Mike Brander

"Raise your if your brother's a homo!"

- Mike Brander (who is mocking his brother Chris is not a homosexual).

Mike Brander is a minor antagonist from the 2005 romantic comedy movie Just Friends. Mike is the younger and only sibling of the film's main character, Chris Brander. Mike is not really villinous compared to most bad guys, but given his attitude and actions towards the films protagonist he is not likely to be deemed a good guy either.

Role in film
Mike is shown throughout the ocurse of the film to be constantly starting petty fights with Chris and will normaly attempt to call a truce when he feels he does not have the upperhand. Mike does care for his brother but only in a "You're family so I have to" method, and it is made obvious that Chris is not on the top of Mike's favorite people list.

Mike has an extremely ardent crush on Samantha James, the film's main antagonist and one of Chris' clients. Mike's attraction to Samantha is not something he is at all embarrassed about and he informed her about instantly upon meeting her during the Christmas holidays. Mike has all of Samantha's highly slutty modeling posters and photos stuck on his bedroom wall and openly admists he pleasures himself to them daily, he relayd both facts to Samantha without any hint of shame in an attempt to flatter her.

Chris wanted to sneak away from Samantha, who had very covetous feelings towards him, to woo his true love, Jaime, and asked Mike to "detain" Samantha. Mike was naturally enthusiastic to spend some alone time with his dream girl and drove her to the mall, but while talking with Chris on his cell phone he accidentally hit Samantha with her taser and knocked her off a level of the mall. Rushing her home, Mike tied an ice-pack to her head, which had gotten seriously injured from the fall, and gave her a sever overdose of vicodin, causing her to behave rather retarded until the effects wore off. When Chris saw Samantha in this state, he and Mike had one of their violent, but laughable squabbles. Chris soon after beat Mike into the couch and stomped on his butt for good measure, causing Mike to weakly mumble "Truce". Mike then picked up the phone to listen in on Chris' phone call with Jaime and whispered insults into the line, reulting in Chris tackling Mike and punishing him off screen in someway, Mike could be heard yelling "TRUCE!" during this.

While Chris was again out with Jaime, Mike took another crack at being alone with Samantha who was making time fly in Chris' bedroom. Mike offered her daisies, magazines and snacks (that had carbs) and she unkindly scorned all of them and then Mike but then apalogized and permitted him to keep her compony. After Samantha began to rave about being sex starved Mike turned his head away so she could not see how distressingly turned on he was getting. Samantha then began to flirt with Mike and got him to give her a back rub with the possible attempt to seduce him, although she could have been lying just for a free massage, Mike's infatuation with her was strong enough for him to not think that far ahead. Mike frantically grabbed soem oil and ripped off his jacket and began to massage Samantha's back which was bare due to her having willingly stripped. As the massage made progress, Mike babbeled happily to himself and began flushing more and more intensly, when Chris reappered however he threw Mike off of Samantha and onto the floor.

Later that night, Chris got Mike to distract Samantha by taking her out again and (after poking Chris in the eye), Mike ignored Chris' command to take her to a coffee house and took her to a club instead. At the club, Samantha played her guitar and sung onstage, but due to her being very bad at singing, and the crowd just wanting her to get naked for them, she was jeered at and had things thrown at her, resulting in her physically assulting one of the audience members. The next day, Mike had a whispered argument with Chris so as not to wake Samantha. Chris told Mike he was going to meet with Jaime again and to not let Samantha know where he had gone, to which Mike agreed prior to giving Chris a Christmas cookie. Mike, however, had no idea that it was soon to become the best day of his life.

That night, just as Mike had finished brushing his teeth, he looked in the mirror and saw Samantha's glowering face right behind him causing him to let out a high pitched shriek. Samantha grabbed Mike, spun him around and rammed him hard against the wall and loudly demanded that he tell her where Chris was. Mike vowed to "never" betray his brother to her, determined to stay true to his promice. Samantha whispered "Oh yeah?" in a dangerous tone that implied she was going to hurt Mike until he gave in. Instead she (to Mike's ineffable glee) tongue kissed him with tremendous zeal and Mike instantly gave up Chris' secret to her.

Mike accomponied Samantha to the party Chris was at alongside both Jamie and Dusty, and watched her destroy it, doing nothing to stop her though expressing slight sympathy when Samantha punched Chris in the throat and warning him that a wire was connected to the car as Samantha stormed off. Mike's last words to Samantha (as far as the movie showed) was a weakly mumbled "Call me" that she did not respond to. Mike was last seen calling Chris a homo and casually telling him to keep in touch as he (Chris) stormed out the door, all the while focusing just on a PSP he was playing.

Mike was acting extremely goofy and crazy as Samantha destroyed the party, possibly because being kissed by Samantha had caused his happiness to elevate beyond natural limits. In his last seen he is shown to have calmed down but still acting dreamy and happy at a slightly above average rate, which could have meant he was no longer ecstatic about Samantha kissing him but had calmed down to the point of simply being able to daydream about it.

It is unknown what became of Mike afterwards, if he ever saw Samantha again or ever even got over her.