Movies: Mushi-shi Vol. #1

Most shows are about stuff like whether or not a given villain will be defeated, or whether or not the guy will get the girl. Mushi-shi takes place on a wholly different plane — it’s not about a hero or a violent competition, but about an entirely new world with its own nature and biology, its own laws of being, its own cycle of living and dying and being reborn. It has the same meditative beauty as Haibane Renmei or Kino’s Journey — shows that are not about fighting or blowing things up, but simply observing things as they are and knowing their true nature. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.

The “mushi” (derived from the Japanese word for insect) are like primordial homunculi — large single-celled organisms that only a few people can see, but which interact with the real world in bizarre ways. Sometimes they latch onto people and cause afflictions that have to be dealt with, but they’re not inherently evil: they just have a life cycle of their own, and sometimes we are part of that life cycle whether or not we realize it. The mushi-shi or “mushi master” of the title is Ginko, a young man with a mop of pale hair and a cigarette perpetually dangling from a corner of his mouth, and the ability to detect and work with (or rout out) mushi when they manifest.

Article originally written for AMN. Click here to read full text.