The story was consistently good throughout the anime, though following a traditional structure to where the high or low points of the story was. It's nothing too out of the ordinary for a SoL show which makes the moments where something special happens become even more special. It does have some predictable moments like how both of the main characters meet and what they do but overall with those predictable moments, they didn't really deviate from the overall story's quality and didn't really affect the overall enjoyment of the film.
The art style is done spectacularly, it flows really well between the more actiony scenes and the calmer scenes, with it matches the aesthetic of the show beautiful. The characters are animated very stylishly and their facial reactions are very diverse and helps paint a picture of what the personalities of the characters are, even though they might be a tad overdramatic. There is always a moving part on the screen and even things like a book falling over on the ground is shown in a bright matter. The scenery at the points it need to happen were done well though at times it felt like it was panning a bit slow.
The sound is the best part of the show. The show's background themes brighten up the anime in a bright, colorful way which I expected for it being made by Kensuke Ushio, who also did A Silent Voice and Liz to Aoi Tori. It is also a major part of the show as the whole show resolves around the theme of music.
This characters of this are well done. Cherry, a Japanese haiku poet with a lack of wanting to share his haiku's vocally and hides behind his headphones to make people not want to talk to him and Smile, who is a successful online personality with a personal crisis with her bucked teeth which she wears a mask to protect herself from potential embarrassment. Both characters are very simple but both feel like real characters living with their basic problems, and seeing their interactions with each other and the rest of the cast. The supporting cast can be a bit forgettable apart from Fujiama, the grandfather of one of Cherry's friends. He helps create this diversity from the main characters being this loud, forgetful and annoying character, which makes this story feel more alive and all together more realist.
I found this show to be a simple yet an enjoyable one at that, I would suggest this to people who like music, slice of life and people who love a little romance in the show. I was glad to see the global same time release of this film on Netflix as I think it's the right step for Netflix to have these sort of releases for their original anime films.
