The release of the movie Barbie in Japan has been marred by controversy due to a grassroots marketing movement and the online promotion by the US ambassador, which upset many people.
The movie Barbie, featuring Margot Robbie in the lead role, has achieved significant success with a global box office revenue of $800 million. The film garnered attention in part because of a viral Barbenheimer meme that linked it to a biopic about J. Robert Oppenheimer, the nuclear bomb scientist, which coincidentally premiered at the same time.
Initially, Warner Bros, the producer of Barbie, embraced the fan-created memes that portrayed Margot Robbie’s Barbie alongside Cillian Murphy’s Oppenheimer, along with images of nuclear explosions. However, this marketing approach did not sit well with the Japanese audience, especially as the country was about to commemorate the anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which occurred 78 years ago.
The hashtag #NoBarbenheimer started trending online, prompting Warner’s Japan division to publicly criticize its parent company. Warner Bros later issued an apology to address the situation.
Mitsuki Takahata, the Japanese voice actor for Barbie, expressed her disappointment on Instagram. Learning about the marketing campaign with the memes made her consider pulling out of a promotional event in Tokyo for the movie’s opening on August 11.
“This incident is really, really disappointing,” she posted.
The media-savvy US Ambassador to Japan, Rahm Emanuel, shared a photo of his meeting with director Greta Gerwig, but the response from Japanese netizens was unfavorable.
“Your post at this time will irritate many Japanese and further discourage them from watching that movie,” commented a user known as tsuredzure on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter.
Currently, there is no release date announced for the movie ‘Oppenheimer’, which tells the story of the creation of the atomic bomb. The film has faced criticism for overlooking the devastating impact the weapon had on Japan during the final stages of World War Two, resulting in the destruction of two major cities and the loss of over 200,000 lives.