My before and after feelings of the series: Unique animation style may put some off, but has it's own merit. Plot and script will draw comparisons to Azumanga Daioh, but Lucky Star, ends up with it's own sort of feel. Female, hardcore Otaku seems to be the basis of the Anime, but ends up starring two characters.
Lucky Star ended up being a very enjoyable series. The themes and characters are unique but ordinary at the same time. Lucky Star is generally going to be what you expect it to be, but your reaction to it may be different than what you expect.
The Animation - The animation irked me at first, but after watching an episode and getting used to the colors and style, I think the animation is one of Lucky Stars' strongest points.
When I first looked at some pictures of LS, like other users have pointed out, I thought the characters looked too loli for High School age. Even while rewatching LS, the thought goes through my mind that these characters could pass as elementary girls in just about any other anime. I think a lot of people, like me, learned about LS while they were looking for a new anime to watch after Haruhi. The different style of animation (In addition to the character descriptions) put me off from watching an episode for some time. The characters look much more their age outside of scenes where they are sitting down or are talking heads. The style is not the norm, but it's different and unique, like the series itself. And I think the style fits the series perfectly. After completing the series, I wouldn't have LS animated any other way, besides it makes Anime Tenchou seem even stranger than he already is.
Overall Story/Characters - The plot didn't scream to me that I had to watch the series or even an episode right away, I'm a bit of an Otaku myself, and the character description of Konata, made me feel like I'd be watching myself(I wasn't wrong about that either) But it was a lot more enjoyable than I had expected, Kagami was a surprise for me, I thought she was just going to be part of the background and the punch line for Konata's jokes. However, If you flip through some of the episodes, it's hard to find two scenes that don't feature Kagami, Konata or both. When I was reading the character descriptions before watching the show, Konata seemed to be the "Mascot" character, and that the anime would revolve around her. The overall story, was around what I expected it to be, but my reactions were different. Most scenes gave me a small chuckle and had me thinking how close to home these characters were, the series was a lot more "charming" than I thought it would be.
To be honest, I laughed harder when I was watching AzuDa, but AzuDa lacked emotionally. I thought LS would be very alike to AzuDa, but somehow it was able to put something together for me in the emotional department. For me, I think it was how they had developed Kagami's sense of character, in AzuDa, I had the feeling that the characters were all stereotyped, and that you could always expect a certain character to act a certain way. Kagami, would get distraught over gaining weight, she'd be aloof when she got the love letter, and she'd get angry when her sisters blamed her for not getting groceries. LS did a good job of showing her emotions and bringing the viewer along for the ride and getting the viewr to emphathize with the characters, at least I thought so when I was watching.
For the series, I liked the episodes where they focused on one theme and didn't jump around too much. Episodes, focused only at the beach, only at comiket, only at the school trip, were more memorable episodes. When the show jumped around from place to place, you lose a sense of what that episode was about.(Though, the episodes that jump around are the best to rewatch I find.)
What the show meant to you. - To me, the show was about having fun and laughing things off, but, Kagami has put a bit of scare into me on my own study habits and future.(I should be studying right now
)
What could the creators/animators/writers could have done better. - I would have enjoyed the series much more if they had started putting in those 5 minute serious scenes in each episode earlier on. 5 minutes isn't too bad, you still have plenty of time for joke sequences. If I had known about Konata's Parents' pasts earlier, I would have felt I was more into the show for the rest of the episodes. It wasn't until watching some of these heartfelt scenes at the end, that I really wanted to watch the next episode of LS.
Lucky Channel/Karaoke- I only became a fan of lucky channel and the karaoke after episode 14. With Akira showing her bad side the entire episode of lucky channel, that really got me laughing. The Hare Hare Yukai performance with Shiraishi got me laughing even harder. All in all, I think Lucky Star would have been better off with more skits than the Lucky Channel segment. The Karaoke part is nice, I watched through the credits for each episode at least once, which more than I could say if it was just the same ending everytime.
Animation Quality: 10(Colorful, consistent, pretty.)
Voice Actors: 10 (I haven't heard better.)
Script: 9 (Good script, fits the characters well, plays well with their personalities)
Editing: 9 (I didn't see anything offensive or uninteresting.)
Emotional Involvement: 8 (It's a comedy, but they've shown they can put in some of this too, I'd like to see more.)
Overall: 9