History Main / SirensAreMermaids

* ''VideoGame/LegendOfMana'': Averted but acknowledged. Mermaids and Sirens are different species, mermaids being fish-tailed humanoids who can teleport via bubbles and sirens being beautiful harpy-like creatures that look like a cross between birds of paradise and women. The two species are friendly with each other, however, and are implied to be distantly related in some way.

* ''Film/{{Mermaids}}'': Venus, one of the mermaid sisters, is a Siren and able to hypnotize men though with her dancing and her eyes instead of singing. Her powers don't work if someone knows that she's a Siren.

* A ''Literature/HarryPotter'' tie-in book describes [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent three subspecies of merpeople]], one of which is the sirens. They live in the warmer waters of Greece and are the more beautiful kind that human art tends to depict; the other kinds are, from a human perspective, ugly. All merpeople apparently have a love of music, though.

* ''Manga/RosarioToVampire'': Averted, as Mermaids and Sirens are completely different monsters. The mermaids also never sing (they instead suck the life energy of people), while the Sirens do and from what we see can see from their true form, they are birdlike, resembling angels.

However, despite all the differences in mermaid portrayals, they seem to have one thing in common. For some reason, mermaids tend to be called [[EnthrallingSiren sirens]], and are given the ability to sing phenomenally well, to the point of leading unsuspecting people to their doom. In traditional definitions of mythology, the Siren is not depicted as a mermaid-like fish-woman, but as winged bird-woman hybrid -- in fact, the original Greek Sirens were portrayed as a cross between women and songbirds, and could die by drowning.

AsYouKnow, [[OurMermaidsAreDifferent mermaids]], like [[OurMonstersAreDifferent all fictional creatures]], can vary in their portrayal from work to work.

** 1e and 2e averted this trope, depicting sirens as completely human-looking and merfolk as having no special song-related powers. 3e split the difference, making merfolk that still lacked ''innate'' song-based powers but had Bard as their favored class.

* ''Manga/MahouSenseiNegima'': [[spoiler:Akira Okouchi]]'s pactio name is ''Siren Valida'', while her outfit is more clearly mermaid-themed than harpie.

* ''TableTopGame/YuGiOh'' has [[http://yugioh.wikia.com/wiki/Deep_Sea_Diva Deep Sea Diva]], a mermaid with a heavy musical motif that can summon other monsters to it from the deck like a siren.

* In ''FanFic/MegaManDefenderOfTheHumanRace'', in addition to a plasma staff, Splash Woman can attract robots to her.

* ''VideoGame/{{Fable}}'': Played with. An Siren appears underwater, but with legs instead of a mermaid's tail.

* In ''WebComic/SirensLament'', they prefer "siren" over "mermaid". Seemingly as a more politically correct term.

* In the book series "And then I turned into a Mermaid" Sirens are depicted as being a combination of their songbird and mermaid depictions being described as mermaids with wings.

* In ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanOnStrangerTides'', mermaids also have beautiful singing voice and lure men to death. And one of the mermaids is named Syrena. Justified because it's a human who names her that on the fly so she's viewed as less of a creature.

* In ''Film/PiratesOfTheCaribbeanOnStrangerTides'', mermaids also have beautiful singing voice and lure men to death. And one of the mermaids is named Syrena. Justified because it's a mostly-ignorant human who names her that; her actual name is unpronouncable.

* In Creator/{{Disney}}'s ''Disney/TheLittleMermaid'', Ariel has a beautiful singing voice. Most Disney heroines do, but here it's actually a plot point, since the BigBad's price for changing her into a human is her beautiful voice. However, this is taken from the original story[[note]]In the book her voice was just a fee and there was no mention of any singing.[[/note]]. Used in a more direct fashion when Ursula transforms herself into a human woman and uses Ariel's voice to cast a spell on Eric, hypnotizing him.

* ''Series/OnceUponATime'': Averted. The mermaids are separate creatures from sirens. A siren shows up in the episode ''What Happened to Frederick'', appearing as a beautiful shapeshifting lady in a lake. Mermaids (including [[Disney/TheLittleMermaid Ariel]]) show up in Neverland. However, mermaids ''do'' have alluring singing voices, and at least one ''is'' encouraged by her father to lure ships onto rocks.

* In ''Anime/PuellaMagiMadokaMagica,'' the [[MonsterOfTheWeek witch]] [[AndThenJohnWasAZombie Oktavia von Seckendorff]] is an EldritchAbomination resembling a weird cross between a mermaid and an orchestra conductor. Possibly an accidental example, however, because there are symbolic reasons for this form. [[spoiler:Her backstory resembles ''Literature/TheLittleMermaid,'' but with a musician friend in place of the prince.]]

* In early ''Advertising/CapnCrunch'' commercials, the mermaid Magnolia Bulkhead sings an alluring song to sink Crunch's ship and get his cereal.

* Notable aversion in ''VideoGame/HeroesOfMightAndMagic3''. Mermaids are beautiful half-women half-fish creature who give your army a luck bonus, while Sirens are the monstrous harpy-like monsters from Greek legend, who eat 30% of your army, which does give you experience in return.

* ''WesternANimation/MyLittlePonyAndFriends'': "Rescue At Midnight Castle" features the Seaponies, the first characters to get a song. It's very reminiscent of a BusbyBerkeleyNumber, and they would always appear singing a chord of "shoo be doo" in the remainder of the episodes.

* It's popularly held that manatees (Order ''Sirenia'') are often mistaken for mermaids. Although mermaids don't look very much like humans, they do have their nipples located under their flippers, which might cause them to be mistaken for a woman.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Arthur}}'': Averted in the episode where D.W. retells ''Literature/TheOdyssey'', with herself as Odysseus. The sirens are just random girls dancing to [[EarWorm "Crazy Bus,"]] a song that D.W. became obsessed with [[CallBack in an earlier episode]].

* ''VideoGame/PokemonSunAndMoon'': Primarina, Popplio's final evolution , is referred to as a sea lion and a mermaid, but also has the distinctive singing feature of sirens. It is also part [[OurFairiesAreDifferent Fairy-type]].

* It's popularly held that manatees (Order ''Sirenia'') are often mistaken for mermaids.