First of all, yes, it is all a huge marketing-scheme-ball-of-melodramatic-moe-bullshit. If you are the kind of stuck up intelectual snob that hates this kind of thing; yeah, just run away and never look back.
With that out of the way, is any part of this show actually amazing? Not really. There is definitely a lot of effort and production value to the whole show and nothing is outright bad, but few things stand out and the ones that fail to be as high quality can really hurt the show at times.
Like the CG. The show looks pretty for the most part, but the CG especially is weak, which sucks because it is used on the performances, you know, the idol performances that should be the main appeal of the show. Studio Sunrise worked on this so maybe that fact the CG is used on people rather than mechs made it so it lacks a bit.
The songs are nice if you like that kind of thing, but high pitched anime idol voices is something very specific to like so I don't expect many people to enjoy them. Like many japanese pop songs though, they are well written and have interesting elements here and there. Also, the fact that there's 9 voices a lot of the time is impressive I guess. Sound design is fine, nothing to say about it.
The story hits some very real themes at times, but it does it in a very unrealistic way and setting. The whole thing is really unbelievable if you think about it even a little, but if you can look past it, the show explores different things about friendship, teamwork, stardom, and effort. It's not too deep, but if you have ever been in a band or other artistic group seriously you can find some interesting things.
Also the fact that there are no male characters even in the background for most of the scenes can be a bit weird at times. A nitpick, but a justified one I think.
The characters are tropey but work pretty well with each other. I like how everyone seems to have 1 or 2 people they are specially close with over the rest of the main 9 girls. Overall, the group grows more than its members and that's fine.
Due to what this season does for the whole story, the pacing is really predictable for the most part, and can feel a bit rushed. A couple more episodes in length could have helped. This first season works for setting the bases of the second one, which is better, so it is not a big deal.
In conclusion, no part of this show is really outstanding in a good or bad way, but if you give it a go and you don't hate it, it works fine as a hook into the second one, and can even hit some very relatable points depending on who you are. Cannot fault people for disliking it fast though, it is moe, unrealistic and I can definitely see it being annoying or infuriating to some.
I guess it did have the goal of catching people over its moe net since the beginning, and it worked on me so, congrats Love Live. Even after writing this I still don't know why I enjoy it as much as I do. F***
