...but then they had to insert the explanation behind the unexplored background plot points of the series proper. Don't get me wrong, it's fully gratifying to know the details of what led her mother to marry into the Saimoris in more detail, to understand how and why the emperor manipulated their lives in a last ditch effort to maintain his power. That's all good.
Here's my problem: Miyo responds by essentially saying that it's water under the bridge because she has Kiyoka now. Time to move past it.
Except... no it's not.
Look, I get that they weren't going to punish the emperor of all people. I get that there was probably nothing they could do with this information, not without creating big problems for themselves. And I get that Miyo spent the entire series moving past her history so that she could live a happy life with Kiyoka. That's great. I love that she has managed to move past her trauma.
That being said, the fact that neither Miyo nor Kiyoka respond to this in a way that offered any kind of catharsis is incredibly frustrating. The prince essentially told them that his father was responsible for so much of the pain and loss in her life, as well as the misunderstandings that led to so many of the problems she encountered with her family in the original series. That's a big deal. That should matter. Even if they don't say anything directly to the prince, the fact that this was all revealed to be the grand scheme of a power-depleted emperor desperate to hang onto what little he had at the expense of Miyo, her mother, and her extended family should not be so easily dismissed just because she ended up with a good man in the end, especially since that last bit was most definitely not the emperor's aim. And none of that is to mention all of his efforts to end her and Kiyoka at the end of the series.
This scene may not take up much of the runtime of this OVA, but it's probably the most important part for the broader series. It was an opportunity to reckon with the single biggest cause of everything that Miyo has had to struggle through and the person who had thrown the most impediments possible in the way of their relationship. And they just... didn't. She's beyond it now, emotional payoff be damned. The fact that this is basically episode 13 makes it all the more galling given that this takes place not long after some of the worst things the emperor did to them. It may be a short OVA, and I like a lot of it, but this really stuck in my craw. Major missed opportunity that left what could have been one of the more important moments of the series feeling empty.
