Hidamari Sketch x☆☆☆ - Episode 3

Episode three of Hidamari Sketch My God It's Full of Stars takes us to the first day of a new school year proper, which naturally holds all of the usual landmarks of such an event at Yamabuki High School, from the Principle's glass-shattering rant into the mic about Yoshinoya through to said teacher's rather spectacular (and spectacularly ill-timed) introduction to the school's students.

However, this episode as a wider entity is all about decisions, with the first chunk of this instalment in particular leaving Yunocchi with a tough decision regarding what to take for her elective classes now that she's started her second year. After getting some sage words of wisdom from Sae and Hiro, Yuno is determined to decide for herself without asking Miyako what she's chosen to do - Probably a sound decision in itself given Miyako's favoured manner for deciding upon such relatively important things.


As per the last episode, the second sub-story here takes us back to the previous school year, with Yuno bumping into Sae at a local book store. While the first part of this episode was perhaps a little short on humour, this part of the instalment was packed with great laugh out loud gags that I won't spoil here, as they're very much of the "you had to be there" variety. Regardless, this particular part of the episode was another fine example of Hidamari Sketch at its very best, from the humour through to the wonderfully portrayed relationships between the various characters it involved.

My only surprise with regard to this episode is that once again Nori and Nazuna are relegated to bit parts within the episode, meaning that we still haven't really had anything but the most cursory of introductions to them and their lives. It's hard to believe that this is likely to remain the case throughout the course of Hidamari Sketch Hoshimittsu as a whole, but who knows? In fact, I'm almost tempted to ask "who cares?", considering how well the dynamic between the original four girls worked in the past, and continues to do so throughout this latest season so far.