere, she can have her fair share of selfish moments, but in the end, no one gives more shits than Umi does, even if it looks like she's gives no shits about your feelings.

Eli: A phenomenally multi dimensional character, a lot of flaws surrounding Eli are actually the story's fault. Eli is the ultimate cockblock in the beginning, and boy did I hate her. This made her redemption as a character all the more heartfelt, as I ended up loving Eli by the end. While the story portrayed her as a stern white knight, who's reasons for despising Muse is due to her lack of confidence in them when it comes to saving the school, it eventually became clear that Eli's distaste actually stems from her stubbornness and pride. As an ex-professional dancer, she views Muse's activities as mere games and looks down upon them constantly. The flaw behind her eventual opening up is that the members of Muse were way too lenient with her. This bitch thinks y'all are trash and you're gonna forgive her just like that? Yeah. Again, this isn't due to Eli's character, this is due to Season One's atrocious writing.

Nozomi: Nozomi takes the spotlight as one of the easiest characters to like, both from a characteristic and development stand point. She's the smug mastermind. Her Washi washi may turn off a lot of people, but hey, the author is a Yuri author. Cut her some slack. What made Nozomi even more likeable was when her past was revealed. Nozomi used to be extremely shy, contrary to her extremely calculative nature we see now. Her friendship with Eli and their close bond is what caused Nozomi to transform into what she is now, and that's just a testament to the canon ship that is NozoEli. Seeing Nozomi open up to the rest of Muse and allowing her true shy nature to slip in once in a while humanizes her exponentially.

Nico: Nico is the most controversial character. Very rarely do you see someone who thinks Nico is "alright." Nico will usually find herself on the very bottom or the very top of people's rankings. I'm one of the latter, Nico is one of my best girls, but my reasons for liking this monstrosity is different from most people. My reason doesn't just boil down to "she's funny" or "she's a meme." First of all, let's be honest: Nico is a fucking piece of shit human being. She's the type of person you'd block on all social media outlets. A real life Nico would have no friends, and I learned that the hard way. You see, Nico is a character that chased her dreams with everything she had, and failed. She didn't fail because "the world is unfair." No, Nico deserved to fail. Nico failed because she failed to see how selfish she was, pushing people beyond their limits without them wanting to. She failed because being a school idol is a team effort and she only thought of herself. The reason she failed is nobody's fault but her own. As someone who's been chasing their dreams for ages, experiencing failure after failure and blaming it on the world, only to slowly realize that I'm the one who's failing myself, seeing this part of Nico made me cry. Not gonna lie, this side of Nico destroyed me. It didn't help that when I was younger, I was also very foul mouthed and hot tempered. I'm one of those real life Nicos. Nico's shitty personality persisted throughout the series, such as lying to her siblings to make her look good and disrespecting the rest of Muse. That's because leaving behind your selfish self is hard. Extremely hard. Nico's flaws lasted all the way till the end of the series, and hell, she was still an annoying shitter at the end, but that's cause this is realism. People don't change at the drop of the hat, and some people don't change at all, but Nico still accepted it and tried to change till the very end. Nico's determination is honestly inspiring, and that drew me to her character as well.

Nico is one badass motherfucker.

A cast full of characters that naturally clash with each other, yet even so, they grow with each other to the point where every single character is irreplaceable. The characters bicker with each other constantly, yet their contrasting personalities somehow work with each other. In fact, the characters themselves realize that their drastically different personalities are what make them stand out from other idol groups, and it is because of how irreplaceable every single member of μ's is that causes them to disband their group at the end of the series.

Art and Animation:

CG is distracting, and while Love Live’s CG is much better than your typical anime, it’s still, well, distracting. This is especially so during some concert scenes when it rapidly switches between 2d and 3d animation. However, I’ve witnessed some horrible CG in my life, so I grew to appreciate Love Live’s relatively tolerable CG. The 2d animation and art during the actual show isn’t very impressive either. While the character designs by themselves are goofy in their own way and eventually grew on me, the animation and art quality is very inconsistent, ranging from pretty good to downright despicable at times. This is especially apparent during scenes where the camera zooms out, and the characters become barely recognizable sketches, with weirdly scaled facial features and bodies.

One thing that Love Live excels at however are the facial expressions. These goddamn facial expressions are golden, and are used to support both comedic and serious situations. There is a lot of emotion behind these facial expressions, and you can tell what a character is thinking just by looking at their face. You can tell when Eli is done with someone’s bullshit just by looking at her unamused stare. Even the characters are able to react to situations based on another character’s facial expression, such as Kotori constantly wrecking Umi in cards due to Umi’s lack of a poker face, or Nico knowing that her boobies are in for a rough time due to Nozomi’s rape face. The majority of Honk’s silly nature is expressed through her facial expressions, such as her seal clapping and her amazing expression after getting flicked in the forehead by Nico. You can also see the build up before someone starts breaking down into tears, first by their obvious attempts at holding back the tears, until finally you are greeted with the ugliest crying face ever.

Music:

What makes the music in Love Live unique is that only people who watched the show will probably listen to the music. Idol music is very niche and before watching Love Live, I wasn’t into idol music whatsoever. I thought it was too simple and too cringey. While I still think that way about most idol music, there are a few songs that I actually listen to a decent amount nowadays, and not because they are different from the usual idol music in the show, but because of the context behind the pieces.

Songs like Snow Halation and START DASH!! didn’t appeal to me by themselves, but once I witnessed the context behind those two pieces in the show, I started to like them. Also, Love Live uses its idol music in ways that if you like the show and the story, you will like the music. Stuff such as using the OP theme of the first season as the encore for μ's’s “final” concert, and using Aishiteru Banzai, a song we heard in the first episode and a personal fave of mine, as the graduation music in the final episode of Season 2. Love Live puts a lot of emotional connection to a lot of would-be average songs, and that’s what makes Love Live’s music memorable in the end.

Reflection:

Love Live is bad and you should feel bad, but feeling bad has never felt so good. Easily one of the most satisfying series I’ve ever watched, Love Live fulfills a lot of simple wishes, such as seeing a group of friends start from humble beginnings and becoming international stars, seeing even the coldest of bitches open their hearts to become lovable characters, stuff like that. Stuff that has been done over and over again, but for some reason you especially want it to happen to these 9 girls. And then after an emotional scene, they bring it full circle with the first song you ever hear. Stuff like that makes the first time watching it unforgettable, and makes the first time rewatching it that much more spectacular.

At least, that’s what happened to me. Not everyone will experience the same things I did, in fact, most of you probably won’t. However, Love Live is definitely one of those shows that has the possibility of changing your life. When you ask for better or worse, I’d probably have to lean towards the latter, for some people then fall into the idol hell known as School Idol Festival, and I hear that there is no escaping that place. And even if you don’t get your life changed, at least you indulged in some top quality memes.

TL;DR:

Story: Love Live sucks balls, way too sappy and melodramatic. However, it eventually drops this and becomes a passage of time anime to the likes of K-On, and the drama becomes more natural with positive outcomes.
Characters: Waifus? Memes? Why not both? A cast of characters that constantly clash with each other, yet eventually become a team where every member feels irreplaceable.
Art: CG. And shitty artwork when the camera zooms. Other than that, it’s ok, and the facial expressions make everything daijoubu.
Music: Will either make you cringe or cry a river of tears, especially once you know the context behind some of the songs.

Individual Ratings:
Love Live! School Idol Project: 4/10
Love Live! School Idol Project 2nd Season: 7/10
Love Live! The School Idol Movie 7/10

My favorite part of the show: Characters.
My least favorite part of the show: How they handled the drama in season 1.
And of course, order of grills (Keep in mind that I like all of them):
Umi > Honk > Nico > Kotori > Eli > Maki > Rin > Nozomi > Hanayo.

Fun fact! The Love Live franchise as a whole, including Sunshine, has like zero consistency in terms of clothing. Characters randomly change outfits mid scene.

Lets just say that this show did not live up to the hype or standards that I had been lead to believe.

I knew about the story coming in. A school is shutting down in a couple years due to the lack of enrollment. A group of girls realize that the most popular school also happens to have the most popular school idol group. So their like, "shoot we can do that. and then the school will be saved." And then they do that. End of story. the rest of the show is them gathering new members and fighting against the administration who wont let them ... try to save the school for some reason.

The music in the show is so meh. The songs are well made but that's the problem. These are, in kayfabe, supposed to be high school girls producing a perfectly made song. Also during the performances the animation cuts to some horribly moving cg. Not only does it look bad, but it moves at a different frame rate, or something, than the rest of the show and its a bit shocking every time.

Coming in, I saw that Nico was pretty much the fan favorite. This is not cause she's cool. It is probably because she actually has a character. Shes and the student president are of few in the show that actually do. Everyone else is either very one dimensional or tropey. I think my enjoyment of the show was harmed because I did not like a single character in the show.

By the first couple of songs, which are in universe huge hits, you realize that this is just a product meant to sell merch and not really an anime. It has no interest in being an anime. Once this glass shattered, it becomes very hard to watch the rest of the show. You realize that no conflict will stay a conflict for long and everything will work out. By the end, the show leaves you with a cliffhanger to watch the second season. No thanks.

When I entered the anime community, I never thought that one day, I'd come to enjoy Idol Anime - something I had long associated with the more... dedicated part of the fandom. Yet when a friend recommended this anime to me, my socks were blown so far away I reconsidered the entire Idol anime category. Love Live brings a fun story, mixed with coming-of-age plot development and an overall fantastic atmosphere and world

Story
While I literally just said the story of love live is excellent, I can't exactly say it for this season specifically. The world building is amazing, and the plot moves along really ... well, however, I always felt that it was always a bit too cheesy and dramatic. I'm sure other watchers feel similar about this situation. Even so, the story still manages to be captivating, it positions itself so that you'd know what is going to happen, but they pull enough wool over your eyes so that when the giant plot twist comes, you'd spit out whatever soda you're drinking and go "WHAAAAAT?" I know because I did that a few times.

Characters
You can't have an idol anime without an idol group. And while the character development in this season felt a bit underwhelming, it all made sense when season 2 dropped. So bear with me when I say it's lacking yet complete at the same time.
The 9 members of the Idol Group μ's, or Muse, each bring their own unique personality into the mix, which the anime made sure to highlight.
Honoka is your classic bubbly chipper anime girl. Rushing all the way to the end without giving a damn about consequences or anything in the way. While the anime did a good job of bringing up that side of her personality, when the season's big plot twist dropped and her personality completely did a 180, I, like many other members of muse, were confused at the sudden turn of mood in the group's center singer. This is because the anime never even hinted at her having that side. Sure, we've seen her distraught, but never like what she became at the lowest point of the season.
Kotori is next. Her personality, especially through the season's plot twist remains consistent and logical, she's shy, rather quiet, and always speaks to others with a soft tone. Like a guardian angel of sorts. Of course, harboring the responsibility of holding the group together means that she often leaves many of her own feelings bottled up, and the anime did a great job exploiting and using that trait.
Umi didn't quite receive as much development compared to the other 2nd years, but her slowly overcoming her skepticism and stage fright made for a very rounded, albeit short character arc.
Of the first years in the group, I'd say Hanayo and Maki received the most development, both of them leaving their wallflower lifestyles and learning to overcome their internal nervousness to become essential members within Muse. Rin, unfortunately, was left out of development. She remained painstakingly flat as just a cheery 1st year who likes to put a nya~ at the end of every sentence.
The 3rd years also recieved substantial development, with the spotlight focused on Eli. With her overseeing the development of Muse, and eventually letting go of her strict Student Council President demeanor and becoming much more loose and affectionate with the rest of the group. Nozomi, while not receiving much development, still felt very rounded and realistic because of all the behind-the-scenes meddling she did to help Muse bloom. From giving the group their name to eventually joining the group herself, she felt like a parent who cares for her kids. This leaves Niko. She mainly serves as a guidance figure, but all of us fans know she's there for comic relief with her signature Nico Nico Nii. Other than that, though... I'm afraid she remains rather flat for the reminder of the season.

Art and Sound
Here's the big daddy of this anime. Throughout the season we see Muse go from a new group with little experience to a firm frontrunner in the school idol industry with their own unique style. First off, we can immediately establish that Muse is unique, especially in their music style. For example, compared to rival group A-RISE's more electro theme, Muse's music is far more bubbly and cheery, while incorporating enough pop elements to be a firm head-bopper. But what's far more impressive is that with the release of each track we see steady development in Muse as a group. The easiest way to see that is to compare the two iterations of START:DASH!!! When the group just started out, you can see that the choreography, hand movements, and even the animation itself to be simple, basic, and something that a new group would totally do. However, at the end of the season, when Muse once again performed START:DASH!!! This time with a full roster and more knowledge, the choreography and dances become much more sophisticated, and while they kept the original motive, each member of the group was consistently making complicated moves and fancy patterns. You can also see the clear difference in skill by comparing the first iteration of START:DASH!!! to the OP. It's a subtle detail, but one that makes the anime feel that much more real when picked up on. However, if you didn't pick up on that detail, the songs themselves are such absolute bangers that many of them made their way onto my weeb playlist and firmly established themselves in a corner of my playlist.

Overall, I loved Love Live. It felt like a realistic anime, complete with absolute bangers of songs and characters that grab onto your heart and never let go.

Now, I've never written a review here on MAL before, and I feel as if I should start with a series that I hold close to my heart: Love Live.

To give some background apart from what's listed above, Love Live is adapted from a project by Dengeki G's magazine in which they created a 2D idol franchise, often asking for fan input on group names and the like. Before the anime was released, there were many CG music videos for the main group (μ's, pronounced Muse).

So, yes, there is liberal usage of CG in this show. For the most part, episodes are animated traditionally, but ... in both the opening animation and any in-show performances, CG is mixed in for dance performances. If you've seen Aikatsu, it's quite a bit like that. It is, admittedly, pretty terrible; but if that's not a deal-breaker, then I would certainly recommend you give the show a try.

You might be wondering why I described the series as being close to my heart, when the story is generic and sometimes has overwrought drama. Now, the art is cute and well-designed, and the music is, at least in my opinion, some of the better idol-styled music I know, but neither of those is what made me stay with the series.

It was the characters.

At first glance, these characters are simply anime girl archetypes, and I won't deny that they're that too. But they're also so much more. Although there are nine of them and only thirteen episodes to fit them into, throughout the series, we get to know them to the point where, honestly, I felt as if they were my friends. While many shows have little but tired tropes in the way of characterization, the girls of Love Live are humanized, with various facets of their personalities explored and little details and quirks to flesh them out.

My only complaint is that I was so attached to these girls by the end that I wanted to see more of them; but in that case there's a near-endless supply of side material to sate my appetite for μ's.

In conclusion, it will probably be more enjoyable if you like idols already, but the characters are worth watching the show for on their own.

Woah, Love Live? What am I doing in an Idol anime?
Well, I was just curious about why do these kind of 'Idol anime' is very popular in Japan. And I think now I know why.

Story: (10)
The Story is about Kousaka Honoka, a 2nd year student of Otonokizaka Academy, which is about to close down by the end of the First Year's graduation. So, our MC here is trying to figure out how to stop the closure of the School, and by what? By being an Idol of course.

I'm not a big fan of 'Music' anime, but this one is AWESOME. Not by the ... Songs, no... it's the story and the lovable character that keep me hooked until the 2nd Season of this show.

Art: (9)
Who cares about Art, really. Except if it's like Mars of Destruction (shivers). The characters are hand-drawn like any other anime, but when they hit the dance floor, they turned into CG.

That's probably one reason why I give the art 9, the CG. It's not smooth, if it's smoother, it would be an eye-candy. (I think.)

Sound: (10)
I like the songs in this anime. My favorite, Is the OP: "Bokura wa ima no naka de". Others are also good, like "Snow Halation" or "START: DASH!!"

Character: (9)
Honoka, Umi, Kotori, Hanayo, Rin, Maki, Nico, Nozomi, and Eri. Those are the Nine main characters of this anime, yes NINE.

Loveable? Check. Cute? Check. Tsundere? Check. Carefree? Check. Shy? Check. All the members of Muse will make your heart melt.

Could've been better if there's at least one male character, though.

Enjoyment: (9)
Overall, I enjoy this series, it kept me hooked until the 2nd Season. If you're into Idol, this is for you. Comedy? Also for you. Slice of Life? Here you go.

This anime is exactly what you think it is, a bunch of really cute girls singing and dancing. That is what makes this fun, the music. The animation switches between its normal animation to CG during the performances and it goes great with it. The characters are really cute girls that fit almost every aspect of anime girls.The main character, Honoka, is a hyper happy-go-lucky girl who seems like a really hard worker and thats why you love her. What got me to like this anime was the music, its cute and catchy, and i love music like that. If you watch don't expect ... any real drama and especially don't expect any romance cause there wasn't any boys.
This is a good anime to watch when your bored and have a full day to yourself.

“If each of us can put our hearts into the things we love, a new place will be our goal. If we trust in the things each of us loves, we can embrace the excitation and move forward.” – Love Live S1 OP

When we were young, we had dreams, we had friends, and we had the energy. There’s virtually nothing that could hold us back. We were naive, we were clumsy, and we made mistakes. But hey, it’s all part of growing up, no? After all, dreams don’t come without bumps and challenges on the road.

Enter Love Live School Idol Project, boy, what a ... motivational series this turned out to be. (Not to mention I actually finished this in a day)

Skipping past the synopsis, Love Live Season 1 has a clear plot direction: forming a school idol group in order to boost the popularity of their school. In the process, more and more girls were recruited, often through emotional means, and it wasn’t long enough where they were all gathered together and went on to strive further: challenging the Love Live school idol contest.

Throughout the series, we see how the girls, each with their own personalities and quirks, come to terms together for one single cause. Honoka, Kotori and Umi form the backbone of the group, being the original trio who formed the group, and the series ended up focusing on them the most. The other 6 girls do get their well-deserved screen time as well, but 13 episodes isn’t very much, luckily we do have another season, so hope is not all lost should you desire to see more of these girls.

Becoming a school idol group isn’t easy, having the dream alone doesn’t cut it. In the anime, we were shown how hard the girls work to achieve their goals, how much effort and emotions that were put into. Whenever one’s in trouble, another will quickly come to console them; whenever an obstacle is put ahead of them, they face it together; whatever fun they have, they enjoy it together. Their actions pure and sincere, and it does make you feel like wanting to be like them. Which is why I mentioned before, that this anime serves as a great motivation for teenagers and adults alike.

Animation and soundtrack wise, this anime is top notch. The performances are nothing less than spectacular, blending in CG effects to the animation flawlessly. For the music, you have tons of songs from these girls to enjoy from, and when they aren't singing, the bgm serves very well to support the emotions of the scene.

The message conveyed through Love Live is simple: “If you love something, go for it.” Such a short yet powerful message served us greatly to remind ourselves, what are you waiting for? What are you holding back for? Do you have a dream on your own? Go for it then!

Before I started watching Love Live! School Idol Project, I was a bit hesitant about going into it. I'm not entirely sure whether it was the fact that I was a huge K-On! fan and didn't want to accept other similar animes or the fear I have for too many main characters at once because I dislike overly complex/confusing stories.
But I have to say that all my hesitations were blown away right at the first episode, as I continued I discovered that this anime is to one of the most lovely anime I have ever seen.
Now onto the 5 parts of ratings:

Story - ... 8

I found the story to be quite original in its own way, the dream to become an idol isn't anything unseen in the anime world but Love Live! School Idol Project managed to set it up in a magnificent way. You don't often see students doing everything they can to save their school, and in this anime they do it in a very uncommon way.

Art - 9

Very high quality art, lots of bright colors, I love it.
The first thing that really caught my attention was the way their eyes were drawn. Eyes of other animes really pales in comparison to these. I found myself looking at those shiny pearls way more often than necessary, maybe Honoka will say :" Hey! My boobs are down here." if you know what I mean.
But nothing is perfect, the only thing I slightly disliked was the usage of CGI in far away dancing movements, but it wasn't a huge deal because the close ups were drawn.

Sound - 10

Remember when I said that nothing is perfect? Well here is a 10/10.
The music in this anime was not only pleasant to the ear, they all had a meaning behind them as well. The way that more and more characters come into the music everytime and make the music even better than it already was is just beautiful. As of today I still listen to many songs of Love Live! School Idol Project regularly.

Character - 8

This section is what I feared in the beginning because there are simply too many characters to go over. But Love Live! School Idol Project managed to do a great job at presenting the various characters that appear throughout the show, there are a few characters that we don't know too much about but the stories behind the characters that were showcased more than made up for it.

Enjoyment - 9

I think this will be one of those animes that brighten up my day whenever I feel despressed or lose faith in humanity. I'm also very glad that they made a season 2.

Conclusion

One of the most memorable animes I've watched till now, and I was even hesitant at first.
For those of you who like slice of life or music animes this is a must watch. And for those of you who only watch macho stuff and think this is too sissy/girly, you should at least give this anime a try, because trust me this is no generic school anime that you despise.

If I hadn't seen K-ON! first, I would've likely rated this higher. However, as the first season progressed, while I had not initially thought of K-ON!, the parallels became progressively narrow.

Now, if you haven't seen K-ON!, you're in for a treat as this series is fun to watch. Never mind that it has to do with idols (which isn't my cup of tea), the series overall has one main character but never derails from it's central goal: the group of 9 girls has their heart set on competing (and winning) the Love Live event to boost the popularity of the school so it ... doesn't have to close down. Simple, yet enjoyable journey overall and I'd recommend taking a watch.

Unfortunately, my review is skewed from the aforementioned show, however I felt a lot better with the second season (which I'll write a separate review on).

Story: Cut-and-paste K-ON! No, really I can't get over this, it really does not feel like an original story. Even the dreams and goals of the main protagonist are the same (Honoko and Yui), they're both aloof, it's like they also pull all the characters into Muse/HTT in the same manner, and a tragedy hits near the end of the series which has the nail-biting viewer asking what's going to happen next? There's no real resolution to the series either so again, it doesn't feel like an original or inspired story at all. It's not boring, but I had hoped for better.

Art: I had a problem with the inconsistency of how the characters are drawn. When there's any close-up shots, their features are drawn out and colored more (lips, eyes, nails, etc) and become more shoujo-esque. However, when they appear farther away, it seems more generic art and those facial features are less accentuated. The animation for the dances are pretty spot on, but during some of the concert sequences, I felt it was very CG-like, as if I was watching Dream Club or Idolm@ster for X-Box 360/PS3. Call me old fashioned, but I prefer a more hand-drawn feel.

Sound: The music is very catchy, but I didn't feel it was very memorable. By and far, there wasn't a track or performance I didn't enjoy watching, but I didn't feel the urge to run out and buy the soundtrack. The opening and closing themes are among the better of the music in my opinion.

Character: You really can't help but like at least one of the nine girls in this show. They made sure to make them dynamically different yet have a likeable side. This becomes more apparent in the second season. While the series does focus around Honoka primarily and Kotori/Umi, they give a fair amount of time to most of the characters on screen. The characters is what makes this show so much fun to watch.

In conclusion, it's still a fun show to watch, regardless if you feel the need to compare it to other series. As a story, I felt it was uninspired (yet not boring) but it doesn't really have fillers, over abundance of fan service, nor scenes that are so over the top it would derail from the show. The music is catchy but not amazing. Really watch this show because the characters are a lot of fun to watch, especially their chemistry together.

Welcome to my review of Love Live! School Idol Project. At the time of writing this review I have completed watching the series. This review might be late, but this Anime is one of my all-time favorites and I hope you guys can take the time to see what I think about it.

Considering the time of writing this review, it will cover both the 1st and 2nd Season of the Anime series and will be about how the series is done as a whole.

I'll put this section here early in case you guys miss it. Do visit my blog section on my profile after ... reading my review for an Afterthoughts pertaining to this particular Anime for some healthy discussion. Thanks!

Here goes:

1) Story (9/10)

- For a school idol-based Anime, one would expect the story to be focused on the main idol group or personality. Instead, what is portrayed in this Anime is the individual character development. There are 9 people in the group, and so 9 different stories (or Arcs, as you would call it) are shown in the Anime. Indirectly, the focus on individual characters boosted the story of their school idol unit as a whole. I find this to be a very interesting point to note and that the audience wouldn't get bored because the Anime doesn't just stick to one character all the time.

2) Art (8/10)

- The colors and design are what you would expect; bright and vibrant with a healthy mix of different looks for each character. Once again, you should notice the focus on individual characters here. Each of them are unique in their own right and have different personalities to distinguish one another apart. The use of sakura blossoms brightens up the atmosphere as well.

3) Sound (9/10)

- Coming from a school idol Anime, sound is pretty much one of the most important points you would expect to be good.And it is. From the development of the music to how it is played and acted out, they are almost perfectly done and there is little to nothing to nitpick about.

4) Character (10/10)

- Normally, I'd rarely give out a full mark score for any category. However, the character portion of this Anime series is really well done. As mentioned before, the individual character focus give time for each of them to develop and makes for an exciting and fun to watch series. Each featured character has their own spotlight in the series and are given their own freedom and space to gel with the idol unit so that they become closer to one another, if that is not enough, the unit even has outings together to ensure that they have fun with one another. I cannot mention this enough, the character portion of the series is really a stand-out point.

5) Enjoyment (9/10)

- The Anime series starts off with a curious development right off the bat; having to save the school from closing down. (Not a spoiler; it's mentioned in the synopsis.) How that develops, I won't mention further. The series then moves to the formation of the idol unit, its development and growth while simultaneously focusing on character development for each of the nine members. All in all, the series is really fun to watch.

6) Overall (9/10)

- I came to know of this Anime series through a friend's recommendation and I'm glad I gave it a shot. It's a great choice for anyone looking for a school idol Anime to watch and I would definitely recommend it myself. There wasn't a point in the Anime in which I disliked; it was well done in every aspect. For those who haven't watched the series, do give it a go and tell me what you think about it!