This is actually the first time I am reviewing an anime series on this blog, wow. Over a year now since I first started, and the first time. I was supposed to review Kaiba ahead of anything else, but what the heck, Hyakko just ended and I found it pretty funny, so here are my two cents on the series, its characters, and development. Remember this is all my own opinion, so please judge accordingly if you plan to judge. As of this posting, the fansubbed versions for episodes 11 to 13 are not yet out, so obviously there are going to be spoilers. Read on at your own risk if you are following the series.

General Information

Title: Hyakko
Production: Nippon Animation
Number of episodes: 13
Theme song performances: Ogawa Mana (OP), Hirano Aya (ED)
Season in which it aired: Fall 2008
Arbitrary overall score: 7/10
 

Summary

Hyakko follows the lives of four girls who enter their first year in high school. Their school is a huge private academy known as Kamizono High, and the four girls get lost together on the same day and meet up, and later find out that they are all in the same class. The series also follows the development of not just the four girls but their classmates and other related people’s inter-relationships. It can be best described as a high school comedy series.
 

Seiyuu

For a somewhat lesser-known anime, Hyakko sure has a lot of stars. In the four girls alone, there are two veterans and one current popular seiyuu. Neya Michiko lends her experienced voice to Iizuka Tatsuki, Hirano Aya plays the timid and shy Nonomura Ayumi, Orikasa Fumiko brings her talented front as Kageyama Torako, and Ochiai Yurika plays Saotome Suzume.

In the side characters too, there are plenty of big names. Fujiwara Keiji plays the unfortunate homeroom teacher of the class, Kuwashima Houko brings her very talented and deep work as Kazamatsuri Touma, Horie Yui voices the robot-obsessed meganekko Suzugasaki Chie, and Kaida Yuko dresses up as the “yankee” Makunouchi Ushio. Like Hirano Aya, the singer for the OP, Ogawa Mana, also has a role in Hyakko, though it is pretty minor, as Nikaidou Hitsugi. Based merely on this cast alone, Hyakko is already worth a first look.

The cast delivered, for the most part, throughout the show. I am not a fan of Hirano, and quite frankly she did only ok for me in this one. Fujiwara did pretty well in this anime, and of course, Orikasa and Neya did fantastic jobs. Kuwashima and Horie had fewer lines for the most part, but they brought out their own characters well.
 

Plot & Character Development

As can be expected of a high school anime, there really is not much of plot development, but they did try to slowly bring in the side characters, almost each episode featuring one or two, in two or more short stories or parts. I think they also did pretty well as regards character development as well as relationship development, but there are loopholes of course in the developments. Still, it was not something to be upset over, for me.

The comedy is definitely not for everyone, but for those who enjoy it, it sure is a good laugh.
 

Animation

The animation truly was not of even good quality, but I am not complaining that much. Maybe they planned for it this way, in order to make it more a laid-back anime than anything else. I also like how they sometimes played soft or appropriate music while showing scenes such as a water tap dripping, the school yard, and more. It sure brings out the atmosphere.
 

Music

It was pretty fine throughout, I have nothing much to say here, but I will get the OST for sure. The music is probably, if I were to put words on it, reminiscent of school days that you might be going or have gone through, though at times, the music is of action-packed stuff, and when it turns to that, I usually hardly liked it or bothered listening to it.

I also did not like either the OP or the ED, just not my cup of tea.
 

Characters

Here I will go either one by one or a few at a time, depending on the screenshots, talking about the characters and what I thought of them in the series, and their development.
 

Nonomura Ayumi

The first female character to be introduced, Nonomura Ayumi strikes me as a girl that might just irritate me in the long run. I dislike her character for various reasons, including her being voiced by Hirano Aya, and that is about it. Her shyness and timidness though is probably essential to the equation of making Hyakko’s core group successful, in tune with Torako’s cheeriness, spirit, and hyperactivity.
 

Saotome Suzume & Iizuka Tatsuki

Iizuka Tatsuki was the second girl to be introduced, and she is part of the core group. Voiced by Neya Michiko, her ojou-sama character type is brought to full bloom yet she is not as cold or hostile as most other characters in this group I have seen. She was also my favorite girl in all of Hyakko until episode 7 onwards, and only until episode 12 did the other girl truly replace her. Tatsuki is very lonely, as her character type would suggest, and she is usually dignified, though there are moments when she snaps, which helps in the comedy and shows that not all ojou-sama types have to be so uptight.

Saotome Suzume was the fourth girl (right after Torako) to be shown. She is a very close friend of Torako’s, and does not say much most of the time, and has a very blank mind. She does eat a hell of a lot though, and has superhuman strength or something. Otherwise, she is quiet most of the time, but does stand up for Torako a lot, though through soft actions rather than speaking. A very blank girl in terms of intelligence and thinking for herself.
 

Kageyama Torako

Arguably the driving force behind Hyakko, Torako first makes her appearance by leaping out of a second-floor window of Kamizono and immediately after landing gracefully to seemingly sprain her ankle. A bright, bubbly and almost always cheerful person, Torako hides a rough family background and history with her parents and her half-siblings. She is often bullied by her older brother, Kitsune, but her elder sister, Oniyuri, always worries and cares about her as though she were her own sister by blood.

Torako also often gets into trouble and uses weird ways to solve them at times. Yet her apparent stupidity is more a nonchalant attitude, but she does care for her friends, especially Suzume, and now Ayumi and Tatsuki, along with all the other classmates. An airhead with a passion.
 

Suzugasaki Chie

 

Makunouchi Ushio, Nonomura Ayumi & Andou Nene

3 of the other classmates, considered to be minor roles throughout the anime, of the 4 girls’. Suzugasaki Chie is your typical meganekko with a weird side passion into robots, almost an obsession. She even creates her own robot and provided the basis for Torako in episode 3 to fool around, causing their homeroom teacher much emotional hurt. She also sucks at sports, which shows clearly in episode 11, but anyone with a robotic passion would.

Makunouchi Ushio is your typical school delinquent character…except she really is not a delinquent. She has a soft side to her, though she talks tough. Stands up quite well for her friends.

Andou Nene makes a smashing appearance as the first side character to be introduced, at the beginning of episode 3. Her clearest statement to date has been how she is bisexual, though she still hits more on girls, especially in her class and on Ayumi and gang, than others. Andou wants to run for the presidency of the student council and for that reason, took on the role of class representative. She is often in heat when there are extra hot scenes with the gang, especially Torako and Ayumi.
 

Tsubomiya Inori, Ooba Minato & Kobayashi Koma

Kobayashi Koma is the photographer…a money-minded one that is. Taking pictures is her hobby, but so is earning money from selling those pictures. She is very laidback as a character, and dresses rather much like going for a vacation all the time. She is often in cahoots with the senior from the Cultural Club, Kyougoku Yanagi.

Ooba Minato gets introduced rather late, and is worse of an airhead than Torako. She also has a penchant for crying and getting upset over the smallest things, such as dropping a 100 Yen coin trying to put it into a vending machine. She also has a weird hobby of sticking onto people who have helped her out of kindness before, driving them to the point of frustration and insanity with her giggles. She is also pretty athletic and rather tall, but her character is irritating, to say the least.

Tsubomiya Inori acts as the “Sadako” of the class, having a very deep problem of being unable to socialize with others at all and having made no friends since the day she was born…until she finally tries in high school and befriends Torako, breaking the ice with the rest of the class through an unexpected day of hairstyling. Tsubomiya turns very moe in this episode, as can be seen in the shot below. Unfortunately, after just one day of it, she turns back to her normal appearance due to her being unable to dress herself up. She also has a weird laugh that sounds too much out of a horror movie…
 

Tsubomiya Inori, moe version.

 

Kazamatsuri Touma

Touma is introduced even later than Ooba, though she is already occasionally shown throughout the series as a character that attempts to avoid Torako all the time out of lessons, despite them sitting beside each other in class. Touma’s reason for her evasionary tactics is not known until episode 10 when her character gets further developed, showing that she preferred to be on her own, yet Torako keeps invading her private space. This arose from their first meeting before they got into Kamizono High however, and Torako was actually the reason that Touma decided to join Kamizono, though you will never get her to admit it. She can be colder and more aloft than Tatsuki.
 

Sengoku Shishimaru, Kageyama Kitsune & Kyougoku Yanagi

Kyougoku Yanagi is introduced early on, one year Ayumi and gang’s senior. He is only interested in the beauty of photographs, and selling them for profit. His skills in using a camera and getting difficult shots is legendary, and he finds Tatsuki to be appealing based on appearance. Though of a somewhat perverted nature, he does try to help his friends.

Sengoku Shishimaru is Kyougoku’s friend, and he is more of an upright guy…except for one minor problem – he is infatuated with Torako. He is so obsessed that he goes so far as to call her “my angel”, and in finding out that Kitsune, his friend, was Torako’s brother, he went so far as to ask, “Hey, Kitsune. Is it ok for me to call you, onii-san?” Of course, he was instantly smacked for that. Where Torako is concerned, she is his angel and can do no wrong, and is the cutest girl in his eyes. He gets shy and nervous around her though.

Kageyama Kitsune is the delinquent elder half-brother of Torako, which is not revealed until episode 7. Kitsune, as per his name, looks sly and like a fox (kitsune means fox in Japanese), though he hardly really plots. He is also cool and laidback about most things, and does not hesitate to do some outrageous stuff, just because they seem fun, like when he raises Ayumi’s skirt to allow Kyougoku and Koma to get a shot of her pantsu. Kitsune also later provides the family background info regarding Torako in episode 12.
 

Amagasa Kyouichirou

The homeroom teacher that gets punched by Torako in the very first episode, Amagasa is one of those nonchalant and seemingly indifferent teachers with a “cool” attitude. However, in the series, he was the character that was made to be owned, time and again, usually by Torako. Sometimes, you just cannot help but pity the man.
 

Yagi Yuki & Nikaidou Hitsugi

Yagi and Hitsugi (as they call each other in the anime) apparently have no connection to the actual Hyakko plot, seemingly more of a plan to showcase two new voice actresses in the industry, one of them the singer of the OP. They exist as mini side comedies in an episode, as well as serving as the narrators for the previews of the next episode. Both of them are in Kamizono Elementary.
 

Kageyama Oniyuri

Finally, we come to my favorite girl of the show. Oniyuri is Torako’s elder half-sister, and she is a very cool girl, the Student Council President, and is good in both athletics and studies. However she is also very worried about Torako, as can be seen in her concern when she is finally introduced in episode 12. Though first seen in episode 6 or so, her identity is not shown as well until episode 12. Oniyuri has a scarier and stronger name than Torako herself, which Torako observes when she meets Oniyuri in her childhood for the first time. Another image of her as we end the post.
 

Overall, Hyakko certainly was not what you might deem a “good” anime, but it more than served its purpose for those who catch on to its comedic side and like the girls’ antics and the way the characters are developed throughout the anime. Not meant for everyone indeed, this anime gets a ranking of about 7 out of 10, if I had to give an arbitrary score, overall.

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