Mermaid Forest Vol. # 1
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January 10, 2006
by: Ray Almeda
From the creator of Inuyasha comes a story different from any other.
Written By: Kevin Mullett
Review Hardware Used: Panasonic 52” Wide Screen T.V. Sony Precision Cinema Progressive DVD Player.
Disc Description:
Butchering a mermaid and consuming her flesh seems like a small price to pay to escape death. However, Yuta recognizes the curse as he buried the withered corpses of friends and family and searcher for a way to undo his fate. He soon meets the beautiful Mana, who shares his curse and his desire to be cured of the living. Unfortunately, until they can die, the must suffer a deadly world of selfish humans hiding terrible secrets and horrible crimes.
Disc Features:
English Dolby Digital 2.0
Japanese Dolby Digital 2.0
English Subtitles
16x9 Anamorphic Widescreen
Production sketches
Disc Review:
Mermaid Forest is a very original and engaging story. This show is from Rumiko Takahashi who was the creator of the amazing story of Inuyasha. The basic premise of the show is that Yuta has been alive for over 500 years and he believes that living forever is more of a curse than a gift - “I can’t live. I only survive.” The story takes place in a world where not only people know of the existence of mermaids, but also of their mythical powers. It is said that anyone who eats mermaid flesh will have the gift of eternal life. But the thing our characters do not know is that mermaid flesh comes with “strings attached” and our characters find out what will happen once they eat the flesh, not before. There are three things that can happen to someone who eats mermaid flesh:
1. The person can live forever.
2. The person can become seriously deformed and hideous - something that is referred to as “Deformed Ones”
3. The person can just die instantly as mermaid flesh is one of the strongest poisons out there.
In the first episode of the series, you find all about these conditions from Yuta. She claims that he ate mermaid flesh over 500 years ago and that he has been wandering from town to town since then. Yuta finds a companion in the end of the first episode. A young girl named Mana, who he rescues from a group of mermaids, had planned on eating her. As a twist, the story develops more because if it is true that a human can eat mermaid flesh and live forever, then a mermaid that eats human flesh but not any human specifically - that of one who has eaten mermaid flesh - will live forever as well. This way, the mermaids can maintain their youth and live forever as well.
In the second and third episode, Yuta runs into a group of pirates who do not kill people and only take ten percent of a ship’s cargo. These pirates are at war with another group of pirates, who are more like the traditional pirate of killing and pillaging everything they can get their hands on. The more violent of the two pirate groups are looking to find mermaid flesh so that they can all live forever. In their hunt for the mermaid flesh, you learn that the chief of the violent pirates is either a mermaid herself or has eaten mermaid flesh. She keeps explaining that she needs to eat mermaid flesh again for her baby. It gets somewhat confusing and the only closure in the end is seeing her diving off a cliff and landing in the ocean.
The show is very original in many ways. I really like the idea that if you eat mermaid flesh, you can become an immortal. Of course, there is always a catch and the catch here is that actually very few do receive the gift of eternal life, while most either die or become a “deformed one”. On the whole, I do highly recommend this show for those who are looking for something that will really keep you entertained from start to finish. A wonderful story and very in depth characters is exactly what you would expect from Rumiko Takahashi.
Video:
Mermaid Forest has high quality animation, all being done with hand drawings and not using computer graphics or a combination of both CG and hand drawn animation. The great animation is used throughout the first three episodes of the show. I really like that the animation is very consistent in the introduction through the end of the credits.
Audio:
Mermaid Forest has a very odd intro song. I was not particular fond of it, because of the opera style that it has. The sound quality for the rest of the show is also very good. There aren’t a lot of high tech sound-effects that would really make the Dolby Digital enjoyable, but it is still a very good show.
Menu:
The menu system for this show is very basic and straightforward. The only menu selections you have are to switch around the sound options or the DVD extras. There are no sub-menus from those menu choices. The main menu has a nice ripple effect on it, but that is it. No animated menus or anything fancy.
Dialogue:
The dialogue in Mermaid Forest is spectacular. The English actors are very easy to understand. The only problem is that sometimes the show goes too fast for you to truly understand what is going on in a situation. Other than that, the dialogue is very well done.
The Bottom Line:
Mermaid Forest is one of those shows that do not come along very often. Not often do you find a show of this quality in both the story and the animation. My big problems with this show is that there are a lot of things that go unexplained and they really throw you into the middle of things. In just the first episode, mermaids raise a girl just for the reason to kill her. Then, they eat her flesh tobecome young themselves. Also in the end of the third episode on the disc, the wife of the evil pirate chief is pregnant and needed mermaid flesh for her baby, but from what I can tell she is a mermaid already. This is the problem I have with not explaining things through. A very good show on the whole.
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Content |
It's an original story with good characters, and I like the whole eternal life with a catch thing. |
7.5 |
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Video |
You gotta love the animation throughout with its good consistency with the hand drawn animation. |
9.3 |
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Audio |
Nothing really to complain about here, just nothing too spectacular either. |
8.7 |
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Menus
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I would honestly call it menu only and leave it at that. |
2.3 |
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Extras
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All the extras on here are art gallery and previews. Try again. |
2.6 |
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Dialog
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It's excellent and believable, with some very funny lines. Really enjoyable. |
8.9 |
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Verdict
An excellent story, very good throughout the episodes with only a few minor things to turn you off. I would definitely recommend checking this one out.
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8.0
[not an average]
+ Wonderful animation
+ Great sound effects
- Menu system is way too simple
- Where are the extras?
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