Hinako Note

I'm not one to review shows but to find a show like this where every single one of my preferences if checked and in abundance was like winning the lottery. This show is peak fluff, everything from the VAs to the coziness of the artwork is designed to relax you, its like lighting up a fat one at the end of a stressful day, the more you dive into it the more it loosens you up. Then there's the fan service, why God himself channeled his glory into the hands of the animators of this show! The fan service while small, and only occasionally popping up is so pulchritudinous, so resplendent, that like a child seeing the moon for the first time I was unable to take my eyes of it as I just saw in awe genuinely thanking whatever higher power there is in this world for letting me live right now and enjoy this. The story is pleasantly enjoyable and the op is catchier than a super charged version of the common cold. People tend to overlook shows like this, they say there's not enough action, or character development/plot, well I can tell you that when you reach a point where you think your time is limited and you won't see tomorrow, the big adventures and great stories never matter, what does was the love, and this show goes straight to the heart.

Hinako Note feels like a bloated cake filled with sugar and cream. Hinako Note follows Hinako Sakuragi voiced by M.A.O a "scarecrow" wanting to be an actress to get rid of her extreme shyness by joining a drama club in Tokyo and arrives in a boarding school which happens to be a bookstore and a cafe attached to it. So with that little introduction to Hinako Note, what does Hinako Note look at? *Theatre *Cafe more specifically maids *and books This is kinda what LA means by "bloated cake", also like Hinako Note literally wanted to have their cake by being like Gochuumon wa Usagi Desu ka?, Kiniro Mosaic and Wakaba*Girl and eat it too by bringing in something refreshingly new from this anime trend (easily because of Hinako's dilemma of being a scarecrow). Now LA isn't bashing on Hinako Note, no no no, LA is merely saying the similarities are there and heck LA actually really likes the frequent changes into moe chibified form that only increases that yes, this is typical moe fluff...but "ok to decent" moe fluff. But if LA REALLY needs to talk about faults, then it's that Hinako Note has ALOT going for it trying to be soo many things as well as riding into the anime trend of moe fluff and their daily lives and sure some defence is that both the cafe and the bookstore helps Hinako get over her shyness as she works at both and hijinks ensues. The other problem is the most obvious one and that is that most of the characters have a preset running gag that never changes or evolves to the main cast (from again the aforementioned Hinako's scarecrow shyness) such as Kuina Natsukawa voiced by Miyu Tomita eating habits (which includes books), Chiaki Ogino voiced by Hisako Tojo being the affection of all the girls in Hinako's school as well as Yua Nakajima, Hinako frienemy because of her Chiaki and in the early theatre moments. Finally we have Mayuki Hiiragi voiced by Yui Ogura, the maid of the group and gets shy when she's called a doll and she was LA's favourite character...why?...the majority of her comedic moments landed quite well even if they are running gags. In terms of animation by Studio Passione, the animation has a really tendency to switch from normal character designs to chibified form ALOT and yes the chibified form are moe as hell and LA really does it like from all this, though it makes LA question if their chibified form is in a metaphorical sense or they can actually change into chibified and it's ONLY the main cast...and LA is looking too deep into this. One little flaw LA will say about the animation is that the fanservice is there and eye-rollingly annoying at times when it does show up. The fanservice is mainly n the more risque costume the cast (sans Mayuki) gets into, like sexy nurse or maids and they plain old chest shots because big boobs are great in conjunction with a moe fluff anime...... -sigh- again Hinako Note trying to have it's bloated cake and eat it too and no LA has no defence for this one. Annnd in comes voice acting and there's ALOT of squeakers in this anime, from M.A.O to Marika Kouno as Yua to the typically obvious Yui Ogura, but thankfully Yui Ogura's vocals fits into her role thus her being a caricature of her roles doesn't exactly apply to this role if this character is SUPPOSE to be like this and the fact that YUi Ogura doesn't go crazy with her moe squeaker vocals as Mayuki. LA was slightly annoyed by Hisako Tojo due to her ever constant low monotoned moe vocals. For LA's most annoying voice actor it went to M.A.O for obvious reasons and on the flipside, LA's favourite voice actor goes to Yui Ogura. Hinako Note isn't a bad moe anime, if anything LA just wished it could do something more with it's material outside as well as trying to ride into the anime trend of Gochuumon wa Usagi Desu ka?. Hinako Note is a hit or miss in terms of comedy and will vastly depend on whether you like the main cast of this anime (or the voice cast). LA will say this again for Hinako Note...it's a bloated cake filled with sugar and cream...whether you can handle and eat all that can either frustrate you into leaving or just go into a sugar rush, run out of energy then find finer cakes with a better focus. Rabbit House Coffee anyone?....

En Español debajo de la review en ingles Hinako Note It is an anime in the category of comedy, stories of life, moe that its story revolves around our protagonist with the problem of panic to other people since she was little in her life in the country until she enters college determined to overcome That panic is fashioned in Tokyo in order to study theater, where she is well received in Hitotose, a cafe / bookstore where she meets her classmates who will help her overcome her phobia, helping her in everything possible so that she dedicates herself fully to her theater career. Personally I do not recommend this anime since its story does not become well developed and it does not have any grace both in the chapters and in characters that the most remarkable thing is its animation and its moe content. Es un anime en la categoría de comedia, recuentos de la vida, moe que su historia gira entorno a nuestra protagonista con el problema de pánico a las demás personas desde que era pequeña en su vida del campo hasta que entra a la universidad decidida para superar ese pánico se moda a Tokyo con el fin de estudiar teatro, donde es bien recibida en Hitotose un café / librería donde conoce a sus compañeras que la ayudaran a superar su fobia ayudándole en todo lo que sea posible para que ella se dedique plenamente a su carrera de teatro. Personalmente no recomiendo este anime ya que su historia no llega a ser bien desarrollada y a no tener ninguna gracia tanto en los capítulos como en personajes que lo más destacable es su animación y su contenido moe.

Story: 7 | Art: 7 | Sound: 7 | Character: 8 | Enjoyment: 7.5 | Overall: 7 A cute, fun and short comedy anime about a girl with anxiety who moves away from her farm to try doing live acting performances to make herself more confident. She stays with a few other girls who become friends and has a great time with them all. Someone else who reviewed Hinako Note mentioned how this is great to watch when you've had a tiring day and stuff, which I much agree with. It was also great for helping me calm down before going to sleep or getting ready to go out somewhere such as appointments and meetings. There were some things that I thought weren't too necessary (some mildly perverted scenes lol), and just a couple times where they have some comedic scenes go on at wrong times or longer than it needed to. Overall this was still fun to watch, it's nice for calming you down or just to see Hinako's first steps to getting over her anxiety while also having cute funny moments along the way. I don't know if I'd watch it again but either way it was still a nice show to put on when stressed. -15/02/2022 (edited 19/02)

Recommendation: A very nice cute girls doing cute things comedy. It's fun if you like that genre, but not worth going out of your way to see if you don't normally like shows like this. Story: Hinako, a nervous girl from the country, moves to Tokyo and tries to become a theater actress to gain confidence in herself. As is typical with shows like this, the plot really doesn't matter. The show itself often ignores the theater premise and just goes with your traditional setups for these kinds of shows. The beach episode, training camp at school, etc. Surprisingly no hot springs episode now that I think back on it though. The entire theater portion of it really doesn't matter to be honest, it's just a setting and a thinly-veiled excuse to dress the girls up in various cute costumes, which the show spends the vast majority of its runtime doing. The one thing I would criticize here is that the show has a tendency to periodically slam the brakes on to do about a minute's worth of extremely out of place fanservice before resuming the episode like it never even happened. I'm not inherently opposed to fanservice and I understand the reality of why it exists, but it feels very jarring for a series that's very sweet and innocent most of the time to suddenly throw in a bunch of closeups of the girls in their underwear and aggressively zoom in on their crotches. Audio/Visual: The voice acting is strong for the most part, several of the VAs are immediately identifiable. The voices do tend towards the overly cutesy, but that's the kind of show it is so the highly saccharine nature of the show will probably get to you before the voices do if that's going to be an issue for you at all. Visually, the character designs are very nice and look good, but often turn into blobs for parts of scenes as a stylistic choice. I didn't mind this, but your mileage may vary. They don't ask a lot of the animation here, but what is there is well-made. The designers also did an excellent job of creating and animating a wide variety of different costumes and dresses as well. The girls essentially playing dress up is a major element of the show and the design of the clothing is consistently strong throughout. Characters: I really enjoyed the characters in this series. They're all very cute, maybe drifting into cloying territory occasionally, but have unique personalities and gimmicks that are fun without adding unnecessary complications. Hinako turns into a scarecrow when she gets nervous, Kuina is food-obsessed to the point of eating books, Mayu is easily embarrassed yet insists on wearing a maid outfit at all times, Yua is the friendly rival (think Ayano if you've seen Yuru Yuri), and Chiaki is the mature and understated one. It's pretty easy to sum up the archetypes but they do a good job of making you care about the characters beyond just those archetypes. Their interactions are very charming and the comedy is gentle but pleasant. Overall, this is just a fun and sweet CGDCT series. There's little to it beyond what you're probably expecting, but it's a pleasant and relaxing watch. A great healing anime if you're ever in a bad mood.