As an overly exaggerated and contrived addition to the main series, Fruits Basket: Prelude proves that some things are just better left in the past. It’s still the Fruits Basket we know and love, just at its absolute worst and buried beneath a lack of clear focus, and some frankly questionable choices.

The first third of the runtime is wasted on a recap that adds nothing to the events of the final season, leaving just under an hour left for the actual story at hand – a choice that leaves the production no other option than to utilize exposition to a detrimental extent, leaving less time to explore the relationship moments that one would expect and making developments feel much more procedural than organic. The recap is way too lengthy and straightforward making it extremely redundant for return viewers, whereas viewers new to the franchise are just getting thrown headfirst into the middle of narrative and would likely be left with more questions than would have been answered. The story that comes after is still quite an emotional affair, but the rushed nature of it makes it all feel very over the top, to the point it almost ends up being comical at certain stages.

Production wise, it’s incredibly close to the main series, and probably the strongest point of this movie, as it does emulate a good atmosphere despite the narrative issues surrounding it. However, one of the more glaring issues is the choice to not retcon some of the more questionable aspects of Kyoko and Katsuya’s relationship. While the choice to stay true to the original material, no matter how dated, is commendable, the head-first approach that doesn’t even attempt to tiptoe around the more problematic elements is something I found difficult to come to terms with. It was hard to get that bad taste out of my mouth no matter how sweetly the production tried to paint it.

At least young Tohru was cute, and the small epilogue we got for her & Kyo was quite nice. However, these alone are not enough to balance out the exaggerated soap opera elements leaving the movie as a mere fractured reflection of the emotional magic that made the main series so good.