I'm going to get a lot of flak for this review as I know how popular this show is but I have a hard time defending this show as it just leaves me feeling frustrated. It's Love Live School Idol Project.

Otonokizaka Academy is about to close due to a lack of applicants much to the dismay of student Honoka Kosaka, but she gets an idea after seeing School Idols perform for another school and decides to give it a try with her friends in the hope of drawing in new students to keep the school running.
However her path is littered with obstacles including the student council, a disgruntled Idol fan and the most common trope, overdoing it until you collapse, but Honoka's enthusiasm is enough to create the idol group Muse with it's members in all high school years and with the power of love and friendship and colorful pop songs will keep the school open.
Where have I heard this story before? Oh yeah Girls Und Panzer did it first and better.
Where have I heard Honoka's character before? She's an expy of at least three other anime vocalists and pretty much every female lead in every other shojo series including the majority of Pretty Cure, Pretty Rhythm and too many other shows to name, her character has been done to death.
Now is Honoka's predictable character going to be excused by what she does in the show? Never. What she does is easy to predict, the people who criticize her will always shut up and she will inevitably succeed even in the face of the worst luck.
Are the other characters any better? Not really, I've seen all these other characters before as well with the exception of Nico Yazawa who may not be the best character but she's at the very least original in design for a show like this.
Okay what about the music and the animation and choreography in the music videos? The music is catchy but the actual performances are not that good, the CGI doesn't blend as well as say Super Sonico and the choreography is messy.
There's no dub to judge so what's the diagnosis.
Love Live is okay by anime standards but my god is it horribly overrated.
First off there are much better Idol shows; AKB0048, Aikatsu and even the catalog of Vocaloid's most poptastic music videos offer better viewing.
Second there are better music anime in general; K-On and Super Sonico are amazing, even BECK Mongolian Chop Squad and Black Heaven are worthy watches and I also remind people of the classic Macross franchise as well as one of the oldest music friendly anime franchises of the original Bubblegum Crisis.
And finally despite the fact that I don't like many things that are popular, at the very least the likes of the Shonen Jump stuff, Sword Art Online and Attack on Titan are popular for a reason, I don't see the same with Love Live no matter how many times I watch it, it's not worthy of all the praise it gets. What am I missing? What is the appeal? Is all people want in an anime a bunch of school girls in idol dresses looking pretty and singing and dancing to current day J-Pop music? Or is it because, like Hamtaro it's another ultra safe anime?
I honestly don't know, whatever point I'm missing, I cannot enjoy this show for what it is.
Final Verdict: Love Live does nothing new. It relies entirely on tried and tested story lines, tropes, characters and even existing idol shows. I cannot see why this show is so popular, to me it's okay but horribly overrated.