"Completely Incompatible", huh? Sounds like a good way to describe this series in relation to Kiddy Grade.
Episode 3 starts off with the Pink-Haired Nitwit rather typically screwing up the orders of her friends Alisa and Belle, with Q-Feuille arriving behind her with the correct items. Q-Feuille then tries to talk Ascoeur into getting her act together. Forget it, Q-Feuille, she's a lost cause. The cafe then gets an order for the director's office, which Ascoeur happily accepts. Cue title card.
After the title, we see Ascoeur arrive at the director's office with coffee and finds Trixie and Troisienne are there in a meeting with Director Hiver. She's enthusiastic to see the two and rushes in, which naturally leads to the Pink-Haired Nitwit tripping. Luckily, Troisienne is able to catch both her and the coffee. Ascoeur is instantly impressed. We also find out that Trixie is apparently clumsy, thus Troisienne is used to picking up after someone. The two are there to report on a mission they had just completed and convince Sommer and Director Hiver to let Ascoeur stay. We then get a debriefing montage.
Cut back to the cafe, and Ascoeur is acting weird now. I'm not sure how to describe her behaviour here, but part of me wants to say she's acting like she just got laid and it was the best sex she ever had. Naturally, she's creeping everyone else out and I'm left wondering if I didn't miss something far more interesting. When Q-Feuille questions her, Ascoeur goes on about how great Troisienne is and how she wishes she had her for a partner. Q-Feuille, being Ascoeur's partner, is naturally a bit miffed by this. The two are then tasked with delivering a rather large order of coffee.
Ascoeur continues to talk about Troisienne on the way to their delivery, telling Q-Feuille she should be more like Troisienne, when who do they run into in the hall but Trixie and Troisienne themselves! After a brief exchange, Q-Feuille drags Ascoeur away. The way Ascoeur fangirls over Troisienne is starting to get more than a little creepy at this point. The two make their delivery and get into a rather silly little argument over whether or not Q-Feuille is mad before returning to the cafe.
Upon their return to the cafe, Ascoeur finds a magic wand that looks like something from Cardcaptor Sakura. Q-Feuille instantly recognizes this as the "legendary Sakura wand". We then see a short anime clip that looks like a cross between Lucky Star and Cardcaptor Sakura. The anime, as Q-Feuille goes on to explain after mimicking the pose of the main character, is called Card Getter Sakura. Q-Feuille seems to be a rather big fan of this anime, though this scene is just making me think of other more interesting shows I could be watching instead.
After gushing about the series and the main character, Q-Feuille then proclaims that the wand they just happened to find is an incredibly rare item. Only 395 were sold at an exclusive event 8 years ago. Ascoeur takes the wand from Q-Feuille and, being the Pink-Haired Nitwit that she is, whacks it off her hand a few times before setting it precariously close to the edge of the counter. It falls off, but Q-Feuille makes a diving save. At this point, I feel the need to mention that the difference in the art style when the characters make some of their sillier facial expressions is a bit... jarring.
After Ascoeur casually dismisses the incident, claiming the wand is just a toy and wouldn't break anyway, Q-Feuille finally decides she's had enough and starts yelling at Ascoeur. Yes, after all that fangirling over Troisienne, THIS is what finally sets Q-Feuille off. A toy magic wand. That's what causes the big break-up that this episode has been leading up to. The two start arguing, hurling insults back and forth. At least, I think they're supposed to be insults. I know I'd be pretty insulted to be called a pumpkin pudding lover at this point. Alisa and Bella arrive and the argument ends with the two girls declaring that they hate each other and folding their arms in a huff.
But apparently that's not the end of it. Cut to their dorm room later that night and we see the two of them have divided the room with bedsheets. Considering both of them are behaving like children at this point I suppose this isn't entirely unexpected. The two argue over whether or not the two sides are divided equally when Alisa and Belle walk in. By this point there's practically a maze of bedsheets dividing the room.
Deciding to take matters into their own hands, Alisa and Belle separate the girls and try to talk to them. The scene goes straight from them walking into Ascoeur and Q-Feuille's room to this. This anime certainly likes to jump around a lot. We first see Ascoeur arguing with Alisa, saying she can't be friends with Q-Feuille because she's not Troisienne and because she's obsessed with Sakura. In another room, Q-Feuille's speech is completely garbled as she presumably rhymes off Ascoeur's faults. She could be there a while.
Yet another scene change as its suddenly daytime with no transition whatsoever. Alisa and Belle stagger groggily out of separate rooms, complaining that they can't keep up with them. Ascoeur and Q-Feuille call them back in as they're apparently not done talking yet.
And after that brief scene, we're now in the cafe! SLOW DOWN, ANIME! Seriously, this is starting to get a bit hard to keep up with. Anyway, Mi Nou asks the girl's to deliver a cup of super strong coffee to table three. At first, neither Ascoeur nor Q-Feuille move, and then they start fighting over who gets to deliver it. The cup of coffee ends up flung across Mi Nou's face instead. In the end, she ends up taking the coffee to the table herself. Naturally, it was Alisa and Belle who ordered the super strong coffee. The two explain to Mi Nou that they were unable to put a stop to the arguing. Mi Nou yells at Q-Feuille and Ascoeur for keeping them from getting any sleep. As punishment, they have to take over Alisa and Belle's jobs as receptionists.
Finally at the half-way point. Our first eye catch is Sakura from Card Getter Sakura taking over the front desk. The second replaces her with Pumpkin Pudding Man. I see this guy is going to become a running joke for the eye catches.
Returning from the eye catches, our two ES Cadets are now working the front desk. This scene could have almost been a neat little throwback to Kiddy Grade if it had been anyone else in their place. Director Hiver and Sommer show up briefly, with Sommer commenting that the role suits them. If he's trying to imply some similarity between them and Éclair and Lumière, then I must highly disagree with that remark.
They aren't working the front desk for long, however, before an injured man desparately requiring their assistance rushes in. He suddenly collapses after claiming his injuries are just scratches, which makes me wonder why he collapsed when this certainly seems to be the case. Nevertheless, Q-Feuille and Ascoeur quickly jump into action and leap over the desk to catch him. He tells the girls ne needs to see a Mr. Smith in the Special Trade Guaranty Department as he needs to transfer money to him by 12:00, or else he'll be forced to pay 3 billion. That... that seems a bit harsh. Of course, the Pink-Haired Nitwit immediately asks how many pumpkin puddings you could buy with that. Someone hit her, please.
Oh, but it gets worse, because apparently if Mr. Smith doesn't get that money then everyone on Planet Oinos will have to hang themselves. There's already less than 9 minutes left. Oh yeah, and his injuries? He was in a car accident apparently. Yeah, sure looks it too. This whole situation is absurdly contrived. He gives them a card to take to Mr. Smith and is then taken away by paramedics. After showing that there is now less than 6 minutes remaining, the girls find out there are 15 sections in the Special Trade Guaranty Department and 24 Smiths, 13 of which are male.
Naturally, this contrived set-up is meant to force the girls to work together. Anyone could have seen this coming by now, I'm sure. Q-Feuille decides to try using her divination ability, which hasn't been mentioned before now. Apparently it's pretty unreliable, and it seemingly is as Q-Feuille sees a vision of a woman when she uses it. Since there's not enough time to contact all the Smiths, Ascoeur decides to teleport to them all instead. I'm not sure how that even begins to make sense. Between the two of them it'd probably take less time to try calling them all than it would for Ascoeur to teleport to them.
Ascoeur manages to land on top of the first Smith she teleports to, who directs her to Section 9. She then teleports to Section 9, but is told that the note has to go to Section 5. The guy in Section 5 tells her to take it to Section 4. The Smith in Section 4 tells her to take it to Section 1. In Section 1, she runs into a rather masculine-looking woman that informs Ascoeur that the only Smith in Section 1 is female. Naturally she just had to word this in a way that made it sound like she was referring to someone else. Disappointed, Ascoeur returns to the front desk.
There's now 2 minutes left. Having learned from the Section 4 Smith that the correct Smith should have met the guy in person, Q-Feuille realizes that would mean that the one they're looking for would have been to Planet Oinos in the last month and does a quick search. This still brings up several Smiths, but Q-Feuille recognizes one of them from her divination. The female one. Ascoeur is shocked to find out that this 'guy' is actually a woman, and Q-Feuille realizes that the man who gave them the bank note might have made the same mistake. With less than a minute remaining, Ascoeur teleports back to the female Smith and completes this absurd mission.
30 minutes later, Ascoeur and Q-Feuille are discussing their recent adventure. Ascoeur complains that the female Smith totally looked like a man. Has she ever taken a good look at Mi Nou, I wonder? Or does she get a pass because she wears lipstick and has a noticeable rack? Q-Feuille looks up some information on her to find out she's a bodybuilder and likes protein. The guy from before then returns, already recovered from his injuries apparently, and thanks the girls. I can't help but wonder how he already knows they were able to find the right person to give the note to. Maybe he's just assuming they did.
Naturally, with all that's happened, the two girls have completely forgotten they were mad at each other and reach the natural conclusion that, yes, they need each other. Because one incredibly contrived incident where your powers perfectly compliment each other if you squint a bit is absolutely the best basis for a partnership. Q-Feuille gets embarassed when Ascoeur says she's the perfect partner, leading Ascoeur to then call her a tsundere. Another client arrives to ask for directions and Alisa, Belle, and Mi Nou watch from around the corner as both girls eagerly offer to help.
Finally its the end of the day and Troisienne and Trixie show up. Troisienne is carrying the wand from earlier. Turns out that the wand was her's all along and she, too, is a fan of Card Getter Sakura. Seems Q-Feuille and Trixie have found some common ground and are now friends as well. There's something especially unsettling about finding out Troisienne is equally obsessed with the anime as Q-Feuille, though. Trixie jokes that the two of them should just be partners. Ascoeur gets upset at this notion, but Q-Feuille reminds her that it was her that suggested Q-Feuille become more like Troisienne. Trixie says she shouldn't do that, but Q-Feuille declares that she now looks up to Troisienne. The episode ends with Troisienne and Q-Feuille declaring that Sakura is awesome.
Boring and entirely predictable. That's about all there is to say about this episode, really. The only interesting parts revolve entirely around the in-show anime, Card Getter Sakura. Personally, I think I'd at least check out an anime that combines Cardcaptor Sakura with Lucky Star, even if only to see how it turns out. Couldn't possibly be any worse than this, at least. Finding out Troisienne was interested in this anime, too, was actually an interesting little surprise though her and Q-Feuille's obsessiveness is incredibly off-putting. All in all, out of the first three episodes, this one was the least painful to watch. Still made me wish I was doing something else, though.
Next episode: The Babysitting Mission! Well doesn't THAT just sound promising.
