Fruits Basket 1st Season

Sixteen episodes in, I have finally reached the point which urges me to write a review to this series. Being not familiar with both the manga and the original run, I decided to pick it up due to omnipresent excitement and love towards the title. Needless to say, I was disappointed to the boot.

Story: 3/10

I really wanted to like the story, I swear. The concept itself is not THAT bad, but really - it's too cheesy, even for a shoujo series. Later on, the author tries to add a darker twist to the plotline, which by itself wouldn't be such a bad idea if it ... wasn't done poorly. There are so many plot holes I just want to be filled and this anime fails to answer all of them, leaving the viewer with even more questions. The storyline just keeps flowing, events happening, and the cast goes along with it like no big deal - they're barely engaged in their own lives for some reason. The worst part- it feels like everything reloves around the main character, Tohru, as if she were the singularity of the world they live in. And that wouldn't be so bad either (since she's the mc after all) if she weren't the most boring person in the world - which leads me to my next point-


Characters: 2/10

Bad. Extremely bad. One-dimensional, boring, with one personality trait. Tohru Honda is a prime example of that. You can't just justify the characters entire personality by saying her mom died and now she's smiling through pain to make everyone happy. No normal 15-year old acts like that, and I refuse to believe there isn't some savior complex going on there, because holy crap - she lets everyone treat her like a doormat just to trigger a monologue scene where the animation is suddenly 10 times better and the other party starts praising her kindness and input in their life. Her entire personality revolves around being cute, polite, an overall ditz, and of course - her mom being dead, so why not please everyone around her just for the sake of forced emotional crap? If it wasn't enough, she also cries all the time and for everyone, which makes the series annoying to watch. And that's just the mc - her male love interests are equally as bad. One is the prince, the other the angry tsundere, and they both suffer from traumas we know nothing about. They manhandle her, scream, treat her like a housemaid (i bet she pays the rent too), and of course, both fall in love with her because she cured their trauma and saved them from the heavy emotional baggage just being the vegetable she is. Of course, let's add the perverted older man to the mix (who is surprisingly one of the more decent characters), a parody of a person suffering from a bipolar disorder (you know, he has two sides, pure and horny), and a villain whose motives are known to very few, because so far, they only were shown hurting people without any reason. Despite that, I'd like to praise Tohru's friends, because Uotani is a damn nice character. Can't say much about the other one yet, but she seems decent too. Sadly a few characters can't carry the entire series on their shoulders, so this anime fails miserably at story-telling and keeping the viewer engaged. It becomes more apparent in later episodes, though.


Art: 6/10

The arts pretty nice, you can see that the animators are doing a great job at their work. However, the quality isn't consistent (all the budget goes to the monologue scenes, probably) and something about the way Tohru is drawn just ticks me off. She just looks too cutesy, even for the animes own art style, and her eyes are for some reason twice as big as others?


Sound: 5/10

The openings and endings are pretty nice, especially the second ones, and they're the entirety of my rating. Why? Because the sound in the actual anime is dreadful, especially the sound effects accompanying comedy scenes. Other people have already written about this issue, so I won't paraphrase their words. It's just really damn bad.


Enjoyment: 3/10

Sometimes I am physically not able to watch this series. It fails to keep me engaged, I get annoyed at most characters and the slow-paced story-telling keeps getting on my nerves. Despite that, I still want to know what exactly is going on in the Souma household and how the story will resolve, so to a certain extent, the story has to be interesting. After all, it's widely known all around the world. If you want something to just watch with your brain turned-off - sure, go on, maybe in that state, you might find the cross-dressing gags about Yuki, which occur every other episode, funny. But do I recommend it? Definitely not.


OVERALL: 3/10

[SPOILERS]

To be honest I didn't that I would be writing this review. After episode one, I was thrilled for next week's episode to come. Episode one of the series is almost word for word of the original, which was what made me hopeful for this new series. Then episode two came and it was fair, but it didn't quite live up to the expectations of the previous episode. Then it kept getting worse. Much worse.
{ART}
Now let's get out the art and animation out of the way. It's pretty, but that's about it. It doesn't add anything or even begin salvage how bad this ... reboot is. I cannot excuse some pretty frames for an awful execution. Most of the time the art is only pretty when it wants to be, there are countless frames that look ugly and sometimes downright scary. That's mostly a problem in far away shots. Not to mention this new art doesn't fit very well with the show's comedic moments, well when there is any, and I'll get into that.
{SOUND}
I don't really have a lot to say about the sound, other than I don't like it. the music is nothing special, and the ops and eds are pretty sucky. Especially the first op, I have an extreme dislike for that one. There is also one background track that the show uses during dramatic that feels really unfitting and makes whatever dramatic moment that is occurring less shocking. That track honestly makes the scene less dramatic.
{CHARACTERS}
I have a lot to say about the new characters. Tohru, the main character, has been demoted to a pretty doormat. Tohru does pretty much nothing and waits for the plot to happen to her. She feels like a doormat that the plot and people constantly step on. her two friends are the best characters because they are the only characters you can't screw up no matter how hard you can try. Now let's get into the Zodiac, Hatsuharu and Ayame, my two old favorites, have been demoted to extra and exposition about Yuki. They only to serve that purpose and are not onscreen for any other reason. Ayame essentially lost all of the charm and comedy that he had in the old anime. Hatsuharu is the same way, the prove that's your real hair color scene is no longer as effective in pulling a laugh from me or anyone else I show it to. It gets worse, now let's talk about Kyo and Yuki. The old Kyo, the hot-headed, but soft-hearted Kyo, has been replaced. has been replaced by what, you may be asking, well, he's been replaced by a straight-up asshole. He's mean to essentially everyone, even Tohru and doesn't seem to give a crap about anyone around him. this new Kyo doesn't give me a reason to care about him or anything he wants to achieve. Yuki is just as bad, the sarcastic and satirical Yuki we all knew and loved, has also been replaced by a dry cracker. This new Yki has zero character, whose jokes always fall flat. This new Yuki has nothing, he's a cracker. A stale cracker that's out of date. Kyo and Yuki have some sort of trauma, but I don't even know what it is because it's only briefly implied, so I don't know the true extent of it. Like Yuki's backstory just seems like Akito painted freaking Picasso on the walls and it somehow scarred him. I don't even know where to begin in the supporting cast. Momiji and Hatori are characters only there for exposition as well. They don't do much of anything other than show up, give exposition and leave. I'll get into their backstories and how bad they are now, but other than that they don't really need to exist. This new Momiji is excruciatingly annoying, and I hate when he's on-screen. Now let's get to the most egregious examples of bad reboot characters, Shigure, Kisa, Hiro, and Akito. Shigure and Akito suffer the most in this reboot. Shigure lost everything that made him funny, for the sake of making him dark, mysterious, and sinister. That's his whole character now and it sucks to watch on screen. This twist was also revealed pretty early on making me hate every time he's on screen. Kisa is very crappy now. She's pretty much if Tohru and Yuki had a baby. A pretty doormat that has very mysterious trauma. She was bullied and stopped talking and then learned how to do it in like maybe 5 minutes because Kisa'a episode became Yuki's. I mean honestly, the show should be called Yuki's basket. Hiro is very bad too, like, I mean I know we all remember the old Hiro episode. And how dramatic the whole thing was, well they replaced Akito's slap with just Shigure and Hatori talking about it. We don't see it, we don't even see a reaction from Akito about it either. It's not very good. Akito, on the other hand, suffers another way. all of what made Akito scary and fearful in the old anime is gone. I don't know where it went, but it's gone. In the one scene with Hatori, I know we all remember who Akito threw that vase at Hatori then it hit him and then Akito went all crazy asking "Hatori what's wrong? Who hurt you?" Well, that's not there anymore. Akito isn't abusive or borderline bi-polar. This new Akito doesn't feel like an antagonist either, Akito feels more like an anti-hero and I don't like that. I don't even know what new Akito is. I guess he can paint though. It almost feels like this new show is trying to excuse Akito's actions on a sad childhood, and I will not stand for that.
{STORY}
The story suffers greatly because of the characters. The plot just kind of happens and nothing feels genuine. The story doesn't feel like it has an antagonist, and there's really only one protagonist with a bunch of extras. The story of the old anime goes as follows, A girl learns that a family is cursed and she goes down a path she never expected learning new things about herself and those around her, while ultimately accepting the curse as a new part of her life. You see that sounds great and that's what the old anime accomplished. This new anime however I don't even know what it's trying to do. the story feels like it has pacing issues, it goes fast then it slows down. Every element to the plot feels out of place as well. There is comedy, but only where you least expect it. The actual comedic moments in the show aren't funny, not even close. The funny moments come from the dramatic moments. Whenever one comes on I burst out in laughter because of how poorly they are handled. Like when Momiji's mom tried to commit suicide well when she tried to stab herself this big bass drum pounds. The music also makes the moment funny because right, when whatever is shocking, is shown all you hear is a bass drum pounding once. The bass drum is so random and it makes the scene funny.
{ENJOYMENT}
The only thing I enjoy about this show is how bad it is. I only come back weekly to see if the new episode can stoop even lower than the last. I don't recommend to anyone who hasn't watched the old one. If anyone is saying this show is a masterpiece then they haven't watched the old one. If you get anything from this review watch the old one if you haven't.

Ahh, I don't usually write reviews, but this anime is close to my heart since the original run of Fruits Basket was pretty much my introduction to anime.

Story: 3/10
Honestly, I was really excited to see how this version of the anime would differ from the original run, and... wow I was so disappointed. It's like a more boring version of the same storyline. The story followed the typical pacing for most anime where the beginning is slower than the ending. The only problem is that the end of this season is still basically the introduction to the show. For god's sake, we are still meeting ... characters by the time the show has picked up the season finale type pacing. I also didn't really enjoy any of the subplots within the show. Learning the problems that all the other Sohma's had because of the curse... I couldn't connect with any of their struggles. It was kind of just annoying hearing them whine about stupid things. I really enjoyed being able to have those few episodes dedicated to Uotani and Hanajima, though. They were kind of just mindless best friends of Tohru's before, but now you can understand why they love her so much and are so protective of her. Plus, you really feel a lot more connected to them in general.

Art: 5/10
Honestly, it was just generic art. Basic. Nothing amazing, but nothing terrible either. There was a lot dating sim vibes to it... It also just felt a little outdated with the backgrounds of some conversations. All of those pinky backgrounds with bubbles floating around? Yeesh, time to update those toners.

Sound: 2/10
I don't usually pay attention to sound in a show, but wow. I could not stand any of the music in this show. All of the terrible instrumental pieces thrown in throughout were just unbalanced and entirely uninteresting. The only things that prevent me from giving this a 1/10 were the intros and outros. And no, they weren't good. They were just not absolutely horrid like the rest of the soundtrack. But I really had no desire to listen to them.

Characters: 3/10
I was honestly going to give this a 4, but Tohru's character pissed me off so much. Maybe I did not pick it up in the original version because I was a child, but I don't think she has a single line in this show that isn't about her mother or being a doormat for others. I used to think her character was inspiring before, and now I just feel like she's actually a big idiot. All the characters around her praise her for being not wishing for anything more than what's in front of her. You know what that is? It's called lacking any form of ambition whatsoever! And it pisses me off. Being a passive complacent girl is not anything to look up to. As for Yuki and Kyo... Generic. And Kagura annoyed me so much! Every time I saw her character show up, I dreaded it. She's annoying and violent, all in the name of... love? What?? The biggest disappointment was the way Hatsuharu's and Hatori's characters were shown. They were two of my favorite characters before, but I felt like their appearances were boring and short. Haru's backstory was bland, and Hatori's felt so rushed that the emotional connection was a lot weaker than I would have liked. Otherwise, I did enjoy the other characters pretty well. Uotani and Hanajima were so lovable! And surprisingly, I really liked Momiji and Shigure's characters way more than before. Momiji has all good the qualities Tohru has, but isn't the dimwitted doormat she is. And Shigure felt like he was pretty rounded, although I still don't understand any of the motives of his character.

Enjoyment: 6/10
I mean, yeah I had a lot to complain about when it comes to reviewing this show. But like, I watch anime not to criticize it but to simply enjoy it. And shoujo anime like this is the perfect kind of mindless entertainment. Was it amazing? Definitely not. But it kept me entertained with how simple it was. Had I not watched the original run and formed an attachment, I might not have enjoyed it so much, but nostalgia does play a huge factor!

Overall: 4/10
I was really excited for this show because it has so much nostalgia for me. But I also was really excited to see how they would update it for 2019.
Answer: It remained outdated, and for the most part, almost the exact same as the 2001 run but with worse pacing and better art. And somehow the characters felt even more one-dimensional than before.

This was a super hyped show since its a remake and blah blah blah.
Now I hate the show

There won't be spoilers, but instead, my rant.

I feel like the character's stories are so fucking stupid because it is literally sob story after sob story it is so repetitive and boring. I literally do not feel any empathy for any of the characters because it is so repetitive. The only parts of the show I appreciate are the happy moments, but also the comedy (subjective) is actually super boring. It wasn't enjoyable, and I hated every moment of it.

The characters individually are okay.
Tohru makes a ... kind and good MC, and the other side characters are the same.
The two main guy characters are like natsu and gray but they actually hate each other, though I don't mind or care, but the presentation of the show is so boring. It is a show trying to make a sob festival, but failing because of its repetitiveness. There isn't enough room or time to know what even happened because after one sob story there is another and another and another, and the first sob story wasn't even interesting in the slightest.

This is a combined review of seasons 1 and 2 since I watched them consecutively and don't remember exactly where one stopped and the other began

Writers and other creative types take note, Fruits Basket is a textbook example of how not to write melodrama. This show is misery porn of the worst kind, reveling in abusing its characters and having them brood over their misfortunes. Every single character without exception comes from a broken home. Their parents are either dead, or abusive monsters, or abandoned them. Some of these stories are very compelling individually, but it devolves into self parody quickly ... as literally dozens of characters are given tragic, tearjerker backstories. The story loses all its emotional impact by way overusing this sort of thing. There is no subtlety and no "normal" character to highlight the extreme abnormality of these people's lives.

Speaking of characters, they are really not good at all in this show. The central protagonist, Tohru, starts off as a likable and determined girl who's doing her best to stay positive after getting hit with a series of tragedies that leaves her living alone in a tent in the forest. As the series progresses, she gradually sheds almost all of her positive traits and turns into a spacey moron that lacks basic common sense and self-preservation instincts. Kyo, one of the male leads, is thoroughly unlikable from the moment he is introduced to the series and never gets better. He broods and he snaps at people. That is his entire personality. The other male lead, Yuki, is slightly better, but a preposterous outbreak of Mommy Issues hilariously derails his character in season 2. The main antagonist of the series, Akito, is a non-presence much of the time, and a goofy comic book villain who does Bad Things because she's Bad, but never actually feels threatening once she enters the story. There are a few good side characters here and there, but the main cast is painfully unlikable and the villain is not compelling.

Bottom line, this is a disastrously overwritten mess of a show with unlikable characters and ridiculously melodramatic storylines. If you ever needed an example of why less is more when it comes to melodrama and tragedy, this show is the perfect illustration of why "more" doesn't always work.

Have you ever seen a Korean drama where they talk like they are recovering in rehab after a car accident, at a pace of one word per second or slower, cry at the slightest breeze, and there are hundreds of episodes? This is like the anime version of that korean car wreck. Maybe they were listening to a retelling of the Chinese zodiac on the radio and BOOM, traumatic brain injury, significant loss of cognitive function, and this anime was born as a form of rehab or mental exercise. To be fair, I puke at every shoujo anime trailer and haven't seen one in a ... decade so maybe I've forgotten the formula and this is actually how they were all along, so maybe this is NORMAL for a shoujo anime.

I remember watching parts of the first Fruits Basket anime. I didn't care for the sappy emotional moments, but I wanted to uncover the mysteries of the family tied to the zodiac and how the heroine was going to "break" the curse. So then I thought, there's nothing else to watch, and the final season of the remake is out, so maybe keep an open mind and try a shoujo anime again? After mildly pushing through the first season, half staring at the wall through the second season, and downright skipping through dialogue on the final season, I can honestly say it was NOT worth the trouble and felt like a large waste of time. The only good that might come out of it is if you are a Japanese learner, they enunciate words very clearly and very slowly, the same words over and over again, your yasashi's and sabishi's like a broken record, to the point you can probably start quoting them by the second season and start staring at the ceiling and ignore the subtitles.

The first season honestly isn't too bad. It feels pretty much like the first anime, or at least what I remember. It introduces various characters and builds up a lot of expectation, teases many conflicts and relationships, drums up mysteries. But these are all on the shallowest of terms. There are a whopping 12+1 zodiac members after all, and some side characters, so it's forgiven that they don't delve deep into any of them.

The problem is, the rest of the show doesn't deviate from this pattern. What you knew about the zodiac in the beginning, you know about the same amount near the end after three seasons. Why is that? Because there was never anything of substance to begin with. It's like listening to a stump speech from your local politician. He say's he's going to solve crime, make the streets safer, build trust in the community. Every subsequent time you see him, he repeats the same stump speech, maybe adding that he really likes "cheesy grits" to appeal to the cheesy grits demographic, or sends his campaign surrogates around town to repeat the same talking points. After three anime seasons, you finally ask him, "you've been repeating the same thing over and over again, but HOW are you going to accomplish any of this?" He prevaricates. He never had a single idea. Nor a plan. He brought you in with promises. He drew a picture of a basket full of fruit instead of learning how to grow and harvest them. The whole zodiac mystery is basically a lie, a forced plot device that is pivotal to so many of the relationships and emotional experiences, but is utterly imagined and rendering them all null. It's a bad case of schizophrenia, crying over spilt milk but there never was any milk to begin with.

Like most school-based adolescent anime, Fruits Basket is utterly devoid of adult figures or authoritative personages. They are always running around on their own, living on their own, making their own decisions, getting into mischief on their own, or saving the world on their own. The decay of the family unit and child abandonment has always been a constant sinister subtext in school-based anime, but it gains a nefarious twist here. Almost every parental figure has some twisted, abusive relationship with their children. At first, the anime makes it out to be some sort of "curse" brought upon the parents by children posessed by a zodiac animal spirit. That it's supposed to ruin their lives somehow or make them go mad. But as the show progresses, the whole zodiac thing becomes less and less a passable justification and more a very very weak crutch. There is no actual curse that causes them to act that way. You don't touch a cute bunny rabbit and suddenly want to kill yourself. The writer just wanted to contrive a reason for people to hate the zodiac children, including their parents, without doing the legwork. It actually gets worse, as non-zodiac children from normal families are also shown to be equally mistreated and unloved.

From being shunned by their parents to being ostracized by society, the whole crux of the show hinges on their persecution as zodiac members. But if the zodiac curse literally doesn't do anything, what the hell are they constantly crying about? The short answer is, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. They contrived a societal restraint upon themselves and are living as if it is real. If there actually was an omnipotent force causing them to behave the way they do, a mysterious zdoiac power, maybe it would make a lot more sense. But most of the time, they are all living in their own delusions. Nothing makes the parents hate their zodiac children. Oh you turn into a kitty cat when hugged now? I hate cats. I have cat allergies. DIE! It's accepted as gospel that every parent hates their zodiac child. It's accepted as gospel that every outsider who finds out about the zodiac transformation will automatically hate them. It's the flimsiest premise imaginable to underpin a story about loneliness and salvation. Maybe if they turned into coronavirus superspreaders, it would make more sense.

And boy do they deliver on the melodrama. Endlessly repetitive melodrama. Crying over spilt milk is an understatement. If they accidentally bump into another person in the hallway or say the slightest wrong thing, they will spend the next five minutes reflecting over how selfish their actions are, how lonely or betrayed the other person might be, how they are not being genuine or unwilling to break out of their shell, how dark the world is and how no one will ever love or accept them, how useless they are to society, and every possible feeling of self-doubt imaginable. I'm surprised the whole cast hasn't committed suicide by now. It's like Catholic guilt, but impressed upon them by Japanese society. No matter how many positive steps are made or revelations realized, they keep regressing and repeating the same tired monologues as if the characters suffer from collective alzheimers, because it's a great way to pad the hell out of the runtime. The yasashi and sabishi drinking game is not to be trifled with.

The more appropriate evaluation of the zodiac family is, they are rich, spoiled, highly dysfunctional members of an incestual cult suffering from various mental illnesses. Just like a cult, the supernatural zodiac part is completely imaginary. The head of the cult was sheltered from the rest of society and taught she is the center of the universe and controls the zodiac, thus she acts like a jealous tyrant with violent proclivities towards the zodiac children because she is afraid they might leave her. But this doesn't explain the zodiac children themselves, who attend "normal" schools, have normal parents (as normal as an abusive parent in Fruits Basket gets), have jobs outside the compound..err estate, act like normal school kids otherwise, and can separate right from wrong. They spend a cloying amount of time talking about how yasashiiii everyone is, how kind and altruistic and benevolent and socially well-adjusted and heroic every member of the zodiac is. So why are they suffering? How can such well-adjusted people also be unfit for society? They cry over the most routine anime bullying and blame it on being a "zodiac" member when it has no relevance to their personality or why they were bullied.

Other than all the contrived suffering of being a zodiac member, the most credible reason should have been the master/slave relationship between each zodiac member and the family head, who is supposed to be able to bend them to her will, have them on a short leash, and instill fear within them. But this supernatural power is broken time and time again to the point of becoming meaningless. It's only ever described in the most abstract of terms, and the characters will disobey arbitrarily when the writers feel like it. Their lives, who they love, what their futures hold, is supposed to be dictated by her and her whims, but it seems mostly just psychological conditioning, and not a real power. They all realize it's abnormal, that it's harmful, and yet they mindlessly obey, and revel in their own suffering. Even the older children, who watched the tyrant child grow up and were not subject to the mental torture the younger zodiac children received from her, continue to make excuses to stay shackled with the abomination, be it out of pity or some twisted love.

And twisted is the family. They will let the family head commit violent atrocities on other members without so much as a word, including sexual advances to underage children, or incarcerate outcast members indefinitely. It's every definition of a cult and insular society. Yet poorly supported and leaning heavily on the whole zodiac coercive power that never manifests as real. If there was an actual framework, some bulwark of people and traditions keeping up the charade, it would feel more like a genuine and justified cult. Like I mentioned before, all the zodiac children are well-adjusted, knowing right from wrong, frequently rebellious, and have all the trappings of modern progressive anime characters. All the "adults" basically have either disappeared, exist solely in flashback form, or seem to not concern themselves with the politics of the place or running a tight ship. The estate is basically just the zodiac children and their mindless servants who have no names and consist of nagging old ladies that are completely ignored. Even the people who are supposed to know about the zodiac curse number only in the dozens while the greater estate is kept oblivious.

So who is forcing the cat to be incarcerated? Who is forcing the other animals to stay? Who is forcing anyone to obey the weak, childish brat of a family head who can be easily punched through several walls by multiple members of the zodiac that practice martial arts? Who is keeping them there to suffer when they know there is a large, wonderful world outside? They themselves are keeping up the charade, the finer points they barely understand, creating their own suffering, their own delusions.

And then we have the whole deal with the main protagonist. She is supposed to be the one that "saves" everyone from their loneliness and isolation, to acknowledge and accept them unconditionally, and to be a parent to basically every zodiac child. The problem is, they all already have supporting relationships with each other (they are all ridiculously yasashi after all), and meet many people outside of her that are just as uplifting and supportive. The writer actually gets tired of making her out as some superhero yet dimwitted mom figure that galvanizes change and drops the schtick halfway in the second season, letting the children grow on their own, and instead saves her for a half-assed romance using a repeated plotline.

TLDR: Cult members live in their own deluded world and contrived suffering but is really just a roundabout thesis on the effects of bad parenting, lack of authoritative figures, and child abandonment.

***This is a review of the ENTIRE Fruits Basket 2019 anime series (all three seasons)***

[TL;DR: Fruits Basket has the hallmarks of an interesting story with great visuals and presentation, which ends up slowly drowning in a swamp of awful writing, bad tropes, too many characters and just mountains of needless melodrama. There are some really interesting bits about the supernatural, the Zodiac curse and the people involved, stories about redemption, reconciliation and a painfully slow buildup to an epic finale...that never comes. The whole franchise is an ultimately unsatisfying dive into a pit of dark melodrama peppered with bad slapstick and a whole lot of ... unresolved childhood trauma. Unless you are prepared to wade through this emotionally and literarily confusing mess for three whole seasons, look for something else to watch.]


"Bad Parents: The Anime", which should've been the title of this series, since it has absolutely nothing to do with fruit or baskets (or fruitbaskets) in the slightest, but a lot more with just the worst parents in the history of forever. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.

*Some light spoilers ahead. No specific plot points, just overarching theme*

The story revolves around the "Chinese Zodiac animals" and the curse/story connected to them, if they were real people living today. It's a really interesting concept and it's effects and repercussions are introduced very early in the series. Meaning two effects actually. One, the Zodiac people turn into their respective animal forms if they are ever hugged by a female. Yes, it IS Ranma ½ level of cringe, and while it's mostly used for comic relief purposes early on, it's completely forgotten by end of the first season, and later only comes up to serve as a dark reminder of how they are "forbidden to get intimate with anyone" or something. The second repercussion is that all the Zodiac animals are bound by the curse to Akito, their God-analogue, to obey, love and worship her for all eternity. Or not. Or just kinda. Or just some of them. Or...who the hell knows, really. Supposedly the main pillar of the entire story, this "bond", The Curse™ is so vague and badly defined, it's rules are constantly changed and contorted in contradictory ways for plot convenience all throughout the series. It's not only confusing and ruins any buildup but goes to show how the anime can't even adhere to it's own rules, which will be a constant theme in the series going forward.

Okay, let's get this "Bad Parents" thing I mentioned before out of the way first. Except for one important exception, every single parent in the anime is the most horrendous, incompetent, evil, abject human trash the world has ever seen. Every single notable character in the series suffers from the worst possible childhood traumas you can imagine (and some you can't), which scarred them for life in various horrific ways. The vast majority of the drama in the entire series comes from this metric F-tons of unresolved mental and emotional baggage that would give second-hand PTSD to even the most seasoned therapists. All these parents are so unrealistically cruel and vile to their children, it sometimes borders on hilarity. Failing to live up to impossible expectations, being used for monetary gain, parents trying to vicariously live through their children, blame them for their own failings or even the deaths of loved ones, the good old "I wish you were never born" schtick, etc. You get an entire smorgasbord of just the worst mental anguish you can imagine which comes up sooner or later with each and every character and addressed in great detail.

The whole series is basically a bunch of fundamentally broken and borderline crazy people yelling/crying at each other about real or perceived atrocities and their hilariously awful upbringing preventing them from living a normal life or having basic human connections. This doesn't just affect the Zodiac people, but most other side characters as well, each bringing their own special blend of fucked up to the table.

Now, the anime tries to turn this whole mess into one giant redemption story, where our Mary-Sue protagonist Tooru, a simple highschool girl, uses the power of Being Nice™ (and crying, like, a LOT of crying) to magically resolve their respective traumas (which would normally need YEARS of hard therapy) and show them they are all worthy of love and respect, facing their past and yaddy-yadda, boom, you're magically cured. The whole series is swimming in incredibly drawn out melodrama. There is yelling, pain, anguish, anger, fighting and oh, did I mention crying? There's a metric fuckton of crying, like oceans of tears and sobbing set to sad music and rain. Which is sometimes rudely interrupted by some awfully placed comic relief bits, but I digress.

Everything I just said still wouldn't be so bad if the series didn't move at an absolute snail's pace. The pacing of the story is all over the place, sometimes speeding through important parts while spending criminally long stints at forgettable side stuff that never comes up again and lingering on scenes that outstay their welcome really quickly. Not to mention some of the character's incredibly dumb decisions and remarks of "we talk about this later", "this is not time for this", "when right time comes" bullshit, that only serves to drag out the runtime. All that, coupled with the insanely droll and drawn out bits of melodrama just makes watching Fruits Basket a real exercise in frustration. You can skip through entire episodes of crying, shouting and flashbacks and you wouldn't miss anything. The whole series could easily be edited down to half the episode count and you'd still get the complete experience, without all the unnecessary slack (which will hopefully happen in the upcoming Fruits Basket: Prelude movie).

***For those concerned: No, I will not address the rampant insinuations of rape, pedophilia, grooming, physical and psychological abuse and other vile acts that may or may not be in the franchise. It's not my place to do so and there's enough awful shit in this mess without me having to go there, so don't ask. 'Nuff said.

The one saving grace of Fruits Basket could be the art style, which is not incredible by any means, but it's pleasant to look at and has some really nice sceneries, decent animation and real production quality to it. The music and sound are also really good additions and enhance an otherwise pretty lackluster story.

In closing, all I can say is, that Fruits Basket had real potential. A really good premise with nice art style, that ultimately got dragged down to a confusing, plot-hole-ridden black hole of incessant melodrama and bad pacing. I know many people absolutely adore this series (judging by all the 10/10 ratings here alone), and I don't mean to invalidate anyone's enjoyment of the franchise, but some things have to be said out loud when it comes to this anime. If you've enjoyed it, more power to you. If not, it's time to move on to different waters. Thanks for reading!

I REALLY wanted to like this show - but seriously, after 10 episodes in - it is so boring - or rather I HATE the main female MC SO MUCH + a very very very slow story.

Dont get me wrong - I love the art style of Tohru Honda, she always changed her hairstyle and she looks so soft/cute. It is really the character that annoyed me! As other review as pointed out, "Chihayafuru" gives us a pretty similar type of MC but is much more likeable!

It is hard to pinpoint what exactly makes Tohru so frustrating, but let me try:
(1) She PANICS/CRIES ... every SINGLE time when the guys fight/or just say something a bit unexpected/or even just PRAISED HER (!!! this is the greatest frustrating part for me). E.g. when the Ox praised her - she PANICS and CRIES - "I haven't don't anything to deserve etc" - can she just accept a praise gracefully and NOT Panic ?!?
(2) She does not have high regards FOR HERSELF. E.g. thinking the family doctor called her to scold her for "one of my many shortcomings"
(3) She talks about her mother ALL THE TIME, unnecessarily. Yes, I know about her past - but is it really necessary to talk about - how her mother would have XX; would have XX; xx every single time? That is so annoying.

Story-wise, 10 episodes in, the plot is very slow and gets mundane with all the unnecessary fights..boring to watch

After the backlash in forum about how Fruits basket Final Season should be on MALs Top 1, I needed to know what all the fuss is about and I gave it a go.

Although I need to mention, that I have only finished the first season (obviously this review is only for this season).

This will be a short review.


There are just a few good shojo Animes out there, which are wholesome and I enjoyed them. Shojo anime like Shirayuki, Kimi ni Todoke and Toradora even though Shirayuki is the only one of them all, who respects female characters and give them personality. There whole Identity aren't ... shaped up by the male characters, who are longing for them. So basically, Shirayuki is the one and only shojo anime that did great in terms of romance.

The problematic side of Shojo animes/mangas
I want to discuss the huge problematic side of every basic shojo anime or manga, which needs to be addressed more often.

The fact that
1. Female MC is shallow, characterless and her whole Identity is about being around male chracters
2. Female characters are selfless and dedicated to throw their whole life for men
3. Age doesn't matter, female mc can be a minor but still can live with a perverted older male character

And most importantly:

4. Female characters get se**ally abused/ molested by attractive men

For example: FC gets pinned on the wall, FC sleeps and gets nearly kissed by male character, FC always sees male characters naked, FC gets threatend by male characters and so on and so on.

Conclusion/ Final Thoughts on Fruits Basket
The only interesting thing about Fruit Basket was the beginning, were the folklore was introduced and the 24th episode, were "True Forms" are being mentioned, everything else felt so dragged and filler like, I didn't enjoy this whole mess.

My 16 year old self would have enjoyed the pinning on the wall, the se**al harassment in fiction, but after seeing what real girls are going through because some men don't know their boundaries, it makes you shiver in fear.

Women can't go outside without constent fear of harassment and here we have young girls thinking this is romance. It is in fact not. Now, know this. Every movie you are watching downgrades women and now it is time to bring this awarness to young girls and women.






Story: Folklore: interesting, everything else? No plot: 3
Art: 6
Sound: 6
Character: 4, shallow female characters, perverted males
Enjoyment: 3
Overall: 4

I don't know how I made it that far tbh. I have no problem watching shoujo anime, but this is really the divine testing my endurance.
To keep it short, my main problem is the main character. Her voice and actions are so blend it's surreal. Usually cheesy plots and shoujo mc compromise with one another to some extent as to make the anime watchable. Here sadly the main character is just uncompromisable, and the plot just makes it worse by highlighting just how important the mc is to all the other characters.

I found it boring. Unbelievably so. Nothing is happening. And seriously her ... voice is extremely annoying since it somehow reflects how innocent and pure she is. It scarred how I view the shoujo genre as a whole. I am convinced the people only watch it to see the two guys on screen and that's it. Literally. Their problems do not make sense and have no weight whatsoever so forget about it being relatable in any shape or form. I watched these eleven episodes a year ago, but I cannot live without ranting here because I was hugely misled by the popularity and rating of this show.

That being said, maybe this is just not for me. I felt similar utter boredom while watching Kimi ni todoke. But watching Blue Spring Ride, my little monster, and other shoujo anime did not make me feel like I am enduring anything. It's really not worth it.

Watching this anime was torment to me. And it conflicted me. I read the manga when I was a teenager, and I absolutely loved it. I had a special affection for the characters and the story, I kinda knew that there were a lot of sexist themes and behaviours, but it was something that I could avoid because, well, at the time I thought it was harmless. Now, however, I couldn't stand the narrative. It was awful to watch. Tohru fullfills a very obsolete model of what a woman should be, being submissive and forgiving, just overall very passive. This series is special to me, ... but watching it as an adult makes me realize that it is not worthy of being relieved in this day and age. It just doesn't bring anything new.
It was lacking a lot in realistic development, considering that there are sensitive topics such as loss, suicide and bulliyng. I felt that the characters were very cartoon-like. In the first part of the story Kyo and Yuki behave exaclty the same, you can only differentiate them by their looks; they are overly protective towards Tohru and they fight. That's it. They lack depth, and all the characters fall in this dynamic: they are a mere cartoon of what a person actually is. And the comedy is ... non-existent.
It pains me to write this. This makes me wanna read the manga all over again to check whether the adaptation was just bad or if it was me who changed. Maybe I'm just too grown to like it now.

Coming from someone who has watched the original anime as a teen and was very hyped to watch this as an adult, I will give you a few things that I have enjoyed and a few things that I personally did not enjoy, series was dropped on episode 10.

Pros:
The art was thoroughly well done from the original I quite enjoyed seeing the characters all up to date in the newer style so props to the animator teams.

The voice acting is fairly well done to I liked how they sounded during different emotions whether the characters got angry or sad or happy.

now for the cons:
Questionable ... scenes and lines:
I feel like there is a lot of questionable things that happen throughout the series that make you think kids should not watch this. They make humour out of very serious topics such as rape, child predators and even violence whether abuse to the Tohru(female) and other male characters. Personally I don't mind humour out of dark topics but only when it's done well and this was done poorly. Theres a lot of hints at Tohru being female so that means she can't defend herself so a man should have to walk her home. The Soma family legit puts Tohrus life in danger constantly and just a lot of other sexiest topics (no i'm not a feminist but it sickened me to see it).

Story:
The story is just so bland, constant headache of fighting and it happens every single episode it get tiring to watch and brings nothing to the story expect from cringe lines from Tohru about being happy all the time.

tdlr: Don't bother with this joke of a remake anime it has outdated ideals, bland story with maybe a two good things about it like the animation and sound.

I just cant anymore man, I thought this show would be good since the hype around it was insanely high but sad to say it is nothing but disappointing. I guess Shoujo is just not for me, I tried so hard not to criticize this anime but god damm the mc is fucking stupid af and the male mcs are fucking appaling. The art was fine and the sound design was good but only if the story was not so cheesy I could enjoy it.
I regret watching this. This show was so boring that it cured my insomnia.
I just cant anymore man, I thought ... this show would be good since the hype around it was insanely high but sad to say it is nothing but disappointing. I guess Shoujo is just not for me, I tried so hard not to criticize this anime but god damm the mc is fucking stupid af and the male mcs are fucking appaling. The art was fine and the sound design was good but only if the story was not so cheesy I could enjoy it.
I regret watching this. This show was so boring that it cured my insomnia.

This rating and review cover the entire seasons (1, 2, and the final one).

(Note: I base my review on my overall enjoyment).

I enjoyed watching the original Fruits Basket and was very hyped when the new version came out. Of course, I have never read the manga because I didn't want to spoil the ending. Needless to say, the excitement and anticipation all but dwindled after I've finished watching the first season.

I remembered I couldn't stop laughing in the older version of Fruits Basket and was expecting the same with this new one. But of course, episode after episode, there was only me sitting watching silently, ... and sometimes, getting rather frustrated and annoyed. Why? Because every so often, I'm being told by one character or another that the female lead is so nice and wonderful, and now and again, the two male leads would bicker and fight for no apparent reasons. It was entertaining at first, but that got old fast.

In my humble opinion, season 1 was okay, season 2 was boring and slow, and the final season was just horrible. To sum up, all three seasons of some 60+ episodes could have been made into a one-season of 25 episodes and that would have told the complete story. Of course, I don't like the ending and after finishing, the story leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Now I have to go find something else to watch to wash it off. Maybe I'll watch Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi (Kakuriyo: Bed and Breakfast for Spirits) again because it has a far more interesting plot and characters, especially the female lead Aoi, who shows strength through actions instead of every other character in the story keep reminding the viewer of this.