WARNING BIG SPOILERS AHEAD. IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN BANANA FISH OR 91 DAYS AND YOU'RE PLANNING TO WATCH THEM THEN DON'T READ

Now that we have that out of the way, let's talk about these two animes. If you have seen Banana Fish, but haven't seen 91 Days let me tell you - they're really similar but you're still missing out.

Let me establish the differences and similarities.

· Both animes are set in the US, both heavily include mafia.

· Main characters use aliases. Aslan Calenreese is Ash Lynx, Angelo Lagusa is Avilio Bruno.

· The groups that surround the main characters are also similar. Ash has Eiji, Shorter and his gang members.

Angelo has Nero, Corteo and the Vanetti gang members.

Even the roles of characters are similar.

· Corteo & Shorter.

Shorter was Ash's best friend. Ash was forced to kill him in order to save Eiji AND Shorter from the drug. Angelo is forced to kill his best friend after Corteo betrays the Vanetti family that Angelo works for, killing Corteo proved his "innocence" as him being an accomplice. In reality, Corteo wanted Angelo to live a better life and was trying to hurry up his revenge so they could go home.

· Nero & Eiji.

These two, even though they have similar roles, are complete opposites.

Eiji is Ash's salvation, the one person who loves him unconditionally and never asks for anything in return. Ash finds peace when he's next to Eiji, he feels at ease and opens up.

Nero is Angelo's enemy. He only befriends him to get closer to Don Vanetti. They do, eventually, become real friends along the way. Nero gets quite obsessed with Angelo, going as far as choosing him as his right hand when he becomes the Don. Angelo, in the end, doesn't kill Nero. "I didn't kill you, because I didn't want to kill you" are his last words to Nero.

· Both characters are getting revenge for what happened in the past.

Ash is getting revenge for everything that Dino made him do and did to him. He's not exactly  obsessed with revenge. At least not as obsessed as Angelo is.

Angelo is blinded by revenge. It's the only reason he's still alive. His family was killed in front of him when he was a child. Vincent Vanetti, Nero Vanetti, Vanno and Ganzo - the four people he wants to kill. Well, techinally it's three people as Ganzo is the one who tipped him off about who killed his family.

· Corruption

In both animes the mafia is full of corruption. In Banana Fish, the mafia is working with the government developing a drug. In 91 Days tha mafia is corrupted from within. Ganzo, Nero's uncle, sells his family out to help another family thrive.

· The fates of protagonists.

The fates are both similar and different at the same time.

Both main characters die. Ash is stabbed, Angelo is shot. The difference is...

Ash dies completely against his will. He was willing to die before if it meant that Eiji was safe, but at the end he realized that he needed to see Eiji, that Eiji is his reason to live, he didn't even get to say goodbye to his love.

Angelo, on the other hand, thought that getting revenge would give him a reason to live. He was wrong. "It was all pointless" he tells Nero after Nero's whole family is killed, after Nero finds out that the person he trusted is the one who brought doom on him. Angelo doesn't even care if he dies, he knows he will die at the hands of Nero but to him it doesn't matter. He just walks forward as Nero takes his gun out and kills him.

...

In both animes you sort of connect with certain characters. I personally connected with Eiji and Corteo. I could understand that they wanted their friend to live a better life. They were doing their best.

That said, I'm gonna miss Angelo and Ash. Both so similar yet different.

Tari.