Fruits Basket

**Fruits Basket** (フルーツバスケット) ,also abbriviated to **Furuba** or **Fruba** (フルバ), is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Natsuki Takaya. It was serialized in the semi-monthly Japanese shōjo manga magazine Hana to Yume, published by Hakusensha, from 1998 to 2006. The series' title comes from the name of a popular game played in Japanese elementary schools, which is alluded to in the series.

*Fruits Basket* tells the story of Tohru Honda, an orphan girl who, after meeting Yuki, Kyo, and Shigure Sohma, learns that twelve members of the Sohma family are possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac and are cursed to turn into their animal forms when they are weak, stressed, or when they are embraced by anyone of the opposite sex that is not possessed by a spirit of the zodiac. As the series progresses, Tohru learns of the hardships and pain faced by the afflicted members of the Sohma family, and through her own generous and loving nature, helps heal their emotional wounds. As she learns more about Yuki, Kyo, and the rest of the mysterious Sohma family, Tohru also learns more about herself and how much others care for her.

Takaya began a sequel titled *Fruits Basket Another* in September 2015, and the spin-off series *The Three Musketeers Arc* in April 2019. The original manga was first adapted into a 26-episode anime television series in 2001, by Studio Deen and directed by Akitaro Daichi. A second anime television series adaptation, produced by TMS Entertainment and directed by Yoshihide Ibata, premiered from April 2019, with its first season airing from April to September 2019, its second season airing from April to September 2020, and its third and final season airing from April to June 2021. The reboot anime series is a co-production of Funimation, who released the series through a partnership with Crunchyroll.

A new anime series titled *Kyо̄ko to Katsuya no Monogatari* has been announced and is set to premiere in 2022.

## Plot

When high school student Tohru Honda's mother dies in a car accident, Tohru decides to live with her grandfather. Renovations on the house and an unsupportive, unkind family member cause her to move out of her grandfather's house temporarily. Tohru declines the offer to stay with one of her two close friends as she does not want to impose on them; since she has nowhere else to go, Tohru begins living in a tent and supporting herself.

However, after discovering a nearby home inhabited by her popular classmate Yuki Sohma and his cousin Shigure, and following a landslide that destroys her tent, Tohru moves into the Sohma house; on her first day living there, she meets Kyo, Yuki and Shigure's orange haired cousin, who crashes through the ceiling and challenges Yuki to a fight.

Tohru tries to stop him, and - accidentally falling into him - causes him to transform into a cat in front of her, discovering the Sohma family curse; that twelve members of the family, excluding Kyo, are possessed by the spirits of the Chinese zodiac (十二支) and turn into their zodiac animal when they are weak, under stress, embarrassed, or when hugged by someone of the opposite gender.

When Tohru discovers the Sohma family secret, she promises not to tell anyone, and is allowed to keep living with them. Although the Sohma curse stretches far deeper and darker than Tohru initially thinks, her presence and her acceptance of them soon becomes a large, positive influence on those possessed by the zodiac. She sets out to break the curse and, on the way, meets and discovers the Sohmas' vengeful zodiac spirits, including their leader, Akito, who occupies the position of "God" in the Chinese legend, and who both keeps the family together and chains them to their spirits.

## Production

The title of the series is taken from a children's game, Fruits Basket, in which the participants sit in a circle, and the leader of the game names each person after a type of fruit; when the name of a child's fruit is called, that child gets up and has to find a new seat. When the protagonist, Tohru Honda, first plays this game in kindergarten, she is not given a fruit, and is instead assigned "onigiri" by her classmates, who do not want her to play. However, Tohru, thinking that are delicious, does not realise that her classmates are intentionally leaving her out of the game; once the game is finished, and all of the children but Tohru have been called, Tohru realizes that onigiri are not a type of fruit at all, and she realizes that she does not belong.

Tohru comes to associate this game with the Soma family, and that she does not fit in among them any more than an onigiri does in a basket of fruit. In volume 1 of the manga, after Yuki and Kyo bring Tohru home from her grandfather's house, she begins to feel like she belongs with the Sohma family; after this, she imagines herself as a child hearing "onigiri" called in the game, symbolizing that she has finally found her place.

Natsuki Takaya named most of the twelve Somas cursed by zodiac animals after archaic names of month in the former Japanese lunisolar calendar that correspond to their zodiac animal. The exceptions are Kureno and Momiji, whose names were swapped by mistake; Kyo, as the cat, is not part of the official zodiac, and so does not follow these naming conventions. Yuki's name also does not follow this naming convention, since Takaya came up with it before deciding the other names.