Article contributed by Madalena Daleziou
Fruits Basket is back for its third and final season, and most likely the darkest yet. Season 2 departed from the generally more light-hearted, though still emotional first season and dove deeper into the main characters’ traumas and past regrets.
If you are thinking of starting watching the final season as it airs on Crunchyroll or Funimation, but want to refresh your memory of Season 2, we’ve got you covered with a review and a recap of the major events that changed everything we thought about Tohru, the Sohmas, and the curse.
Season 2 started with Tohru settled in the Sohma household for good. Tohru, Yuki, and Kyo prepare to enter their final year at high school, which is stressful to them for different reasons as they have to think of the future; it doesn’t help that some of them feel they don’t have much of a future… but more of that in a bit.
Tohru and the Sohmas decide to spend their summer holiday in a Sohma property by the sea and have some fun days before the school year starts. Thankfully for the show’s pacing, this time doesn’t feel like your typical “beach episode”, which we encounter in many anime shows; even in the relatively light-hearted episodes, there’s character growth and inner demons that fight to emerge.
Things get scary when Akito decides to also visit the seaside town and expects the rest of the Sohmas to attend to him, apart from Kyo whom he doesn’t want to see, resulting in Kyo and Tohru spending a lot of time alone and their bond growing even stronger.
Eventually, Tohru and Akito meet and Tohru learns the full extend of the curse: Akito is like the god of the zodiac Circle which basically means that those affected by the Zodiac curse are supernaturally drown to him and can’t resist his will even if he abuses them. Moreover, Akito’s ultimate plan is for them to all live together with him after the younger ones graduate, and for Kyo to live forever confined, like the previous Cat before him.
Throughout the show, we’ve seen Tohru acting selflessly, always with the interests of others in mind. Learning about the curse is a turning point for her. Upon hearing what is going to happen to Kyo, she resolves to find out more about the curse, and end it. In doing so, she’s once again acting on her wish to help her friends, but for the first time, there’s some selfishness there too. She doesn’t want to lose her friends, who have been there when she needed them the most. But already, there are hints that she feels more than friendship for Kyo and wants more.
In the holiday house, Tohru meets Kureno Sohma, who always accompanies Akito and is never seen alone. She realises that Kureno must be the person her best friend Arisa is in love with. Back home, she tries to get Kureno to at least let Arisa talk to him about her feelings, but he refuses to see Arisa.
Soon, the parent-teacher conference draws near, causing different sorts of feeling to our main characters. Yuki is particularly stressed because his mother, who is normally indifferent, tries to control him in order to gain more privileges for herself. Yuki is rescued by his brother, Ayame, who is finally putting some effort in the relationship, making Yuki realise he can actually depend on him.
Yuki’s character development is truly amazing in Season 2. At first, many fans might have thought that his tender feelings towards Tohru would culminate in a declaration of love, but it turns out this is not the case. Yuki, who was abandoned and forced to live with the abusive Akito, never felt parental love. Due to that, he projected his need for motherly love to Tohru, because she was the first person to actually believe in him and have his back.
As Season 2 goes by, Yuki grows close with Machi, a fellow student council member who acts cold towards him, unlike most girls at school who try to flirt with him. He also starts to confide in another classmate, Manabe, who turns out to be Machi’s half-brother and brought up to compete with her for their father’s wealth. Seeing other people also struggling with a complicated family situation they did not choose, Yuki sees his own situation more clearly and starts to heal.
Meanwhile, Rin, who has broken up with Hatsuharu to protect him from Akito’s wrath, is trying to break the curse by herself. In doing so, she neglects to take care of herself and ends up sick in Shigure’s house, where Tohru takes care of her. Although Rin tries to keep her at a distance, Tohru perseveres and they to eventually form a friendship and bond over their mutual wish to break the curse.
This, and Tohru’s insistence to help Arisa, result in her meeting Kureno again for the first time alone. Earlier, Tohru had been told that Kureno is the rooster of the zodiac circle, but Kureno hugs her to show her that he is no longer bound by the curse that causes members to transform into their respective animals when hugged or unwell.
Kureno reveals that he’s unsure why his curse broke when the other Sohmas remain cursed. While he is now free of Akito, he still cannot bring himself to leave. When Tohru cannot understand why, Kureno reveals that Akito is actually a girl, forced to grow up as a boy by her mother, Ren. Akito was also abused in childhood, and only knows how to recreate the violence she has experienced while mistakenly thinking her bond with the zodiac members is true love. While Akito remains helpless and miserable, Kureno tells Tohru that he can never leave and be with Arisa, ending the show in a heart-breaking note.
In many ways, Season 2 was different from the first one. There were many more dark moments, and there is a sense of foreboding, a feeling that the characters can never go back to the way things were before. There was still light-hearted fun, especially in the student council episodes, but more importantly, there was character growth, development of positive relationships and hope for the future. As is always the case with Fruits Basket, problems aren’t solved magically. Trauma is still there and healing is a long, often ugly process, but the show is all about the little moments of happiness, love and hope in the meantime.
