Hinata High School

Lore & Background

The source material does not mention a school named 'Hinata High School.' The series tells the story of Tohru Honda, an orphan girl who, after meeting Yuki, Kyo, and Shigure Soma, learns that thirteen members of the Soma family are possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac and cursed to turn into their animal forms when they embrace someone of the opposite sex or their bodies come under a great deal of stress. Tohru is a high school student who works as an office janitor to pay her tuition fees. She lives with Shigure, Yuki, and Kyo Soma in exchange for housekeeping. The school setting is where Tohru interacts with her closest friends, Arisa Uotani and Saki Hanajima, who are also students. The source does not provide specific details about the school's name, location, atmosphere, or its role as a backdrop for the final arc.

In Their Own Story

The source does not contain a narrative passage about Hinata High School. The story follows Tohru Honda as she learns about the Soma family curse, meets the rest of the zodiac members and the family's head Akito, and resolves to break the curse. The series concludes with Tohru moving with Kyo to another city so he can continue his martial arts training, and in the final pages it is shown that they had a son and a granddaughter.

Reader's Guide

The source does not provide a guide or analysis of Hinata High School's role in the story. The series focuses on Tohru's relationships with the cursed Soma family members and her determination to free them from their supernatural burden. Key locations mentioned in the source include the Soma household where Tohru lives and the city where she moves with Kyo at the end of the series.

Did You Know?

• The manga was serialized in 136 chapters in the monthly magazine Hana to Yume between January 1999 and November 2006.
• The series was adapted as a 26-episode anime television series produced by Studio DEEN initially broadcast on TV Tokyo between July 5 and December 27, 2001.
• Natsuki Takaya gave Tohru a name normally used only for men because she likes to give masculine names to female characters 'to balance them out.'
• Takaya named most of the cursed Somas after the month in the former Japanese lunisolar calendar that corresponds to their zodiac animal, with exceptions including Kureno and Momiji whose names were swapped by mistake.
• In the sequel series Fruits Basket another, Tohru and Kyo are married with three children, their oldest son Hajime acting as the male protagonist.

Origins and Creative Conception

Natsuki Takaya created the characters of Fruits Basket. Tohru Honda was the first character she created, with Yuki and Kyo Soma soon after. Takaya gave Tohru a name normally used only for men because she likes to give masculine names to female characters 'to balance them out.' She chose to have other characters address her as 'Tohru-kun', using an honorific typically used for boys, because she thought it was 'a more dignified form of address.' The next characters Takaya developed were Yuki, Kyo, and Shigure Soma. Kyo was 'the first character whose personality and looks really hit me...without any hesitation.' Takaya named most of the cursed Somas after the month in the former Japanese lunisolar calendar that corresponds to their zodiac animal. The exceptions are Kureno and Momiji, whose names were swapped by mistake; Kyo, who as the cat is not part of the official zodiac; and Yuki.

The Central Narrative Arc

The series tells the story of Tohru Honda, an orphan girl who, after meeting Yuki, Kyo, and Shigure Soma, learns that thirteen members of the Soma family are possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac and cursed to turn into their animal forms when they embrace someone of the opposite sex or their bodies come under a great deal of stress. As the series progresses, Tohru meets the rest of the zodiac and the family's mysterious head, Akito Soma, and eventually resolves to break the curse that burdens them. In the first half of the series, as Tohru learns about the zodiac curse and its effects on those she loves, she becomes distressed, and when she learns that the dangerous Akito is the 'god' of the zodiac, she resolves to break the curse. Only later does she admit that she wants to free Kyo most of all. Despite setbacks, both external and personal, Tohru stubbornly persists in her goal and eventually frees Kyo and her friends. In the last chapter, she is moving with Kyo to another city so he can continue his martial arts training, and in the final pages it is shown that they had a son and a granddaughter.

Tohru Honda's Character Profile

Tohru Honda is an orphaned high school student who, at the start of the story, begins living with Shigure, Yuki, and Kyo Soma in exchange for housekeeping. She loves to cook, describes herself as an excellent housekeeper, and has an after-school job as an office janitor to pay her tuition fees to avoid being a burden on her grandfather. She is depicted as polite, optimistic, extremely kind, and selfless. In the original Japanese, Tohru habitually speaks formally, but not always correctly, a habit she picked up from her father, Katsuya, after he died when she was three, as a way of replacing him in her mother's eyes. Tohru's mother, Kyoko, raised her alone until she died in a car accident shortly after Tohru entered high school, a few months before the start of the story. Tohru repeatedly calls Kyoko the most important person in her life and treasures her photograph; when she falls in love with Kyo she feels guilty of being 'unfaithful' to her mother's memory.

Arisa Uotani and Supporting Dynamics

Arisa Uotani is a former gang member (a 'yankee') and one of Tohru's closest friends. Arisa is depicted as tough, brash, and sometimes violent; she wears long skirts, sometimes carries a lead pipe, and often speaks like a man. Arisa is tall for a girl, and once claims she wishes to reach 6 feet (1.8 m) in height. She is especially competitive with Kyo and bickers with him frequently. Her childhood was troubled: her father is an alcoholic and her mother left him for another man when Arisa was young; Arisa joined an all-girl gang called The Ladies in fifth grade, and idolized Kyoko Honda's reputation from her gang days. When Arisa met Kyoko's daughter Tohru in middle school, and then Kyoko herself, she was shocked by the change from gang-leader into doting mother, but became friends after Kyoko helped her escape from her gang. With Saki Hanajima, she swore on Kyoko's grave to look after Tohru, and in their 'parental' protection of Tohru, noted by Kyo and Yuki, Arisa is depicted as the brash and direct father-figure.