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The strikingly original series Mushi-shi (2005) features lyrically rendered backgrounds, unusual stories, understated vocal performances, measured pacing, and an eclectic score. Mushi many guises and represent "life in its purest form," according to Ginko, the Mushi-Shi or Mushi Master. Mushi bring the drawings of the boy-artist Shinra to life, and save a woman who was thrown into a raging river as a sacrifice to the water-gods. One type appears as a flowing stream of prismatic color whose beauty haunts a man to his dying day; another forms a mist over the sea that lures mariners to their doom. Soft spoken, chain-smoking, Ginko wanders through Japan, studying the problems produced by encounters between humans and Mushi and trying to alleviate them. Sometimes he succeeds; sometimes he fails. The many types of Mushi offer the filmmakers opportunities to create striking effects. In "Pretense of Spring," composer Toshio Masuda blends exotic percussion, guitar, and traditional Japanese instruments to heighten the viewer's sense of the winter cold in a remote mountain village. In the snowy landscape, certain Mushi take the form of spring flowers, luring animals and people with a false promise of spring, then feeding on their life-energy. In "A Sea of Writing," Ginko visits an archive that contains the writings of previous masters. But Mushi hidden in the precious scrolls cause the writing to flow out of them like spilled water. Only the archivist can control the writhing sentences: she delicately catches them with chopsticks and returns them to the pages where they belong. The filmmakers effectively blend hand-drawn and computer animation to suggest the differing realities of the humans and the living words. Mushi-shi is adult in the best sense of the term: intelligent, subtle, and thought-provoking. Given the popularity of Yuki Urushibara's award-winning manga in Japan, fans can hope for a second season or a sequel: Twenty-six episodes don't begin to encompass Ginko's travels--or the diversity of the Mushi. (Rated TV 14: grotesque imagery, alcohol and tobacco use) --Charles Solomon (1. The Green Gathering, 2. The Light of the Eyelid, 3. The Tender Horn, 4. The Pillow Pathway, 5. The Traveling Swamp, 6. Those Who Inhale the Dew, 7. Raindrops and Rainbows, 8. Where Sea Meets Man, 9. The Heavy Seed, 10. The White which Lives Within the Inkstone, 11. The Sleeping Mountain, 12. One-Eye Fish, 13. One-Night Bridge, 14. Inside the Cage, 15. Pretense of Spring, 16. Sunrise Serpent, 17. Pickers of Empty Cocoons, 18. Clothes that Embrace the Mountains, 19. String from the Sky, 20. A Sea of Writing, 21. Cotton Changeling, 22. Shrine in the Sea, 23. The Sound of Rust, 24. The Journey to the Field of Fire, 25. Eye of Fortune. Eye of Misfortune, 26. The Sound of Footsteps on the Grass)
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