Nichijou - Episode 20

Given its somewhat frequent appearances throughout the series thus far, it is perhaps a relief to see that Mio's particular abilities are now out in the open as she happily admits to her friends that she draws manga.

However, what isn't such a smart move is inviting Nano, Mai and Yuuko to help her meet a particular deadline for her work - while Nano is quickly taken out of commission merely by the content of the manga in question, asking Yuuko and Mai to help with such a task is foolishness in the extreme.  Lo and behold, while Mai takes her own very unique view of working on backgrounds (which effectively means "fill it in with something more interesting" in her parlance), Yuuko turns to be a walking diaster zone in her own right thanks to a painful mistake with a pencil which for once makes the most of Yuuko's over-reactions to hilarious effect, followed by a rather major ink spillage which she tries to rectify rather than simply telling Mio what's happened.  This sketch book-ends the episode, as a trip by Yuuko to buy more suitable paper turns out into a long, lamenting monologue recalling the scenario by Mio.

Away from that, there isn't really a lot else to mention within this episode, with Mai's dog Pyon providing one of this show's very occasional "yeah, that happens to me too" moments while we also follow a game of hide and seek featuring Nano, Sakamoto and the Professor where the latter (of course) has something unexpected up her sleeve.

Still, it has to be said that this episode's manga drawing sketch is probably one of the better fully-fledged offerings we've seen from this series to date - it did threaten to overstay its welcome during Mio's monologue, but the first segment was full of great gags that actually made the most of Mai and Yuuko's foibles rather than simply making them irritating as so often seems to be the case.  This second half of Nichijou certainly seems to have been an improvement over the first thus far, even if it remains hit and miss in its own right.