The Japan opening of the hit movie “Barbie” was dealt extra setbacks as a web-based petition gained steam calling on Hollywood studios to disavow a grassroots advertising and marketing motion that made mild of nuclear holocaust. A Change.org petition collected greater than 16,000 signatures over two days as of Thursday, demanding that Warner Bros and Universal Pictures, the studio behind the “Oppenheimer” biopic, name a halt to the “Barbenheimer” hashtag that has helped make the movie a world blockbusters.

“Barbie”, which stars Margot Robbie within the title position, has grossed greater than $800 million in worldwide field workplace, whereas the movie about nuclear scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer that opened across the identical time final month has taken in additional than $400 million. Warner Bros initially latched on to fan-produced memes that depicted Robbie’s Barbie with actor Cillian Murphy’s Oppenheimer alongside pictures of nuclear blasts.

But followers weren’t amused in Japan, which in coming days will mark the memorials of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki 78 years in the past. “If one were to create an illustration or derivative art of Barbenheimer, it should not be of Barbie delighting in a mushroom cloud,” mentioned Koji Maruyama on the Change.org web site. “Barbie should never be a character who rejoices in misfortune or tragedy.”

A #NoBarbenheimer hashtag trended on-line, re-posted greater than 100,000 occasions by one measure, prompting Warner’s Japan division to concern a uncommon public criticism of its dad or mum firm, which then adopted with an apology this week. Mitsuki Takahata, who voices Barbie within the dubbed Japanese model, posted on Instagram on Wednesday that she was dismayed upon studying of the memes and thought of dropping out of a promotional occasion in Tokyo hyping its opening on Aug. 11.

“This incident is really, really disappointing,” she posted. The identical day, the media-savvy U.S. Ambassador to Japan Rahm Emanuel posted an image of his assembly in Tokyo with director Greta Gerwig, however the response on-line was chilly.

“Your post at this time will get on the nerves of many Japanese, and will further solidify their resolve to never go to see that movie,” replied a poster referred to as tsuredzure on the X platform previously referred to as Twitter. A spokesperson for the embassy mentioned Emanuel took his spouse, daughter and her pals to see “Barbie” and that he embraces the movie’s message about girls’s empowerment.

No Japan launch date has been introduced for “Oppenheimer”, which chronicles the creation of the atomic bomb. The movie has been criticised for largely ignoring the weapon’s destruction in Japan in the direction of the tip of World War Two, obliterating two main cities and accounting for greater than 200,000 deaths.

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