Watching HELLO WORLD was really something. It simply left me astonished, mind boggled and it left me with something I could just think about for hours on end. This review will have heavy spoilers, delving very deep into the story and its potential meanings.

Although I wasn't expecting much with its measly 73% on anilist, I still had high hopes in finding something that would leave an impact. Hours after watching, I still don't really know my stance on this movie, which isn't really a good or bad thing.

This movie was really just full of concepts that you'd need to get your head around at every corner. Even up until the very end, I just couldn't stop thinking about what this movie really wanted to convey.

I'm actually just going to skip most of this entire section, because if you're reading this very spoiler heavy review, I assume that you've already watched the movie. If you're looking for a non-spoiler review to see if you'd like to watch the movie, then I'd recommend Prowler's review.

We'll call the first setting, where the younger Naomi lives, 'Layer 2'. We'll just call the younger Naomi by his name, and the older Naomi by 'Sensei'. Correspondingly, we'll call Sensei's world 'Layer 1', and we'll call the world above that 'Layer 0'. There is only really ever 1 Ruri present throughout the entire story until the final scene.

After Sensei uses Naomi to save Ruri and bring her back to Layer 1, he initiates a recovery in the system, which deletes and restarts the data, killing Naomi. However, Naomi lives instead of being deleted, being saved by the crow (Layer 0 Ruri), which leads him into Layer 1. Sensei goes to Ruri, but Ruri knows that it isn't the same Naomi that she was just with, and the homeostatic system appears and attempts to remove the discrepancy in the data of Layer 1.

Naomi saves Ruri yet again in Layer 1, and the crow leads them to an entrance to a new world. In the process of going to the new world, the homeostatic system attempts to eliminate one of the two Naomis, as there shouldn't be two. Sensei gives up his life for Naomi to meet Ruri in the new world.

Meanwhile, Sensei wakes up from a coma in Layer 0, where Ruri has been supposedly trying to recover him, just as Sensei was trying to recover Ruri.

The first thing I want to talk about is the fact that the crow is Ruri's avatar from Layer 0, unbeknownst to Sensei. This can be confirmed through the similarity in their voices when Sensei wakes up from his coma in the final scene.

After contemplating this story for a while, me and my friend came to the conclusion that Ruri initiated the entire storyline all the way at the start by helping Sensei save Ruri in Layer 2. This was to contribute to her end goal of having Sensei sacrifice himself, and then supposedly take him and implant him into his body in Layer 0. Thus syncing his mind and body, which was the requirement for reviving Ruri.

Another theory that was explored, but is extremely far fetched, is the fact that the pretty girl from Layer 2 was the crow, which is why she was following Naomi and Ruri around so much. I personally don't believe this theory to be true.

I don't believe that both Naomis were the same, as Sensei went through some character development in Layer 1, where he realised he was wrong and decided to help Naomi save Ruri. If they were the same, Naomi would've seen how everything would play out, and in the future as sensei, help Naomi from the beginning. I could see how this would work with Ruri if Naomi was out of the picture though.

Whether Layer 0 is still part of the data world is unknown and widely theorized. There's no evidence to indicate that it is or isn't, so that will just stay as it is.

Finally, onto the actual review.

The story and plot was amazingly complex, but there were ways that they could have made it more cohesive. It felt as though the end of the movie was near when I was only halfway in, and then the ending seemed so far away once I got close to the finish. I would give the story a 9/10

The animation really caught me off guard at the start. It really seemed like it was just a really long anime game cutscene, but then you get used to it a little. I'm not really a fan of heavy cgi use in anime. 7/10

There isn't much to say about the sound, music and voice acting. They all seemed all right and didn't have a huge effect on the story or tone. 8/10

Overall, HELLO WORLD is a movie with an overly complex storyline and a fast-paced structure. It's a nice watch and can leave you somewhat satisfied after you figure out all the little story elements. 8.5/10