I've been recently developing a jealousy toward the Slice of Life genre. These days it feels like the only kind of manga/anime that can ever get a positive consensus anymore are super subdued, comfortably paced, character driven emotional dramas or comedies which have easily relatable characters and also touch on real life social and emotional issues. But on the other side of the coin, it's still a genre with a lot of great titles under it and this manga is one of them.

Story- 8/10: This is your standard highschool-based slice of life with a twist, twist being the adult main character. But unlike doing something cosmetic like making one of the main characters deaf (Koe no Katachi) or a penguin caricature (Oyasumi Punpun), the twist here actually substantially changes how the setting is looked upon, and in a way that adults can enjoy arguably more than teenagers (since the MC is an adult).

However, like in Koe no Katachi, any scene where the twist of premise is not utilized makes the story feel like a copy paste Slice of Life. Granted, having a truly original story is next to impossible these days. But since a bog standard Slice of Life is literally just REAL life, I find that a problem since I personally don't read things for a real life-type experience.

In all honesty though, when the characters who are secretly adults get to interact with the normal teens, it's a very interesting read. Fortunately, that at least DOES happen a majority of the time.

The only other real complaint is some beating around the bush at the end, but if you can get through Prison School's cavalry arc, then this is nothing.

Art- 7/10: This is the first and only manga I have read entirely in full color. And THANK GOODNESS it was in full color because that's the whole saving grace of it. The characters are really flat, bland, and inexpressive, BUT...

...the BACKGROUNDS are where the expressiveness comes in. Well, not the backgrounds as in, the school or the town. I mean the backgrounds as in, the mysterious void that the manga panels float in. That... place?... changes color and texture in response to stuff happening, which easily offsets how boring the people look. Granted, I think the abstract art of Oyasumi Punpun does a better job at having "expressive backgrounds", but the presentation here is good enough.

Characters- 9/10: Since it's a Slice of Life, the characters are the driving force. The most interesting people are obviously the adults who are pretending to be teenagers (I'm using plural because the MC has ReLIFE employees alongside him during this whole thing). Buuuuuut as I said before everyone else is, well, normal.

If you're no stranger to the genre, you can probably guess what direction each and every character arc goes in. But their arcs are represented well in the background art I mentioned earlier.

Overall- 9/10: This is a solid Slice of Life manga, that's all there is to it. I'd easily recommend other Slices of Life such as Mahoutsukai no Yome and Uchuu Kyoudai (well just those two really) over this one. But ReLIFE ain't bad for what it is.