Mermaid Forest: Volume One – Quest For Death (Animé TV)

 

Picture: C+     Sound: B-     Extras: C-     Episodes: C

 

 

Should people eat the flesh of mermaids?  Should they experiment with elixirs of life?  These are the burning questions behind Mermaid Forest, as male lead Yuta starts burying leftovers because of a curse and you know how the truth has a big problem staying buried.  If it didn’t, we would not have a show.  The initial episodes are:

 

1)     Mermaid Does Not Smile

2-3) Village Of The Fighting Fish (in 2 parts)

 

 

This certainly does get graphic and earns its 16 and up age minimum, and with all the curses, bizarre consumption and anger here, that is no surprise.  Each show runs 25 minutes and has better writing than usual.  My big problem with the show is that it just seems narrative-wise to be trying to find a way for people to have conflict to a point that it is just not believable.  This is not that one needs any of the characters to be likable for the story to work, just that these people are such idiots that it ruins any ability to suspend disbelief.

 

The anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is a disappointment, lacking detail and is only saved by its color richness.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo in either English or Japanese has Pro Logic surrounds and is not bad.  Outside of a few Geneon preview trailers, the only extra here is a production art gallery.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo