Brothers Conflict - 1

There needs to be some sort of Bishie Limit.  This is just ridiculous.

Brothers Conflict centers around Hinata Ema, an only child whose frequently travelling father left her alone for most of her childhood. After he remarries, she goes to live with her new step-brothers, of which there are thirteen. Yes, thirteen. Everything I know about biology is crying right now. Ema’s talking squirrel (No, seriously...) Juli warns her that living alone in a house with men is dangerous, and constantly compares them to wolves. He turns out not to be too far wrong, since at least one of her new ‘brothers’ starts putting the moves on her on the first day. Subtle this anime is not...

It's not creepy

Watching the opening, some of the brothers looked more like girls than the protagonist. More bishounen than the day is long. I started to get the feeling that I was not part of the intended audience. I was expecting a comedy, but aside from a couple obligatory misunderstandings, the tone was remarkably serious right from the get-go. It is my own fault, I suppose, not being as well-versed in Japanese genres as I should be, that I was unable to spot that this was an Shoujo in advance.

Only one of them is female.  Only one.

I am somewhat disappointed that the tone was not as comedic as I expected. It seems a waste of a decent premise, since it fits comedy so well, while the implausibility breaks the suspension or disbelief in any more serious setting.

The problem is that the extreme implausibility of the situation, both logistically, and the ‘idealness’ of the brothers themselves makes the whole thing feel very wishful. If you flipped the genders, it would just look sad on the author’s part, especially given the seriousness of the tone.

I’ll be the first to admit I don’t know much about the female mind, but seeing that this is likely to be the equivalent of a harem, I think I can comment a little. Fundamentally, this setup is too easy. There are love interests, sexy bishounen love interests, as far as the eye can see, who are not only perfect people, but also in close proximity. At least in the harem genre, the upper limit is generally six. This is more than twice that. There’s no challenge, no intrigue. For anime with 'Conflict' in the name, I would have liked to see a bit more of it in the first episode than ‘Oh woe is me, living in close proximity to more amazing love interests than I can shake a stick at.’ Because really, social propriety seems to be the last thing on anyone's mind. Not that I'm against pseudo-incest fetish material - each to their own - but I don't think people are expected to go all lusty quite so... quickly. A bit more agonizing and lamenting taboo is customary, no?

'Brother' - say it with me now.

Though the premise sounded like it would show promise, I was quite disappointed with what I saw. The harem genre can be done very successfully - Clannad is a prime example - but this was boring and bland. It might be fun for the intended audience of girls as eye-candy/wish-fulfillment, but the plot is weak.

I would not recommend this anime unless you enjoy Shoujo for its own sake.