It's been a while between episodes of Mnemosyne as always, in terms of both the real world and that of this OVA. Episode five fast forwards us once again, this time to 2055, and a world where the Internet and the real world are seamlessly interconnected.
While this series' jumps forward in time have often taken a little while to settle into the swing of, this episode in particular seemed more confusing than most, with the instalment as a whole featuring entirely too many Rins. Add to that the fact that 'our' Rin had lost all of her memories due to her rather nasty coming together with a jet engine at the tail-end of episode four, and you have yourself an episode that really took rather a long time to explain itself and get to the crux of the matter. This transition for the viewer perhaps wasn't helped by the use of Maeno junior's daughter as the main hook into the whole story, who turned out to be a slightly whiny and irritating spoiled brat. Still, on the positive side we at least finally got to find out the crux of Apos' plan (the lengths some people will go to just to own a pair of breasts), and were also offered a climax that could make the final episode intriguing I suppose.
As always, Mnemosyne seems to pride itself on its arguably stylish brand of sex and gruesome violence, with the former in particular seeming to take up a large amount of screen time. It seems that as the series has progressed, so these two facets of the show have become more prominent, as if to hide the weakening plot. While I did somewhat enjoy episode four (and despite these elements rather than because of them), episode five had nothing approaching that level of verve, walking down the wrong side of the fine line between mystery and confusion while the separation of Rin and Mimi actually removed probably the best character inter-dependancy from the show. In short, shorn of its detective agency roots, this particular episode of Mnemosyne lost much of what had at least made earlier episodes watchable, leaving little beyond the violence and sex coupled with a brief clarification of the main plot surrounding Apos. In other words, not enough to make for a particularly enjoyable viewing experience, unless you like that kind of thing.
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