Everyone loves to see violence in fiction. Especially if its the brutal, bloody, gory type. War and military-themed shows feature a lot of these crowd-pleasers, and there’s no way anime can be escape this trendy flood. If one mentioned gore and anime, we can easily name a few titles right away. Elfen Lied, Black Lagoon, Akira, and Jin-roh are probably the most often quoted titles. Short series don’t usually get much mention compared to full-length TV or theatrical anime, and chances are that many anime fans are blissfully unaware of this one.

Daughters of Mnemosyne.

Mnemosyne is an especially brutal show. Remember the immortal C.C., and the various number of times (and ways) she got herself killed? Mnemosyne features immortals who get killed a lot, and their deaths are always, always violent, gruesome and bloody. They get killed, they come back to life, get killed again, come back to life, rinse and repeat. Of course, that’s not all there is to it.

Vodka and yuri. Simply awsm.

The plot follows Asougi Rin, sexily carried by Mamiko Noto (kinda reminded me of Witchblade), and her business partner Mimi, yet another loli voiced by Kugimiya Rie. The two run a private investigation agency, taking on various odd jobs and coming across various interesting cases. (Gee, where have I heard that before?) At the end of episode one, they found themselves a new staff member in Maeno Kouki, a clone whom Rin rescued from a pharmaceutical lab experiment.

There can only be one!

Rin and Mimi are both immortals after having consumed a Time Spore that drifted from Yggdrasil, the so-called Tree of Eternity. What’s interesting about immortality in Mnemosyne is that the immortals retain the physical condition of their bodies at the moment a Time Spore entered their body. If they happen to be sick, or young, their bodies will keep its youthfulness, and also any sickness that was present at the moment. Case in point, Rin is permanently short-sighted. Her eyesight would never improve, nor deteriorate. Ever.

Yes. Toenails ripped out, and piercings all over the place.

The writer takes another interesting leap with immortality. Each episode was aired monthly, so there was a nice big gap between each broadcast. Each episode is also set with a nice big timeskip that spanned years between each other. It was interesting to see the technological progress as well as changes in the environment. From the early 90’s, all the way to somewhere around 2050’s. Each episode follows the descendants of the Maeno family, starting with himself, his son and his granddaughter – all of them somehow find themselves involved in Rin’s adventures.

Yggdra-Yggdara-Yggydisa-... ah fuck it.

Mnemosyne tells a fantastic and engaging stpry with very memorable characters and fluid depictions of gore and violence. It delivers the animation ever so gracefully, even certain sex scenes have a different, glowing quality. It’s an elegant collection of action-packed drama powered by a tantalizing mystery, creating a unique blend of suspense and excitement in a way that is difficult to describe in words.

Yum.

It doesn’t try to tackle complicated philosophy (I’m looking at you, Masamune Shirow), nor does it fiddle around with overused cliche themes (75% of all shonen titles out there are guilty of this). It is ultimately a tale of deep romance, soaked with an immense yearning and a crimson love that spanned for over a thousand years. Mnemosyne walks this ground beautifully, making a masterpiece out of itself.

It only spans across 6 episodes, but each one is a solid 45-minute run and there’s never a dull moment in between. An absolute, must-watch for all guro lovers :D

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