New Little Mermaid Trailer Turns The Character Into A Horror Movie Monster

As is the case with many old fairy tales, Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid" has plenty of horror elements and ends with the titular mermaid in a strange aerial purgatory that may or may not one day earn her a soul. The untold truth of Disney's "The Little Mermaid" also features a rejected 1940s version that was way darker than the one fans eventually saw in 1989. Even the finished Disney product has its share of darkness, courtesy of its villain, Ursula the Sea Witch (Pat Carroll). 

With all of this in mind, perhaps the horror movie version of "The Little Mermaid" was always inevitable. A new trailer for director Leigh Scott's R-rated "The Little Mermaid" horror movie (via MSR Media) reimagines the story's titular mermaid into a mysterious woman called Aurora Bey (Lydia Helen), who introduces herself to archaeologist Eric Prince (Mike Markoff), whose dig has unearthed proof of a strange ancient civilization. Aurora, of course, is far more than meets the eye, and the fact that this is a horror movie gives you a pretty good hint about how things go from here. 

"The Little Mermaid" is just one of the many horror movies based on fairy tales — specifically, ones made famous by Disney — that have been making waves. "Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey" gives the denizens of the Hundred Acre Wood a slasher movie treatment, and the amount of Winnie the Pooh Characters in the "Blood and Honey 2" trailer beggars belief. Horror fans also have gems like "Bambi: The Reckoning," "Peter Pan's Neverland Nightmare," and "Mickey's Mouse Trap," a horror flick that dropped its trailer right after "Steamboat Willie" hit public domain. 

Public domain, of course, is the key to many of these creations. While "The Little Mermaid" is very much a public domain fairy tale, making films like this can be tricky — for instance, "Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey" had to tiptoe around Disney copyrights despite the original novel entering public domain during production. It remains to be seen how "The Little Mermaid" has managed this task, and how charming the end result is. Still, the movie certainly seems like a unique take on the classic story.