Hello everyone,
Today we'll review a manga/anime series that aired recently and I quite liked named "Hyakko" written by Haruaki Katou and that focus on the common life of four high-school girls.
Let's start with a synopsis :
On their first day of high school shy Ayumi Nonomura and taciturn Tatsuki Iizuka become lost on the immense campus of Kamizono Academy. An irresistible force of nature named Torako Kageyama accompanied by her best friend Suzume Saotome appears in front of them. Led, sometimes pushed, by Torako, the girls and their classmates work through problems of school, home and adolescence.
Yeah, this is a typical slice of life calm and relaxed setting and this is most likely the series was meant for, but...
...hell if it was fun. actually it was so fun that sometimes I wondered "maybe this is more comedy than slice of life?!" and ended up categorizing this series in the same category of GA Geijutsuka Art Design Class as both were meant as slice of life and turned up as nice comedy as well.
The plot is mainly episodic and focus on a particular girl around Torako and one by one the cast is complete and the anime unfortunately end with a prequel episode.
There are, to be honest, some slow episodes in the series, but they're not many and generally the series flows naturally from the start to the end.
This series is one on my list of "buy manga, I wanna see how it continues" (the manga is at 6 volumes and is still ongoing so there is plenty of material to read from)
The characters are quite many as we count 13 main girls plus some random guys around them as well (the brother of Torako being the most popular at least for me. 
)
Most of the characters, unfortunately, does not have much screentime dedicated to them except for the main four ones that get some kind of development and backstory building during the series.
My favourite character is by far Suzume Saotome, with her quiet personality and aura of mysteriousness around her. Nice second for Torako, even thought she acts childish most of the time (irritating me)
In the list of "why are they even here?" character we have Nene Andou (probably to someone she will be funny, but to me it's just a nuisance) and Touma Kazamatsuri with her irritating personality.
The visual quality is pretty high and I liked the girls design. The animation is instead a big problem, at least in the TV broadcast it was all messed up and inconsistent. I hope they fixed it up for the DVD releases.
Loved the opening animation for the style of presentation that gives off the aura of Slice of Life to this show.
The sound quality is top notch, I loved most of the characters voice and we do have some big name here like Fumiko Orikasa in Torako's role, Yui Horie in Chie Suzugazaki's role, and some others.
My favourite is by far Asuka Nakase's role as Minato Ooba, with her childish voice and personality. (the portrayal is perfect!)
Concluding, this is a high quality series with little problems like animation and some slow episode, but it's anyway worth your time so give it a look if you're looking for a nice slice of life/comedy series.
See you soon,
feal87