Just the title itself say's alot about the anime.
SKET stands for Support, Kindness, Encouragement, Troubleshoot. The second (助団), which instead uses kanji, derives from the verb tasukeru (助ける), meaning to help or save.
So just from the title you can in some sorts understand that this series is about, well.. Helping.
Judged by many as Gintama set in a school life setting, the series have had a tendency of being flooded by "hate war" comments. I agree with the Gintama fans that the series is very similar. But at the same time it really shines on it's own at times.
But if you think about the fact that author Kenta Shinohara worked as the assistant of Hideaki Sorachi (creator of Gintama), it's really not that weird for him to be influenced.
--- Story ---- 8/10
Story wise I have to deduct some points due to it being too heavily influenced by Gintama. So if you can picture a scene where Gintama didn't exist, I would have given it a 10/10.
Basically the story is as simple as 3 people, get to know them, see them interact with other people. Easy huh? But it doesn't have to be more complicated.
What I really enjoyed about Sket Dance, is how the story progresses. You get introduced to many supporting characters, but not so fast that you feel that it affects the relationship with the main cast. And this way you get to know the characters in a perfect pace. Both past, present and "future" gets depicted in a decent way.But as said, even if it's really well made, it's kinda too similar too Gintama to give it a full score.
---Art-- 10/10
Sket Dance is just a really good looking anime. It's very typical shounen art. They have a very tyipcal shounen trait in the fact that they give the main cast something special, like an item, special hair color or something similar to recognize them by. In this case, you have Bossun's hat for example. What I love about the art in SKET Dance, is how they play with different ways of drawing. Take for example one of the characters, called Saotome Roman, who turns everything around her into a manga. This playfulness really got to me, and I loved it so much.
--Sound--- 10/10
I really, really, really, enjoyed the music in SKET Dance. I have a tendency of skipping openings and/or endings, but SKET Dance, really just got me hooked on both how well made the openings were made to fit the music, and how good the music was. The Sketchbook really fits the anime, and I struggle to decide which opening of 2 and 4 I love most. The youtube part in opening 4 was absolutely awesome.
--Character-- 10/10
The maincast is made up off: Yuusuke Fujisaki (Bossun) , Hime Onizuka (Himeko) and Kazuyoshi Usui (Switch). Mostly all of the fun about the series is based on interactions between the main cast themselves, or between the main cast and supporting characters. Like how Bossun and Himeko make the perfect boke and tsukommi pair for example. Or how you have Switch and a girl called Yuuki Reiko have epic arguments about science vs occult.
But what I find most fascinating about the character maincast, is how the protagonist is in terms, the weakest character, which is very uncharacteristic for a shounen anime. He gets picked on alot for having this kinda role, and I love it.
But I can't withold the fact that the main cast, do have kinda, sad backstories, but this is what I enjoyed most of this anime. There is two different types of characters (in some sense). The ones you look up to, and the ones you wanna support, give a hug and so on. The main cast have tendencies of both. Very nice.
The supporting characters are hilarious and extremely well made. Almost all of them are super weird, like overly tsundere girl, a fatty thinkining she is really hot, student council sadist and so on. My favorite supporting character is probably Dante, who only speaks in Visual Kei mode. It's just so funny.
--Enjoyment-- 10/10
This is probably one of the anime's I've enjoyed most in quite sometime. It's not as funny in the start, but just takes off after a little while. My favorite epsiode probably has to be an episode, where the protagonist Bossun, drinks a fluid which mixes up all his facial expressions, or the episode where they play Hyperion. Just watch it ok? Come on. Go go.
--Overall-- 9/10
Overall. It's just great. I really hope it will return like Gintama has done so many times. If you have seen Gintama, give it a chance. If you wanna watch a series that just makes you laugh and laugh, but can also hit that soft spot inside, check out SKET Dance. You won't be dissapointed.
