Surprise awesomest show of last season – Hidamari Sketch
Posted on | April 26, 2007 | 8 Comments |
Since I made my last preview post, I have been trying out the new season’s shows. So far, the verdicts have been -
- Nagasarete Airantou – Good, especially the whale called Sashimi, but far too much use of the old nosebleed gag. Love disliked it, so I’ll give it a couple more episdes to see if they discard it for some actual comedy…
- Romeo x Juliet – Dragged to watch this by love and actually thought it was rather good – genius, putting Will Shakespeare in his own play. And who doesn’t love the flying horses and countries in the sky? Definitely reminds me of something old…like El Hazard or something like that… If only there was yuri in it as well, then everyone could be happy…
- Hitohira – The main character is really, really cute and both me and love empathise with her so this one is definite win…however, the subs by [one] are definite lose. We appreciate the effort of course, as an audience should, but we probably won’t be watching any more of them until someone better starts subbing…
- Lucky Star 2 – NOT AS GOOD AS LUCKY STAR 1!
But most of all, I have been catching up with one of my favourite shows of last season, Hidamari Sketch.
I got hold of the series in a slightly weird fashion – through danbooru. Spotting some very very cute Megami magazine scans of the series, noting the tag name and then looking it up on Animesuki and finding that they had been fansubbed by Shinitani. And what a great job they have done too.
Hidamari Sketch is another SHAFT anime, and this is obvious from the outset from the weird symbolism and “acid trip” sequences and camera angles. I have never really been that convinced by SHAFT, and since I am slowly becoming disillusioned with the new series of Negima?! I have come to realise that the first half of Pani Poni Dash is probably their best work to date.
However, Hidamari Sketch is promising to change that… Not perhaps through the SHAFT weirdness and randomosity, but through the strength of the source material.
The basis of Hidamari Sketch is a four person format reminiscent of such classics as Ichigo Mashimaro (4+1) and more recently, Lucky*Star. The foursome is made up of Yuno (sleepy cute protagonist), Miyako (tall blonde poor ADHD), Hiro (ball haired weight conscious Mikuru) and Sae (generic megane wearing senpai). Their +1 in this series is Yoshinoya sensei (cosplay obsessed sexy teacher) And yes, she is hawt. Thank you Shinitani for pointing that out ^_^
At this point I have to point out that love isn’t really convinced by Hidamari Sketch. However, I must also point out that she likes contemporary art and I don’t, so it really is a matter of taste ^_^;;
The anime itself is a fairly random affair, following the lives of four art college students in a “slice-of-life” kind of way reminiscent of Azumanga Daioh (for instance, the theme of one of the episodes was “it snowed”). The real reason I seem to keep on watching this show is the awesomeness of Miyako.
I haven’t watched an anime for one character for quite a while…The first anime I watched simply because of one character was Martian Successor Nadesico – in fact, I could probably have just stuck together all the scenes where Ruri said “Baka baka” and that would have done me. The next one was Ichigo Mashimaro, which was awesome in its own right, but I was generally only watching to see what Miu did in the next episode…
Miyako’s character is reminiscent of someone I can’t quite place…instead of tall dark and handsome, Miyako fits more of the tall, blonde and clueless. In fact, my favourite part of her character is the fact that she is poor and she doesn’t complain about it! (Surely a new innovation in the world of anime…Ahh, Binbou Shimai Monogatari, you were undersold in your lifetime…) In fact, Miyako is now one of my all time favourite characters.
So is it justified to be watching a SHAFT show just for Miyako? The answer – survey says – WIN. Also, with a scene like this in the starting sequence, how can a yuri fan like me NOT watch Hidamari Sketch, I ask you? (Though SHAFT are notorious for shoujo ai teasings without actual substance O_o) Miyako/Yuno for the win though…I would think of writing some fanfiction, but I doubt I could do Miyako’s character justice in writing.
The morals of the story for today are:
- All praise Shinitani
- Watch Hidamari Sketch!
- That is all
Comments
8 Responses to “Surprise awesomest show of last season – Hidamari Sketch”
Leave a Reply
Other sites and Projects
- Yuribou scans - Scanlations of dubious virtue
- Yuribou's List of Japanese Adverbs and Onomatopoeia
- Yuribou hentai dictionary
Subscribe to our feed
Search
Blogroll
Aggregators
Blogroll
Fanfiction
Friends
Manga
Other
Yuribou is brought to you today by the number
April 26th, 2007 @ 2:16 pm
It is a fantastic series, I’m hoping Shintani manage to complete the remaining 6 episodes, or it gets licenced, whichever happens sooner. Miyako rules!
April 26th, 2007 @ 3:38 pm
Though I wouldn’t mind if you did try writing that fanfic though. :P
April 27th, 2007 @ 7:23 am
Come on now, all of hidamari’s characters are made of win…geez.
April 28th, 2007 @ 2:43 am
Yea, it’s quite good. I’m watching it for the sensei and Miyako as well. Do love the overall SD shapes ;).
May 9th, 2007 @ 8:51 am
Miyako somehow reminds me of Tomo of Azu, only Miyako have some brains, and acts like a real girl. Tomo always ambushes anyone who comes near her ^_^
I watch the show only for Sae though. She also have a lot of funny scenes and her relationship with Hiro is cute. All in all the series is quite nice.
Oh and thanks for this site. I’ve been laughing my @$$ off for four days now because of it.
May 11th, 2007 @ 9:28 pm
Gah! Curse you, Yuribou! As if it weren’t enough that you brought Nanoha into my life, now you’ve managed to force me to add another anime series to the growing stack on my hard drive. My thesis will never be finished at this rate!
Displacement activity aside (is watching anime displacement activity? Or is it just plain laziness?… ^^;), thanks ever so much. Again, never heard of Hidamari Sketch before, and now I can’t get enough of it. Pure win all round. And yes, it’s all about Miyako. ^_^
June 4th, 2007 @ 12:27 am
Yeah
June 4th, 2007 @ 12:29 am
Sorry, damn thing cut my post off. >_> I meant to say, Yeah, Miyako is absolute win. Especially voiced by Kaori Mizuhashi. If you want another stupid, yet very very lovable character like her, except better (and my all time favorite), you should play Tales of Legendia. You’d absolutely love Norma. It’s better to play it in Japanese, plus she’s also voiced by Kaori Mizuhashi! But, if you can’t, then you should just play it in english.
She’s also hawt as a yuri-shipper, she has interests in two of the characters, Chloe(which Norma x Chloe is absolute win, possibly my most favorite yuri pair), and Grune. D: