Well, as many of you have always known, I've always had a deep love for Mushi-shi, and heralded as one of, if not the best anime ever.  Well, naturally, this made me want to read the Manga on which it was based, but I've never really gotten around to it.  Well, I suddenly decided today that I'd start, and I read the first 2 volumes.  I immediately noticed, not only it's fantastic art, but it's very strange.  Now, let me back up.  The anime, is a fucking masterpiece.  And, it follows the manga to a tee.  However, the anime is more consistent.  It takes the average of the manga, this will make sense in a minute, and uses that average to slightly tweak the manga, but still remain almost exactly the same (like seriously, it's almost like they just photocopied some of the manga for the anime), but just the slight bit different so it's more consistent.  The manga is inconsistent in a few ways.  Firstly, the drawing style, but really just with ginko.  In the first, I'll say couple, of volumes, the way she (Yuki Urushibara) draws ginko is quite different than how they draw him in the anime.  He looks younger, and a slightly more, how can I say this, almost childish (not a great way to say it, but for lack of better words).  However, not long after, volumes 5 or 6, it reaches a state that is quite similar to the way it's drawn in the anime, and by the end of the manga, nearly identical.  Now, this is probably due to her increasing her skill level (hence why the animators choose the later drawing style for the anime) and it's also settling into her style more.  Also, just a little thing, things are handled differently, even throughout a volume.  It's all the same style, but there are simple little changes, and it's not necessarily inconsistent or taking away from it, in fact it probably adds to it, though unusual, to how she handles things.  I can't really explain it... actually just forget about that point.  Now I think it's just me.   Anyway, volume to volume, the media also changes.  One time it will be just kind of pen with some screentones, another more screentones, maybe less, than the next could be light ink washes with careful gradations, and the next is full colored watercolors.  It's beautiful, and she makes great use of these different mediums, and has excellent control.  But, it's unusual to have a comic that changes so much from volume to volume.  But I also like it.  It kind of turns each one into it's own art piece, but all with a strong coherency.  Though, to be honest, I would have loved it to be all full colored, as I like that the best.  But anyway, read/watch mushishi.  It's awesome and stuffs.  WATCH IT!


P.S. I have no idea why I wrote this or what I was trying to say.  I just like mushi-shi, I guess I was trying to say.