I haven’t seen it yet, but I read something the writers thought was really important: Ariel has never been to the surface before she does it in the movie, hence they had to replace the seagull with a bird who she knew from under the sea.
Another is that her focus is not so much on Eric, and the fact that she gets amnesia about what she needs to do to keep her legs.
But that actually makes somewhat less sense to me, considering it was all hypnotism. Although, granted, in the original film there didn’t have to actually be a marriage either; that could be considered dramatic flair on Ursula’s part.
A more compelling argument against the morons who have made a fuss about this is that in the original text, the Little Mermaid’s skin color is explicitly mentioned. It’s green.
Although I don’t believe all fictional representations accurately reflect real mythical beings I have to concede your point of a more compelling argument.