48 Fun Facts About Fruits Basket

Which zodiac animal is Hiro, the sharp-tongued schoolboy who is in love with Kisa?

The sheep is Hiro's animal. Unlike most zodiac parents, his mother took his transformations in her stride, so he grew up in an unusually peaceful, loving home.

In which shōjo magazine was Fruits Basket serialised from 1998 to 2006?

Hana to Yume, Hakusensha's twice-monthly shōjo magazine, carried the whole run. Partway through, Takaya needed surgery and the series went on hiatus until she returned to finish it.

The title Fruits Basket comes from what?

A Japanese schoolyard game gives the series its title: children named after fruits swap seats when theirs is called. Classmates shut Tohru out of it, the root of her feeling that she doesn't belong.

What did Tohru's kindergarten classmates nickname her instead of a fruit?

They named her Onigiri, a rice ball, which is not a fruit, so she was never called and only realised afterwards that she had been left out.

How does Tohru's mother die shortly before Fruits Basket begins?

In a car accident shortly before the story opens, Tohru's mother is struck and killed; a cursed Sohma who saw it hesitated to pull her clear for fear of exposing the curse.

Where is Tohru living when she first discovers the Sohma house?

In a tent in the woods on Sohma land, Tohru camps alone while her grandfather's house is remodelled, unwilling to impose on her friends Arisa and Saki.

What disaster wrecks Tohru's makeshift home, leading the Sohmas to take her in?

A landslide buries everything she owns, so Shigure and Yuki invite her to live in their house, where she earns her keep by cooking and cleaning.

How does Kyo first enter Shigure's house in chapter one?

He crashes through the ceiling of Tohru's new room while Yuki is showing it to her, and at once challenges Yuki to a fight.

What triggers a cursed Sohma's transformation into their zodiac animal?

A hug from the opposite sex, or stress, sets off the change, though a hug from another cursed Sohma is safe. When his curse finally lifts, the first thing Yuki does is embrace the girl he loves.

Which zodiac animal is Yuki?

As the rat, he is the object of Kyo's lifelong hatred, even though the two secretly envy each other.

Which zodiac animal is Shigure, whose house Tohru moves into?

The dog is Shigure's zodiac animal; outside the family he is a novelist who writes literary fiction under his own name and racy romances under the pen name Noa Kiritani.

What role in the zodiac legend does Akito occupy?

Akito is the God of the zodiac, the figure the animals of the legend were bound to; that bond compels the cursed Sohmas to obey Akito and holds the family together.

What does Fruits Basket chapter 97 reveal that the 2001 anime never does?

The family head is biologically female: Akito was raised as a boy at the insistence of Akito's mother Ren, a secret kept from the younger zodiac members and from Tohru until late in the manga.

In Fruits Basket, what awaits Kyo if he fails to beat Yuki before he graduates high school?

Confinement for life on the Sohma estate is his stake in a bet with Akito, who offered him a place in the zodiac if he won. He never beats Yuki, and is spared only because Akito relents.

What happens when Kyo's bead bracelet is removed?

He becomes a grotesque, stinking monster, the true form that his bead bracelet normally suppresses; Tohru follows him into the woods in that form and begs him to come home.

Who took Kyo in and raised him after his mother's death?

Kazuma Sohma, the karate master his pupils call Shishō, took the boy in after his mother died and his own father rejected him, and came to think of him as his own son.

Why did Fruits Basket's karate master feel bound to take in the young cat?

Guilt over his grandfather, the previous cat, drove him. As a boy he refused a sweet the old man offered, calling it cursed, and the forgiving smile he got back haunted him for years.

Hatori is the zodiac's dragon in Fruits Basket, but what creature does he actually turn into?

A seahorse, about eight centimetres long, is all the dragon's spirit can manage. Shigure reads it as a sign that the zodiac curse is weakening.

What does Hatori do to outsiders who learn the Sohma family secret?

He erases their memories with a hypnosis-like technique passed down his line of the family. Momiji's mother begged him to use it on her, because she could not bear having a cursed son.

How did Hatori become nearly blind in his left eye?

Akito attacked him when he asked to marry his assistant Kana, striking his left eye; Akito then blamed Kana for the injury, and her guilt-stricken breakdown ended the engagement.

In Fruits Basket, Momiji the rabbit has a mother from which European country?

Germany is his mother's homeland. Repelled by the curse, she rejected him, so he grew up on the Sohma estate apart from her and from his sister Momo, who doesn't know he is her brother.

What do the Sohmas call Hatsuharu's calm and enraged personalities?

White and Black are the names for his calm and his violent sides; he is the ox, with white hair over black roots, and as a child he blamed Yuki for the ox's reputation for stupidity.

What does Ayame, the snake and Yuki's older brother, sell in his shop?

Custom romantic costumes such as frilly dresses and maid outfits are made to order with his seamstress, Mine Kuramae. When his curse lifts, he can finally embrace her.

Which zodiac animal is the shy Kisa, who stops speaking after being bullied?

The tiger is Kisa's animal; her tawny hair and golden eyes are marks of the curse, and she grows close to Tohru, calling her onee-chan, after Tohru coaxes her to speak again.

Which zodiac animal is the anxious, constantly apologising Ritsu?

The monkey is Ritsu's animal. He dresses in women's kimono because he feels less pressure that way, and he is in training to succeed his mother as hostess of the Sohma family's hot-spring inn.

How did the young Kagura get Kyo to propose in the Fruits Basket manga?

She threatened him with a knife when they were children and has called herself his fiancée ever since. She later admits her love began as pity for the cat.

What is unusual about the rooster's curse when Fruits Basket begins?

It broke roughly ten years earlier, when he was in his teens, yet Akito keeps him confined to the estate to hide it, so he is 26 before he first sets foot in a convenience store.

Which bird did the Sohma family's rooster actually turn into?

A sparrow, not a rooster, was his animal form. He is also the one who frees Rin after Akito locks her away.

Why did Fruits Basket's author lengthen Rin's hair from her first short-haired design?

To suggest a horse's mane blowing in the wind, Takaya lengthened the short hair of her first design, since Rin is the zodiac's horse. Akito later hacks it short as a punishment.

What was Tohru's mother Kyoko before she married?

Leader of an all-girl biker gang in her teens, she was nicknamed the Red Butterfly because her bike's tail-light looked like a red butterfly as she rode at night.

In Fruits Basket, what was the dying Kyoko asking of Kyo when he heard only "I'll never forgive you"?

To protect Tohru, as he had promised her years before. She got out only "I'll never forgive you", and Kyo carried the guilt for years.

What special ability does Tohru's friend Saki Hanajima have?

She senses and sends out "waves", an electric-signal power she can also use to attack, and her reputation for poison waves keeps the Prince Yuki Fan Club away from Tohru.

Which Sohma does Tohru's brash friend Arisa Uotani fall for at a convenience store?

Kureno is the Sohma she meets at a convenience store; she frets over their nine-year age gap, and in the final chapter prepares to move in with him.

How did Fruits Basket's author name most of the cursed Sohmas?

After old lunar-calendar months matching their animal is how Takaya named the cursed Sohmas, a scheme she admitted she broke by accidentally swapping the rooster's and the rabbit's names.

Why did Takaya give Tohru a name normally used for men?

She likes masculine names on female characters, which she says balance them out. She also has the cast call her Tohru-kun, an honorific usually kept for boys, because it sounded more dignified.

Which company animated the 2001 Fruits Basket anime?

Studio Deen animated the 26-episode 2001 series under director Akitaro Daichi. It aired while the manga was still running, departs from the books in places and stops well short of their ending.

Which studio produced the 2019–2021 Fruits Basket anime, made with a new Japanese cast and staff at Takaya's request?

TMS Entertainment produced the reboot under director Yoshihide Ibata. Its 63 episodes across three seasons adapt all 23 volumes of the manga, the full story the first anime never reached.

Who sang the opening and ending themes of the 2001 anime?

Ritsuko Okazaki sang both the opening "For Fruits Basket" and the ending "Chiisana Inori" of the 2001 anime; she died in 2004.

What is the first opening theme of the 2019 anime?

The first opening was "Again" by Beverly; "Chime" by Ai Otsuka took over from episode 14, and the final season opened with "Pleasure" by WARPs UP.

Which English voice actress plays Tohru in both the 2001 and 2019 Fruits Basket dubs?

Laura Bailey voiced Tohru in Funimation's 2001 dub and came back for the 2019 reboot with much of the original English cast, even though the Japanese version was recast from scratch.

Who voices Kyo in English in both Fruits Basket anime series?

Jerry Jewell voices him in both: Funimation brought back its 2001 leads for the reboot's English dub, while the Japanese version was recast from scratch.

Who voiced Tohru in Japanese in the 2019 Fruits Basket anime?

Manaka Iwami took over from Yui Horie, the 2001 Tohru, because Natsuki Takaya asked for an entirely new Japanese cast and staff.

Which award did Fruits Basket win at the 5th Crunchyroll Anime Awards?

Best Drama went to its second season at the 2021 awards. A year earlier the first season had been nominated for the same prize and lost to Vinland Saga.

Which publisher relaunched the Fruits Basket manga in English in 2016?

Yen Press licensed it in a package with two more Natsuki Takaya series, Twinkle Stars and Liselotte & Witch's Forest.

What is the title of the sequel manga Natsuki Takaya began in 2015?

Fruits Basket Another follows high-schooler Sawa Mitoma among the next generation of Sohmas. Takaya launched it alongside the collector's edition and said Tohru, Yuki and Kyo would not appear.

What does the 2022 Fruits Basket film add to its recap of the series?

A prequel episode about Tohru's parents, titled Kyoko to Katsuya no Monogatari, is added to the recap, showing how student teacher Katsuya Honda fell for the delinquent Kyoko.

In Fruits Basket, what did the young Yuki give a lost Tohru after leading her home?

A baseball cap that had been Kyo's: Yuki tried to hand it back, Kyo refused it, and Yuki kept it. Tohru treasured the cap for years without knowing which boy had led her home.

What do Fruits Basket's final pages show about Tohru and Kyo?

They had a son and a granddaughter: the final pages jump ahead to show the two walking hand in hand in old age.