Reincarnation no Kaben Ep.01 - Haito looks good. Protagonist seems reminiscent of...

Episode 01 of Reincarnation no Kaben does a good job of setting the pace and the setting of the series. The story seems to focus on a world where there are objects called "branches of reincarnation" that grant people talents from their past lives, provided they slit their own throats with them.

Touya Senji is a standard teenage protagonist (to the point that I had déjà vu when I saw his face) who has low self-esteem due to always being compared to his more talented older brother. He gets involved with Haito and uses the item to obtain the power of his past life, which seems to be related to stealing.

Animation and art is quite good so far and I really like Haito's design. Personality I still can't fully read her though.

I'm curious if all characters will get the same level of flashy animation when transforming that we've seen for Haito in this episode.

It is a convenient power because, unbeknownst to the others, it allows Senji to steal the powers of other characters. This allows him to wield multiple talents and have the upper hand in battle. He seems to have sinister plans for using it, but then again, he is a protagonist in a shounen-like series, so I do not expect too much to happen.

Yes, we have heard of similar mechanics in various other series like Persona 3 (the gun), but in general, I think it is just an idea like any other to set the stage for the battles to happen. Each character has some important figure from the past connected to them, and they activate their power accordingly.

For example, the main heroine, Haito, seems to get her talent from Miyamoto Musashi, but we have seen Vlad III in this episode too, so I guess it will be a showdown between multiple popular names from the past. I have had a quick look at the character list and have seen Einstein and Newton among the common ones, but then I spotted Hitler and I laughed.

The series is based on an original manga written and illustrated by Konishi Mikihisa that started in 2014; it currently has 22 volumes and is still ongoing. I am genuinely interested in giving the manga a try once the anime is over because it must be doing something correctly to last this long.

John von Neumann turns out is a cute girl in this reincarnation. I'm not complaining and I'm curious about how many will get gender bended.

Both versions of Haito are cute, but I think I like the normal student one the best. I wonder why she moved into protagonist's class specifically...

I do not expect this to be a masterpiece that will be remembered, but it will be a guilty pleasure for me to follow this season. Chuuni series are not usually what I watch, but I have fond memories of other series like this one that I watched in the past, so I want to give it a chance.