Fruits Basket Volume 19

SPOILER Summary: Kyo has a lengthy talk with Tohru’s grandfather at Kyoko’s grave. Tohru and Shigure have a talk about the curse, now that Tohru knows more about it. Tohru and Kyo get closer as do Yuki and Machi. Yuki pays a visit to Ayame with Kakeru and ultimately Machi, where Yuki learns of Ayame’s relationship with Mine. A more masculine, adult-like Momiji-kun and several others of the Zodiac gather at Shigure’s house to visit and eat with Tohru. Kakeru confronts Tohru about her loss as his new girlfriend Komaki lost her father in the incident that took Tohru’s mother’s life. However, he patches things up with Tohru after learning more about Komaki’s feelings on the subject.

Thoughts: Whew. Things have gotten a might more angst-filled, haven’t they? There are times when I miss the fun of the early volumes. The way the story that linked Kakeru’s girlfriend Komaki with Tohru (Komaki’s father killed & Tohru’s mother killed in the same accident) was odd. Initially, I thought I missed something when suddenly Tohru is under verbal attack. It made sense in the end, but I didn’t really think it worked too well from a story-telling perspective.

I liked how Takahata-sensei managed to bring in most of the other members of the Zodiac for cameos. Uo-chan and Hana-chan get speaking cameos as well (Hana-chan getting a really oddly-placed second cameo). However, now that I think about it, as Tohru’s best friends, why aren’t they closer to her?

I liked how Yuki and Machi’s relationship takes small steps forward. Ditto Kyo and Tohru’s. I liked learning how Mine and Ayame are in fact a couple. So there was a lot of good stuff here.

I’m not as keen on Takaya-sensei’s character designs now either. I’ve tried to put my finger on exactly what she’s changed that makes things less visually appealing to me, and I can’t quite do it. I think it is partially the eyes though. That said, I did enjoy seeing the more adult Momiji-kun though.

I dislike how the manga adaptation still has those who know Akito’s secret use the “he” pronoun when talking about Akito. I understand that writing a sentence without using a male/female pronoun is difficult, but Del Rey has done so and I don’t see why the TokyoPop adapter could not do so. My understanding is that in the Japanese, no gender is assigned to Akito and as such, it is just assumed that Akito is a male. However, it doesn’t appear that the adaptation will ever change. In instances where it is absolutely clear that characters refer to Akito as female, the adaptation will reluctantly use “she” but then will immediately go back to “he” and that’s just nuts.

Well, four more volumes to go, which considering TP’s decision to slow things down to a craw on releasing the manga to a volume roughly every four months, I guess it will be July 2009 before we get volume 23.