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Key Points
- Memes about the Barbie and Oppenheimer movies have sparked criticism in Japan.
- An official Barbie Movie account interacted with several controversial memes, which joked about atomic bombs.
- The tag #NoBarbenheimer began trending on social media, with some users calling for a boycott.
Barbie and Oppenheimer are two of the biggest movies of 2023, and ‘Barbenheimer’ memes – which juxtapose images or themes from the two films – have taken over the internet in recent weeks.
However, in Japan, they’ve triggered accusations of trivialising nuclear attacks. The criticism took off after an official Barbie Movie account interacted with several memes about atomic bombs.
The Oppenheimer movie is , a key figure in the development of nuclear weapons, which were used against Japan in the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The bombing killed an estimated 140,000 people before the end of 1945.
One of the memes showed Barbie with a hairstyle resembling a mushroom cloud, while another depicted Barbie and Oppenheimer with an atomic blast in the background.
The official Barbie Movie account did not post the memes, but interacted with several of them, including a comment that it would be a “summer to remember”.
Social media users labelled the memes and the Barbie account’s comments inconsiderate and distasteful.
The tag #NoBarbenheimer began trending on social media, with some users calling for a boycott of the movies.
Warner Bros has apologised for the reactions and comments of the official account, describing them as “regrettable”.
Oppenheimer was released in most countries on 20 July and has been a box office success with positive reviews, but it has not yet been screened in Japan due to sensitivities about the subject matter.
Sunday 6 August will mark the 78th anniversary of the bombings in Japan.
The Barbie movie has already been , due to its depiction of a controversial maritime boundary.
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