Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Fruits Basket ::
by William the Bloody
Tohru Honda was 16 years old when her mother died after a car accident. She went to live with her grandfather (since her father had already died when she was a child), but now her aunt, uncle and cousin are going to live with them as well, so the house will be closed for renovations for a while. Tohru assures her grandfather that she has some friends to stay with for the month or two it will take to fix up the house, when in reality she opts to live in a tent in the woods. Oh, Tohru has friends, two best friends in fact, but one of them lives in a one room apartment and the other has a very large family and Tohru just couldn't see herself putting her dear friends out. Since her mom died, she has taken up work cleaning offices in the evening, so it's school, then work, the home to the tent for dinner, homework and sleep. On her way to school through the forest one day, she finds herself outside a cottage with some painted stones drying on the porch and she stops to admire them, the animals of the Chinese Zodiac. Toru discovers that her classmate "Prince" Yuki Sohma (so nicknamed due his being quite handsome, intelligent and good at sports) lives there and he walks her to school. At the end of the day, Yuki finds Tohru in the woods again, only she's more than a little worse for wear. It seems life in the tent along with her daily stresses have taken a toll on Tohru's health and so Yuki takes her to the cottage. The recent rainy weather also causes a landslide in the woods and poor Tohru's tent is no more. Tohru passes out, and Yuki and his older cousin Shugure who owns the cottage, lie her down, where in a fever induced state, she tells them everything about her mom dying, why she came to live in a tent, and how come she didn't drop out of school in order to work full time (it was her mother's greatest wish for Toru to get a diploma as she had dropped out and felt she missed opportunities because of it). Shigure and Yuki are both touched by Tohru's words, and let her spend the night, while Yuki spends hours digging through the landslide to find Tohru's things. Tohru wakes up the next morning a little disoriented but better, and Shigure convinces her to stay at the cottage as their live in house keeper since both he and Yuki are terrible slobs and cannot even find their own kitchen anymore under the mess. Tohru moves into the empty room upstairs when a strange man, another one of Yuki's cousins, bursts in and challenges Yuki to a fight, only one thing leads to another, where in order stop her from falling down Yuki grabs her and... POOF he turns into a rat. Then she runs into the stranger and POOF he turns into a cat. Shigure walks into her and POOF he turns into a dog. Tohru is panicked thinking she must have done something to turn her new friends into animals, but Shigure in dog form explains that the Sohma family is cursed, and there are some members who transform into the animals of the Chinese Zodiac either when embraced by someone of the opposite sex or under great anxiety, but it wears off after a little while. The Sohma family is very large, very old and very, very wealthy, so they have managed to keep their tragic curse a secret from those outside for generations. Tohru can stay on as house keeper if she agrees to keep the secret, which she does, after all, they're her friends now and if her friends ask something of her, Tohru will be sure to do it. This is fortunate for Tohru, because it seems the mysterious Sohma family will do whatever it can to keep its curse a secret, up to and including erasing someone's memory, but Shigure convinces the head of the family that she is trustworthy so hopefully it won't come to that. Now the large Sohma family gets word of an outsider who is aware of their curse and suddenly all want to meet her! Life in the Sohma cottage will be more than Tohru bargained for!
The Good: The animation is good, clean and crisp, and keeps the tone of what I've seen of the original manga series it is based upon. The characters are great, each with their own distinctive personalities, and giving the people who personify Zodiac animals the qualities expected of their sign. I simply adore the lead character Tohru. There is no other way to describe her other than as a good person. Literally she is honest to goodness, down to bone GOOD. Her motivations are always pure and she always puts her friends' needs above her own. I also like what the did with Kyo, Yuki's cat-cousin. There is no official year of the cat in the zodiac, but the Chinese legend has a cat character, and they do a good job giving Kyo a cat-like personality. Shigure amuses me because he is slightly perverted, what with his love of high school girls, but he is also fiercely loyal and also a bit of a joker. The overall writing on this series is excellent, giving us both fun and genuine emotional moments. The English dub voice cast is wonderful. The three main characters, Tohru, Yuki and Kyo, and all superbly done voices. Tohru's I find especially has personality and a realism to it. Unfortunately, I did not get a chance to watch it in its original Japanese, so I can't tell you how they sounded.
The Bad: There is one young boy of the Sohma family (Momiji, the rabbit) who is obviously voiced by a girl in the English cast. It's not TERRIBLE, but it does bother me a little bit. I mean, they did get actual prepubescent boy actors for all of the other young males. Also, there is one character who appears late in the series (Ritsu Sohma, the monkey) who is really, REALLY annoying. In keeping in tune with the personality traits of the monkey, he is apologetic... a bit TOO much. I mean, he EXPLODES into super loud and crazy apologies. Once or twice, funny... over and OVER AGAIN, not so much. There were a few plot points I wasn't clear on. I don't know if it's just me who missed some exposition someplace, but I don't understand why Akido is the head of the Sohma family. I mean, he isn't the oldest by far and he doesn't have a Zodiac animal. There was something said about how he "was chosen to die", and I have no idea what that even means. He's alive, but very sick, but what, did the Sohma family MAKE him sick on purpose, and how would they even DO that? Something about he got chosen to die so he's in charge, but I don't understand WHY, dammit! Maybe it's in the manga and they glossed over it here? Oh and the series may at times come off as TOO sappy.
Overall, I liked it. It was heartwarming giggle fest that makes me feel squishy inside. Tohru's ability to look for the good qualities in everyone make her an admirable lead character, but not without her flaws (as Kyo pointed out, she sees the good qualities in others but not herself). The series starts out funny and evolves into an encouraging emotional tale which will tug at your heart strings. Great characters, writing, animation, and fun can outbalance its shortcomings, if you can get into something super sugary sweet.
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