Review of Fruits Basket

This anime reminds me of "Full Moon wo Sagashite" (to be abbreviated as FMwS from here on). Here's a list of things the two share in common: 1)I think both are hugely overrated; 2)they are both shoujo (duh!); 3)They are both the heart-warming type of anime; 4)They both have female leads that are so INHUMANELY nice that they can get a bit annoying. 5)They both try (rather unsuccessfully, in my opinion) to be funny. Though "Fruits Basket" tries a lot harder than FMwS. And here's a list of things that the two anime differ in: 1)FMwS's music kinda sucked a lot of the time despite the show being about music, whilst themusic in "Fruits Basket" is almost impeccable, with the soft instrumentals never failing to inject emotion into the more moving scenes. I loved almost all the background music apart from the "drum roll comedy mode" it sometimes goes into. In fact, the amazing opening track is possibly one of the reasons why I didn't hate this anime the way I hated FMwS - how could I bring myself to hate an anime with such an amazing opening theme? :D

2)Whilst FMwS has loads of blatant filler episodes disguised under the excuse of "character development" (pretty poor excuse to be honest, since I didn't find most of the episodes character developing at all), I found the story in "Fruits Basket" has a nice flow that is developing constantly.

Which is better? Well, I'd have to say FMwS. Though plagued with fillers, FMwS nevertheless manages it to redeem itself a lot from its incredible last 10 episodes. "Fruit Basket", unfortunately, is full of "filler comedy" instead, and had no long lasting periods of awesomeness. The comedy used in "Fruits Basket" is the slap stick kind and not very witty for the most part. There's horrific overuse of super deformity to try and force a comedy moment when there simply isn't one. It's interesting to note that they went as far as completely immersing the comedy elements within the serious elements. But, I'm afraid it's not something that I can appreciate because in general, I simply... hate... this... kind... of... comedy. Besides, people rarely use comedy this way because you run the risk of diminishing the effectiveness of the serious moments with the comedy, which is often the case with this anime.

Story and characters are the main strengths of this anime. I liked the way the story is developed in such a natural way. It's good that it chose not to do anything like the artificial "zodiac animal of the week" format that would have been so easy to fall into in this kind of anime. Instead, the characters gets introduced in a much more natural, unpredictable fashion. In fact, by the end, we don't even get to meet all of the zodiac animals... which may disappoint some people, but again, I think it just makes the whole thing seem less like an artificial character introduction process.

Essentially, the theme of "Fruits Basket" is about being different, about the people who don't fit in with normal society. The focus of this anime all deals with these "different" people. In fact the title "Fruits Basket" itself is related to the backstory of the main character Toru being "different". It's a very moralistic story, and throughout the anime, I find myself sympathising with the characters as they tell their story such as the one told by Mimiji. Everyone seems to have a story to tell, and some were so moving they almost brought tears to my eyes - I particularly liked the story of the idiot traveller. These mini stories that are dotted across the whole series are mostly very captivating, but not all of them manage to hit the soft spot. I couldn't remember for the life of me the backstory to the "Yankee" (can't remember her name) cos it made such a light impression on me, and there were a few others that didn't quite work out. I got the feeling they were trying too hard to make a sad story for every character so some inevitably ended up feeling contrived, and I didn't really feel much at all for those characters. There are times where the voices sound like they're trying too hard to be emotionally crippled or something, and ended up sounding overly flat and apathetic instead, as though they are slowly learning how to read from a script. Speaking of flat voices... what a crap character that "Yankee" girl is. Another one of those deadpan emotionless characters - can she get any more cliched? For some reason this kind of character *really* gets on my nerves.

Most of the characters are likeable, if a little annoying during the "comedy" moments. The only character who I find to be consistently funny is Shigure, probably because he doesn't rely so heavy on the super deformity humour, and is genuinely funny because of what he does and say in that sneaky way of his. I think that he is one of the most interesting characters in the cast - even though he acts like an idiot all the time, he is probably wisest of all. He sees through everything that goes on, but says very little of the things he sees.

The main character Toru, with her pure, innocent personality, subtly changes so many of the characters over time. But the main problem, as I mentioned already, is that she is just too nice. The only time her infinite niceness is truly put to the test was during the last few episodes (again, just like FMwS). The last few episodes succeeds so well as a climax I had to watch them all in one sitting. They were undeniably exciting, but the motivation behind it is weak. It's painfully transparent that those events basically unfold just to give Toru a "final test", tougher than any she faced before, like a final boss in a game. But the main problem is that it makes no sense with respect to the plot - why, out of all animals, does the curse fall on that particular one? I can't really think of any reason why that animal would be special in that way, and the anime doesn't really provide any answers either. The result of Toru's confrontation with another character turns out to be boringly predictive too, and comes off as a bit of an anti climax - it feels like it's just all too easily resolved.

Whilst I feel the cancer aspect in FMwS is played down too much and is very forgettable, the tragedy that happened to Toru's mother in this anime is given its deserved attention. Throughout the anime, Toru turns to the photo of her dead mother for guidance and strength. In fact, I think they may have overplayed it - it's all very convincing that Toru seeks to draw strength and comfort from the portrait of her mother, but to go as far as what she did in the bathhouse episode?! I think not. However much someone is devoted to their mother, I don't think anyone would do what she did in that episode... unless maybe they're too young to know better or not quite right in the head. Considering Toru's extreme niceness, I guess an argument can be made for the latter

In summary, Fruits Basket is for those who like an anime with lots of over the top comedy, and a story full of morals. But be warned, it contain characters that are so nice in a fairy tale kind of way that they'll annoy the hell out of people who don't quite appreciate niceness taken to those extremes. Some may even go as far as calling it "puke inducing". I wouldn't go that far personally, but the sweetness of the show is all a little bit too much. On a rating scale of Yes No or Maybe, I'd give this a Maybe.