The second episode of the TV Asahi drama series "Reborn ~The Last Hero~" (Tuesdays at 9 PM), starring actor Issei Takahashi, aired on April 21st. In that episode, there was a scene in which Mitsunori Neo (Takahashi), who has been reincarnated as Hideto Nomoto in 2012, is asked for advice by Togo (Masachika Ichimura), the representative of Togo Fund, which garnered a lot of attention on social media.
◇The following contains spoilers.
In episode 2, Mitsumasa, the president of the emerging IT company "NEOXIS," is reincarnated as Hideto living in the year 2012. Confused, he tries to understand the situation and searches for a way to reclaim his original life as Mitsumasa, but when he learns that the Mitsumasa of this era also exists, he realizes that he has no choice but to live as Hideto.
When Hideto looks at the circumstances he finds himself in, the shopping street is deserted, and the dry cleaning shop run by Hideto and his father, Hideji Nomoto (Fumiyo Kohinata), is drowning in debt. But Hideji and the people of the shopping street do nothing but party and make merry from midday. Hideto can't stand this situation and decides to try and revitalize the shopping street, but just then he hears from Sarasa (Anne Nakamura) that a large supermarket is going to be built in front of the station. The supermarket will be run by the top company in the industry, whose president is Hitoshi Ichimanda (Yoshiyuki Tsubokura), the man Mitsumasa tried to take down before he was reincarnated.
While the people of the shopping district were in a state of despair, Hideto's fighting spirit was ignited, and he declared, "I'll do it! Now that I've decided, I'll definitely do it!" and set out to revive the shopping district. The story then unfolds as he uses "14 years' worth of memories" to revive Akari Shopping District, which he had once tried to shut down.
Later, Hideto encounters Togo in front of the building where "NEOXIS" is located. Togo, who knew that Hideto had revived the shopping district, says to Hideto, "Perhaps you have the foresight to analyze the present and predict the future," and continues, "A client has asked me to create an advertisement using figure skaters. If I knew the results of next year's Sochi Olympics, I wouldn't be having any trouble, but who should I bet on... what would you do?" He then asks for Hideto's advice.
When offered 10 million yen in return, Hideto remembered that the dry cleaner's shop was 10 million yen in debt, and advised Togo, "If it were me, I'd ask Yuzuru Hanyu," and thus obtained the 10 million yen.
On social media, there was a flurry of excited comments about the fact that the name of Yuzuru Hanyu, who actually won a gold medal in figure skating at the Sochi Winter Olympics, came out of the mouth of the British character. Comments included: "I can't believe Yuzuru Hanyu was mentioned!", "I laughed at the sudden mention of Hanyu lol", "It's rare to hear the name of a real person like Hanyu", "I was surprised by the sudden mention of Hanyu", and "I never thought I'd hear Yuzuru Hanyu's name in this drama..."
