Ahhh. Its been a while since I read something so horrible on the same level as Zannen nagara Chigaimasu or On the Emperors Lap but I have found a worthy contender for the worst manga that Ive ever read. While its the same level of bad as those two its more comparable with the horrible reverse harem anime Brothers Conflict. In Hot Gimmick the female lead gets to choose between her brother and a pair of rapists while in Brothers Conflict the female lead gets to choose between her brothers some of whom are rapists. Im sure youre all shocked at whats going on in Hot Gimmick with the incest and the creepy guys so I will first present you with the plot. Hatsumi Narita and her large family live in corporate housing in a building ruled by the Tachibana family the highestranking family in their compound. When Hatsumis popular 14yearold sister has a pregnancy scare she has Hatsumi go out and buy her a pregnancy test since it would cause more of a scandal if middle schooler Akane was caught by Mrs. Tachibana who would surely make their lives miserable. But when Hatsumi returns home with the test shes caught by the Tachibanas son Ryoki. But in exchange for keeping Hatsumi and her sisters secret he has decided that Hatsumi will be his slave and he doesnt want her anywhere near her childhood friend Azusa who returned to the compound. https://www.animefeminist.com/wpcontent/uploads/2019/04/hotgimmick.gif Yeah... Love Interest 1 Ryoki wants to make Hatsumi his slave. Hes physically and verbally abusive and he regularly sexually assaults her. He doesnt take no for an answer ever and even goes so far as to stick his hands up her shirt when shes unconscious. To him a slave is more like a sex slave instead of having her carry his stuff around or do his homework or something. Four chapters in and he attempts to rape her. That happens a few more times in the first 23 volumes and no one seems to notice that its nonconsensual. Hatsumi will be screaming STOP NO NO and then her neighbors will see and be like Oh youre dating? Have fun making out or whatever. Just assuming this is all consensual. At one point her dad sees this and he gets mad at her for being in a relationship and having sex and all that when it was pretty clear that he was assaulting her. It made me sick. Theres a panel I should have saved it because I cant find it where Ryoki and Hatsumi are kissing and Ryokis thinking Shes not struggling like usual Is this what a consensual kiss is like? Ahh the beauty of consent. And I just wanted to throw him across the room. Ryoki is also controlling and possessive with his narcissism preventing him from letting Hatsumi have any relationships above him. Shed have family troubles and then hed get mad at her and slap her for not answering his calls. Hed get upset that she would be thinking of her sibling who ran away from home instead of thinking about him exclusively. Hes just all around terrible constantly calling Hatsumi stupid and all sorts of other insults. And he never got better. http://www.heartofmanga.com/wpcontent/uploads/2011/08/HGchapter1cast.jpg Love Interest 2 Azusa is not much better. Hes not as bad as Ryoki but Ryoki has dethroned Futo Asahina from Brothers Conflict as my least favorite character of all time and if youre wondering how bad Futo is hes one of the few love interests in Brothers Conflict who isnt a child predator and yet he somehow is creepier and more disgusting than all of them. And I hate Ryoki more than this dude. So being better than Ryoki is not an accomplishment. You see Azusas also a rapist he just hired other guys to rape Hatsumi. He just wanted to record her being raped and send it to Hatsumis dad since her dad apparently had an affair with his mom and his dad divorced his mom because of it and then he had a hard life and his mom died. Trust me its so convoluted and it does not get dropped. What Im telling you about is like the 4th volume and this story is basically Azusas entire motivation for the entire series. He goes around acting like Hatsumis dad killed his mom when she just got sick and died due to stress or something. Azusa led her on gave her a daterape drug but her brother found her beforehand. A few days later he sends her to his modeling office or whatever for his friends to rape her. I guess he wanted Hatsumis dad to know what it feels like to lose a loved one? Hes basically horrible and evil and then Hatsumi apologizes for not noticing his pain and then his manager comes to apologize for his actions but instead basically justifies and excuses his behavior... Then they brush his actions under the rug and hes just there with his mothers affair plot trying to ruin everyones lives. Love interest 3 Shinogu is... not a rapist but Hatsumis brother. You see he was adopted and was in love with her from the very beginning despite Hatsumi having been like three years old and him being like six and Hatsumi not remembering that he was adopted and seeing him exclusively as her brother. It just feels creepy. He also lets his 19yearold friend hit on his 14yearold sister so keep that in mind. Shinogu despite being the least creepy in terms of consent and being a decent human being was still the last one I wanted to get with Hatsumi. Im sorry but I felt disgusted whenever he was on the page. Theres even a point where you think he and Hatsumi slept together which made me want to vomit since Hatsumi literally thought they were biologically related until a few weeks earlier. Fortunately they did not sleep together which helped to preserve my sanity a bit more because that was all that I could take. And Shinogu was trying to unadopt himself so that he could be free to pursue his sister and everyone was encouraging the two of them to get together in the end... I just felt gross watching all that unfold. http://pm1.narvii.com/6450/d47bda11ef90485ba2c5424a4948b034c256191100.jpg Hatsumi made the wrong choice but there was no right choice in this situation since all the men who are interested in her suck. Im not going to discuss Hatsumi herself in as much detail because while shes not quite as bad as Ema Hinata Brothers Conflict or Yuki Cross Vampire Knight shes not a great character. Shes a doormat who gets taken advantage of by every character in this manga and never changes always remaining a victim of abuse. I did not hate her but it was frustrating to watch. I just wish someone with an actual functioning brain would step in and help her. I covered the characters before the plot because the characters are the plot. The whole story is just Hatsumi and her harem of trash men causing drama. Theres some side stuff with an awkwardly written side couple featuring Hatsumis sister and their neighbor but as poorly written as that was Id rather have that than the HatsumiRyokiShingouAzusa stuff. We also get some love triangle stuff with a pointless love rival for Hatsumi a groomer tutor and the Azusas mom affair drama. Id say that Hot Gimmick could have been interesting if it took another angle with the premise. It could have explored corporate housing and its effects on children in an indepth way since the English translation has a little afterword by someone who lived in the womens dorms in corporate housing. It sounds like a strained environment to raise children in and I think it could have been interesting to focus on the kids their psyches and what theyve internalized after growing up like this. Hot Gimmick does touch on it a little bit but more in the soapopera way where its just to cause drama and obstacles for Hatsumi and her many love interests. https://hakutakudotblog.files.wordpress.com/2023/02/1bba9hotgimmick.png?w=977 The art was acceptable. The colored pages ranged from okay to I learned how to use photoshop yesterday. It wasnt terrible art and it could be nice simple and stylized with the big eyes. It can be nice to look at and the mangaka has a distinctive style. I can easily recognize her stuff even if its more of a curse than a blessing since I HATED Hot Gimmick. This manga was honestly such a struggle to get through and I regretted every second of it. It begins as a trashy but addictive read in the very beginning but I lost patience with it and could no longer view it as a pleasant but secretly enjoyable trash read. It became the bane of my existence. I want to warn you all not to read this manga because it is terrible and I read this so you dont have to. Consider yourself saved from the curse of Miki Aiharas terrible writing and even worse ideas of romantic relationships.