Stanford Newtype Anime

Ohhh no! Tohru’s grandfather calls her up, telling her that she has to come live with him in his house. After a tearful goodbye, she departs the Sohma household. Her new dwelling leaves a lot to be desired, though. Except for her grandfather, all of her family members are annoying bastards. Understanding how rough it must be on his granddaughter to have such a sucky family, he pulls her aside and tells her that he would be alright with her if she wanted to return to her housekeeping job at the Sohma’s. It’s a good thing he did, too, because at that very instant the Sohma family pays a visit and drags Tohru back.
Also note, we have a title! Fruits basket is apparently a child’s game that Tohru played back in the good ole’ days. The rules seem rather silly… the kids give themselves fruit names, and then the fruits are called out, one by one. Finally, the child with the proper name will be allowed to go play with the other children. Tohru’s “friends” ended up tricking her into the name Onigiri, which means rice ball. Stupid kids. Rice isn’t a fruit.

Oh jeeze, Kagura is a CRAZY WOMAN. She apparently has the hots for Kyo, which is appropriate, since she is even more emotionally unstable than he is. Her wild fits of spontaneous craziness end up destroying a large chunk of the house. However, Tohru helps her clean up, do to some kind of strange respect (she makes a comment about how she has to admire someone who can love another person so much and for so long as Kagura can Kyo). Not surprisingly, it turns out that Kagura is another member of the Zodiac, a boar. Thankfully, she leaves at the end of the episode.
Important information learned from this episode: If they are both animals of the Zodiac, two members of the opposite sex can hug without any transformation action.

Hold on to your seats, ladies and gents… the drama is just beginning. Tohru catches Kyo and Yuki fighting. She tries to stop them, but only succeeds in hugging Kyo by mistake. After becoming a cat, Kyo gets all upset and calls Tohru a stupid girl (rightfully so). Apparently he has an anger management problem, and later apologizes to poor, mistreated Tohru.
Tohru and Yuki end up walking home together from school… unfortunately Tohru winds up turning Yuki into his rat form… big surprise. Yuki doesn’t really get upset though, instead he confides in her, showing her his garden and telling her that he just wants to live a normal life (yah good luck with that… what kind of normal person has their own, personal vegetable garden?).

Turns out that Kyou’s “that darn cat.” Not only that, but Shigure is the dog, and Yuki is the rat of the Chinese Zodiac. They all inform Tohru of their odd little curse… they turn into members of the Zodiac when they’re hugged by a member of the opposite sex. Well, that’s just wonderful. The problem is that Tohru may have to have her memory erased. Luckily, it turns out that Akito, the head of the household, decides not to… just as long as Tohru doesn’t go blabbing.

Honda Tohru - a 16 year old girl who lives in a tent. Her mother left her behind after she died in a car accident. One day Tohra departs her make-shift home and stumbles upon a house, outside of which the characters of the Chinese Zodiac are all lined up.
A man comes out of the house and begins talking to her. Tohru complains to this guy about the lack of a cat. Apparently there’s some story about how all the other animals of the Zodiac went to a banquet, leaving the poor little kitty all by himself. Her mother had told it to her, and she decided to take on the year of the cat rather than remaining a dog.

Imagine Tohru’s surprise when she finds out Sohma Yuki, the prince of her high school lives in this mysterious house. She takes some crap from her fellow students for having been seen with Yuki, but is saved by her two best friends, Uo and Hana.

The Sohma’s find out that she’s been living in a freaking tent, and so they let her in as a housekeeper. This is all great until she accidently hugs everyone. Oh jeeze, they’re members of the Chinese Zodiac.

Honda Tohru is a 16-year old girl who, after having lost her mother, was forced to live life all by herself. However, that all changed when she became a housekeeper for the Sohma family. It turns out that the Sohma’s aren’t your average family. Oh no. They’re the members of the Chinese Zodiac! Life’s not easy being a symbol of Chinese Astrology… they turn into their respective Zodiac Animals when they’re hugged by a member of the opposite sex. Inoccent, selfless, happy-go-lucky, and bubbly Honda Tohru learns bunches by living with these weirdos. Not only that, but she teaches a few important lessons as well. She holds a special place in her heart for the cat of the Chinese Zodiac. But can she hold onto that love after she finds out the truth behind her beloved feline and the curse of the Sohma household?
*note: The original Japanese release has no episode titles. They were added in by Funimation later.

There is a massive coverup by the military as to the true nature of the teacher’s death at school, and everyone seems fine with it except of course Saya, who witnessed the event. Another discussion between George and David ensues over the fact that George will have to let go of Saya some day, and that it’d be best to do it now. The scene flashes back to George’s past, it goes something like this: George once served in the Vietnam War; was indebted to some guy who saved his life to take care of Saya; had a family (wife and daughter) which was lost in an accident; wanted to commit suicide; but stopped because Saya’s “heartbeat” “told” him to “live on”. George decides to raise Saya as his daughter, and takes in Riku and Kai as well. Life story in a nutshell.

Anyways, the main action of this episode deals with David revealing the nature of those “monster” things called Chiropterans, as well as the nature of “Red Shield”, the organization which seeks to eliminate them. In essence, they need Saya’s “blood” to stop these monsters…All of a sudden a cloaked figure walks into the room, asking for water. Saya hands him a cup, but David realizes that it’s a Chiropteran. David attacks it with an oversized pistol…but it fails to do any good. It’s up to Saya again to save the day of course! But wait! Saya doesn’t want to take action…and instead stands there rooted to the ground in fear/anxiety/panic/any combination of those. Hagi blocks the Chiropteran’s first attack, but it’s George who takes a step in trying to harm the monster. What he gets in return is a nasty gash across his front. It turns out the Chiropteran is actually someone who knows George, and his split personality (the one that recognizes George) kicks in and he runs away. Saya is left to mull over the fact that her inaction got her father seriously injured.

Continuing on from last episode…Saya, in her sort of berserk state, takes this sword from Hagi and slices the monster with it. But not before cutting her own thumb on the blade and making herself bleed of course…because everything seems to involve blood, blood, and more blood. Anyways, her brother comes along and is naturally pretty freaked out by all of this. It seems that the military have a stake in this whole monster deal as well, and so Hagi clears out with Saya and Kai onto the roof of a nearby building. The military discovers that the monster was already eliminated, and that raises some concerns among their ranks. Introduce typical crazed scientist-like figure. He makes it seem like the monster that Saya killed was released on purpose or was at least an experiment of some sort…and even gives it a name…”Mouse”…

What happens after the rooftop excursion is that Hagi disappears and the whole thing fast forwards to a hospital scene. George, Saya’s foster father, and David, the blond haired guy (real descriptive, I know - look at screencaps) have a little conversation which Saya overhears…it’s about how she’s supposed to be the only “weapon” created that is able to stop these monster things. Well, of course Saya is disturbed by this and runs off to the beach, where Hagi turns up again with his cello playing. Kai is angry at Hagi for showing up again, and tries to punch him. He ends up instead with his back against the sand. Saya somehow remembers Hagi from before, but he vanishes once again (how exactly does one vanish with a cello case and cello on his back?). And, to keep with the theme of Blood+, as if they haven’t already, there’s the splattering of an innocent dog by some hooded figure in a telephone booth at night. Go figure.

There is this girl named Saya who looks to be the reincarnation of a psycho girl from the past who killed pretty much everything including the monsters which had appeared back then. On her way home Saya sees a guy playing a cello (named Hagi) for a crowd which triggers some sort of flashback where she witnesses a girl trying to open something locked. A little later on as Saya’s going out her house George (her foster father), and David (some business guy), debate over who Saya essentially belongs to. To make the long sequence of events short: Saya runs back to school to get some shoes she had forgotten; she bumps into the cellist guy who’s now weilding a dagger instead of a bow…; and one of her teachers is eaten (well, mutilated) by some sort of monster hiding in a tree.

Saya runs away from all this of course, and bumps back into the cellist guy who she was scared off by in the first place. Turns out Hagi has some skills other than with a cello and he chucks the dagger into the monster’s eye. Some weird stuff follows (this series is all about weird)…Hagi has this demonic looking arm. He cuts it and implies that he wants her to drink his blood? In the end she does anyways when he forcefully kisses her. And then, the circle comes full swing. By drinking his blood she reinvokes the spiritual essence of that girl who she saw in her vision opening the lock.

Warning: This series is not for those who are queasy at the sight of blood. Simply put, there is a lot of it. This is the followup to Blood: The Last Vampire movie, and it sure keeps with the same level of graphical violence. The story goes something like this: Good versus Evil, Red Shield (organization of humans) versus Chiropterans (monsters who can shapeshift into humans and feed on human blood). That is the series in an overly simplistic nutshell. Saya lives with her foster father in a happy little family, but that all changes when she meets a mysterious cello player who hands her a katana-like sword. From that moment on Saya begins to unravel the memories that she lost a year ago.