Another World

On the surface, high school students Naomi Katagaki and Ruri Ichigyou seem to be polar opposites. In contrast to Naomi's shy and timid personality, Ruri strikes fear in her classmates due to being rather cold and outspoken. Nevertheless, both Naomi and Ruri nourish a strong passion for reading, which gradually draws the two closer.

As Naomi spends more time with Ruri, he discovers that she has a sweet side and is not as intimidating as everyone thinks. Subsequently, he develops genuine feelings for Ruri and decides to confess his love to her, which she happily reciprocates.

However, their wholehearted relationship is disrupted when Ruri gets struck by lightning, causing her to enter a coma. Wanting to see her smile again, Naomi resolves to return Ruri to her everyday life—no matter how great the lengths he must stride are.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Ichigyou, Ruri Main

Hamabe, Minami Japanese

Katagaki, Naomi Main

Kitamura, Takumi Japanese

Kadenokouji, Misuzu Supporting

Fukuhara, Haruka Japanese

Xu, Yiyi Supporting

Kotobuki, Minako Japanese

Senko, Tsunehisa Supporting

Koyasu, Takehito Japanese

Horiguchi, Yukiko Character Design

Reviews

Apr 22, 2020

StellarIceberg

Recommended

Another World, a spin-off to the movie Hello World, give the necessary character development the movie couldn't show.

As far as storytelling goes I liked this more than the movie. The spin-off dealt the story-telling in 3 different episodes each starring Naomi as he gets to where he is in the movie. Before moving on to the story and the characters, I'd like to highlight areas in which the spin-off was better than the movie.

A major drawback of CGI anime movies is the movement of individual characters on screen. Sometimes the character models can feel a bit too unnatural than they already are when placed in ... a scenario that requires rapid movements or vivid expressions. Due to being a 10 min short for every 3 episodes, a major blunder was avoided. Since there were no need for.. (i forgot the word will edit if I remember) large animations? yea, the frames looked good. The backdrops were all beautifully animated, tho CGI models did ask more to be desired.

Moving on to narration. Now, this is a rather subjective topic as much I may want to objectify it. People like different styles of narration and that's understandable. The 3 episode shorts each asked for different narration styles. If I would differentiate it, it would be as follows: 1)Despair 2)Desperation 3)Hope
I know it may sound weird but hear me out.
Oh yes, SPOILERS AHEAD.
Episode 1 deals with Naomi's coming to terms with his weakness and relying on books to help someone he knew he couldn't himself. After finally seeing her smile once, his world gets shattered by some random ass thunderbolt in a matter of seconds. The slow score at the starting of the episode along with Naomi's narration helps set the scene for the backstory. Now here's where it gets weird. IDK WHY THE fuCK they used a dubstep right after that. BUT FINE. The slow-paced scores throughout the second ost help set for an awkward meeting between two people. And a high-low set for when they're happy.

Episode 2:
From the start of the episode to the end, all we hear is tirednss in Naomi's voice. From his way of living to the backdrop, with everything blacked out, it sets the scene for his desperation to shy away from reality. From him rejecting outings to protecting his solidarity, everything points him towards rejecting the reality that befell him as he tries desperately to change it.

Episode 3:
This one starts off with the tone the last one left it with not changing immediately. Well, I guess that's a norm in the media but still it's appreciable. Naomi's silence throughout the episode signifies the despair that he's sunk deep into. Being unable to help the only person he cares about and seeing all his efforts wasted, Naomi's at his breaking point. Tho with quite a few comedic reliefs throughout the episode, Naomi's underlying depression slowly eats him. His anguish hits hard when he questions himself before Ruri. The narration of the episode follows the theme hope, cause despite being head deep in despair, he tries to find happiness in the little things his lab head and assistant do and finally renews his yearning for the day Ruri wakes up in the past that he's unable to accept. Not a light-hearted romance, his love for one person acts as both a curse and a blessing for Naomi.

God that was long.
Now I was gonna go into characters but if you've read until this point, you probably have already watched Hello World and don't need to know that. And it would make this review needlessly long.

I thoroughly liked the history given to Naomi that justified his desperation. I'd say I enjoyed this more than the movie as it gave Naomi the character development he needed and since I watched the movie beforehand, it put a smile on my face to know he succeeded.

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Apr 22, 2020

BabyGirl06301

Recommended

I'm caught between two thoughts that are conflicting right now, so I'll just take you through both.

These three shorts weren't entirely necessary? As far as the content of the shorts themselves, I feel like we got the gist of it from the main film. It does show the stuff that fills the time between when we meet Naomi in the recorded world and when his older self appears, but a lot of it was just extra stuff and not really anything that added to the story. That's my first thought.

My second thought is WHY WASN'T THIS PUT IN THE ACTUAL MOVIE?! Yes, the content ... wasn't entirely necessary, but the content isn't what I got out of these shorts-- it was the emotion. The emotional motives that I understood logically and only got a taste of sensationally were all right here! Why provide a weaker product in the film when the material to make it better is available? Obviously, the way these shorts were told as a sort of memory bank of the older Naomi wouldn't have worked in the context of the film, but why the hell not rework it to get all the feeling into the final product? Having to go to a seperate place to see development that should've been present in the original work is so disappointing.

Should you watch these as a prequel, should you watch them at all, I don't know. I more or less think the only one that adds anything substantial is the final one, but then again, the first two could've provided a foundation for that one to stand on. Who can say? What I can say is that it would've been a way better decision to add it into Hello World rather than do it this way. However, putting that aside, I enjoyed seeing what I did of the older Naomi. Being able to connect with him, even if only a little bit more, made me feel like Hello World had a depth to it that I didn't see initially. If you felt like Hello World seemed unfinished, watch these. It won't entirely amend it, but it will give you a bit more to work with.

Reviewer’s Rating: 7

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Apr 10, 2020

whither

Mixed Feelings

These shorts contain the emotional development the movie was missing. With the two separated, both feel incomplete.

~ Story 6/10

Adult Naomi's story is fleshed out here. We get to see his feelings for Ruri grow in his youth, and then his turmoil and emotional hollowness as he goes into adulthood.

It sounds great on paper. Unfortunately in reality, it's just not very interesting separated from the movie.
If you watch this before the movie, you will be very confused. If you watch this after the movie, you will feel like the emotional development came too late. The ideal situation would have been to have the heartfelt moments ... from this ONA inserted where they belong in the film. The story would have been much stronger.
Even if this ONA was meant to be an extended trailer of sorts for the film, the scenes should still have been integrated into the main story somehow.

~ Animation 3/10

There is a huge chunk of this ONA that is just still images with voice-overs or even just silence with text on screen. I thought the point of 3D CGI was to streamline the animation process, but I guess the budget was just too tight.

The sepia tone + vignette was pretty corny and unnecessary. The voice over narration was already enough to make it clear that these are Naomi's memories.

~ Character 8/10 ------------SPOILERS----------

This ONA does what the film should have done for the characters.

Unfortunately, since these emotional scenes were put into a spin-off instead of the film, Ruri's in-film personality is practically blank.
For example, her fear of heights in the movie is reduced to 2 gags (falling off the stepladder & almost falling out of the car). Her attempt to overcome her fear in order to go visit the mountains with Naomi should have been in the movie. The final reveal that she was the little crow would have been much more rewarding. The girl who was afraid of heights flew through the skies to save her loved one. It's hard to pick up this touching detail from the movie alone.
Another example is the scene of her singing in the library when she thinks no one else is listening. In the movie, she goes from aloof to 'love of my life' for Naomi in no time at all. This one little scene of Naomi catching her with her guard down would have done wonders for their relationship to go from strangers to friends.

Naomi himself would have benefited greatly from the character development shown here. The way we get to see his unhealthy obsessive lifestyle while trying to find a way to bring Ruri back would have made his final sacrifice in the movie so much more touching. In the movie we only see the "exciting" scenes where he fails at experiments over and over. We didn't get these quiet moments where he's sitting in his empty apartment, not taking care of his health, shutting out the world, unable to function. Even him trying to care for a cat only to have it confiscated without a fight was great insight on his state of mind.

On a lesser scale, the research team would have been more lovable in the movie if they had the comedic moments shown in this ONA, along with seeing more of their relationship with Naomi.

~ Overall 6/10

I'm glad this spin-off exists to bring more depth into the characters, but it just doesn't work separated from the movie.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Unappreciated Gems that Deserves Greater Acclamation!

by Lone_Wayfarer

38 Entries · 325 Restacks

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by barcanoloski

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	Poll: Another World Episode 3 Discussion lihle808 - Nov 29, 2019	15 replies	by RGreatDanton »» Jan 28, 9:30 PM
	Poll: Another World Episode 2 Discussion lihle808 - Nov 29, 2019	11 replies	by RGreatDanton »» Jan 28, 9:26 PM
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