First review on MAL! I may clarify that I have watched a lot of male idols anime's, and not even the ones from my favorites franchises (Uta no prince-sama and Ensemble Stars!) are even half enjoyable as Im@s SideM. One thing that really catch my attention was the fact that most of them (12/19 if I'm correct) were 18 or over. Seeing adults in this kind of animes is really something fresh! I loved this! The animation is, really, amazing. I'm not a big fan of The Idolm@ster franchise since I dislike the producer-idol relationship it portrays. Just personal taste. But from the clips from the 2011 animeand Deresute I saw, Im@s SideM animation is just as good as them.

The standars of animation in idols' animes are really low. And worse yet, when the staff decides to mess around with cg. It usually ends bad. But this is not the case, i'm glad to say.
- The animation is stunning. Go watch the opening (Reasons!!) on Youtube. I swear it stays in that level.
- The character desing is just on point, not to simple, not to complex.

The characters are super likeable!
They are not that edgy/tragic past/war criminal/class traitor we tend to see in idol anime. They are just lads having fun!
Yes, there are some characters with trauma they need to overcome (like Tsubasa "idol Makoto Tachibana", my favorite), but is just a part of them growing up.

Another thing I *really* aprecciated was the lack of unnecessary drama. Only in the 12th episode. And it wasn't even unnecessary drama.

So yeah! I would highly recommend this show if you like Idolish7, Tsukiuta, or Marginal#4, slices of life without romance (or a little, if you count i7 as romance).

Am I biased? yes.
But after watching so trashy idol animes, let me have my moment.