Hidamari Sketch Special

Information of Anime

Yuno, Miyako, Sae, & Hiro are students to an art school & are living at the Hidamari apartments.  Together, they work together on & off school.

Storyline (CONTAINS SPOILERS)

Below is a summary of the storyline I've seen.  If you haven't seen the series yet & don't want to be spoiled, skip this section.  If you want to know the story & want to see how I viewed it, read on.

The special is two additional episodes that once again focuses on the four girls lives & activities.  The first episode is set at a public swimming pool & the second is about love letters when Hiro finds one in her shoe locker at school.

My Personal Review

Hidamari Sketch Special is basically additional episodes to the anime series. There's nothing new here & the episodes are actually in-between some of the episodes of the previous anime show.

Animation

Same as the TV show.  The character designs are kind of like loli girls with small chubby faces.  They look all the same really with the difference being the eyes pretty much.  There are times where the girls would have different designs such as scribbled faces with small bodies or other SD type of forms.  Basically done for cuteness & humour.

The backgrounds are a mixture of animation & real life images.  Most of the real images are from objects like paintbrushes & teddy bears.  As the actual drawings, they are pretty dull with very little details in them.

The colours are on the dull side.  My assumption is basically to make the show like a light drama which is pretty much what it is.  Most of it is like cell work instead.

In terms of the animation movement, it's a mixture of realistic & silly stuff.  Most of the time it's silly stuff to show the show's light comedy.  It's pretty smooth with little choppiness.

Sound

The sound effects are on the realistic & silly side.  They are pretty clear & nicely cued.

The seiyuus here are ok.  They play their roles pretty well.  However, they seem to lack some energy to make the show interesting.  I'm not sure if it's the seiyuus or the characters itself.

The music is ballads mostly.  It's soft & easy on the ear.  For me, I think they are too easy as I don't notice them & don't really care for them.

Story

Again, mainly following the lives of the four girls.  The episodes here are basically add-ons to the first season of the show.  In other words, it's basically a thank you gift to the fans before heading to the second season.  There is no actual ending to the specials in terms of having a main plotline.

The background humour stuff is still there as well.  Sometimes the backgrounds will have some out of place items when the background switches from one another.

Overall Conclusion

Hidamari Sketch Special is not a show for everyone.  It's aimed to an older audience.  Plus, it's quite dry to the point where it gets boring.  Personally, I don't recommend watching this as there are other anime shows out there that does a better job than this in keeping audience attention spans up.  But, I felt this special was a bit better as more humour is thrown in.  If you are looking for a laidback show with very light comedy, this may be up your alley. It's recommended that you watch the first season though to understand where the characters are coming from.

Hidamari Sketch Special gets a six out of ten. There is no main storyline as it's mainly a service special & it's still a bit dry due to its presentation. But it was enjoyable than the first season.  That is for me personally.

Last updated on March 11, 2008