Alternative Character Interpretation: With The Reveal in Season 2 that Rikki is actually a lonely poor kid, her dislike of Zane in Season 1 has multiple possibilities. The first is that she just thinks he's a jerk. The second is that she hates him because she's jealous of what she doesn't have. The third is that there could be romantic feelings from the start but she's acting Tsundere because she believes he'd never be interested in a poor girl.
Angst? What Angst?: Cleo and Kim's parents divorce offscreen between season one and two. It's briefly mentioned, and neither the girls nor their father show any emotional turmoil at all. What's more is that while a couple of episodes do address it, it's entirely from Cleo's perspective. Kim doesn't seem bothered at all by the fact that her mother just up and left. Their father doesn't seem to be affected by losing his wife at all. And the mother is never seen again, yet the issue is glossed over.
Emma. She's either a well-meaning girl with a few neurotic tendencies or a bossy and controlling harpy who tries to lecture her friends every chance she gets.
This also affects Bella, depending on the attitude to Emma. Either she was a Replacement Scrappy or a massive improvement.
Max being nearby and willing to help Lewis/the girls.
Bella being a mermaid.
Everyone going inside in "Pool Party" right when Cleo is thrown into the pool.
Ms. Chatham somehow knowing the girls are mermaids.
Charlotte suddenly Forgot About Her Powers when she only learned to dry herself off quickly the previous episode, instead choosing to hop into the dolphin's tank as she transforms and getting herself into a panic.
The planets just so happen to line up with the moon in the respective teenage years of the two trios of mermaids known in the recent history of Mako Island.
Designated Hero: Sometimes, the main characters will behave in petty and selfish ways and never really learn from it or properly outgrow it. Some outstanding examples:
After Cleo gets fired from her job and Lewis takes the position, Rikki and Emma sabotage Lewis at his job in the hopes of getting him fired so Cleo can get her job back, which leads to Lewis being the prime suspect in a police investigation.
At the climax of the first season, when Lewis reveals he knew all along that the girls' loss of powers was temporary but Miss Chatham told him to keep quiet so their reactions would be real, Cleo responds by subjecting him to prolonged torture by trapping him on top of a water spout while the rest of the girls stand around laughing.
Despite knowing that Rikki is poor and lives in a trailer park, Emma and Cleo (who live comfy middle class lives) get angry with Rikki when they learn that she's trying to find something that has a reward attached to it.note In their defence of this one, they didn't know Rikki's father needed the money desperately and they assumed Zane was just being greedy.
Also Rikki, despite being poor, cringes at the simple idea of getting a job and barely even tries at the Juicenet Cafe, only getting Emma into trouble. Instead of even trying at a retail job, she picks up something simple and illegal.
Rikki, Emma, and Cleo sabotage a family dinner between Cleo's father and Charlotte's mother in an attempt to drive them, as well as Charlotte and Lewis, apart - never mind that at this point, Lewis was single because Cleo turned him down, and therefore fair game for Charlotte, who at this point has been nothing but a decent person...save for the incident where she pours flour over Cleo, her grin implying that it was on purpose.
After Charlotte's initial encounter with the moon pool, Lewis deliberately gets her wet to see if she'd gotten mermaid powers. Here's the kicker: they were in public at Juicenet. Not only would this have broken the Masquerade, but Lewis would have just exposed an innocent and confused teenage girl to the public if she had gotten mermaid powers. Neither he nor the girls seem to see any problem with this.
Will in Season 3. He is introduced as Bella's Love Interest and eventually becomes part of the group. However, in a similar sense to Charlotte stealing Gracie's tape and spying on the trio, the way he finds out about their secrets is very pushy and invasive of their privacy. As shown below in Unintentionally Unsympathetic, he forces Bella into revealing herself by splashing her with a glass of water, and a few episodes later, he refuses to help the gang with Rikki's kidnapping until Cleo and Rikki are confirmed to be mermaids too. Yet despite all this alongside Rikki warning Bella about getting closer to Will earlier in the season, he still somehow manages to befriend them and be a part of keeping the mermaids' secret.
Ash, in "The Gracie Code: Part Two", as a way to cure Emma's supposed fear of water, picks her up without her consent and carries her off to the ocean while she yells at him not to. While he does leave and drop her, Ash's expression compared to Emma's during the carrying scene also shows him smiling as Emma looks down in distress. Like with Will above, Emma still quickly forgives Ash for this despite him almost breaking a boundary with her by forcing her into the water when she didn't want to.note While Emma did lie to him to keep her secret, Ash still believed doing what he did would help, without consulting Emma on how she would feel until he forced her into it.
Designated Villain: Charlotte, who before going all-out evil arguably doesn't really do much wrong to the girls beyond some lowkey Alpha Bitch bullying, even though her relationship to Lewis comes off as rather pushy from the start. Can you really blame her for getting a tad upset and suspicious when Lewis continually lies to her, or runs off or stands her up with little to no explanation to go and hang out with three other girls? To Charlotte's credit, in the beginning the show presents it more as Cleo being petty than anything else, and she does plenty of legitimately nasty things as part of a Face–Heel Turn to become a true villain. She also starts antagonizing Cleo early on, episode 6 of the season having already established a mutual dislike.
Draco in Leather Pants: After a while some fans begin to realize how sympathetic Charlotte really is in some parts, especially considering how the main cast treats her throughout most of Season 2 before she snaps. Though, a few fans often go overboard with it, downplaying and sometimes even outright ignoring what she did in her final appearances. Even before getting together with Lewis, she shows signs of being very creepy and controlling, spying on him, following him around and meddling in his private business with the girls, as well as jumping at every opportunity to make Cleo look bad and not respecting Cleo's privacy as she repeatedly goes through her stuff. The others have every right not to want to be friends with her,note though they didn't have to be too harsh to her at the beginning of the season and she does several things that are recognised as symptoms of emotional abuse (including hiding Lewis' phone and trying to control who he hangs out with). Despite everything she did to Cleo, the girls still try to warn her about the full moon, and she resorts to using her powers in a way that could nearly kill them.
Evil Is Cool: When Charlotte becomes a mermaid, she has all three of the water powers, and she turns into a total badass at her first full moon; controlling things in Emma's house from the outside, and at one point even conjuring snakes out of the water to attack the other girls.
Dr. Denman was willing to basically kidnap three girls to experiment on them, presumably never telling their families. And what was she going to do with Lewis, who would out her as soon as he could?
After Charlotte takes the locket and breaks Cleo's spirit - she swims out into a known shark breeding ground. Think about it: Cleo came close to committing suicide or at least some form of self-harm.
So how do they avoid being seen in the school loo? Do they just not go in public?
"The Siren Effect" - Cleo says it's a Wednesday. So why is she having a sleepover on a school night? And why aren't the girls getting ready for school the next day?
Germans Love David Hasselhoff: It's a hit in the UK and Europe, to the point that the 3rd season aired in the UK first before Australia got it... by a year.
Growing the Beard: Midway through the first season, with episodes like "The Siren Effect" and "Shipwreck" marking a turning point. The young actors slot into their characters better, the show started playing Emma's status as the responsible one for laughs, the supernatural elements increase and Zane starts suspecting the existence of mermaids.
Harsher in Hindsight: The three leads repeated shunning of Kim and Charlotte is a little sad in light of both Cleo Massey and Brittany Byrnes admitting to getting cyber bullied by Loony Fans who hated their characters; the former even being told to kill herself at the age of twelve!
Now that Claire Holt and Phoebe Tonkin have become more well-known due to their roles in The Vampire Diaries and The Originals, Emma and Cleo's friendship is this. Emma even shares her last name Gilbert with the main heroine of The Vampire Diaries. Even funnier when Legacies, which is a sequel to TVD and TO, introduced a character named Cleo who becomes friends with Hope (the daughter of Phoebe Tonkin’s character).
Seeing Phoebe Tonkin as the meek one is very amusing when she would later get cast as bitches and Action Girls. And in Season 2 Cleo's Clingy Jealous Girl side does come out, which is almost Foreshadowing Phoebe's later casting types.
In the finale of Season 1 Cleo wonders if Dr. Denman is gonna see if they can talk to fish. A few years later in H₂O: Mermaid Adventures the girls can do just that.
Humour Dissonance: Emma invokes that's not funny at Rikki a couple of times in the pilot. In the instance where she says a joke Rikki made is actually funny - it's just a quip saying "this doesn't mean we're married, does it?"
It Was His Sled: The big plot twist of Season 2 was that Charlotte was actually the granddaughter of Gracie, the original mermaid trio, and she becomes a mermaid herself. It's now so well known that viewers can easily forget it was meant to be a twist. Hell, Nickelodeon even spoiled it before Season 2 had aired in the UK by using a clip of Charlotte as a mermaid to promote the new season.
Kim is never more than a standard Annoying Younger Sibling who just acts like a brat. Admittedly the worst thing she ever does is try to expose the girls' secret in one of the early episodes, but besides that she's never more than mildly annoying. And yet she was one of the most despised characters on the show.
Brittany Byrnes has said that, even though Charlotte was a villain, the things she was hated for were not the villainous acts like trying to strip the girls' powers but the more annoying things like micromanaging Lewis's birthday partynote Granted, that did involve locking Emma and Cleo in a room and trapping them in their mermaid forms because she didn't like their opinions. or trying to become part of the group.
Karmic Overkill: While it was very cathartic watching the girls defeat Charlotte for all the pain she made them endure, especially Cleo, some of the earlier contexts leading up to this feel kinda sad in retrospect. As stated in both Designated Villain and Unintentionally Sympathetic, Charlotte didn't really become a villain until the last episodes of Season 2, and even then she at least initially tried to be nice to them. And considering how much she genuinely enjoyed being a mermaid, losing her powers permanently is much sadder with all this in mind. Sure, the power went through her head, but still, a redemption and a Heel Realization from both sides could've worked out as well.
Les Yay: It's a series about a group of teenage girls who often seem to like each other a lot more than their boyfriends. What do you think? (Rikki and Emma tend to be a little too close with each other sometimes.)
Love to Hate: Charlotte. Even though she was only an antagonist for a brief time and apologized for everything she did when she was Drunk with Power, she was very easy to hate when she was the villain.
To fans outside Australia and New Zealand (and some even within), it's something of a running joke to quote "nor Cleor" in reference to how some characters with stronger accents pronounce Cleo's name.
More Popular Replacement: The closest thing to a recurring antagonist in Season 1 was the generic Alpha Bitch Miriam. She vanishes in Season 2, and that season's antagonist Charlotte is a far more memorable character, even getting to become a mermaid herself.
Never Live It Down: Brittany Byrnes has said that the two moments that she is constantly attacked for among particularly zealous Charlotte detractors are: kissing Lewis (even though he and Cleo were broken up at the time) and taking Cleo's locket.
Older Than They Think: About four years previously, there was a Made-for-TV Movie called Mermaids that revolved around three mermaid sisters trying to preserve The Masquerade. This was however aimed at an older demographic, the three mermaids were adults and also sisters, and were born mermaids rather than becoming them later.
Mermaid stuff aside, some of Charlotte's behaviour towards Lewis is actually disturbingly reminiscent of real life emotional abuse. She tries to control who he can see and talk to, insists that it's just "what [he] should do" to pressure him to ask her out, hides his phone from him to prevent Cleo from calling, tricks him into hurting Cleo in a Kick the Dog moment and ultimately lies and manipulates him.
The penultimate episode of Season 2. Cleo has a fight with her father over doing the dishes (which she can't do because getting water on her hands means she'll expose her secret) and her ex's new girlfriend does such mean things to her that she runs away from home and ends up in a shark breeding ground.
While not entirely hated, the fact that long established and beloved, Adorkable nerd Lewis was Put on a Bus to make room for expanding the role of a bland, generic Mr. FanserviceHunk like Will did not go over well. It was an unfortunate side effect of Angus Maclaren having to leave to film something else.
Byron, Emma's Adorkable and slightly dim love interest from Season 1, gets replaced with Ash, who's a bit of a Designated Hero and the noticeable age difference between them makes their romance slightly off-putting (Craig Horner was five years older than Claire Holt, who was only seventeen at the time). Due to both characters being Put on a Bus in Season 3, he ultimately feels like a pointless recurring love interest. This reaction to the character may have contributed to the decision to just bring back Byron for H₂O: Mermaid Adventures.
American viewers watching on either The CW and/or Netflix may be surprised to see Claire Holt and Phoebe Tonkin, knowing them more for their recurring roles on The Vampire Diaries and their main roles in its spinoff, The Originals.
Seasonal Rot: Season 3 is considered this to many fans as Emma, and later on Lewis, (until he returns in the end), are replaced with newer characters such as Bella and Will. While Bella is a mixed bag, Will does some questionable things throughout the season that in retrospect, felt uncomforting to watch. Furthermore, other changes such as the different necklaces, the water tentacle being as a new threat instead of the Full Moon (with the latter not having any plot/conflict all season long), and possibly the JuiceNet Cafe now being called Rikki's Cafe makes the entire season feel disconnected from the first two. Lastly, aside from Emma being mentioned, most of the past events of the first two seasons is barely discussed as well.
Stealth Pun: Since everything is water-themed, Rikki *might* be a pun on (show host) Rikki Lake.
The Scrappy: Good God, Kim. Many, many of the show's fans have expressed the deepest desire to punch her through a window for her constant attitude.
Squick: In the episode, "Irresistible," the girls become unwittingly attracted to Nate due to the ladder spraying himself with a bottle of Ambergris, which, in this story, is said to attract mermaids. Now, considering whereAmbergris comes from...
That's not even mentioning that Ambergris, when freshly produced, initially has a smell of what is described as a, "marine fecal odor," and only becoming more pleasant smelling as it ages. With that in mind, it makes perfect sense why Nate ended up clearing out an entire restaurant and chasing so many people away!
Suspiciously Similar Song: Score example; the theme that plays during emotional moments bears an uncanny resemblance, in both melody and instruments, to the main theme from Finding Nemo.
Take That, Scrappy!: Kim does get plenty of slapsticky comeuppance to make up for how annoying she is. She gets publicly embarrassed when she tries to out the girls' secret, catches the measles, gets sprayed with a garden sprinkler and is dumped by Elliot for being too bossy.
Testosterone Brigade: Mostly from season 2 onwards when all the leads got a Fanservice Pack. As the show is Australian and features stunningly beautiful lead actresses, there are frequent episodes that get them into bikinis, midriff tops, hot pants and short skirts. The show features a lot of episodes with parties, so there's plenty of reasons for the leads to get all dolled up.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Miss Chatham vanishes in Season 2, never getting to interact with the granddaughter of her teenage best friend or offer the girls any guidance on what to do about Charlotte.
Some fans felt that there should've been a Season 3 episode in which all four mermaids appeared, which would've had both Emma and her replacement Bella interacting.
While her actions in the last half of Season 2 were pretty much villainous, Charlotte being a mermaid roughly lasted only 5-6 episodes. As much as she was hated by fans by the end of Season 2, wouldn't it still be interesting if Charlotte at least had a redemption arc while keeping her mermaid powers in Season 3 while also being the third mermaid that filled the gap in that season, or, if still keeping Bella in that season, as the fourth or fifth official mermaid in the group?
The show never really explained why the girls should hide being mermaids from their parents, especially Emma (who has a very good relationship with hers) and Rikki (who has no younger siblings that could potentially out them). It might have been an interesting plot to have the parents discover their daughters' secrets and become Secret Keepers to subvert Adults Are Useless.
Toy Ship: One episode had Emma's younger brother Elliot trying to ask Cleo's younger sister Kim out. Kim just took advantage of him and kept bossing him around. He eventually got tired of her attitude and ditched her at the end of the episode.
While what Charlotte did in last few episodes of Season 2 was mean and ruthless, and she got a well-deserved defeat in the end, consider the entire Season 2 from her perspective: She seemingly makes friends with Cleo and Lewis, the latter of whom she quickly gets a crush on.note When they all first met, Cleo never mentioned she has dated Lewis and she clearly dumped him. Unfortunately, when she gets close to him Cleo unexpectedly goes all Clingy Jealous Girl on him and gets her friends in on the drama. Nevertheless, Charlotte still continues to be nice to them despite all their suspicions and rudeness. Not to mention all the times Lewis has abandoned her for said ex and friends.
There's also the fact that they made fun of and scolded her for a phobia she had.note Sure, she shouldn't have tried to injure Ronnie the dolphin like that, but she was still acting out of fear and poorly thought out self-defense. There's also some Jerkass Has a Point at play; the girls claim that dolphins are harmless, but Charlotte's report that one was harassing her is completely realistic. Even playful behavior of dolphins can wind up harmful to humans.
What makes this even more frustrating in the end is that while she appropriately gets punished for her actions, the group were still able to get away with how they treated her. Heck, Nate, who has done way creepier stuff and worse, at times, mostly got a slap on the wrist compared to Charlotte herself.
Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Will in "Kidnapped". He notices that Bella flees from water, so he dumps a glass of water on her when he's sure she can't easily run away from him. As a result, he discovers she's a mermaid by violating her trust and forcing it out of her. Later on in "Crime and Punishment", the gang finds out that Rikki has been kidnapped, and Will is the only one who knows where she might be, information he withholds until he confirms that Rikki and Cleo are mermaids as well. Bella still gets together with him after that, and he implies that her being a mermaid is the most attractive part about her.
Vanilla Protagonist: Emma is this, compared to the other two. Cleo has a Will They or Won't They? romantic teasing with Lewis, as well as having a fear of water. Rikki meanwhile has a mysterious backstory and it's a while before we even meet her family. Plus she too has Belligerent Sexual Tension and acts Tsundere towards Zane. Emma however is a well adjusted, straight-A student with a happy home life. Her romance plot gets solved rather quickly and the only real angst on her part is having to quit the swim team when she becomes a mermaid - and that's only in the second episode.
", a catchy, pop-rock number.