[Categories: Anime Reviews]
Mushishi episode 25: Fortune Eye and Misfortune Eye
It’s turned out to be something of a Studio Artland double bill today but in all honesty I was so eager to see the penultimate instalment of Mushishi that I couldn’t help but download it ASAP. It’s yet another visually stunning and bittersweet tale of sacrifice and loss that leaves the viewer deep in thought for a long time afterwards.
In this episode Ginko meets a travelling musician who knows a thing or two about mushi and those who study them. As she recounts the story of her childhood Ginko hears a story of how a certain mushi has affected her life and those of the people she was closest to.
Her father was another mushishi who was studying a certain type that gave its host improved sight: an exciting prospect to a blind girl such as young Amane. Through almost sheer chance (or were her father’s studies partly to blame?) she herself attained this fabled mushi-enhanced vision, only to find, in true Mushishi style, that it is as much a curse as a blessing.
Early on Amane is overjoyed at the fact that she can see: a number of scenes featuring gorgeous watercolour backgrounds that have become this series’ trademark effectively convey the wonder of her new-found ability. As time goes on she begins to experience the full extent of the mushi’s power: she becomes able to see further and further ahead, to the point at which she can predict the future. As much as this sounds like a true gift it becomes a burden to Amane, particularly when even her abilities cannot avert tragedy that she is able to see in painful clarity.
Fortune Eye, Misfortune Eye is a typically-themed episode but even when the show gets (by its own standards) formulaic, the plight of the individual protagonist is still enough to make it a memorable experience. The mushi in question is a little-known variety so it takes Ginko a while to realise the full implications; that is, the stark choice that Amane has to make after years of being to see it all yet feeling that she can solve nothing. I can’t bring myself to call this a weak episode since it is so full of sincere, heartfelt emotion at the cruelty of nature; nevertheless it doesn’t quite match the greatest heights that this series has reached in the past.
While this episode eloquently conveys the joy and suffering brought about by mushi on a personal level it lacks the more hard-hitting moral questioning that some of the other outings have shown. All the same, even an ‘average’ Mushishi story is still a superb piece of supernatural drama: my only main complaint? There’s just one more episode to go before our journey with Ginko draws to a close.
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