Touhou 5.5: Death of a Ghost

Touhou 5.5: Death of a Ghost, known in Japan as Touhou Yuureishi (東方幽霊死), is a 1990 made-for-TV anime short film directed by Hiroshi Takajima and produced by Drillimation Studios. The film revolves around the death of Mima between the events of Touhou 5: Mystic Square and Touhou 6: The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil. The film aired on Fuji TV on August 3, 1990. The film was licensed in North America by Walt Disney Pictures and aired on ABC's Saturday Morning Block on October 27, 1990, shortly before the 26th episode of the English version of Magical Girl Team Lucky Star aired. The film was released on VHS and Laserdisc in 1991, followed by a DVD release in 1998, then a Blu-Ray release in 2011.

The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film, but never won the actual award. The film earned a 9.1 on IMDb and a 88/100 on Rotten Tomatoes.

Plot
The film begins shortly after the events of Touhou 5: Mystic Square. Reimu and Marisa are depicted in their new Driller Engine 2 outfits, and at the beginning of the film, Reimu is seen exiting her home and meeting Marisa, and the two discuss Gensoukyou's next fate.

While exploring a meadow, Reimu loses Marisa and encounters Mima, asking Reimu who she is, and Reimu lies to Mima that she is not Reimu, and the two argue over their actual appearance. After escaping Mima, Mima then heads into the Hakurei Shrine, only to find the snippets of Reimu's original purple hair when she cut her hair short, and then finds out that girl with the brownish-black hair was Reimu. Mima does the same thing to Marisa's home, finding a snippet of Marisa's hair as well when she did the same thing as Reimu.

While Marisa is exploring the forest trying to find Reimu, she encounters Shinki again and engages in a brief duel, but is interrupted by Reimu who finally finds her, and joins the fight as well. After Shinki is defeated again, the two head to Marisa's home, but Louise blocks the entrance to Marisa's home, and engages in another duel that causes part of Marisa's home to be destroyed. She explains that her parents will "fix it later".

As night falls, a beaming light from the sky appears, causing Reimu to go outside with many others and the beaming light releases Mima, which frightens everyone but Reimu and Marisa, and begins to attack Reimu for lying over her appearance. Marisa makes an announcement near everyone that Mima is too dangerous and that children return home. As the battle between Reimu and Mima progresses, Marisa joins, but the children that Marisa asked to return home return as an angry mob and begin throwing torches at Mima on an attempt to set her on fire. The torches are ineffective as only magic can hurt Mima. After finally attacking Mima hard enough, Reimu chants the Death Prayer and uses and ofuda to seal Mima, but the ofuda causes Mima to dissolve, as a cause of "being downed by a bunch of young kids".

The next morning after the fight, Gensoukyou has a huge celebration over Mima's death, and as the credits roll, various images from the feast are shown. A post credits scene shows a small red light appearing from the horizon, setting up the events of Touhou 6: The Embodiment of Scarlet Devil.