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tohruhondablog · 4 years ago

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What is Fruits Basket & Why to Watch It

Spoiler free!

What is Fruits Basket

Fruits Basket (フルーツバスケット, Furūtsu Basuketto) sometimes abbreviated 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 magazine Hana to Yume, published by Hakusensha, from 1999 to 2006. It is compiled into a total of 23 tankōbon volumes. (Fruits Basket Wiki)

Fruits Basket (2019) is the reboot anime adaption of the manga of the same name by Natsuki Takaya. The 2019 anime faithfully adapts the entirety of the manga, along with a completely new cast and staff from the original 2001 anime. The series streams on both Crunchyroll and FunimationNow, while Funimation holds the license to home video rights. (Fruits Basket Wiki)

Synopsis:

Tohru Honda is a high schooler who has just lost her mother, meaning she has now lost both her parents. She doesn’t want to bother her living relatives, her grandfather and few of his relatives, so she determines she will support herself by living in a tent. She manages for a little while, until the owners of the land, Shighre and Yuki Sohma (her classmate), discover her living there. Shigure invites her back to his house to determine why she was living in a tent in the first place. After learning her reasoning, it is decided she will stay with them for awhile in exchange for much needed cooking and cleaning around the house. In the midst of this discussion another Sohma relative Kyo arrives. Chaos ensues and Tohru accidentally falls into him, which turns him into a cat. She panics, thinking it was her fault, and bumps into the other two who also transform into animals. The Sohma's then explain to her that their family is cursed to transform into the 12 animals of the Zodiac, plus the cat, if they’re embraced by a member of the opposite gender. From here we follow Tonru as she lives her live with the Sohmas.

Why Watch Fruits Basket

My main reasons which I will go in depth on are these: the characters, the plot, and the animation and music.

Tohru Honda, Kyo, Yuki & Shigure Sohma

The characters

Tohru is an amazing main character. You will hear me time and time again mention that I highly relate to her in many ways. I will include a post introducing myself which explains why I feel qualified to give analysis from her perspective later. Yes, she is clumsy and a bit naive at times, but she is also incredibly mentally and emotionally strong. She manages to maintain an almost entirely positive and driven outlook, despite the grieving process she is currently going through. She is a wonderful person who truly cares for and puts others before herself. She will be a friend to anyone that will let her. In fact, her two best friends are a reformed former member of an all female gang, and a goth girl with a psychic power that has caused people to fear and avoid her. The friendship between them is incredible. They’re the perfect example of how women should love, support and build each other up. The Sohmas are also very interesting, because they have all suffered so much trauma from living in a family that is inherently abusive, due to the nature of their curse. This show may be considered a shoujo/romance and also has some great comedy, but don’t let it fool you. It’s very dark at times, showing the backstories of mental illness and trauma from almost every major type of abuse. The characters are not at all one-dimensional. The theme of this show is growth and change, and all of the characters grow in incredible ways. The various relationships between Tohru, the Sohmas, and the students at her school are very unique. Even minor characters are developed well with very real emotions and personalities.

The plot

The Zodiac curse is interesting all by itself, but the concept of growth and change is so much fun to watch. You’ll be rooting for the characters to be their best selves and live the happy lives they deserve. The plot is never what you’d expect and there is never a dull moment. The comedy never ceases to make me laugh, the romantic moments make my heart beat faster in my chest, and the depictions of trauma are informative and taken very seriously. There are very few shows, anime or otherwise, that can give me real physical chills from the emotions shown in them. Fruits basket has given me chills countless times. I can’t promise you that you won’t cry sometimes, but I will promise you that if you give this show a real chance it is worth all of the hype it gets. I can’t tell you how much this show has helped me learn about myself and others, and process my own traumas. This show addresses mental health in a very real, yet entertaining way that is easy to understand. I think almost anyone can relate to at least one of the characters, and I believe everyone could benefit in some way from watching. Also, if you’re a guy that happens to be reading this and are skeptical of watching a shoujo/romance with a female main character, don’t be! I have known guys that were extremely entertained by this anime, and could also relate to the male characters. Just don’t turn away from it for those reasons alone.

Animation and music

All I can say is that they must have had a high budget, because they did not hold back on providing the highest quality animation and music. The characters and scenery are absolutely gorgeous and breathtaking. The music is catchy and enjoyable. I love the soundtracks so much, I listen to them regularly.

In closing

I hope that by reading this I have convinced you to at least give Fruits Basket a try. I hope you’ll enjoy it as much as I and many many others have. There is a reason that this manga is one of the most popular shoujo of all time, as well as the 2019 anime being one of the most watched of the anime season every time a new season airs. The Internet Movie Database (IMDB) rating for it is also 8.5/10.

Thanks for reading!

🍙 Tohru’s twin (@lunastellanova)

Feel free to DM me or send an ask if you want to discuss!

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Tohru Honda's tumblr masterlist here

This blog contains Fruits Basket edits by myself (@lunastellanova), re-blogs of Fruits Basket information/art/fanfiction ect, and meta from the perspective of Tohru Honda.

#fruits basket #fruits basket 2019 #furuba #lunastellanova #tohru honda #kyo sohma #yuki sohma #shigure sohma #shoujo anime #romance anime #anime #anime reviews #anime review #tohru honda photos

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connan-l · 3 years ago

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All right, so now that I finally digested the final a little I have some random messy thoughts about Fruits Basket 2019. It got really long lol, but this has been stuck in my head for a while so I needed to get it out!

Honestly, it was a very good adaptation and I’m still in awe I was able able to see the whole manga animated. Fruits Basket is pretty important to me, as I read it for the first time when I was around twelve and it was definitely one of the series that impacted me the most — the way it tackles themes of cycle of abuse, loneliness, grief and moving forward still feel very special to me even now (I briefly wrote a post about it months ago after rereading the manga), so of course I was delighted upon hearing the reboot announced and for the most part, it didn’t disappoint. I’d never truly thought I’d be able to see characters like Rin or Machi actually move on screen in my lifetime so in a way it still feel surreal lmao (RIP to Komaki though). It was really refreshing to revisit the story in that way, especially given amusingly enough I am myself in the middle of some big changes in my life where I have to leave things behind so it felt sort of... well, I won’t say empowering per se, but quite encouraging and satisfying to watch Furuba, and especially its final, at this timing, in a way. It wasn’t perfect, there are certainly a lot of flawed directive choices that I question and unfortunately quite some important cut contents — but even at its lowest it stayed all in all good. I’m genuinely a bit stunned there are people who thinks the entire thing is worthless or a failure, because man, I have seen what a bad anime adaptation looks like, and Fruits Basket 2019 definitely isn’t one. Natsuki Takaya herself was clearly very invested and satisfied in that adaptation — I mean, just the fact she drew arts for every single episodes or for the season 3 ending really shows that I think. And while there’s a part of me who will always have a soft spot for the 2001 anime, there’s no contest that the 2019 one is the superior one and more representative of the original manga as a whole.

I believe some people really don’t realize how... uncommon it is to get such a consistently good-looking and complete anime adaptation for a shojo manga? Shojo really aren’t lucky in that prospect usually; they rarely get animated, and when they do they’re usually very bland or outright bad, or they get one short season of like 13 episodes that never receive any follow-ups — even shojo considered like classics tend to get poor treatment, unless they’re Sailor Moon of course or a long-running magical girls franchise like Precure (and even then we could have a discussion about the way Sailor Moon’s treated compared to say Dragon Ball for example, but that’s another topic entirely). So yeah it is quite awesome we were able to get this kind of anime adaptation that covers the full manga with good quality from start to finish, and I am so, so glad it exists and that it managed to revive and makes the series so popular again. (Hopefully its success means we’ll be able to get more good anime adaptation of shojo manga from now on!)

But yeah, that doesn’t mean there wasn’t problems with it and I also understand why some of the manga fans had issues. We were kind of hyped with the fact this would be a complete adaptation and in the end we only got a... sort-of-complete one lol. The art and animation stayed fine during the run (there certainly were some episodes that were uhhh, lacking in that sense, but that’s just how it is sometimes with productions and budget), but I admit I was a bit letdown regarding the direction, where it often seemed… a bit uncreative or heavy-handed. There was some very beautiful and smart shots here and there, but on the whole I really had an issue with the adaptation failing to actually take more ambitious decisions on its visual aspect, especially compared to the pretty pannelling of the manga — and when it did take these decisions it just was… kind of obnoxious and in-your-face, like the show is trying to hold the watcher’s hand (with unnecessary things like Kyo’s father record player derailing or the whole big ropes symbolizing the curse that often slapped you all over the screen, which usually just made me want to roll my eyes because of how annoying it felt.) Multiple people also pointed out the overdramatization of some scenes like the Kyo and Tohru’s confrontation at the end of season 1 or Akito and Ren’s fight which was, indeed, not very good and a weird choice. Fruits Basket is already a pretty dramatic show and these scenes are already intense, there was no need for such over-the-top theatrical display of emotions that only made them comes off as comedic. I’m probably nitpicking here but it also bothered me some characters’ expressions didn’t feel properly retranscribed (Shigure especially, whose characterization depends a lot on that, really suffered from this), or that odd habit of making some big panorama plans instead of focusing on the faces and bodies, which particularly sucks during emotional scenes (like the backgrounds were pretty I guess, but that’s not what was important here lmao).

Also that might be just a personal thing, but can I point out that the openings were pretty disappointing to me... They're not bad, but they all looked so... bland. The songs are fine but the rest feel so uninspired and it's kind of sad... I dunno, I wasn't asking for much but I just think they could've done more than just scrolling each character looking vaguely melancholic or making them walk randomly one after another :/ The endings have at least pretty illustrations and I'm okay with them (I liked what they did with Kyoko’s photo in season 3 too), but the OPs kind of feel as if they ran out of budget and ideas for them or something. I kind of feel the same with the OST as well, where they’re generally fine but were a bit lackluster, and sometimes… they were kind of played at bad times? I remember the Rin episode in season 2 were the music felt a bit out of place and took me out of the immersion, which is a shame cause it was otherwise a pretty good episode. But that might just be a me-thing here lol. The voice actors were awesome though! (The Japanese ones, at least, I didn’t watch any other dubs). I’ve said it before but special kudos to Maaya Sakamoto cause damn she’s so perfect as Akito, and Shimazaki as Yuki and Toyosaki as Rin truly delivered too. I didn’t know Manaka Iwami at all but I was really impressed by her Tohru, especially in season 3 — she really was good at capturing her character’s subtle emotional turmoils (I think she makes a better Tohru than Yui Horie too, although I admit I missed Horie a little lol.)

Anyway, on the topic of lack of ambition, that might be an unpopular opinion but there’s also the fact that I’m sad they didn’t actually... try to change or add more original scenes. By which I mean, obviously we had some changes, but not ones that were really interesting (when they’re not actively detrimental to the story). For example, I was really hoping that we’d be able to get at least one original episode focused on Ritsu (and Mitsuru too why not) in season 2 or 3, or on Kagura or Kisa; I dunno, it would’ve been a good occasion to give something more to the characters that got sidelined in the original manga, or add some moments that would’ve been nice to develop like about Akito post-cliff confrontation, but we never got that. And well, that makes sense now that we know they seemingly had an episode restriction (at least on season 3), but, yeah, that’s still a shame. Honestly in the end Ritsu’s character made even less sense in the anime, because like, it was nice they tried to adapt his introduction episode so that it feels less “you have to adapt to gender norms to feel better about yourself,” (the gender non-confirmity is definitely one of the bits that aged the less well in FB) but then they still made him cut off his hair and give his feminine clothes to Kagura at the end so why lol. (And speaking of his episode introduction, I dislike that they cut off his conversation with Tohru after the suicide attempt, not only for Ritsu but also for Tohru cause it is one of the small instances bringing up her issues that is set up early on and that is crucial to her, but I’ll come back to this later.)

And now about the biggest problem to me being, the cut content and episodes rearangement. So, just so we’re clear, I definitely don’t think an anime adaptation needs to be a page-by-page adaptation of the manga to be good. Every decent adaptation needs to have changes, and the ones that tries to just follow the source material without any heart often tend to get pretty bad. So changes are good! Cut content are needed sometimes. But in Furuba 19, it really... wasn’t the case.

And the most unfortunate thing being that the one suffering the most from this is the show’s main character herself, Tohru.

So, obviously other characters also got done dirty by this; Yuki and Machi’s relationship was so incredibly shifted in the background and rushed it’s almost funny. I’m one of the people who thinks that, while I do think they’re cute, I definitely agree on the fact their relationship was a bit underdeveloped in the manga — and that Machi’s character especially suffered as a result by being a bit reduced to just "Yuki’s love interest" when she was a character with so much more to offer (and as a whole I also tend to agree with the fact that Yuki probably didn’t need a romance at all and that his arc is more meaningful while focusing on his platonic relationships, but that’s another topic entirely) — but man, if the manga already underdevelopped them, then ohhh boy, the anime just completely dropped the ball. It feels very odd because to me it seemed like season 2 was taking their time with setting them up, so if they knew they had only 13 episodes for season 3 then they should’ve started the changes there; instead we got 1 nice Yuki/Machi/Kakeru episode, and then it’s like "Yep, they’re in love, just trust me." (It does makes me wonder if season 3 wasn’t originally supposed to be longer but then got restrained because of budget or covid or something…) Kakeru also very much suffered because of them cutting off his girlfriend and his complicated relationship with Tohru… Now, to be honest, I’ve always found the Kakeru/Komaki/Tohru subplot pretty... contrived and useless, and Komaki’s not so much a character more than a device for Kakeru’s development, but it does have some good moments relevant to the story’s themes (I like the ‘‘you can’t play suffering olympics with people’s pain’’morale) and it is important to his character (and Komaki is cute, I admit), so it was still sad they shafted it entirely. (Also I kind of like the tense relationship between Tohru and Kakeru. The fact they both seem to not appreciate each other even afterwards feel sort of refreshing even if it’s never explored unfortunately orz.) I was still surprised they didn’t actually try to make a Komaki cameo at the end? Cause I think it would’ve fitted and Kakeru’s girlfriend had already been mentioned in season 2 but... for some reason they... didn’t. (Mayyybe we’ll get an OAV like with Kyoko and Katsuya? Who knows.)

One scene that was skipped/rearranged that I’m very bitter over is the whole Tohru/Kagura confrontation and Kagura/Rin scene — it might not seem like much, but the moment of Tohru refusing to forgive Kagura is very important, and I was pretty annoyed they turned Rin’s trauma response to Kagura’s violence and her subsequent apology/hug to a gag, it legit felt tasteless. The Tohrin scene they removed at the very end too was frustating; it was great they managed to fit in the "Rin doesn’t want to forgive Akito" bit at least (I was afraid they’d cut it off entirely), but it was so essential for her to say to Tohru, not to Haru and Momiji (plus the way they put it in felt very random and awkwardly placed there, when they were initially talking about Tohru before orz). OH AND the Akito/Hana friendship too! Yeah I know it’s not a Big deal but I absolutely love the little glimpses of their friendship and it’s very important to me so I’m disappointed over them not including the ‘Ah-chan’ scene… (It was kind of weird that the show sort-of implied Hana and Kazuma got together too cause that’s… not the vibe at all from the manga… oh well.)

Most people I’ve seen generally only bring up season 3 regarding the cuts/rearangement because it’s the most obvious and the biggest offender, but I personally think there were already problems with season 2 and 1. At first glance I didn’t have much issue with some of the rearrangement, because early Furuba can indeed be pretty episodic, but thinking back on it as a whole I think it might’ve been better to leave some stuff, like Hana and Uo’s episodes for example, to season 2 (I do wonder if they did this specifically so the reboot would offer original content and differ from 2001 early on...) and cut off other not-so-important things from S1 & S2 — because as a result season 2 kind of suffer a bit by being The Yuki Season, which, for as much as I love Yuki, did end up being a bit annoying and made his development feel less natural and gradual, as well as the fact it sidelined the other characters a little and left them with not much conclusion in its final. So this added to how much they ended up cutting in season 3, it makes the show as a whole feels really unequal. I think they did overall a good job in season 3 with what they had, and they really nailed some of the dramatic and Kyoru moments (the sheets scene, cliff confrontation and post-hospital confession were practically perfect), but it is a shame that it ended up as an extremely marathoned emotional roller-caster rather than a more well-paced watch that we would’ve had if it had been 20 or so episodes. (I know others argued that season 3 was what it was because there wasn’t enough content left to cover for 22 or 24 episodes, but I disagree and even if there weren’t, it would’ve been the perfect occasion to add original episodes then. But I think it was more of a budget and Covid issue personally.)

But anyway, all of this isn’t actually what I’m the most annoyed with (and YES that’s a already a lot lmao), those are stuff I can live with, but like I said earlier the most problematic is what they cut off from Tohru’s character. And that indeed includes her parents’ backstory.

So, just so I get this out of the way; yes, I do understand why people were relieved to not see Kyoko and Katsuya’s relationship play out on screen, and yes the age gap and teacher-student thing is creepy and I do kind of wish it hadn’t been written that way. (Though I was a bit amused by people who thought we didn’t get the backstory because of the questionable age gap when, uh... you know I very much doubt the anime industry has an issue with that. Like, to start with, we wouldn’t have had Uo and Kureno’s romance if that was the case (even if Uo and Kureno is less problematic, it’s still the same basis of a underage high school girl/20+ adult man relationship), and second there was a literal romcom anime about a high school girl and an adult man that was broadcasted at the same time as Furuba season 3 lmao. So nah, it wasn’t there the problem to them, it was just time and episode restriction, which was pretty much confirmed with the announcement of the OAV focused on them.)

So, Kyoko and Katsuya is definitely Problematic and I agree on their relationship being uncomfortable; however, I’m a bit baffled that people were literally cheering on not having that part in the show, because it is... it is not just like a small bit of family trivia, it is Extremely important and actively essential to Tohru’s character and Fruits Basket’s themes and narrative as a whole. It’s very important to understand Kyoko’s character, of course; to humanize her and finally present her as a very flawed person and not just the idealized mother that Tohru project upon her, and it is extremely important simply to understand Tohru herself as well; to understand where her way of thinking, her trauma and attitude stems from, and this in a way that just isn’t possible to see with the little fragments of that flashback we got or the bits of Kyo and Kyoko’s interactions.

See, Tohru’s character is principally constructed around two things; her grief over her mother and her almost-pathological selflesness and people-pleaser needs that comes from her abandonment issues and loneliness, and her arc is very much about letting go of both of these things and finally moving forward and letting her life change. There’s this perception of Tohru I see sometimes that she’s not a very interesting character especially compared to others like Yuki or Kyo, or that she ‘‘stays the same kindhearted, naive girl from start to finish,’’ and while I deeply disagree with this I know where it comes from. The thing with Tohru is that she is firstly an extremely emotionally repressed character, and so a lot of her depth and development is made through small, gradual details scattered throughout the manga. It’s done in such a way that except for some obvious scenes those small, apparently insignificant moments are easy to miss or disregarded, and unfortunately it is a lot of these details that the 2019 anime cut, or rearanged in a way that feel less impactful or makes less sense; such as, like I pointed out earlier, her conversation with Ritsu after his suicide attempt. As I’ve seen others point out, this result in altering Tohru’s portrayal and rendering her character mostly about her romance, undercutting and downplaying all of her small, subtle character moments and developments, and miss a bit the second part of the story where the narrative actively challenge the ‘savior/therapist/mom’ that other characters and Tohru herself projected upon her.

And as a result it also means undermining things like her parallel and relationship to Akito, which idealistically should’ve been slowly built up throughout the last season but because of how rushed season 3 was in the end felt a little flat. (Akito’s character in general had some issues also because of the unequal pacing and rearranged scenes, though admittedly I think this was also an issue present in the original manga.) Kyo’s character and his romance with Tohru is the one element that managed to get out of this mostly unscathed (although Kyo also does suffer a bit from it), but because of what was removed from Tohru’s character it still inevitably impacted them by making their characters as individuals lacking. It’s not like it is a complete failure, mind you; I think the anime at least did a decent job at showing Tohru is Not Okay even at the beginning in season 1 (they certainly did a better job at it than the 2001 one lol) and managed to roughly portray her issues well enough overall, but it is just… lacking in the subtlety and nuances that, to me, makes her character and writing really special and unique.

(This post explains what I’ve tried to say here in a much more eloquent and better way that I ever could, and this all put into perspective what I basically love so much about Tohru and Fruits Basket in general.)

And, you know, it would’ve been sad but comprehensible with any other character, but here we’re talking about the story’s literal protagonist, which is why it is the part of the adaptation that makes me feel the most bitter. Tohru and her story is truly amazing and well-written, the thing I was looking forward to the most with this reboot — and while I do understand the episode restriction and I do believe they still did their best with what they had — her arc still deserved to receive a full proper adaptation, not a kind-of-half one.

So, yes, I am at least glad they’ll adapt Kyoko and Katsuya’s story in OAV, but the fact that it will never be included in the actual main narrative is still actively detrimental to it, and it will never have the same effect that if it had been played out before the Kyoru sheets scene where it should’ve been. (I hope they also won’t cut the fact that their story is narrated by Kyo, because that is also a very important detail for both Kyo and the story, but I have the feeling they will…)

Welp, that was quite a long, messy rambling. Not sure if anyone will actually read all of it but if you did then congrats lol. I feel in the end I’ve been really harsh and negative with the reboot… I do love it a lot! If someone asked me I would wholeheartedly recommend it (though I guess I would still argue to read the manga first if you really want to experience the story in all its nuances). I think they truly did an impressive job — even with season 3, which a lot of its episodes were beautifully done and did make me tear up a few times lol. I’m just sad it couldn’t actually offer a better, more nuanced delivery of the story’s depths and of one of my favorite manga protagonists that means a lot to me. But that’s an adaptation that so many fans wanted for years and I’m happy and grateful it’s here cause Fruits Basket deserved at least that much!

#Fruits Basket #Fruits Basket (2019)#Long Post #Connan's Ramblings #Text #Fruits Basket Anime

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stacks-reviews · 7 years ago

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New Releases 7/18/17

Happy New Release Day! There’s a lot going on in books, a few things in movies, and a certain beta I’ve been waiting on.

In Books –The Betrayal Knows My Name volume 7 by Hotaru Odagiri Yuki is an orphan with a strange ability to feel others emotions when he touches them. One day a beautiful stranger named Zess appears and saves Yuki before he can be hit by a car. Yuki feels like he knows this stranger from somewhere

I have been waiting for this for FOUR YEARS. I checked yesterday and volume 6 came out in September of 2013. After volume 6 I would check every now and then like I do for the series I follow monthly but I never heard a word about it. After about a year I just finally came to terms that it had been canceled. Then they announced its return earlier this year. It has been on hiatus for Hotaru Odagiri’s health. I’m just glad it’s finally back. I really enjoyed it the series when it first came out except for the fact that I had trouble telling some of the characters apart. I will soon be rereading the whole series because I can’t remember what happened at the end of volume 6. There should be at least one more volume to go. Not long after they announced it’s return, they also announced that it would be ending soon. There is also a twenty-four episode anime based off the series that was released in sub titles only by Funimation earlier this year.

–Blood Mirror (The Lightbringer #4) by Brent Weeks (in paperback) This will contain spoilers if you have not read book 3 The Broken Eye of the Lightbringer series. At the end of The Broken Eye Gavin Guile is powerless and is locked in the prison he made for his brother. Kip has fled the Chromeria with the help of his grandfather to try and slow the advance of the White Kings army. Karris is taking over as her duties of The White and will try to keep the empire from falling apart. Teia will go deeper into the spy organization she is infiltrating while also reporting on their actions to Karris. Ironfist has shown his true colors and has also left the Chromeria to continue his work for his true master.

I love this series. I had so many theories destroyed in this book but it also created a lot of new ones. I’m still numb from the realization in The Broken Eye that Andross might actually be the good guy here instead of the villain I’ve always seen him as. And where could I even start about Gavin. Then there’s Kip and what happened in this book.

It’s a really great series. I love the ocular powers in this series. Just how it is set up, how each color has it’s own properties, and the consequences of using it too much. There are so many twists and turns. I really recommend this series if you haven’t read it yet.

–Dept. H volume 2 by Matt Kindt, water colorist Sharlene Kindt, and letterer Marie Enger Mia is a special investigator sent to research the murder of her father in a deep-sea research station. Everyone in the station is a suspect, including her own brother.

Mind MGMT was my first experience with Matt Kindt’s work and I was blown away. The story is fantastic (I’m about to start volume 3 out of 6). The illustrations are amazing water colors. I had to read more of his work. And Dept. H did not disappoint.

After waiting months for another copy of volume 1 to arrive at my work, I finally got to read it last week. It also has a great story with wonderful water colors. There was a moment where my jaw dropped open because chaos happened and it came out of nowhere. Not everything has been revealed yet. For example Mia has talked about her mother a few times and how she died from some kind of infection of which there is no cure. Although not expressly stated, it would appear that those in the station are trying to find a cure but even the fish they are examining might also be infected. Volume 1 was amazing and I can’t wait to read volume 2.

–Kakegurui Compulsive Gambler volume 1 by Homura Kawamoto Hyakkaou Private Academy is an institution for the sons and daughters of the wealthy. here it’s learning how to read your opponent, the art of the deal that keeps you ahead. To hone those skills Hyakkaou Private Academy has a rigorous curriculum of gambling. Here the winners live like kings and the losers are put through the wringer.

I’m interested in this series because it reminds me of Liar Game by Shinobu Kaitani but with less murder. Maybe. There might be murder. I would like to give it a try because I love mind game series. Watching as L and Light played mind games with each other is a big part of the reason I enjoyed Death Note as much as I did.

–Liselotte and Witch’s Forest volume 5 by Natsuki Takaya “They say that in a place far, far away; in the east, of the east, of the east…there is a forest where witches dwell. They are said to bestow blessings or inflict curses, brew potions in steaming cauldrons, practice their magic…and fly their brooms into the night sky. This is where Liselotte has decided to live after she was banished from her home by her brother.

The final volume of this cute series by the creator of Fruits Basket. It is still on hiatus while Natsuki Takaya looks after her health.

It is a cute series that follows Liselotte as she and two attendants live in the forest. One day she is saved by a stranger who looks a lot like a boy she was in love with who had died. Volume 4 never came to a bookseller near me and I haven’t had time to order it yet.

–Monstress volume 2 (B&N exclusive edition) by Marjorie M. Liu, artist Sana Takeda, and letterer/designer Rus Wooton “Set in an alternate matriarchal 1900′s Asia, in a richly imagined world of art deco-inflected steam punk, Monstress tells the story of a teenage girl who is struggling to survive the trauma of war, and who shares a mysterious psychic link with a monster of tremendous power, a connection that will transform them both and make them the target of both human and otherworldly powers.”

The Cumea are a race of sorcerers who experiment and kill a race called Arcanics, magical creatures with human characteristics. Maika; who is suffering from some memory loss, is an Arcanic who’s mother was killed by a Cumea. Desiring answers Maika infiltrates a sorcerers home and chaos ensues because of the ancient god who is living inside of Maika.

It’s been a while since I read the first volume and a friend is currently borrowing it so I don’t have much to fall back on for more details. I enjoyed the first volume. It was dark, violent, beautifully illustrated, and has a very rich world building. The series; at least from what I’ve heard cause I haven’t seen many cats (talking cats, what’s not to love about that) in the graphic novels I’ve read lately, has some of the best cats in graphic novels right now.

I actually saw where the B&N exclusive edition arrived last week to my local B&N but I also wanted to mention it on it’s official street date in case other B&N go it late for some reason.

–Princess Jellyfish volume 5 by Akiko Higashimura In the bustling city of Tokyo there resides a place called Amamizukan, a safe haven for girl geeks (otakus of trains, jellyfish, Japanese dolls, and more) who are terrified of ‘stylish’ people. One such girl is Tsukimi who loves jellyfish. One night she meets a stylish lady who helps her save the life of a jellyfish at a pet shop. This chance encounter will result in an odd friendship (at first anyway) between the two and the rest of the residents at Amamizukan. But this stylish girl is actually a boy.

It’s super cute shojo series that was made into an anime a while back. As well as a live-action film that according to one of my friends is very well done.

–Twinkle Star volume 3 by Natsuki Takaya Sakuya lives with her cousin Kanade. In times of pain, she looks up at the stars. On her birthday a strange boy shows up at her house with a present and then leaves. At school she finds out his name is Chihiro and he just transferred there. He treats her coldly until an incident at the club information session. Will it bring them closer or will they forever remain in the dark?

Another cute series by Natsuki Takaya. I have the first volume but haven’t finished it yet. It is a completed series. There should be two more volumes after this one.

–Waiting for Spring volume 1 by Anashin Mizuki is a shy girl who is about to enter high school. She vowed to open herself up to new friendships but the four stars of the boys basketball team is not who she had in mind. Soon she’s targeted by jealous girls and forced into the spotlight.

This just sounds like a really cute shojo series.

In Video Games –Destiny 2 Beta The beta of Destiny 2 opens to all preordered PS4 versions of the game today. I’m really excited for it.

In DVD/BLU-RAY –Adventure Time complete season 7 Finn, Jake, and the whole gang return. This season contains the miniseries Stakes starring Marceline and that creepy but good episode where we find out BMO’s imaginary friend Football is real and lives inside that mirror.

–K: Return of Kings The second season of the series K that takes place after the movies K: Missing Kings. It has been a while since I watched K and although I own the movie, I haven’t had time to watch it yet. K was really good and the animation was fantastic. It was gorgeous to watch. Return of Kings follows the events after Missing Kings.

–Record of Lodoss War (DVD/BLU-RAY combo pack) “In a land torn by war, young Parn and a ragtag team of adventurers set out to restore peace to the island of Lodoss. While an evil sorcerer seeks the destructive power of an ancient goddess, the Grey Witch presides over all with a cold-hearted bent for neutrality. The ensuing battles cost many lives before a brave new generation of heroes rises to face the sinister enemies once and for all.”

This combo pack contains episodes 1-13 of the OVA series Record of Lodoss War and episodes 1-27 of Chronicles of a Heroic Knight. I’ve never seen the series before but I’ve heard of it several different times. I have one friend who loved the series when he first saw it years ago and was excited to hear that it was getting this release by Funimation. I really want to give it a try sometime. I looked up the trailer and it looks pretty good. The dub to it doesn’t sound that great because some of the characters in the trailer didn’t sound like they tried very hard. I’m hoping that it will improve in later episodes. As a general rule if an anime I purchase has a dub, I have to watch the dub first. Unless the dub is really bad then I may switch to subbed. Second watches I watch it subbed.

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