Reborn: The Case of a Good Heart Against Bland Execution

TV Asahi’s Reborn certainly has a lot going on for it: led by the excellent Takahashi Issey in a dual role, it relies on an exciting blend of time slips, reincarnation, and found families. Top that off with a witty hero who helps the poor underdog win against the greedy magnate, and you’re bound to get a heartfelt tale of nature versus nurture, of tenacity and selflessness, and of identity and change.

But Reborn, despite its quirky premise full of potential, falters in its execution. It ends up as one of those series that makes you feel weirdly puzzled, questioning whether you missed out on some important plot point or if you merely had the wrong expectations for it.

This review is spoiler-free! But if you’re in a rush, why don’t you pin our summary? It’s at the bottom!

Who Is Neo Kosei?

Penned by Hashimoto Hiroshi and helmed by Fujita Meiji, Aso Manabu, and Ninomiya Takashi, Reborn is the story of Neo Kosei (Takahashi Issey), the brilliant CEO of NEOXIS, an IT company that beat the odds to become one of the biggest names in the industry.

To the public, Kosei is a charismatic, hardworking leader who has built his ever-growing empire guided by the motto “for the people”. On TV, he’s shown smiling widely as he signs the — seemingly successful — purchase of a bank. On magazine covers, he’s painted as a generous and righteous businessman.

However, at home, we observe as he eats on his own, lonely and miserable. At work, he’s ruthless in making business decisions, obnoxious to colleagues who have worked with him for decades, and paranoid when he receives presents from the company’s partners and collaborators.

Then, who is the real Kosei?

Reborn will have Kosei devise the answer to that question throughout its nine episodes. To set him off on this journey of self-discovery, the series’s first instalment inevitably bombards us with information. We’re quickly dragged through the years as we witness Kosei gradually lose his identity while trying to build the NEOXIS he dreams of.

The more NEOXIS grows, the less humane Kosei becomes. Finally, in 2022, NEOXIS decides to buy land in Arakawa Ward, which includes tearing down the ramshackle Akari Shopping Street. But evicting the people who live and work there proves to be quite a challenge, and Kosei spends the next four years making use of every single merciless tactic in the capitalist playbook to drive the stubborn Akari community to a corner.

Tragedy ensues, but Kosei couldn’t care less. His heartlessness has pushed people away; his values have become null and void — but his business is flourishing, and that’s all that matters.

Things change when, one morning, Kosei is pushed down a staircase and dies from the fall. When he wakes up, he finds himself back in 2012, somehow “reincarnated” into the body of a certain Nomoto Eito, a young man who bears a striking — and almost unbelievable — resemblance to his Kosei self.

It turns out that Eito is the son of Nomoto Eiji (Kohinata Fumiyo), the chairman of the very Akari Shopping Street he destroyed in his “past life”. So Kosei goes from oppressor to oppressed overnight and, as Eito, he is now stuck with a loving but financially inept community whose future is nothing but bleak.

And that’s where the trick lies: Kosei is armed with knowledge of what is yet to come, which he will begrudgingly use to help Eito’s shopping street thrive and, hopefully, find out the identity of his killer.

Being Reborn Into a More Compassionate Universe

As one would expect, Reborn has its protagonist learn the meaning of trust, empathy, and community through his relationship with the caring neighbourhood that surrounds him. Whether that protagonist is Neo Kosei or Nomoto Eito matters little to this narrative, because the point here is the development of a third and independent persona born out of the nurturing environment and the quirky circumstances set by this script.

In one way or another, Eito’s and Kosei’s lives have always been intertwined, which justifies this strange “reincarnation” but also allows both men to exist simultaneously throughout the series. Reborn wants to create a comparison between the two to prove how the moulding of our identity isn’t a case of either nature or nurture, but of both nature and nurture.

Kosei has always been an intelligent, determined, and compassionate person. But, his life at NEOXIS stifled his empathy, turned his intelligence into arrogance, and used his determination to fuel his avarice. His desires became ever more toxic and self-centred, and he lost sight of what he truly needed.

As Eito, however, Kosei is given something bigger than himself to care about. He embraces the joy of giving and receiving love, shedding his pride and twisted ambition to slowly regain his humanity. The residents of the Akari Shopping Street foster Kosei’s qualities and reinforce his principles, allowing him to realise that he’s only sincerely happy when he can help those around him. He’s only fully himself when he forgives, understands, and supports others.

Reborn is at its best when exploring the internal conflicts that guide Kosei towards his most authentic self, a journey that constantly forces him to choose between cynicism and faith, egoism and altruism, individualism and collectivism. And who better than Takahashi Issey to deliver such a character? The show lives and dies by its protagonist, and Kosei is only able to shoulder the weight of this narrative thanks to Takahashi’s irresistible charisma and subtle performance.

Nevertheless, Reborn becomes so enthralled by the exploration of its themes through Kosei’s development arc that it forgoes everything else. Supporting roles are given shallow characterisation: the people from the Akari Shopping Street are your standard — and often saccharine — found family, individuals with little personality and even less agency to speak of. Their let’s-drink-and-forget-about-it approach to most of the challenges they face turns them into lazy devices that only exist to exalt Kosei as a hero. Even more maddening is the fact that they make the same mistakes over and over again, which means that Kosei is the only character who actually grows in this story.

Reborn doesn’t really count on a proper antagonist, which isn’t a problem per se. We’re offered morally grey, antagonistic individuals who aren’t given a clear purpose instead. Without a solid cast of secondary characters to drive this story forward alongside our protagonist, the plot ends up contrived and adrift for most of the series’s run. Since narrative logic isn’t established with confidence, why or how things happen are details often ignored.

The flimsy mechanics behind Reborn become even more evident due to an awfully verbose script. On-the-nose dialogue and constant expository voice-over narration explain every action and every emotion. There’s no subtext, no connotation to be inferred. Things are exactly how Kosei narrates them to be or how the characters meticulously explain to one another, which makes the loose ends, the hit-and-miss comedy, and the questionable ending stand out even more. On a more visual note, Reborn makes use of a fairly creative visual language, with lots of camera movement that effectively responds to the fast-paced unravelling of Kosei’s story.

Should You Watch Reborn?

Flawed, wacky, and lively, Reborn has a good heart and a promising premise that ends up crudely executed. It relies on a series of commonplace devices to deliver a story we’ve all seen before — after all, isn’t Kosei just a modern Ebenezer Scrooge, a selfish and bitter man who discovers the joys of generosity and benevolence?

Don’t expect a tight and complex narrative, and be ready to take things at face value. Reborn might not be remarkable or original in any way, but if you offer it a tad of patience, it might just warm your soul (and make you crave a freshly fried korokke with every single episode, don’t say I didn’t warn you!).

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