cocks ahoy

leave patient alone in a room for 6 hours

Yuki begins the story wearing Chinese-style traditional clothing when not in his school uniform, a nod to the origin of the Zodiac. It’s also shown that he wore kimonos as a child. He uses honorifics and has a generally formal way of speaking. Yet, when he gets his own room in Shigure’s house, the furniture is largely Western-style. He slowly sheds the Chinese-style clothing and moves toward clothing that is more modern. He stops caring so much about formality and social rules, kissing his new girlfriend in public and giving her a key to his apartment when he goes off to university. With the influence of the student council, he starts to relax his manner of speech (as best as I can tell from the English translations).

Kyo, on the other hand, is shown in Western-style clothing from a young age, only wearing traditional clothing at the dojo (that we see). He speaks informally, generally avoiding honorifics and disliking when Tohru uses -san to refer to him. Yet he sleeps on a futon, he pursues a career in a traditional Japanese martial art, he knows how to cook a handful of traditional Japanese dishes, he starts wearing kimonos at some point as an adult, and he affectionately calls his father figure “Shishou” before he’s comfortable enough to call him “Dad”. He’s also acutely aware of how he and his actions reflect on Kazuma, Tohru, and everyone he loves. Even his threat to kill Yuki and then himself is very rooted in honor/shame culture, which is a very Japanese cultural norm.

For Yuki, the strong traditions of the Sohma family were oppressive. They bound him to a cruel god and came to represent the unhappiest times of his life. Strict adherence to those traditions kept him from being true to himself and isolated him from his peers. He needed to escape the confines of those traditions to feel like he belonged in the world.

In contrast, Kyo was denied access to those traditions by everyone until Kazuma. He was kept away from the New Year celebrations, having to literally stand outside while everyone else took part in the traditional rituals together, visually set apart even further by his lack of traditional clothing. He was an outsider looking in, only finding acceptance in the very traditional home and dojo of his adoptive father figure. For Kyo, tradition meant belonging and family— two things he valued more than anything.

Furuba stays true to its message of healing, and getting better. No matter who you are you deserve love and affection and the ability of getting better and realise your mistakes. I love that despite everything the other zodiacs don't have and aren't expected to forgive Akito, Akito realises that she can still get better and she doesn't have to be forgiven to do that and that she can make amends while fully knowing that she might never be forgiven for her actions, she was both a victim and a perpetrator, but her being a victim never justifies her but explains why she was like that.

Things I didn't like:

I know this is a romance shōjo, but the way that breaking the curse just puts everyone in cisheteronormative gender roles was awful to see. Uo and Kureno meet each other two times and they're head over heals for each other and Uo even suffers that greatly over two meetings. I actually don't think Yuki was ready to be in a relationship and the one with Machi isn't that developed, he even covers a role with Machi similar to the role Tohru had with him, but with Tohru he claims it was parent like, while with Machi it was love I guess, despite being very similar, overall I don't think a relationship was supposed to be a thing for a bit longer

The mangaka kind of erased her own queer themes and it sucks so much. Momiji, after the growth spurt, despite still having his child like personality, he starts to dress in a more gender confirming way and the irony of his curse breaking just as he starts doing that feels almost like a joke.

Ritsu says that she has always felt more comfortable in wearing women's clothes and presenting more feminine and after her curse breaks she cuts her hair, starts presenting like a man again, gives away her feminine clothes and is mentioned she is an a relationship with another woman (we could have had lesbians with one of them being a trans woman, but I guess we can't have that) because I guess after the curse was broken she could return to be her true self and that's a straight man apparently.

Despite having canonically bisexual characters like Ayame and Haru, they still have to end up in a m/f relationship, because you still have to fit the mold of everyone having to end up in an m/f relationships despite having more gender options (saying this despite liking Haru and Rin). To be honest after all this the characters queerness felt more like they were put into two categories 1. The one you use for gags (Ayame and sometimes Haru) 2. The one that you will get older and get over it (Momiji and Ritsu).

Fruits Basket ‘フルーツバスケット’ (2019-2021)