What To Expect From The New Fruits Basket
In case you haven't heard, Fruits Basket - a beloved shojo anime from 2001 - is getting a new adaptation. Unlike Studio Deen's previous anime, which ended on an event that occurred early in the series, TMS Entertainment's new effort will supposedly follow the manga more closely.
While we don't yet know which parts of the manga will stay and which ones will do, there are some major plot points that we can expect the new series to hit if it follows the manga. Coming up are some major spoilers for the Fruits Basket manga, so if that's something that you don't want to see, stop reading now. I'll wait.
Now that all the people with spoiler allergies are gone, let's get started. Here are some major things that we might be seeing in the new series.
New Characters
The manga introduces a plethora of new characters, including members of the student council, Tohru's father, and more...but the most important new characters are Isuzu and Kureno Sohma, the two missing members of the Zodiac curse. Isuzu, who is usually known as Rin, is the horse. Rin suffered from severe physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her parents. Though she had a normal and happy life at first, this proved to be an illusion when she asked her parents why they never seemed sad or angry, and they began to show her exactly how sad and angry they could be. Because of this history, she can't believe that Tohru doesn't secretly mean their family harm, and she wants her to leave as soon as possible. One of the only positive things in her life is her relationship with Haru. Kureno was the rooster (depicted in the manga as a sparrow) but his curse was broken before the series began. In order to get Kureno to stay with the family even though he wasn't bound by the curse, Akito starts having sex with him. If you didn't know that Fruits Basket could get horny, now you know.
Akito's Secret
Akito Sohma, the head of the Sohma Family, is a woman. No, she's not a trans woman - Fruits Basket was never that woke. She was born female, and raised as a male because her mother Ren couldn't stand the idea of her husband paying more attention to another woman than he did to her. Because that's typically how people feel about their infant daughters. Forced to live a lie, and fed the false idea that she was a god who required devoted servants, and could only experience love if those servants never left her side, Akito became the despotic, controlling character that fans of the anime remember. This is markedly different from Akito's motivation in the anime, which is that the cursed family was draining Akito's life force and making him too sick to leave his home, and he was furious about being forced into such a taxing position. Tohru Makes A Choice
One of the biggest questions that fans of the anime had was about who Tohru was going to fall in love with, Yuki or Kyo. In the manga, that question has been answered - apologies to Yukiru and Kyoyuki fans, but Tohru winds up falling for Kyo. In fact, by the end of the series, they've married and had a child. Don't worry though, Yuki isn't left hanging - he realizes that he never really loved Tohru romantically, and instead saw her as a maternal figure. He finds true love with Machi, a girl he meets on the student council. The Curse Is Lifted
Exactly how the curse is lifted is kind of confusing. Part of the manga makes it seem like it happened because Kyo, the cat of the Zodiac who also transforms into a rabbitlike monster, finds true love with Tohru. The other theory is that after Akito starts living as a girl again, and accepts that love isn't about controlling people, she lifts the curse. Neither of these methods make much sense - if Akito had been able to do that and simply wasn't doing it because of her mother's abuse, why didn't a more emotionally stable ancestor do it earlier? If the cat finding love could solve the problem, why had that never happened in a previous generation? Maybe that's a loose end that the anime will clear up. Everyone Gets A Love Story (Except Momiji)
After the curse is lifted, the majority of the cast go on to enjoy heterosexual relationships - including some seriously wack pairings. Hanajima, who is the same age as Kyo, gets with Kyo's dad while she's still a teenager. Akito ends up with Shigure - who, by the way, once had sex with Akito's mom to get revenge on Akito for the Kureno thing mentioned above. They get together and have a kid named Shiki. Ritsu gets with Shigure's editor out of nowhere, Ayame gets a woman, and Momiji is forever alone. Like I said, wack. This isn't all that the manga has to offer - there are a whole lot more plot points and side stories that may make their way into the new series. It's hard to say what's going to stay and what's going to go, but thanks to Natsuki Takaya's involvement with the project, it's likely that the new Fruits Basket will follow the manga pretty closely.