Fruits Basket 1st Season

*Minimum Spoiler Review*
TL;DR: Nostalgic Fans will gush over it. New Viewers will just glance upon it. Fruits Basket: "Brotherhood" isn't that bad. If you usually binge shitty slice of life/shojou crap, you can cleanse your palette with this.
[Story: 5/10 , Characters: 5/10, Art: 8/10, Sound: 8/10, Enjoyment: 6/10]

Before I start this review, I want to preface this with saying, this will be my first time watching Fruits Basket. I have not read the manga nor have I watched the original. However, I have done ample background research to know & differentiate the changes and improvement for this new adaption.

“A conscience grows, just like ... the body. It’s bred within your heart. That’s why the shape of people’s kindness is so different.” – Tohru Honda

Fruits Basket S1 (2019) aka Fruits Basket: Brotherhood (/s) was one of the most anticipated anime of this year since it is a readaptation of Fruit Basket that aired 18 years ago. There was so much hype surrounding this new adaptation, that it made me wonder, what was wrong with the old one that it so badly deserved a new adaptation. From my research and understanding, it was the Mangaka, Takaya Natsuki, who specifically requested that this adaptation be done anew; new studio, new anime staff, new voice actors, new everything. Nothing from the previous anime would be brought back. Which begs the question, the old one was beloved by so many fans & rated pretty highly on MAL, why did it need to be readapted? Turns out, beside the toxic relationship she had with the previous studio, she just felt her manga wasn't adapted properly and the characters were not given its due diligence. So 18 years later, TMS studio brings back the shojou classic, Fruits Basket, where they will fully adapt the entire manga over 60+ episodes and not just the first major arc & leave the readers to read the manga like the previous one. Now that we know why it was revived, let's see from the perspective of a first time Fruits Basket anime watcher, putting nostalgia aside, whether this shojou classic will be a hit or a miss in today's anime culture.

“It would be so great if it was possible to go through life without making a single mistake.” – Yuki Souma

Fruits Basket at first glance is a very laid back slice of life style shojou series about a homeless orphan girl named Tohru Honda, who gets taken in by the Souma Family. They have a dark secret that they are people of the Chinese Zodiac and if a human hugs them, they transform into the animals of the Chinese Zodiac. Somehow they just coexist, procreate and live a dysfunctional abnormal life riddled with emotional & love conflicts. However, enter Tohru, this saint of a girl, who grew up hearing stories of the Chinese Zodiac from her now deceased Mother, as she will transform the people's lives around her. The story is very linear however it's riddled with flashbacks of the characters' childhood traumas. Every episode or two, the story focuses on her changing the viewpoint of the people around her as they learn to grow and love the person they are. There is romance, there is drama, there are tears and there is comedy. In the beginning it seems funny since we start to get introduced to different zodiac animals and their unique quirks & upbringing traumas. However in the middle it sort of drags on since it becomes very repetitive but near the end you realize this whole season is just the first arc where they establish the major characters' flaws and growth so they can move onto to next arc. So from a first time viewer's perspective, it's not that great of a story but for nostalgic fans, it's a great treat as they get to revisit their old fav show in new limelight.

“For there to be pain, there has to be kindness. For darkness to stand out, there has to be the sun.” – Kyouko Honda

When you have a series like Fruits Basket that has a multitude of characters, you have to accept that these characters will be nothing more than two dimensional caricature of various character tropes. The main character is Tohru, who is an ubiquitous over the top super innocent saint that only just have love and tears for everyone around her. The major side characters are Kyou Souma (Cat), Yuki Souma (Rat) & Kazuma Souma (Dog). Besides them, you have her polar opposite friends Uo-Chan and Saki-Chan. Each of the character she meets as the show progresses represent different facets of emotional vulnerability that she overcame to become this saint that she is now. So to help them overcome their fears & struggles, she pours her heart out and tears to make them learn to love and accept who they are and carve the future they want for themselves. What's odd is that no characters really stick out to me, despite each of the zodiac characters having their unique character designs, personalities, quirks & traumas. If I have to dig deep, the major complex character is probably Tohru's mother Kyouko Honda, who learned many life lessons from being a troublemaker gangster to a doting calm mother. It's hard to really relate oneself to the main character because she is too perfect for a common human. She's like this Gandhi like figure in this anime and even then you can't even compare her to Gandhi because let's be real, even Gandhi wasn't a saint. As for the zodiac characters and other side characters, they are somewhat relatable but due to them being very two dimensional and rudimentary trope characters, there's not much substance that lies with them.

“Just as no matter how hard you try to keep it away, despair will attack you again and again. In the same manner, hope will return to you. Again and again.” – Kazuma Souma

Now that we know what type of story and characters that makes up Fruit Basket, let's focus on few technicalities of the show that makes this the better anime to watch. From an animation standpoint, TMS Studio, blew it out of the park with their animations. If you compare this with the 2001 (and you should not because technology) it is a vast improvement and the colour palette as approved by the Mangaka, just shows how rich this anime can be. It's vibrant, it's moving, it's emotional and it's constantly breathing. The frames are animated well and the colour seamlessly switches from bold to cool to give the viewers an eyegasmic relaxing treat. Beside the animation, the OST is very soothing. The OP songs are sung very well and the ED songs are nice as well. It's a slice of life style shojou anime and the music composition fits the bill. Great job by the studio. Moreover, the seiyuus did a phenomenal job evoking emotions and excitement with the material they are given. They made the show better than this show can really be. Without these technicalities, this new adaptation, really wouldn't be worthwhile. It just goes to show, how heavily this series dependent upon such.

“If you love someone, they could make you sad. They could even make you feel lonely sometimes. But, that someone can also make you happier than you’ll ever be.” – Kyo Souma

Overall, looking at it holistically, Fruits Basket at its core is about exploring the many universal facets of love; from familial, parental, platonic, romantic, self-sacrificing to even toxic or destructive. Moreover, it looks at the importance and struggle of empathy, forgiveness, personal growth and ultimately self-acceptance. I can see why back in 2001, people really enjoyed a show & manga as such. It is a pivotal show for teenagers learning the world around them and maturing to become a functioning adult with emotional understanding. However, looking at it objectively, this show is very simple with a story that is still scratching the complexity of the human condition. It's neither archetypal of a hero's journey nor is it a show that will transcend the modern shojou or slice of life culture. I can see why nostalgic fans love and revere this show, however, as a first time watcher, I just found it a fine feel good anime. Maybe because I'm not an avid slice of life/shojou anime watcher or maybe because I've passed my teenage emotional rollercoaster years that I'm unable to identify with these characters. Regardless, viewers whether new or nostalgic, should give this show a casual watch and be on the lookout for its sequel; for I'm curious, with how this season has ended, what will be in store for the next. Anyways, thank you for reading this review & feel free to share with me your favourite quote from the anime. Ciao.

P.S. Thank you for reading. I hope you found this short and supaishi review helpful!

Note: This review covers the first season and the first twenty episodes of Fruits Basket (Furuba).

Given the target demographic of shoujo manga (teenage girls and young women), most shoujo-mangaka tend to tread a fine line between drama, comedy, romance, and, but not always, tragedy. The reason why Furuba became so popular and found its place in the pantheon of one of the best shoujo manga of all time was that it was able to balance the elements of drama, romance and tragedy with such exceptional panache that the series was appreciated not just by women but by men as well. This long-lasting popularity explains ... why, despite the source material, being over 20 years old was picked up for a complete adaptation. Alas, all that giddy excitement, was for naught.

Due to the large cast of the series, the writers struggle in developing the characters beyond caricatures throughout the series. Given the large cast of characters, this is not too surprising. Most characters get just 10-15 minutes of screentime in each episode. A typical episode runs as follows: a Zodiac is introduced and is usually shown as acting obnoxiously towards Tohru. Her friends (Yuki, Kyo, Arisa, etc.) are shocked but Tohru, being the saintly character, is unfazed. We are then shown a flashback in which the character’s painful past is shown and the character after being awestruck by Tohru’s kindness changes his/her ways.

If this were to happen just once or twice, such a story telling formula could be tolerated. But given that this formula is used more than 15 times, it becomes evident that the writers are using the flashbacks not to flesh out the character getting the screen time but are using them as a plot device to develop Tohru, Yuki and Kyo instead. In other words, the side characters add little to the story other than to give Tohru and her coterie of friends and impetus to develop. However, this in and of itself, is not the anime’s gravest sin.

What makes the adaptation bad is how it squanders these main characters (i.e., Kyo, Yuki, Arisa, etc.) that it painfully develops in the first season in the subsequent season. After episode 7-8 of the second season, the writing quality takes a turn for the worse and all the characters begin acting as if they were cast out of a particularly bad Korean melodrama. They don’t act as real people but instead act like billiard balls, whose trajectories and actions, can be predicted simply by knowing which two characters are on screen. One can easily predict that this is when a character will cry, this is when they will run away, this is where a misunderstanding will occur and so on. In other words, Furuba the anime, does exactly what Furuba the manga, didn’t – it can’t find the balance between the drama, comedy, and romance. In the process, it destroys beloved characters and ends up devolving into a bad melodrama.

By episode 20 of season 2 (i.e., episode 45), I had come to the painful realization that had I continued to watch the anime adaptation my fond memories of the manga version of Tohru/Yuki/Kyo would be replaced by an inferior anime version of Tohru/Yuki/Kyo. That is something that I’d rather not happen and so I dropped this series. I can imagine that viewers who haven’t read truly great shoujo manga series (like Nodame or Mars) may think Furuba the anime is the best series ever. Sadly, it is not.

Not recommended. Season 1 gets a 3.5/5, Season 2 gets a 1.5/5.

A fun review (this is my first MAL review yey)
Respectfully as a member of a romance genre fan, I have to declare that this is one of the cheesiest series that I ever watched. It did fail me due to the great expectation I had knowing that this has been so many people's favorite shoujo anime.

The start wasn't bad at all, I quite like the fast pacing, all though a lot of silly decisions were made for romance scenes, it was still bearable, It has been done before and I'm not complaining yet. But as the series goes on (maybe 5 episodes in)

Oh my ... god how cringe everything. And Tohru, the so-called angel, the healer, the trauma doctor, everyone's favorite, is not the type of heroine that I expected at all. She reminds me of Sawako from Kimi ni Todoke but without a quirk, she's flawless with a tiny bit of trauma. At first, I thought maybe it was the lack of trauma that made her less interesting, but then I thought of so many other main chara with no trauma at all yet they still made it pretty entertaining.

I was expecting someone calm, strong (yes ik she is strong,, But is it necessary that every time she tries to do something courageous the show gotta make the scene depressing so that everyone starts taking pity) and not cry every time someone fights/or tell her a sad story then moderately giving them wise mommy quotes and sweet smile, and 5 seconds later, all the somas somewhat head over heels fall in love with her. she's y/n yall. Now, this sounds like I'm a Tohru Slander, Yes. She's not radiating empowering persona and it hurts the fact that she's in the center of everything.

Some points that might cause the plot but hear me out.
1. Tohru, our sweet dear Tohru, somehow thought living in a camp in the middle of the forest is safe, taste (ik this is the comedy, but please, the idiocy, I can't.

2. She prefers to live in a house full of MEN! compares to living with her best friend that has offer a stay in their house. Like logically even if the men in the house seem nice, what an idiot gal. They were strangers!

3. second point people be like, "but she doesn't want to bother her bestie's family, their house too small to cramp in." like hello? is the soma not a family that she should've consider also? that she could've also been a burden to them? and start packing and leave like she considers her friends "family"?

4. The fruit basket origin analogy idea. oh, how trauma it is to be called an onigiri and wanting to be a part of the game fruit basket (God it was when she was so young thooo, and yet she remembers that, wow, living in the past I see). My question of the day is, HAS SHE NEVER THEN BEEN A PART OF A FRUIT BASKET? Does she not realize that she is already a part of something before meeting the soma. Are Hanajima and Uo not fruit baskets enough for her? Idk if this is me reaching too far, but come on, just admit that you want to live with the hotties I won't judge gurl, I would too, but don't start pulling the fruit basket shit like it means something lol.

5. Tohru has a family to come home to. THE GRANPA, GURL like istg. It's better to just make tohru straight out homeless and family-less. It would make more sense for her to come back to the soma. Ik she is bullied by her uncle and auntie? but seriously I can't with having everyone defending her both sides. Like why the grandpa gotta be nice too, make him bad, like that make more sense for Tohru wanting to go back with full hottie house.

6. Side character has a far more interesting story, it overshadowed her completely.

That is it. I wish the second season can be more soul-friendly for me since this season had me boiling. I hate that I can never drop an anime as much as I want to, I admit that I'm still curious about Akito's redemption, so I'll give the second season ago.

This anime was so annoying to watch.I watched it only because I heard that it was good and many people liked it.But when I actually watched it,oof.Disappointment!The jokes are so bad and felt so out of place.

Tohru Honda,the main protagonist,is the most annoying anime character I've ever seen.No one talks like that.And even in a bad situation when she starts smiling it pisses me off so bad I felt like smashing my screen.

This show was so cringe,that I need to pause between the episodes and think up of a better plot to kill the cringe.The characters are even more cringey as hell.

The animation wasnt also ... that good but I guess I can put up with that.

I heard there was a second season going to come out.Definately not gonna watch that.Maybe i'll go read the manga.Maybe its better than the anime and gets more interesting.

Have a good day!

At first I enjoyed this series but as time went by, I grew to dislike it. The plot about men in this family turning into zodiac animals was fine. Nothing really special or horrible about it. The art was up to standards, and the sound was fine. I'm not usually a fan of any of the intro or outro music in animes as they don't appeal to me. Where this series went wrong for me was the constant loud arguments and for me, the idiotic and pointless fights, I can only take so much of that. All that fighting might appeal to the target ... audience, but I don't see any purpose in it. They could have removed all those arguments and fights and nothing would have been lost. I might have enjoyed watching it more.
The main character seemed to see the world differently from most people, but it's also like she wanted to be praised by others. She was in a situation where she lived in someone else's house at their whim, but at least the men where she was staying didn't treat her poorly, although they did expect her to cook and clean for them. They certainly treated her better than here actual family did. But she was not really interesting.
The most interesting characters were her two friends an ex sukeban and a strange ESPer, but we never saw that much of them. It might have been interesting to see how those two became friends with each other and the main character.
Anyway, I could only take so much of the pointless, loud arguments and fights, so I dropped this 8 episodes in.

I actually wanted to start watching Fruits Basket after I saw an Instagram post about Rin. I found her so pretty that I wanted to watch it. The anime was pretty hyped back then so I added it to my list.
I myself was actually pretty looking forward to watching it because I love romance and the character design looked pretty neat.
Unfortunately, I did not really like it.
I can't stand Tohru at all. She's a really nice person and takes good care of the people around her and that's really good, but she's just so not understanding the situation she's in with Yuki and Kyo and ... it's making me lose my mind.
She's always apologizing and doing everything other people want her to do like SHE HAS NO FLAVOR and her voice is pretty annoying too. I also don't like her character design.
There are also some other female characters like Kagura or Kisa that I don't like. Kagura has a really weird personality and Kisa is kinda annoying.
I would rather have Hana or even Motoko as the main character because they're both pretty and they have CHARACTER, unlike Tohru.
What's also really annoying is that Tohru is kinda playing with Yuki and Kyo's feelings.
Overall rating: 6
I'm looking forward to seeing Rin in the second season and I also want to know more about Yuki's and Akito's relationship.

Finished the last season and I have so many strong feelings about it, so after a couple of weeks of marinating in my thoughts, here's my review. Includes spoilers!

First, I want to get it out of the way that the 2001 Fruits Basket is very dear to my heart and is probably my all time favorite shoujo anime of all time. It's so good. If you are somehow reading this and haven't watched the original, stop right now and go watch it. I'd say it's necessary to watch before the remake 1000%.

Essentially this season is just a remake of the original Fruits Basket with almost ... all of the same identical scenes. I think they did do a good job of redoing them with some clarity here and there. I will also say I like the improved background art (whereas the OG had plain/pastel backgrounds a lot of the time), it gives more context to the scenes.


Where I think it falls flat is the character design and somewhat the soundtrack.

Soundtrack: it is fairly generic. After watching for awhile, it's pretty decent, some of the songs are memorable, like the one that plays during the "flashback" memory scenes. But it remains less distinct and instantly recognizable than the OG Fruits Basket (watching 2019 vs 2001 for the first time, 2001 would probably stick in your mind much easier).

Story: I don't have many comments about anything except the end, maybe because I've already seen it so many times. The scenes/episodes make sense for the characters and are necessary for their introductions/development. It's good.
One difference between this show and the OG however is where they chose not to have Akito show up in the forest to berate Tohru before she finds Kyo. It makes sense because why would Akito be there in the first place? So it's a good change.
Also, they didn't have Tohru go to her mom's grave during the same episode, and she did not see Saki and Arisa there. I think they should have kept that scene in because in the OG, the scene serves as Tohru's hesitation of going back and shows the support of her friends. Without it, it's like Tohru doesn't question herself at all when running after Kyo (which she would have, after seeing his true form). Including this scene would have made her decision and the outcome even more meaningful.

Character design: Now the biggest drawback for me is the character design. I just think it is a very generic art style. It's not terrible but nothing really distinguishes it from any other generic anime. But I guess it's hard to think of a better way to portray old source material accurately yet uniquely.
As for voice actors, they got nearly all the characters right. In my opinion though, they made Tohru a LOT more annoying and this is especially apparent going into the 2nd and 3rd seasons. It's such a shame because it makes Tohru's essence as a character (innocence, ditzyness, effort) more one-dimensional as the episodes go by and just...very generic.



TLDR:
GENERIC is the word.

This remake is just the 2001 Fruits Basket but with a much more generic soundtrack and characters, with a few changes here and there for clarity, and it opens up the story for the next seasons. When I feel like rewatching Fruits Basket again, I am definitely just going to watch the original, it is just so much better. OG is a 10 and compared, this season is like a 5. But I'll say for someone who has not seen the OG and just this one, it'll be a solid 7.

Fruit Basket - Season 1

I must say to my surprise, I did not expect this show to convince me as much as it did. Although I was relatively skeptical at the beginning, about whether I can actually get so many episodes behind me, it progressed very quickly.

The biggest aspect of this show, which was also the best implemented, was the "background" of the characters. In addition, the characters are quite likable and the humor can actually be funny. I'm especially pleased that this anime has some balance between the ambitions and backgrounds of the characters. The world is not completely black and white, and ... the author has tried his best not to make the stories seem melodramatic, giving them a more realistic touch.

Of course, this series also brings certain problems. As you can already imagine, this series is mostly for shoujo fans. The guys are all super hot models *cough* and blush at least 3x per episode because of the protagonist. There are quite a few sparkle-eye scenes. Very many clichéd speeches so that the characters get more together. The pacing is slow and the scenes offer little variety as long as nothing happens in the story. But the worst thing here is the dialogue. Every now and then I get the feeling that the author had no idea how interactions between people work, giving you several conversations that are comparable to "The Elder Scrolls town guards".

But this wasn't enough to put me off, and towards the second half, the characters' backstories became all the more interesting.

[Story 4]

Fruit Basket is a relatively simple fantasy story that revolves around the animal signs and the curse associated with them. The protagonist, Tohru, is practically the mom of the entire zodiac family. She had to solve their problems, comfort them and constantly tell them not to be sad because they are so hot and also human.

Conquering their own demons and facing their fears was the main point of the first season. And honestly, this point was really satisfactorily executed, I was almost impressed.

[Characters 5]

Bunch of Stereo Types, Check. Bad dialogues and conversations - check. One-dimensional personalities - check.

At least that's what I'd like to say, but their personalities have evolved immensely through their past traumas and have taken root as a result. Practically each of the characters has their own fear that determines almost half of their actions and personality and the more this is conquered in the course of the series, the more the characters develop into an improved version of the respective stereotype.

I can't say I had a favorite character, but if I had to choose one, it would be Tohru's 2 best friends. Not only did they both have a refreshingly built background that wasn't new, but had the best execution so far. But in addition, they had one of the best "friendships" I've seen in an anime/manga so far. Which doesn't seem overly forced, but natural. You could almost feel the harmony between them.

[Animation 5 / Music 4]

The animations were mostly average. The backgrounds were okay. The drawing style, however, was very spongy and not even that, was consistent. Most of the time the characters looked even worse than expected.

The music was pretty disappointing. There were 2-3 decent osts that fit, otherwise there was nothing at all. The 2 intros were below average and nothing special, as were the outros.

[Score 5]

Fruit Basket is a very surprising series. Although you clearly notice how many flaws it has and how far it could be improved. Thus, it has good entertainment potential. I am very curious about the upcoming seasons.

[Enjoyment 7]

As a huge fan of the original fruits basket anime and having read the manga as well, I'm sad to say this remake has rather dissapointed me. Maybe I would not have felt this way if the remake was the first version that I watched. I was super excited when the remake was announced, so I had my hopes up. The art style looks nice, I had to get used to it al ittle but there was nothing to complain about.

My main issue with this remake is the directing. In the beginning of season one it looked like the director was obsessed with copying ... the manga panel-by panel, and then later on in the season they started changing the order events compared to when they happened in the manga. I first noticed that it was bothering me around episode 7, when they told, Hatori's backstory. In the original version I'd always be bawling during that episode but the remake one just didn't do much for me.

It's the way the dialogue is delivered combined with the soundtrack the framing of the shots that just doesn't work sometimes. The music starts playing at weird intervals sometimes instead of when it's supposed to come in, and often they're more busy showing off the backgrounds (they're very pretty though) than creating interesting shots/angles. Then sometimes they add some random things to make it more dramatic ( like that time Tohru fell off the roof when talking to Ritsu) that weren't in the manga at all. Sometimes they're so obsessed with following the manga frame by frame and other times they screw over the whole chronological order of the show.

But seeing as I do love fruits basket's story, I don't hate it. It's just feels somewhat medicore compared to what it could have been.

Note: All my reviews are written after I've completed watching the entire season, never before.

"Fruits Basket" Season 1 rejuvenates the beloved story with modern animation and deeper character exploration, yet leaves something to be desired in pacing and romantic development. The season excels in showcasing the emotional depth of the Soma family and Tohru Honda, weaving intricate backstories that highlight themes of acceptance and resilience. Each episode adds layers to the complex tapestry of relationships and personal growth, making it a compelling watch.

However, the series' focus on side characters, while enriching the narrative fabric, often sidelines the development of Tohru and her future relationship. Fans ... longing for a romantic progression akin to "Kamisama Hajimemashite" may find the slow burn between the main characters a tad frustrating. Despite these moments of yearning for more, the episodes dedicated to characters like Hanajima offer delightful insights into friendship dynamics, standing out as memorable highlights.

Unfortunately, the music didn’t leave a lasting impression on me, blending into the background without significantly enhancing the emotional resonance of key scenes. This lack of memorable musical accompaniment (including the opening and ending themes) represents a missed opportunity in a series so rich in emotional depth.

Character development shines, particularly in episodes revealing Kyo and Yuki's vulnerabilities. Yet, the anticipation for significant romantic scenes frequently finds itself overshadowed by the series' broader focus. The introduction of the Zodiac members adds a mystical layer to the story, though at times, it feels like a double-edged sword, diluting the central narrative thread.

IN CONCLUSION:

Season 1 of "Fruits Basket" 2019 lays a solid foundation for emotional and narrative depth, with its strength lying in character development and thematic richness. However, the longing for more pronounced romantic elements and a tighter focus on the main characters' relationship leaves viewers like myself with mixed feelings. The season sets the stage for potential, promising a continuation that could hopefully address these desires. The blend of heartache and humor, alongside the promise of growth, keeps the series endearing and watchable, but with reserved expectations for the romantic storyline to unfold in future seasons.

The show is a bit slow, with many dramatic and wholesome moments. I enjoyed the big roaster of distinctive characters and the gradual development of their relationships. Plus, serious and cheerful moments are well-balanced, and anime gives some great everyday life lessons. Supporting characters are compelling, so much so that they steal the show all the time.

Yet, I must say that I am disappointed in the show as a whole. For the last, I don't know two decades, everybody hyped this show to me. One of the best comedies out there, they said. Heartfelt drama. A classic. Yeah, the bar was high. And from ... my perspective, this anime just didn't deliver. As an anime famous for its comedy, I didn't find it hilarious, or even funny. Humor is ok from time to time, but it's more meh I chuckled a little than OMG I will die from laughter. Also, since this is the slow-burn story, there are only hits of future romances, so no fun there either.

As far as smaller things I disliked, there are two offenders in that category. First, used music is a bore, nothing catchy or memorable. After the first listening, I skipped both sets of OP and EP. Also, although nice when it comes to atmosphere setting, I find animation bland in the facial expression department. Plain and lifeless.

disclaimer: ive never read the manga nor have i watched the 2001 one.

the anime was honestly really interesting, i liked that its set on the zodiac story, i was very intrigued by it. the art is clean and the voice actors were great with their characters. why did i give it a 6/10 then? i couldn't bare to watch it. the characters were very boring to me. the main girl is the perfect happy to go clumsy one, and the 2 main guy likes her. i think its just part of my pet peeves on how the main girl is like because everything she says ... is so cheesy and cliche but if you like those stuffs then go for it!! just not my type. the special things about her is that she's nice and accepting. she's too perfect. again the story is very cool and im very interested by it but i cant bare to go through an episode because the characters are really cheesy.

Haiku review:

First season is good
Second, superfluous pad
Third, a masterpiece

This review covers the entire “Fruits Basket” remake.

As most of us know, there was an excellent and widely loved “Fruits Basket” series that appeared in 2001. Its lone real shortcoming was that it appeared before the manga was complete, so it couldn’t reveal how everything turns out.

... The story was the kind of shojo that appeals to a much wider audience. The characters were compelling, the plot moved forward at the right speed, and even though it was incomplete it led to a satisfactory ending.

The original series did not, apparently, find favor with Takaya Natsuki, author of the original manga, who was in some measure involved in the three-season remake that’s the subject of this review. The chief production connection to the original is the presence of much of the original voice cast in the English dub, which is nice.

My initial thought upon viewing the remake was how the changes were pretty much limited to style – the characters are more moe, the “leeks” had become “chives” for no apparent reason, and the little androgynous blond character had acquired a German accent and a few German words. The places that could have benefited from the advances in anime making were largely unchanged. Kyo’s transformation, for instance, was little better in this series than in the original.

I have not read the manga, and if this remake represents the manga better than the original did, I’m glad of that. Because in the remake a good and interesting story in which we care about the characters is diluted by padding, a kind of flailing in which there’s an attempt to make this into a high school romantic comedy with zodiac animals and such. It’s as if the story was approached as something that could be hammered into a kind of anime version of a “Twilight”-ish drama. That might be good for the producers’ bank accounts, but it’s crap storytelling. The thing runs a total of 63 episodes, which is at least 11 episodes too long. And it was dissonant, like the first year I watched anime and alternated between “Elfin Lied” and “UFO Ultramaiden Valkyrie.”

It would have been better to have made a second season, picking up from the first, once the manga finished in 2006 – it’s not as if five years awaiting a sequel is unheard of in anime. That failing, the producers might better have remade the original series, changing it only to the extent that improvements in technology allowed it to be better on that basis and that basis alone, and added a second season to complete the story. Then, if they wanted, they could have done “Fruits Basket Fumoffu” or something, where the zodiacs are always getting hugged and there could have been aerial views of the brightly colored explosions and ho ho ho for those who are into it, without messing up the drama of the show. There were cute parts – the scenes with the editor and the school play – that were genuinely funny, but this isn’t a funny show. (And if they’d collected a dollar for every anime trope and cliché used in the otherwise unremarkable OPs and EDs, they would have been able to finance that sidebar series, with enough left over to improve the production values in the main show.)

To say nothing of the endless, repetitive back stories. We got it first time around: It sucked to be a kid in this family; apparently, it sucked to be a kid in Japan, period. No need to devote a half dozen episodes to how it sucked to be this kid, and this one, and this one. It’s less fun than the Endless Eight was. Then there was the soapy soliloquy at the beginning of second season, ep. 22, when Shinji, oops, Yucky, was going on about how Tohru was like a mommy to him (to which his friend said what sounded like, “Even though she’s Irish?” but on third listening I guess it was, “even though she’s our age?”) and how he wanted something more. I half expected him to burst forward in a chorus of “I gotta be me.” This kind of thing happens when they’ve lost control of the story and try to get it back by taking it way too seriously. Truth is, they could lost most of the second season with no loss to the narrative.

“Fruits Basket” is one of the enduring classics in anime. As such, it shouldn’t be messed with lightly, any more than “Neon Genesis Evangelion” should be redone as a rom-com. If it were to be remade, it should have been done with that near-sacred status in mind, with the goal of the heights to which it could further soar, instead of how many high school could be crammed into it, how much it could be homogenized with all the 5/10 shows that come and go without leaving a ripple.

THEN CAME SEASON THREE, “FRUITS BASKET: THE FINAL”

And oh, my God. Perhaps as a reward for enduring the aimless second season, the third season is one of the finest series of anime I have ever seen or can imagine. It is gripping, moving, tense, heart-wrenching, uplifting, terrifying – pick your superlative and there’s something in this short season that fits it. Talk about a roller coaster!

(It also demonstrates that, with a very small exception, all that high school stuff had no bearing or effect on the outcome. It was as out of place as it seemed.)

That third season also does something very well that anime usually does poorly if at all: Usually, if there’s an ending it takes place about 10 frames before the end of the show, leaving the viewer thinking, “and then what?” They hold hands and there’s fireworks, the end. (“Toradora,” I’m looking at you.) Not here. “Fruits Basket: The Final” devotes several episodes – more than necessary, really – to letting us know what happened then. It might be an apology for all the pointless high school stuff, but those producing the show seem to have realized that the audience has come to care about the characters and would like to know that they’re safe, if in fact they’re safe. We get to find out how it turned out writ large, not just at one point in time. It acknowledges that the “Fruits Basket” story is special, that it has a revered place in anime’s enormous body of work.

That’s good, though even the ending may be just a little bit stretched out, as if everyone involved didn’t want to go home yet, didn’t want to leave these remarkable characters behind. And who can blame them? We don’t want to be done with them, either. We want them to come over for a cup of coffee. We want to do what we can to help them along to happiness. Not many anime (or stories in other media) bring us to that place.

After watching a series that’s become important to us we often express a wish: for a different outcome, for a plot hole (or many plot holes) to get filled, most often, for a second season. I’ll do that now. I fervently wish (with no reason to think it will ever happen) that they go back and recut the whole show. That they take the vast majority of the high school stuff, the parts that have nothing to do with the story, and make them into a sidebar series. At least that they remove them from the main story, which loses its pace and just wallows around because of them. The pacing of parts of the series is just right, but in the second season it and much else goes terribly wrong.

If they were to do that, the remake of “Fruits Basket” would be just right, a perfect successor to and completion of the 2001 masterpiece.

At this moment, this is actually my second attempt at watching and finishing this anime.
The MAL rating goaded me into trying this again... Unfortunately I don't think I'm gonna be able to finish even this season. I may very well be stopping at ep.19. I'm kinda annoyed.

It just has been so hard, not to literally fall asleep before this show, and I am genuinely amazed at how watchers have been enjoying it so much, when both the story and its narration are really really poor. I am gonna stay very vague and maybe not precise enough to have an impact... I could not feel anything ... for the MC, could not let myself be enthralled by anything (except some side characters).

The pacing was weird from the get go. Four episodes in, and the narration is already trying to hit us with some damn heavy shit, while allegedly deep feelings are forced upon the duo of male characters. There are some shows which succeeded in setting up these kind of relationships very quickly. It's possible. In Fruits Basket it just does not work at all, maybe because the overall tone is too much immature and shallow, with nothing really serious at stake, leading naturally to zero legitimate bonding.

The MC being such a bland character does not help at all. How the heck are we supposed to root for a dimwitted airhead, who's just gonna let people trample all over her with a cherry on top? I totally disagree with people thinking this is a stronk MC. She's meek, stupid and naive, and by far the worst aspect of this show so far. Another character I could take for comparison is the MC in Ancient Magus Bride. These are the kind of helpless princess characters I find the most boring ; I'm nothing of a rad-fem, but these stories are imbued with a very special type of sexism. We know how is japanese culture, so I always watch animes with critical distance and a grain of salt. Fruits Basket did not succeed for me, at telling me how cute and kind and stronk Tohru is supposed to be, I think because there's just no fun to it, no element of surprise, she's a perfect housewife. Great. Now what? The show fails miserably at fleshing her out, and it's not necessarily a personality issue ; "Chihayafuru" gives us a pretty similar type of MC, she's optimistic, naive, and dorky, in the end flat-out likeable, because the show knows how to make irresistible comedy out of her flaws.

The humor is severely lacking some punch. I did laugh to Ayame's antics, and Shigure's twisted mind. Apart from these two, nothing worthwhile, everything else being generic, lacking subtlety and novelty. It's weird because I could let myself enjoy easy repetitive jokes in other shows. Here the Care Bears overall mood is just killing it. Maybe I'm watching this wrong ,maybe I'm supposed to take this show only as a feel good thing. But then why all the drama and heavy stuff and useless tension? This show is actually so pretentious and first degree, while trying so hard to still be goofy.

Okay it's supposed to be a shoujo manga, well I guess this is the worst kind of shoujo? Like please don't show this stuff to your kids. In my mind, mangas are a great medium, for stories about bravery, resilience, and cunning. You want yourself or your daughter to discover a
strong role model, maybe to start thinking about human relationships, then you need a show that makes sense, about the whole array of human emotions. If the following seasons are on par with the first season, Fruits Baskets ain't gonna be this show.

TL;DR : Slice of life/drama with a hint of supernatural in which I couldn't bring myself to like most of the characters because their problematic behaviors that got turned into comic relief and never really addressed are in my opinion what prevents the story to go forward and the origin of most hardships every character is facing. Didn't like what I watched, but maybe I'm wrong about what I understood, since so many people like it. Give it a try I guess.

I have really conflicting feelings about this show. I'd like to start by saying that I haven't read the manga or watched the original ... 2001 series, so my opinion is solely based on what I've seen in those 25 episodes without knowing anything about the plot or the characters beforehand.
The story is about this angelic airhead Tohru who lost her parents and is lead to live with the Souma, a family of people possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac. We're progressively introduced to all the "animals" that all have their hardships, regarding their curse or just life in general. Tohru acts like a glue of sort for their feelings and their relations. This is supposed to be a wholesome slice of life with a touch of supernatural, but something becomes clear really fast, something nobody seems to care about : two solid thirds of the characters introduced to us are utterly irredeemable pricks, incredibly destructive in both their surroundings and their affective life, unable to acknowledge their own shortcomings, leading to a painful affective status quo in the relations of all the characters because they refuse to make the obvious choices necessary to advance in life, such as not beating the hell out of the person you like every single time you see him. These traits are exaggerated for the sake of humor, I'm aware of it, but I just can't bear it, seeing somebody voicing the fact that he wants to get closer to his little brother then joyfully wrecking his relationship just because he doesn't actually care about his little brother's feelings is both painful and infuriating to me, not funny. And I found even more aggravating that each of these characters have their own "redemption arc" of sort, where nothing about their problematic behavior is fixed but the show just sort of tells you "see ? they're sad too, so try to like them too ok ?" for totally unrelated reasons.
In the end even though some episodes were nice and touching (especially those without any member of the Souma family) most of them left me at best sighing heavily, at worst genuinely pissed.
Do I recommend it ? Hard to say. I'd say that on average I didn't spend a good time watching this show, even though the production quality is top-tier. But at the same time I'm aware most people don't share the same intensity of feelings for mean fictional characters, and this is a generally well liked show. In the end I'd say giving it the "rule of four" (not "three" because the fourth episode is a crucial one in deciding whether you'll like the show or not) treatment and deciding after that. In the end I still got through the whole season after all so it's not THAT bad.

Tohru, oh sweet Tohru, what are you doing acting like a psychatiarist in that house? You're a teenager and trying to solve that person's trauma and problems, stop, let him see a psychatiarist you can't...What? You talked to him and now his entire trauma healed? Well okay but just because it worked this tim...What? It worked again? and again?? Jeez Tohru stop wasting time in that house and open your own clinic, I can already see it. Hundreds lining up to see the great Dr. Tohru with her miraculous power to heal your trauma. Man we'll make BANK!

Okay, jokes aside, I watched the original Fruits ... Basket back in elementary school and I seem to remember enjoying it (somewhat?) so I decided to give this show a shot for the sake of nostalgia, but boy did it dissapoint. I still can't fathom all the praise this show receives and its position as one of the classics. And I am writing this to add perspective among a boatload of glowing reviews. This isn't meant as an attack to the show or anyone who enjoys it, just constructive criticism and an extra perspectve for anyone considering to watch this. So let's begin:

Story (8/10):

So we got our main heroine that lost her home and mother and decides to live in a tent that so happens to be on the land of the Sohmas, a family conveiniently full of cute boys with issues. We get our usual reverse-harem setup with our heroine having to live in the house of the most popular boy in class with his hot cousin and..creepy... uncle? (I really can't remember their relationship). But wait! there's more, we got an interesting supernatural element to blend in this otherwise bland shoujo/reverse-harem. Seriously though, storywise, I actually really liked the premise. I am a sucker for slice of life animes and if you add a supernatural element and some drama for tension then I am hooked. Sadly, despite its unique-ish premise, this anime really dissapointed me in other areas.

Animation (8/10):

Solid animations with crisp clarity and good character designs. No complaints here,

Sound (7/10):

Again, good voice acting and a nice soundtrack. I especially really liked the OP.

Characters (4/10):

We have just gotten to the worst offender. Most characters in this show are actually really likeable and nice. They all undergo some sort of development, well, everyone EXCEPT Tohru. And that, perhaps is the biggest reason why I disliked this show. I LITERALLY ended up loving EVERY SINGLE character aside from her. If that's not a bad sign I don't know what is.

You see Tohru is not a bad person, actually she's kind. TOO KIND if you ask me but whatever. She's so ridiclously dumb and wise at the same time, but hey she's cute so that's okay right? Oh she's also extremely shy and never stands up for herself, well ain't that a great example to set for future generations. GIRLS! forget standing up for yourself and shaping your life, just have your mom killed, your extended relatives kick you out and then settle to live in a tent in the yard of the most popular boy in your school. I am sure that'd work out amazingly.

Okay, maybe I am being overly cynical but I am so sick of all these weak heroines in shoujos. Tohru embodies most things I hate in a female heroine: clumsy, dense, and RIDICULOUSLY SUBMISSIVE. But that all would have been fine with me if she undergone at least SOME DEVELOPMENT, but nope, we're up to episode 20 and she's still as kind and submssive as a rug, well probably kinder since a rug can static shock you but Tohru could never! She'll just smile in a corner and spout some words of wisdom that will heal anyone's soul. If her supposed wisdom was a supernatural element in the story and is something like she's a reincarnation of a kind maiden or some crap like that then I'd at least enjoy her character at least a little. but Nope, we're supposed to believe that a teenager's kind words are enough to heal the trauma of any person she meets. Man I wish real teenagers were like that but they're all too busy tiktoking and calling me old even though I am only a couple of year older. Well healing traumas and causing traumas is only a difference of one word am I right? No? I should get help? Haha you're funny.

Don't even get me started on her presence and characterization. Her entire character can be summed up as "cute girl that lives in a house full of cute boys and has the miracoulous power to heal people's traumas". Everything else about her is as flat as the planet is to flatearthers. She has NO MOTIVATION to be so kind, 20 episodes in and we NEVER LEARN why she's even helping the Sohmas. I was patiently waiting even CRAVING some semblance of a motivation on Tohru's part. Maybe a flashback where her mom told her to never cry or show weakness, or Tohru herself resolving to help the Sohmas since she went through hell and doesn't want anyone else to suffer what she did. Or even having her fall for Yuki or Kyo and deciding to help their family because of that. But nope! She still acts as the Sohma's designated shrink for absolutely no reason other than maybe the fact they provided her with housing (even though I think her doing housework is more than enough if you ask me) at which point she might as well be replaced with any generic nice clumsy female character and the story wouldn't change that much. Seriously? what was the point of her mother dying? That seemed to barely affect her characterization. Well maybe it would have come into play after 20 episodes but I am not sticking around to find out.

Overall (6.6):

In the end, this isn't a horrible show by any means. I've definitely seen way worse, but I found it extremely overrated. If you're a fan of traditional shoujos and like some nice eye-candy boys I would recommend at least giving it a shot. It seems that a lot of people like it so there's at least some merit in this show. If you're however a veteran shoujo watcher looking for something unique or a disliker of traditional shoujo female characterization, I would recommend steering away from this one.

Welcome to the three-part trash fire that is Fruits Basket, where I review each season individually because I like to torture myself. Enjoy the ride.

Trying not to compare the first season of fruits basket with its original anime release is hard, because thought the two are virtually the same plot-wise, the old one is at the very least, quite pretty to look at; it has all of the anime sweetness of big, bug eyed characters with wide smiles, and all the lovely charms of old-school animation. But we’re not here to discuss eye-candy, are we?

… Or are we?

Fruits Basket is yet another one in ... the row of titles suffering from the incredibly cheap looking modern animation that, I can only hope, reduce the cost of production (I hope, because if this is what we consider pretty, we're doomed) but boy oh boy, does it reduce quality as well. In trying to reimagine what characters from a, by now very old manga, might look like today, someone had opened up the door to Uncanny Valley because the characters, for quite a good part of time, look sort of… off.

... But I’m talking nonsense, aren’t I? Who cares about the design and the style - these are largely subjective, as it is! As long as the characters have got heart to carry the plot, all should be fine.

And in that regard… yeah, the first season of Fruits Basket is pretty helplessly charming in a typical anime fashion - we meet plethora of characters, the majority of whom are really sweet and/or interesting, in a fantastical yet homey environment, and each adds a little to the mystery of what and how the Zodiac Curse happened, all of it setting up a nice stage for the rest of the plot to roll in at season two - the terrible ‘plot’ of which I’ll touch upon in another review. The melodrama is often sweet, if a bit much, the tensions between characters are palpable and believable, and though humour is hit-or-miss, it’s, again, charming in a typical anime fashion.

... Speaking of humour.

You see, although there is quite a few things to enjoy about Fruits Basket - the fantasy, the romantic hints, the outright adorable transformations, the anticipation of each Zodiac member as they appear, the tension strewn throughout the plot - none of these things is what I enjoyed the most about this title. I found just about the greatest joy in laughing at the absurdity of it. If I were to rate this anime explicitly by how terrible it looked, how bad it sounded, how dumb it often is, and ultimately, how many times I laughed at all these things, it would probably be a smooth 8 out of 10, because it brought me great joy to see such silly things in what I thought was supposed to be a largely melodramatic, pretty serious and only occasionally humorous (not comedic, mind you) experience.

So if I were to look at Fruits Basket for what it's supposed to be at its core - a fantasy drama with a romantic subplot - it really doesn't portray genuine drama properly. It has simply way, way too many unnecessary, almost cartoonish ‘comedic’ moments - the point of which I’m not certain about, as this is not supposed to be that kind of comedy - which are often more laughable at how hard they are trying rather than for their actual humorous value.

It is not an enjoyable eye-candy, nor a very good melodrama. The romance is too scarce, and what attempt at comedy there is, is awful.

But you’ll laugh, I guess?

I know, I know - the way I say it, it sounds way worse than I think it is. Ultimately, no matter how ridiculous it gets, this anime has things going on in it: for all its faults it was still interesting, and the characters really do wriggle their way into your heart. I was properly invested by the time the season wrapped up.

… Unfortunately, this is where season two comes in. Hold onto your hats.

Having to sit down to watch all 24 episodes of Fruits Basket in a day was quite the experience for me, but I can’t really say whether it’s a pleasant or a dreadful one. The series has been hailed as one of the greatest shojo series of all time, and while I could glimpse the possibility to ascertain such a claim after finishing the all the seasons of the remake series, but I would be lying to myself that one can call Fruits Basket as a great series from the first season. And I’d be diving into the reasons as to why I have extremely ... conflicting emotions and feelings to discuss this particular season. I’ll say this in advance, a lot of people expressed their thoughts that Fruits Basket is a large series encompassing numerous characters with different personalities and multiple layers of conflict between varying characters that possess their own agendas and philosophies in their way of life. I’m currently here to review only the first season, which comprises 24 episodes which roughly translates to at least 480 minutes, which is an ample amount of time to develop at the very least, a few characters. I would definitely like to discuss how Fruits Basket develops its characters within that time frame and whether it does it adequately, or with scant regard for its characters.

I don’t think there’s really a need to regurgitate what the plot is about given that it’s right there on the centre of your screen in the headpage. So, I’ll save some screen time to talk more about the storylines and characters and how they complement each other. The first one I’ve got to talk about is Tohru. Tohru as a character in the entire narrative changed a lot, drastically even, but when it comes to the first season, the slow pacing on occasional points of the storyline had presented her as a character that had a flat arc. What is a flat arc? To put into the simplest terms, our main character goes through a multitude of events which challenges their agency with different characters that might or not contradicts our main character’s and the main plot was to incorporate the change of the characters that surround our main character in situations rather than changing our main character’s personality. That’s actually more common that you’d imagine, case in point, Paddington, Diana Prince. She is kind, heartfelt and caring towards others. Well, there’s no problem in attempting to bestow a character's personal traits as this. But maybe because this is a 90s series, it had multiple gags which did not age well, notably the caricaturistic approach to Tohru’s kindness and Kagura’s slapstick comedy to slap Kyo because she likes her and sometimes she’s too flustered. One of my major drawbacks of this show was predominantly Tohru’s characterisation. Flat arc characters can be generally done pretty well if there were character-based scenes where they were exchange of thoughts and a more nuanced way of communicating by sharing their philosophies upon a certain subject. Arisa’s gangster/hooligan background and her interaction with Tohru’s mom was handled well, but in comparison Tohru’s conversation with Ritsu (his insecurities about his abilities and gender) and Yuki (his social communication) is way less empowering. It’s because there’s an educative nature and a shared background between Arisa and Tohru’s mother which could carefully construct a bridge of connection between the two characters which led to Arisa’s transformation after being accompanied by Tohru and her mother. But the conversations Tohru had with Momiji, Ritsu and Yuki are not on particularly equal grounds, and there’s no high ground for Tohru to be educative about. Because they had very different outcomes and generally contradictory points of views which makes it hard to believe a few lines from Tohru could impact their personality. To make it clear, it isn’t worth condemning everytime this kind of scenes appear in the anime but it happens so constantly that it eventually robs a lot of the characters of their own agency, instead of making their own big character-reviewing decisions, we are drawn into Tohru’s stream of consciousness style of persuasion for the characters in accordance to Tohru’s own viewpoints and disregarding any sense of discrepancy that they might have with Tohru’s own morals and her connection with her mother. Doing so excessively would penultimately result in a sequence of character development that are unextractable and largely overshadowed by Tohru’s constant appearance and ultimately begets a shallow character development for the side characters. It’s one that makes me almost turn off some of the episodes in the series because it is literally encoding an almost theological optimism to push the boundaries as to how Tohru can help the other characters based on her opinions on subjects.

After a prolonged expression of mine toward the negative impacts of Tohru’s compressed characterisation (down to a mouthpiece), I’d reserve a great deal of praise for her cronies. Arisa and Saki. There are far more interesting characters than characters that are starred in episodic natures, (Kagura and Ritsu) and a great amount of time was dedicated to enrich their backstory, their motivations and how they gradually progressed from a person of lesser morals to a person with more positive traits, especially Arisa with her hooligan background. I’d commend that and some of the scenes where the sunset background blends pleasingly with the interactions between Arisa and Tohru’s mother are also worthy of praise. There’s also a few dynamics between characters that are fun and engaging to look at - Yuki and Kyo, though they would always fight with each other nearly every single time they met, but the facial expressions and dialogue they shared during the copious amount of conversations they had was more than fun to look at - the pair had conflict which would lead to some kind of resolutions - either they tone it down eventually or Tohru’s intervention (that’s actually done rather solidly) which rams the scenes they had with an engaging power within it. There’s also new characters that are introduced halfway in the series, like Hatsuharu or Hatori which shared an interesting dynamic with such characters as Kyo and Shigure, and both of the pairs had also their personal ties and connections that are formed based on several foundations of their backstories, which significantly develops the characters more and there’s definitely no more complaints with that from my part.

The sound is decent enough, in my opinion. It had a fairly well done opening songs and two beautifully choreographed ending songs that are in sync with the beats of the music. The lighting in this show was nothing special, considering most of the scenes they had shown are a consolidation of character’s moments and background music and then the lighting. It’s the same as probably the rest of the anime around the period, nothing worth to be frustrated about, nothing worth to vie with the best in the industry. However, there’s a major issue that I find to be perforating the character’s dynamics that suffused the series. The monologues. They are often too whiny, inflated, tendentious and overwritten. Monologues in a human being are generally long and confusing, yes, as shown in multiple works of literature, prominent examples would include James Joyce’s stream of consciousness, but the monologues of multiple characters, especially Yuki and Kyo are garnished and embellished with a sort of poetic structure and mumbling about trivial metaphors to promote a sense of beauty and are often mixed and mingled with a decent background music or a long shot where Yuki’s torso was contrasted with the background. This kind of over-the-top would incrementally forge a bond almost immediately with the audience as it has complementary music and scenery to lure the audience in, aplenty with emotions. But it’s done too much, I’d say, a few scenes are acceptable, but a great amount of scenes are devoted into constructing great deals of monologues, and sometimes there’s even a group monologue which is used to contrast said characters based on their inner thoughts, or sometimes unite them together in a big picture. Nevertheless, it suffers greatly because the sort of decorated poetic style within the narrative monologues or even a heartfelt conversation between two best cronies or bosom friends are inflated with complacent interruptions of the writers to endlessly truss all the scenes with plenitudes of ribbons and balloons. Yuki’s inner thoughts, Kyo’s inner emotions, Tohru’s inner reflections and even Momiji’s inner explorations are done way too excessively and it even shared a same sort of tone and structure in them which itself promotes a contradiction that they are different in their inner self with each other. That carries away the wealth of character development formed by dynamic between characters that sets them apart by uniting the characters forcefully in an chaotic manner that sadly undermined some of the powerful scenes they could’ve had. Maybe this sort of monologue has the intention of showing us that deep down, the characters are all the same, they are not perfect and share a great deal of problems too. But the writer seemed too jonesed to promote this sense of storytelling structure so much that it becomes tiring to look at in the broader sense. If every scene or every monologue is filled with the writer’s precarious love for poetical dialogue, it’s would be the same condition as Aldous Huxley criticising a lot of Poe’s poems, it falls into vulgarity and of a coarsest virtue that ultimately becomes the same as wearing a diamond ring on every single finger. Nice to look at in the first few scenes, but the rest are bereaved of the character’s life, hence we are trapped between the extended fore and aft of over-trimmed inner monologues.

My review here, sadly asks at variance with the rest of other people here, if Fruits Basket is of a Periodic Piece or an enduring masterpiece of character writing? The series in its first attempt at a reboot with 24 episodes seems to be a quirky and sleazy mix of the two, its style can be occasionally alluring, absorbing, magnanimous and welcoming, yet there exists a few episodes that meddle with a style that is archaic, stiff, overwritten, and overly embellished. I am fond of the characters put forward, their introduction are rarely pretentious, but their inner lives are sometimes overwritten and tressed with a gazillion embellishments which confuses me to the extreme. I’d be reviewing the rest of the seasons in the future (which I deemed better), but for the performance of the first season of Fruits Basket, if it’s a work that remains charismatic and relevant for the 21st century seems to me open to some doubt.

The series follows a female protagonist suffering from Japanese Nutcase Syndrome (JNS): a condition where the individual is extremely and excessively polite, apologetic, and worrying of everything around. She meets special people who are diagnosed with a zodiac condition whereby certain events trigger their morphing into their respective animal. The story revolves around her and her attempt to resolve their problems.

The artwork is typical for this year and therefore, I would say it is fine and under expectations.

The story script is finely written and considered abnormal, given the focus on the protagonist's JNS, constantly.

The characters are considered well designed and acted. Each character presents ... a uniqueness to the anime that makes them interesting to watch and unfold. Initially, some may not be liked, but viewers may become accustomed to them over the episodes.

Overall, an interesting series which may suit viewers, but it is something I tried to like but ultimately avoided due to JNS. It's irking and irritating and a lot of us don't like it. JNS behaviour in real-life isn't this intense but exists in Japan almost exclusively. Their counterparts in Korea and China almost never behave like this.

Season 1 review, No Spoilers. Haven't read the manga or watched the older anime version.

From the first episode, I really tried to understand the main character and relate to her in any way. She seemed likeable in the first few episodes. However, by the end of the season, I realized that she just boils down to a one-dimensional, simplistic, dim-witted, damsel in distress that everyone inexplicably falls in love with at first sight.

She's as plain as it can be, she acts like a saint when she's really just an airheaded doormat, she has no flaws (being selfless and too kind is not a real flaw). ... It all makes her unrelatable AT ALL because no one's like that. All the characters in the show have flaws or got into trouble at least once in their life EXCEPT her, it's unrealistic and too simple-minded. I don't even mind what Akito said about her when they met. His opinion was true and honest.

Not to mention her stupid 5 mins TED-Talks at the end of each episode with the corny music and the heart-eyes on the characters she's speaking to, that magically inspire them to resolve all their trauma. AS IF getting over psychological trauma is that easy. That's just some cheap therapy. "My mom told me to never give up" "My mom told me to try harder" "My mom told me life's tough sometimes" Very basic life advice that we all heard before, her mom isn't Nietzsche. Can't she speak for herself and say what SHE thinks sometimes, instead of copying other people's ideologies?

By the end of the season, we got some character development for the other two male characters, I'm sure there's more to them in the next seasons. They're the ONLY reason that'll make me put up with this lame, bland female MC and watch till the end. I only started watching this show because i knew their VAs (the same VAs from JJK anime) would make me love those two characters and they really did.

Also, I really like the other VAs in this show, especially Shigure and Ayame VAs. I really like the adult trio; Hatori, Shigure and Ayame. Hatori is my current favorite out of them, I particularly enjoyed his backstory and want to see that side of him again. Shigure's hidden motives, Ayame's lovely humor and Hatori's charm make me want to continue watching this show.