SUMMARY
This Boy Caught a Merman is a rather different tale than the typical boy's love anime I have grown accustomed to. No school setting as the main focus, no office; just a young man and a merman. This Boy Caught a Merman is the story of Shima, a depressing young man, and Isaki, a very happy merman, who found each other one night. Shima jumps into the ocean after his beloved, late grandpa's picture and nearly drowns, but Isaki is there to save him.
- Enjoying that limited space, Isaki?
The two end up living together for some time. Isaki enjoys being with Shima but has a desire to return to the ocean. Will he return or will he stay and continue to make Shima's life more brighter?
POSITIVES
The artwork in This Boy Caught a Merman is vibrant and different. Artwork appears almost like manga in motion. Watching every scene was a nice treat to the eyes and I found myself wanting to see more of this style as the anime kept going.
This Boy Caught a Merman is not a slice of life anime as most boy's love anime tend to be. Shima does go to school but the main focus is on the beach and Shima's house. A lot of boy's love anime tend to focus on offices and schools as settings and it was nice seeing fantasy elements in a boy's love anime.
The artwork in This Boy Caught a Merman is vibrant and different. Artwork appears almost like manga in motion. Watching every scene was a nice treat to the eyes and I found myself wanting to see more of this style as the anime kept going.
This Boy Caught a Merman is not a slice of life anime as most boy's love anime tend to be. Shima does go to school but the main focus is on the beach and Shima's house. A lot of boy's love anime tend to focus on offices and schools as settings and it was nice seeing fantasy elements in a boy's love anime.
IN BETWEEN
Although no one is a seme (the dominant male in a yaoi/shonen ai or boy;s love relationship), Shuma is the obvious uke (the not so dominant male in a yaoi/boy's love relationship) in This Boy Caught a Merman. Shuma cries a lot but with good reason. I do realize that this would be annoying to people that are long time yaoi fans or new to the genre.
A lof of manga likes telling with words and not showing through pictures. There is a few times when I felt dumb for reading a text on the screen, when it came to words that were describing character emotions. Other times, I was fine reading the text.
NEGATIVES
The length of This Boy Caught a Merman is short but certainly did not need to be any longer. I considered the thirty minute length when purchasing this anime at Nekocon a last month. Instead of going with a shiny blu-ray disc, I instead went cheap and brought the dvd version.
This Boy Caught a Merman worth a look and is only thirty minutes a viewer's time. The characters, setting, and artwork make This Boy Caught a Merman an enjoyable watch. The DVD is a lot cheaper on Amazon than the Blu-Ray disc; just keep that in mind. Throughout the anime, there are cameos to other works made by Sentai films and Soubi Yamamoto, be sure to check those works out as well.
This review was on www.ofanimeandvideogames.com a few days ago.
