The concept of “Barbenheimer” has been trending for a few days, following the simultaneous U.S. release of the movies Barbie and Oppenheimer. For some, Barbenheimer is a funny juxtaposition between the bright and cheerful tones of Greta Gerwig’s Barbie and the gritty, darker themes in Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. Not everyone finds the mash-up amusing, though, and Japan doesn’t see the atomic bomb as a laughing matter. Following several complaints by Japanese citizens, Warner Bros Japan has published a statement criticizing the “extremely regrettable” tweets by the account for the U.S. Barbie movie.
Warner Bros US Receives Backlash for ‘Barbenheimer’ Tweet
https://twitter.com/barbiethemovie/status/1682208852874526723?s=20
The internet latched onto Barbenheimer as a mash-up long before the movies came out. Given that both Barbie and Oppenheimer were set to release on the same day, fans jokingly created memes that combined Barbie‘s bright, bubblegum-pink aesthetic with Oppenheimer‘s dark and dangerous world. Content created for the meme included fan art, posters of Margot Robbie’s Barbie and Cillian Murphy’s J. Robert Oppenheimer, and photoshopped memes of Barbie backed by a bright pink mushroom cloud.
Eventually, the Barbenheimer mash-up reached the upper levels of Warner Bros. Studios, and even the producers joined in on the action. The official Twitter account for the Barbie movie retweeted a fan-made poster depicting Barbie sitting on Oppenheimer’s shoulder, with both characters engulfed in nuclear flames, and the caption: “It’s going to be a summer to remember.”
The backlash against the studio’s tweet was immediate. Japanese fans posted pictures of the devastation caused by the nuclear bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Japanese politician Murata Shunichi protested the Barbenheimer meme as a whole. One particular reply read:
“I absolutely can’t condone the act of jokingly spreading tweets that make fun of the atomic bombing that killed so many people in Japan. I strongly demand that the related tweets be immediately retracted and deleted.”
More replies called the Barbie movie a “no-go,” stating that the film was “completely on board with the atomic bomb and mushroom cloud memes.” On a broader scale, many have accused the Barbenheimer meme of trivializing the horrible destruction that was inflicted upon Japan after the atomic bombs her dropped. A community note clarifying the matter was added to the post by Twitter, reading as follows:
“At 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945 (Showa 20), an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima for the first time in human history. The particular nature of the damage caused by the atomic bombs is that mass destruction and mass murder occurred instantaneously and indiscriminately.”
To cap off all of the anti-Barbenheimer backlash, the official Warner Bros Japan account for the Barbie movie released the following statement, with a translation provided by Gizmodo:
“Because the movies Barbie and Oppenheimer were both released in America on July 21, there’s is currently a movement driven by overseas fans to watch them together (#Barbenheimer), but this is not an official movement… We find the reaction to this fan-driven movement from the official American account for the movie Barbie to be extremely regrettable.”
— 映画『バービー』公式 (@BarbieMovie_jp) July 31, 2023
In the same statement, Warner Bros Japan asserted that they were taking the situation very seriously and asked the U.S. headquarters Warner Bros to “take appropriate action” and apologized to those offended by “this series of inconsiderate reactions.” Warner Bros has declined to comment on the issue, along with anyone associated with the Barbie movie. It is currently unclear how this issue will affect the possible release of Oppenheimer to Japanese markets.
