Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi

Incest. Brother to sister. Brother to sisters. The list goes on, but you get the gist. Love it or hate it, you can’t deny that incest plotlines tend to bring us some of the most engaging and outrageous shows in any medium, anime being one of the biggest offenders. Take Domestic Girlfriend as a prime example. You could also throw in Kiss x Sis or My Stepmom's Daughter is My Ex and go on forever, but you get the idea. The point is, stories built around taboo relationships often result in some of the most wildly entertaining content out there.

So what happens when you mix ... that plus the creator of one of anime's most infamous dumpster fires, Rent-a-Girlfriend? You get a little show called The Shiunji Family Children.

Now, now, don’t tune out just yet. I know I lost a few of you the moment I said “incest,” and probably even more when I brought up Rent-a-Girlfriend, but trust me, it’s all worth it. Yes, on paper the premise sounds like incest... but it's really not. Let me break it down for those unfamiliar.

The Shiunji family lives in a rural mansion with seven children. “Seven?” you might ask. “So what, like 3 boys and 4 girls?” Wrong. Taking the Quints route, there are five girls and two boys, but one of the boys barely even gets ten minutes of screentime total, so it's really just one. One day, their father reveals a bombshell: none of the kids are biologically related. And just like that, their sibling dynamics get completely flipped on their heads as they begin to navigate life with this new information... aka, justified incest baby.

It’s basically The Quintessential Quintuplets if they found a loophole to let them all live together under one roof for extended periods of chaos, and let’s just say some of those “wacky” hijinks go way beyond that term.

Now you're probably thinking, “Great, another recycled trash-tier harem show,” and on top of that, it’s from the guy who made Rent-a-Girlfriend, so how could this possibly be good? Well... yes and no.

Contrary to popular belief, when Reiji Miyajima (the author of Rent-a-Girlfriend) takes his head out of his Chizuru-obsessed nut infested underwear, he can actually write. You saw glimpses of that in the most recent season of RAG, and here, he goes above and beyond. To put things into perspective: there’s more romance development in the first seven episodes of this series than in three entire seasons (and counting) of Rent-a-Girlfriend. So yeah, it’s off to a much better start.

And it’s not just the romance. The characters are surprisingly well-developed too. The main lead, Arata Shiunji, stands out, not just in comparison to Kazuya (which, low bar), but genuinely. When he’s not channeling inner-Kazuya energy, he’s actually one of the better romance leads I’ve seen recently. Well, “romance” may not be the right word, it’s more about how great and supportive a brother he is, particularly to Banri, Ouka, and Minami (the three sisters who get fleshed-out arcs this season). Speaking of arcs, without spoiling anything, Minami's arc is honestly one of the best I’ve seen in romance anime in a while, it's a masterclass. Ofc, this being only 12 episodes long, some characters get the short end of the stick here,or just don’t even get any attention like the aforementioned other brother in the family, but for the ones that were developed this season, they were all done masterfully.

Now sure, you can still see traces of Reiji’s writing flaws peek through, repetitive flashbacks, even to scenes that happened like 10 minutes earlier (and no, that’s not just the anime staff; Reiji himself does this constantly). Also, the weird obsession with random background characters gawking at the sisters in public, it’s just a Reiji thing.

But I’ve gotta give him props for the pacing here. It’s slow. Intentionally slow. A proper slow burn that, compared to the hyper-dramatic pacing of Rent-a-Girlfriend, actually gives the story room to breathe. And as a slow burn enjoyer, I was eating it up. Honestly, it reminded me of Days with My Stepsister, another “incest-adjacent” show, but with more dramatic highs (sometimes even over the top, if I’m being critical).

Now, let’s talk animation, you know, the part that makes anime... well, anime. Unlike Rent-a-Girlfriend, which has pretty drawings but barely moves, The Shiunji Family Children actually looks and feels like a fully animated show. It’s produced by Doga Kobo (yeah, Oshi no Ko's studio), so you already know it was in good hands. Director Ryouki Kamitsubo brings all his experience with “character-focused” series (ahem, GOONER shows as the kids would say) and delivers. There’s a scene in episode one, just Arata taking off his shirt, that has some of the most fluid clothing animation I’ve seen in years. The visuals overall are absolutely stellar, even reaching Oshi no Ko-level quality at times. And as mentioned before, the direction when it wants to go all philosophical on you, will go all in.

As for the music, the OST is jazz-inspired, fitting for the Shiunji family's laid-back, upscale lifestyle, especially since they live in Seijo, Setagaya-ku, a Tokyo area known for jazz. While the background tracks are solid but nothing groundbreaking, the OP and ED absolutely slap. The OP by NACHERRY is a banger, great vocals, catchy instrumentals. The ED, sung by the whole harem cast, hits even harder thanks to the stacked seiyuu lineup.

All in all, there’s a lot to enjoy here, whether it’s the characters, the development, the visuals, or the music. It’s obviously not a masterpiece, but considering this is coming from Reiji Miyajima, this is a shockingly competent and enjoyable entry into the romance genre. It’s weird, it’s messy, and yes, it’s kinda wrong, but man, it’s entertaining as hell, and at the end of the day, that’s really all that matters nowadays don’t it.

Having watched 'Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi' weekly for the past three months, a question has persistently lingered in my mind: 'Is my past experience with Reiji Miyajima's previous work making me unfairly critical of this anime? Perhaps it isn't as bad as I think, and I'm unconsciously nitpicking more than I typically do with other Harem-RomComs?' I believe these are valid questions. In this review, I will outline what I think went wrong with 'Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi' and what ultimately makes this anime so frustrating to watch.


Art and Animation (9/10):

I've decided to discuss the positive aspects first. In my opinion, the art is undeniably the strongest ... element of this show, a point I don't believe is debatable. I've always appreciated Reiji Miyajima's artistic style; he possesses a flair and creativity that makes his characters visually appealing. This, combined with excellent animation and a well-chosen vibrant color palette, results in the high production quality this show offered. To put it simply, the animation quality was S tier. It remained consistently high from the first to the twelfth episode. Furthermore, I found the visual execution of the opening song particularly impressive for this genre. They could have easily opted for a more grounded approach, like many recent harems which often feature a simple sequence of everyone dancing side by side throughout the entire song. I'm glad they chose a more creative and engaging option.


Audio and Soundtracks (8.25/10):

The second and third best aspects of 'Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi' are the voice acting and the opening song. The voice acting and cast selection were pretty straightforward. To my surprise, Umehara Yuuichirou fit into Arata's character quite well, especially considering it's a role that differs significantly from his more familiar work. The female voice actors were also fine, with a special mention for Hana Hishikawa, who voiced Minami. I thought she did exceptionally well.

The opening song was good. While I'm not listening to it on repeat, it was enjoyable enough that I didn't skip it on several occasions. The ending song, however, was pretty average for the genre.


Plot and Characters(5.5/10):

I generally do not mind when common tropes are thrown into a harem or a rom-com anime. Actually, a lot of times they can make the experience better if they are used in a clever way. The same goes for the usual character types. I mean, types like the tsundere childhood friend, the onee-san, or the tomboy have been around in anime, VNs, mangas for like, ages. So for me to get annoyed by tropes and seeing the same character types means one of two things: either they used them badly or they just used them way too much. And in Shiunji-ke no Kodomotachi's case, they kinda did both.

The main story idea isn't as complicated as some other "wannabe incest" shows. Right from the start, it tries to be serious but fails pretty hard because it keeps using tropes in the most annoying way possible. Let's just talk about the obvious thing first. This show has 7 siblings, 2 brothers and 5 sisters. But honestly, with how little we see of Shion, they could have just skipped his character completely. None of the sisters have a crush on him, and he barely shows up in each episode for maybe a minute or two. The longest he talked was probably when he tells his brother, just to make it easy for us to understand, how all his sisters are kind of amazing and are all 'Takane no Hana', you know, if I say it in Japanese. That scene was just not good. You don't talk to your brother about your sisters like that. He already knows that stuff. And when I said they used the tropes too much, I wasn't kidding at all, especially when it comes to Banri and Seiha. I know we haven't seen their arc in the anime yet, but at least they could have made how they act around Arata a bit more believable. I really didn't like how everything about their character felt fake. Like they were just there for fanservice. They could have easily cut out some of the fanservice for Seiha and Banri because it kind of distracts you for a bit, and then right away you're back to Ouka or Minami's story where things are actually happening. The main characters, at least for this first season, felt like Ouka, Minami, and Arata. I thought both Minami and Ouka's story parts were okay, not like I didn't cringe when Ouka said that "Can siblings be soulmates?". But still, at least the story moved forward in their parts. Arata was just a perfect example of a harem guy who doesn't stick to his own personality and keeps doing things that don't make sense for his character. He keeps saying "That won't happen because we are family, nothing will change because we have been family for 15 years," Yet, the moment Banri presses her breasts against him or reveals a hint of cleavage, he becomes flustered and bashful.

What troubles me most about this show is its attempt to straddle a middle ground. It tries to be both dramatic and realistic about the dilemma of romantic relationships between siblings while simultaneously adhering to the conventions of a typical harem anime with an oblivious male lead and stereotypical female leads. I believe it would have been significantly better without the step-sibling element. That plot point was essentially irrelevant in Kotono and Minami's arcs. As soon as they learned Arata wasn't blood-related, they immediately concluded they would try to win him over. I prefer anime that fully commits to either an incestuous narrative with blood-related leads or a standard harem setup with unrelated individuals. I think the latter approach would have worked perfectly with the existing cast of characters in this show.

Overall (6.25/10):

Now, let's revisit the very reason this anime is frustrating to watch. It's because I think it had the potential to be something memorable. The art, the animation, and the direction were all top-notch. However, the story and characters were so predictable and insignificant that these good aspects are significantly overshadowed by the poor writing. I might have still recommended this if the jokes were consistently funny, allowing it to be enjoyed as a comedy-heavy romance show, but that's not the case. It's neither a good harem nor a good comedy. Only consider watching this if you have absolutely nothing else to watch or if you simply want to admire some exceptionally well-drawn 2D waifus.

Thank you for reading ^⁠_⁠^

This series exists for the same reason Rent-a-Girlfirend never ends. Miyajima loves money.

Let's break this down. Obviously the children are not blood related, except for the younger brother with one of the girls, but he doesn't appear much and has a girlfriend anyway.

They get told what was obviously shocking, but of course nothing changes their 16-year-old relationship, right? Literally 5 minutes later they're all into the main character!

All girls are blank stereotypes: Tsundere, Imouto, Tomboy, Nerd, and Onee-san. That's their character, nothing more or less. Well, even the girls in Rent-a-Girlfriend had more character. Their only problem is, oh no, I'm in love ... with my former brother.

The story is aweful, really, there are no story lines you didn't see multiple times in other RomComs and their adaptation of them isn't good or even new.

Then, and maybe that's something personal. In Rent-a-Girlfriend and this Anime there are always some NPCs who have to do expositional dialogue about how beautiful and sexy the girls are. Why? That's so cringe.

Last words to Doga Koba. I really like the studio, Oshi no Ko and Jellyfish look great, but this isn't their best work.