The Winter 2023 Anime Preview Guide

The Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist In Another World

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Haruyoshi is the strongest onmyōji (diviner) in his world. He's betrayed by his friends and, on the verge of death, he wishes to be happy in his next life. He then attempts a secret reincarnation spell. The spell is a success and he is reincarnated, but somehow it's in another world. He is reborn into a distinguished family of wizards, but is judged to have no magical ability. He soon realizes however that the magic in this world is nothing compared to his old onmyō arts, and he declares that he doesn't need magic. He thus begins his easy life in another world with his onmyō arts and a multitude of yōkai creatures who follow him.

The Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist In Another World is based on Kiichi Kosuzu's light novel series and streams on Crunchyroll on Saturdays.

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James Beckett
Rating:

You cannot, under any circumstances, convince me that the premiere of The Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist in Another World was not a double-length episode. You can't do it. I don't care what the little timestamp on the Crunchyroll player says, and I don't care what the clocks on every device in my home say; I cannot accept a reality wherein that single episode was only twenty-two minutes long, when it practically felt like slogging through the first act of a meandering feature film.

To be fair, Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist is not without merit, and I'm actually going to give it a decent score for this Preview Guide, because the show does have some potential. The animation is decent, and the spritz of flavor that is granted by our hero being reincarnated from a famous Japanese exorcist from the past is…well, I can't say that it is revolutionary or anything, but it's something. I also like that our hero, Haruyoshi, has at least one familiar companion, Yuki, to him on his adventure. All of these characters, from the enthusiastic Yuki to the douchey Gly, aren't much more than your average archetypes, but the vibes that the story achieves in this premiere are decent enough. It almost reminds me of Parallel World Pharmacy, which is a compliment, even if I'm nowhere near as enthusiastic about this premiere as I was for PWP.

The big reason for that is the pacing. I don't know if it is because of Haruyoshi's constant, laconic narration, or the script's function-over-form priorities, or if it's just because this is the seventh new premiere I've watched today, and my eyes are literally beginning to glaze over. Either way, there was just something about this episode that was keeping me at arm's length and feeling awfully drowsy from beginning to end.

The Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist is not an awful show so far, and it is indeed probably the most competently written and executed of today's isekai premieres, but I just can't shake the feeling that it is missing…something. Some vital piece that would make it more compelling, to me. If reincarnation isekai are more up your alley, then give it a shot. Otherwise, feel free to ignore it for the many other, better anime that are coming out this season.

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Nicholas Dupree
Rating:

This is not an amazing show. It is, by all standards, below average in most aspects. But after having my brain melted with a ton of poorly put together isekai-adjacent light novel shows this season, I'll take it. I can see the appeal, and might even watch a second episode out of curiosity. I'll count that as a win.

For one, Strongest Exorcist has a mildly interesting twist to the typical reincarnation formula. Instead of being a nobody from modern-day Japan, Seika is reincarnated from a powerful exorcist from ancient times, who once commanded countless powerful spirits. It's basically a combination of the typical isekai formula and the “Oda Nobunaga time travels to somewhere” genre that used to be all the rage, and it's a decently clever explanation for why our hero is secretly super powerful in his new life. What's more, his status as a teacher in a previous life allows him to form a connection with his new family's slave, and teach her his ways. A protagonist caring about somebody besides himself and not being pro-slavery is a super low bar to clear, yet by stepping over it this show still leaves many of its peers in the dust. It's still chock-full of cliches, but there's a world of competence between it and, say, The Iceblade Sorcerer Shall Rule the World.

Even the production is kind of nice, though the character designs are as generic as any other show with “Reincarnation” or “Another World” in their title. But there are a few cuts of nice animation, and even some interesting storyboarding in a couple places. Sure, the action leaves a lot to be desired, and maybe my eyes are just busted after sitting through Saving 80,0000 Gold in Another World for My Retirement, but I didn't hate looking at this thing while I was watching it.

This is a lot of damning with faint praise, but I'm sincere when I say this was a mildly pleasant watch. I also meant it when I said I'm curious enough to watch more, even though I suspect things will turn into magic school pablum pretty quick. But by god, this thing got some goodwill out of me, and that's not always a guarantee with Preview Guide.

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Rebecca Silverman
Rating:

Does anyone a show called The Strongest Sage with the Weakest Crest? Because if you do, elements of this one will seem very familiar. They have essentially the same premise – that someone super powerful in their dying breath manages to finagle a reincarnation wherein they will have the same or more powers. Where The Strongest Sage with the Weakest Crest was in a completely fantasy-based world, The Reincarnation of the Strongest Exorcist in Another World takes someone from Japan's past and plops him down in a fantasy land, which we can tell because it has two moons. Despite what it at first more or less looks like, our protagonist is not Abe no Seimei, but he might as well be – in this case exorcist seems to be a translation of onmyouji, and his spiritual talents definitely lie in that direction. And like in many a similar tale before it, his spiritual powers negate any potential magic powers he might have in his new incarnation, leading people to grossly underestimate what he is capable of.

Unfortunately, this is one of those first episodes that makes you feel like you must be missing an awful lot from the source material. Over the course of twenty-three minutes, Seika goes from being killed in his first incarnation to being a three-year-old to being twelve, hitting a few ages in between along the way. Presumably this is in the interest of getting us to the point where he's old enough to enroll in whatever magic academy his father is eventually convinced to send him to despite his lack of apparent magical talent; the song that closes out the episode certainly indicates as much. But we can't just jump in at that point because we need to understand just what makes Seika so different and special from everybody else, and how else could that possibly happen without us getting up close and personal with his terrible brother and neglectful parents? Oh, and he has to meet the busty young maid Yifa as well. Can't forget that.

The pitfall with this style of Information packing is that it doesn't really give us a chance to get to know Seika as a character or to have anything more than a superficial understanding of what it is that makes him so purportedly awesome. It simply ends up feeling like isekai #27B, with nods to other similar isekai stories just sort of tossed in in the hopes that if enough of them are combined together, we'll have something worth watching. So there's paper-making like in Ascendance of a Bookworm, Yifa looks awfully like Latifah without the fox ears from Seirei Gensouki, and plenty of other bits and bobs are strewn about the plot. The result is that it feels less original and more cobbled together, and while that won't necessarily be the case going forward, when you pair it with uninspired art and animation, you have an episode that's just sort of there. Having an onmyouji be reborn in a fantasy world isn't a terrible idea – it just doesn't look like it's one that this show is going to be able to do justice.