Hello World (2019 film) poster

Plot points of Hello World (the anime)

-Our story begins right as the Japan Cultural Backup drones finish scanning all of Japan at absolute resolution. This is not a coincidence.

-Here’s some random high schooler in Japan, he has a crush on a school idol and he reads books. He is our protagonist.

-Then, an older version of him from ten years in the future shows up.

Future: Hey fucko, so, you’re actually in a simulation of Japan. The drones scanned everything at high enough resolution that we can now plug it in a physics model and run it deterministically forwards.

Future: In the Outside World, it’s ten years later, and I have worked tirelessly to get this opportunity—to work at the Simulation Center.

Future: And I’m not supposed to be doing this at all, btw, but I’ve booted up this simulation so that we can save the brainstate of the girl we love, because she’s braindead in the real world.

Young: What?? Something bad is going to happen to [Idol]??

Future: Who? Oh, no, a different girl. Lol, I forgot I cared about [Idol]. Even though it was basically the only characterization that you have.

Young: Oh.

Future: Anyway there’s gonna be a lightning strike at the festival on Date, and I need you to keep her away from that. Here’s my suite of ultra-cool Hacking Tools that, from the inside of a simulated reality, are pretty much just superpowers.

(gives him a MAGIC HAND with which he can summon matter into existence, limited by his creativity and his desire not to break masquerade and deviate the entire simulation.)

(Editor’s Note: …note that obviously everything is already FUBAR because of the speed-of-light propagation of minor changes; remember Dizziness of Freedom.)

Future: Oh, also, you should go meet her and fall in love so that our relationship actually happens—here’s my journal from those periods. Don’t fuck it up, ok?

Young: Wait—

Future: Gotta go before the COHERENCE COPS get me! (disappears)

Young: …what

Young: are coherence cops real

The Coherence Cops are real. They are invisible to everyone except for the protagonist, but are subtly changing things to return the system to its predetermined state. They appear as a bunch of fox-headed men in suits, which seems pretty baroque for a checksum, but what the fuck do I know.

A romantic comedy montage ensues, in which our protagonist does a milquetoast job wooing a girl that he knows conclusively he will be able to woo, even while he holds a literal walkthrough for their romance. This is a creepy and weird power asymmetry, but she doesn’t really have characterization or lines either, so I suspect that her experience was not a significant concern for the author.

Eventually they fall in love, if you can call it that, and our hero is prepared for the big night. Also, now he can summon all kinds of cool stuff out of his MAGIC HAND, like gold and swords and motorcycles, and what the fuck else would you even need in a shonen anime.

They meet up in the aquarium, or something.

Young: [Girl]! Don’t go to the festival tonight!

Girl: Okay.

Young: …kinda thought this would be harder, huh

Then arrives FUTURE Young.

Future Young: Awesome, you did it!

Young: We did it, superbuddy!

Future Young: Yyyyyyeah. Anyway I’ll be taking her now. Thanks!

Young: Uh

Girl: ???

Future Young: Yoink!

And then he yoinks his teenage girlfriend’s brainstate out of the simulation and leaves his past self to die. The Coherence Cops flag this simulation as hopelessly decoherent, and queue it for deletion.

Big letters appear in the sky: DECOHERENT SIMULATION. TIME UNTIL DELETION 7:59:59…7:59:58…

Young: …what the hell, man

#

In the Outside World, Future Self is in a hospital room, plugging the old brainstate into GIRL’s comatose body. She wakes up.

Future Self: It was all worth it. For you…

Future Self: The last thing you remember is probably being struck by lightning at the cultural festival…?

Girl: No, the last thing I remember is you showing up and wrenching me out of reality. Where is Young?

Future Self: …huh, ok, I didn’t think this through.

Big letters appear in the sky: DECOHERENT SIMULATION. TIME UNTIL DELETION 7:59:59…7:59:58…

Future Self: ……….what, no, what, god, why

Girl: We’re in another level of simulation!

Future Self: aaaaaaaaaa

#

Then our Young protagonist (who was in the aquarium in World-2) uses his suite of HACKING TOOLS to jump up to World-1 (in the hospital room). He is pissed.

Young: Hey dick, remember how you abducted Girl and left me to die

Future Self: Hey be cool man, I’m you from the future

Young: Well then I turn into an asshole

Future Self: But we did it for love!

#

And then they get chased on their motorcycle by a monstrous horde of Coherence Kitsune.

At some point, Future Self heroically redeems himself, saying “I’ll hold them off”, and the other two kids go on ahead without him. He probably dies, or something.

Then, they use their suite of Sweet Hacking Tools (presumably a powerglove and a black hoodie) to jump into World-0. Girl disappears…

…to be replaced by her adult self, who is a doctor! Because this entire movie was just Future Her going through a convoluted process to rescue his brainstate!

And they’re on the moon!!

3/10, it had two cool ideas but it also had contrived Hollywood execution. Skip.