"Sweet Songs Forever #1"
Hey, it's Belldandy!
Well, no, no it's not. But to be honest, I have no idea what the heck this show is about, so she may as well be. Triangle Heart is based off a Japanese game and after watching the first episode, I'm beginning to think I need to have played the game to have any inkling as to the plot of this OVA.
The plot is a little confusing, and it doesn't help that over a dozen characters were introduced in one episode's time (with the majority of them coming one after another during a song break in the middle of the episode). We start off with Fiasse, the headmaster of a girls choir school in England who is in line for some sort of inheritance. Because of some sort of issues with the manner of the inheritance (another claim on it, perhaps), the school has been receiving threats against her. To protect her, the school has enlisted the help of... uh... Fiasse's younger sister, who is a professional bodyguard.
Cut to Hong Kong, where two kids are participating in some sort of mock operation against the Hong Kong special police... and then cut to the kids' family's coffee shop... The show feels like a lot of different plot threads that don't go together very well, and I'm not ashamed to admit I have absolutely no idea what's going on.
Deserving special note are the terrible hair designs (it's as if when drawing them, the artist was forgot about perspective, though other anime have this same sort of hair drawing style and it bugs me there too) on the bland characters, and the extended piece of Engrish (oh, it's awful!) at the tail end of the episode.
Maybe it'll get better when I play the game (which I won't) or more of the story is revealed in upcoming episodes.
Rating: D
"Sweet Songs Forever #2"
This show has to have some of the most boring, generic character designs ever. It as though they had one outline, and they just filled them in with slightly different dresses, different colored eyes and hair, and not much else. In a show with as many characters as this one, a bit more differentiation would be a big plus.
I suppose it's sort of appropriate though. Boring character designs for a pretty boring show.
Chew on this: at one point, Erisu shoots an assailant three times (shoulder, knee and ankle), but can't slow him down. Kyo then takes out his sword and hits the guy with it, explaining that the guy was probably on painkillers, which is why he had to use a hard object to knock him out.
...
After watching this episode, I can't help but wonder why we had to sit through the long coffee shop sequence in the previous one. That whole backstory seems completely unimportant at this point. Maybe they'll tie it together later, but I could really care less. This is not a good show.
Rating: D