Mnemosyne: Mnemosyne no Musume-tachi

Title:Mnemosyne: Mnemosyne no Musume-tachi
Mnemosyne -ムネモシュネの娘たち-
RIN: Daughter of Mnemosyne
Overall:Rent
Keywords: , , , , , , , ,
Notables: R1 License - FUNimation
Rin, a green haired beauty who works for an investigation company. Normally a dangerous job, but Rin has an ace up her sleeve. Due to a certain tree growing in the city she cannot die. But there are people who hunt these 'immortals' and Rin has to be very careful. You also meet her partner Mimi and their 'lackey' Maeno.

6 episode OVA scheduled to be released in Feb '08.

Animation by Xebec.

Mnemosyne - The ancient Greek goddess of memory, a daughter of Uranus and Gaea and the mother (by Zeus) of the Muses.

1:30min Series Opening - YouTube Video

Funimation announced a license for this on 2/20/09
OverallArtAnimationCharacter Design MusicSeries StoryEpisode StoryReviewer
Rent 8 7 8 7 8 8 Ggultra2764 [series:1732#1552]
Watching Mnemosyne was kind of like watching softcore porn on Cinemax with blood, gore and torture tossed into the mix. However, the plot to Mnemosyne wasn't entirely an excuse for gore and sex as there was a decently put together plot to pay attention to throughout what some have mistakenly believed to be an OAV as this was actually made to celebrate the Japanese AT-X network's 10th anniversary by airing the series monthly on the channel. You will notice as episodes progress that Mnemosyne tends to do several time jumps in each of its first five episodes starting from the early 1990s (the era where 128 MB of RAM at the time was plenty of computer memory) and eventually in the middle of the 21st century (where it's possible to download things into a physical form). In each episode, Rin and Mimi get caught up in an incident involving a member of the Maeno family and/or involving one's search for immortality which is somehow connected to the Yggdrasil tree fruit that give Rin and Mimi their immortality. What may seem to be a confusing style of storytelling with Rin and Mimi introduced to a new descendant of the Maeno family for three generations does eventually makes enough sense by the time the fifth episode rolls around, especially if you pay attention to some small scenes in the first four episodes that culminate to something bigger in the final two episodes. Events with the series do end decently enough with a decent amount of depth given to Rin, Mimi and the Maeno family as they interacted with one another. Visuals to the series were decent with use of faded colors to blend with the dark feel of the series with a decent amount of detail for both scenery and character designs. Animation was also decent at some points (some action scenes) and non-existent in others (still shots with minimum animation, especially in some of the show's sex scenes).

Still, this is a show with enough graphic violence and sexual content that is near hentai levels which definitely shouldn't be shown to younger viewers nor first-time anime viewers for that matter. With the show used to celebrate AT-X's 10th anniversary, it's quite clear the show was doing all it could to push the envelope with violence and sex and it definitely shows considering the many gory ways that immortal women are killed or tortured and the various sexual scenes portrayed like orgies, oral sex and sadomasochism. Another problem I did find was that the antagonists tended to be a bit on the shallow side compared to the protagonists and the Maeno family where villains liked Apos and Laura lacked the depth that Rin and Mimi were given.

For a heavily violent and sexual title, Mnemosyne has decent plotting and character depth involving the passing of decades as Rin and Mimi are involved with the Maeno family and dealing with Apos. But the heavy use of violent and sexual content won't make this a title that all folks would want to see, leading me to have to give the series a Rent rating.

Last updated Sunday, October 03 2010. Created Sunday, October 03 2010.
Rent 8 8 8 9 8 8 Dreamer [series:1732#2279]
This series is one gory, bloody and disturbing series. Three words describe this series.... Gore, Sex and Confusion. But it isn't too bad.

Art, Animation & Character Designs
Artwork and animation seemed below par. At times, it would get pretty choppy... which means the framerate dropped. As for charcter designs, on average, it was just ok. At times, it would drop in quality and detail.

Music
The OP was definitely something far... far from the norm. I was highly surprised to find that it was a hard metal piece with heavy electric guitars and crazy riffs.... me liked alot. The ED was equally good. I need to find out who this artist is. But both pieces fit perfectly well with the dark nature of this series.

Series and Episode Story
Aside from all the hardcore violence, gory upclose body dismemberments and countless near hentai sex scenes, the episode stories weren't too bad. With that said, this is a pretty dark anime with even darker characters. However, the plot itself wasn't that interesting and not a whole lot developed in the short 6 episodes.

At about episode 4, I just realized something about each episode (up to that point). Each episode would progress by a few decades. It would always start off nearly identical.... "Rin" asking for something to drink by hollering out to "Mimi", who brings in a bottle of vodka... and the typical saying by Mimi. But if you look closely, you'll see that each episode, the "computers" seemed to be more advanced than the previous episodes.... like in the beginning, Mimi is using a behemoth of a desktop with floppy drive and whopping "128MB" of ram (as Mimi proudly says). I didn't realize it until episode 4, when she starts typing away at the coffee table... which itself doubles a large touch-screen computer. And, not to mention that over couple episodes, "Maeno" aged and with a family. Then it's evident in episode 5, it shows the generations of Maenos. At this time, we finally get a semblance of a plot and things start making a bit more sense.... including the relevance of Maeno.

Overall, it's a seriously gross and disturbing series but good nevertheless. The plot ending still left a few questions but I'm not sure if it's important.

Last updated Tuesday, December 08 2009. Created Tuesday, December 08 2009.
Rent Stretch [series:1732#628]
(All episodes watched):

Mnemosyne is a roller coaster ride of sex and action. Throughout the series shocking violence comes flying out of nowhere with little warning, but it usually made me laugh because I had learned not to take it seriously. The principal characters' immortality turns all sorts of preconcieved notions upside down. Mnemosyne is kind of kinky, too, with things like lesbian sex for information taking place. The result was a fun show even if it clearly wasn't hoping to be remembered as a classic someday.

More than once superb shows have slipped past me because their titles didn't make any sense and I was too lazy to do some research. So I decided I'd download the first episode of Mnemosyne and take a look. Once I finally got around to watching this, I was pleasantly surprised. So many of the shows I watch are just that--watch shows, ones narrowly worth viewing. But Mnemosyne was a definite "grabber". It quickly became clear that this was going to be a fun, interesting show with charismatic characters and action that was both violent and exciting. Something weird and fascinating was going on; one thing that was for sure was that Rin was not just an expert martial artist. The story moves at a nice clip, wasting absolutely no time and covering as much plot in this initial episode as I'd ordinarily get in two or three episodes of a series. It did get grisly with a torture scene, but I had already guessed why there was no need to be appalled when Rin was involved. So... neat! I immediately started up my computer to download the remaining available episodes ASAP.

Basically, Rin and Mimi's superpower is their immortality; the show seems to play with this in a grisly manner--horrific violence inflicted upon Rin is turned upside down and becomes almost laughable since it means little to her. I like the incident where she and Mimi had to make do with some odd clothing after their original outfits had been burned off their bodies. The two are colorful characters; confident, respectable, and grimly making the best of their unique situation. I enjoy their banter as much as the action scenes. There's a definite ecchi aspect to this too; the show teases you in a naughty way but doesn't leave you feeling dirty at the end. I like it. I wouldn't have minded if the individual episodes had more of an interconnectedness, though (is that the longest word I've ever used in a review, or what?). Due to their never aging, each episode takes place several years, or even decades, after the last one. There is clearly one way in which even the two girls could be destroyed, and surely this will be addressed in the finale, but for now the menace is only mentioned on occasion. Individual episodes are difficult to understand, having the common flaw that the basic mystery and its solution are each only explained once, and briefly at that, so if you're not paying complete attention you are screwed. Also, action tends to take place in dark rooms where it is difficult to tell what is going on. There is definitely a pleasing ending, though I still have only a vague notion of what "Yggdrasil" was, and am left wondering if the conclusion is good or bad for the world as a whole, and if the problem has been solved once and for all. Still, a fun show, and naughty as well. The style, the likeable characters, the sex and action are enough to keep me thoroughly entertained even if I don't completely understand what just happened. Surely this will be R1 licensed some day.

My favorite line: "Say something and you're a dead man" --Rin

Last updated Tuesday, September 23 2008. Created Saturday, July 12 2008.
Unevaluated Forbin [series:1732#1573]
Analysis : 3 Fansubs watched.

Wow definitely not for the faint of heart. Tons of blood and if you look at the picture you can see that Apos (The guy on the left) wants to test the limits of the immortality.

What happens to Maeno at the 3rd episode was pretty sad.

MAISM.

Last updated Monday, April 14 2008. Created Monday, April 14 2008.
Unevaluated aoneish [series:1732#1615]
ep 1 released.

holy cow. sex and violence. torture. >.< nothing really explicit.

damn good action. too few though. we'll see what happens yet.

a mystery so far, solved by the end of the episode, resulting in third character to main cast.

op and ed rock.

tbc.

Last updated Sunday, February 10 2008. Created Sunday, February 10 2008.

Other Sites
NameURL
Official OVA series web site http://www.rin-asougi.com/

Community Anime Reviews

anime mikomi org