Brothers Conflict - 10

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Azusa is out of the hospital and the siblings go to a summer festival at Club Buddha in lieu of their planned trip overseas.  In true Brothers Conflict fashion, the conflicts the siblings are embroiled in only become more intense.

Yuusuke really cares about Chi, probably more than just about any of his brothers.  First of all, he hasn’t made any bold advances toward her like many of the other brothers have.  Secondly, he clearly cares about how she feels about a lot of things.  And finally, as demonstrated in this episode, he’s so determined to go to the same university as her that he’s willing to forgo the trip in order to study and improve his grades.  It’s obvious that he hadn’t cared much about academics before he found out where Chi wanted to go to university, so this definitely shows that he’ll do just about anything to be with her.

The exchange that Hikaru starts in the car is really interesting.  Part of me feels like Hikaru is trying to get Chi to open up about everything going on with the other siblings in order to get her to voice her own opinions and explain what she wants.  But another part of me wonders if he just wants to stir up more conflict because it makes for better storytelling.  (He is a novelist, after all.)

There’s a theme that’s being brought to the forefront of Brothers Conflict in the past couple of episodes that I hope people are finally noticing: the concept of family and what exactly “family” means.  Last episode it was Louis who mentioned that what’s in one’s heart matters more than their blood relations to family members, and this episode it’s Yusei (the number-one monk), who explains that family love is true love and none of the conflicts surrounding Chi and her brothers will break that kind of love.

Subaru and Chi finally have another conversation in this episode.  What’s interesting about their conversation is how much it sounds like a brother asking his sister for advice rather than a boyfriend talking to his girlfriend.  Most of the brothers (if not all of them), I think, simply don’t know how to react around Chi—not necessarily because they’re attracted to her, but because they’ve never had a sister before.   I’d argue that all these confessions and feelings and what not from the brothers stem from feelings of affection toward a sister who is important to them, rather than them actually being romantically attracted to her.

Brothers Conflict Episode 11 Preview

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