My brother just showed me the first six episodes of an anime series called Fruits Basket. I found it very entertaining, hilarious in parts, sweet in others, and an all-around great series. I plan to see the rest of the series, but here's what I got from it so far.

It's basically about this mysterious family who has a curse that turns them into various zodiac animals (with the exception of one outcast who becomes a cat, which is a big part of the plot) whenever a member of the opposite sex from outside the family embraces them. Well, sort of. It seems as though the series is actually about the search for acceptance more than anything else, and that issue is tackled in a variety of ways.

The main character, Tohru is a girl who starts off living on her own in a tent. She stumbles upon the house of this cursed family, and after a mudslide wipes out her poor little tent, she ends up staying with them. Throughout the series, you learn of how awfully she's been treated by various members of her family, as well as the other children when she was young. Yet through all of this, she is the most selfless person you could imagine, often ignoring her own well being in order to make others happy. The guys she stays with are really the first to notice just how wonderful she really is. Tohru also plays the major role of analyzing the motives behind each of the characters' actions and concluding that even the most rude and bad tempered characters (*cough Kyo cough*) are all right.

A major element of the story is a tale that Tohru learned of the zodiac animals. In this tale, those to be the zodiac animals were set to get together one day, but the rat told the cat that it was on the following day. That is why the cat didn't become one of the zodiac animals. Tohru applies this story her to experience in the house. Yuki's curse turns him into a rat and Kyo's curse turns him into a cat. (You can see where I'm going with this.) They contantly fight, and yet dispite Kyo's constant training, Yuki always beats him without a sweat. Kyo is rejected from the house, and although he appears to feel nothing but anger toward the others, he really wants to be accepted.

Yuki is called the Prince at school. He's the most popular guy among the ladies, and he even has his own fan club. Yet he simply shrugs off all of the girls who would give anything to date him, not only because a hug would turn him into a rat, but also because he feels that the person who they all seem to love isn't the real him. In reality, he's very shy, and in his own opinion, quite selfish. He seems to develop throughout the series and become more social.

Kagura is another member of the family (I assume a cousin) who turns into a boar. As far as I've watched, it doesn't play much of a role, but I just felt like I'd mention it. She is madly in love with Kyo, and as a kid actually threatened to kill him if he didn't promise to marry her. As you can probably tell, she's very passive-agressive. One moment she's a sweet, loving fiancée, and the next she's in a violent rage, crashing through walls and beating poor Kyo nearly to death. It's no wonder that Kyo doesn't want to have anything to do with her, which deeply upsets Kagura. After one frenzy, she spent the entire night cleaning and fixing up everything she had broken, thus displaying her devotion to Kyo.

Throughout the story, Tohru helps each character find his or her place, and in doing so, finds her own. I really recommend seeing this series, if only for the first five episodes (well, the fifth had a nice ending whereas the sixth left you waiting for the next episode). One thought: If there were more people like Tohru, this world would be a much better place.