With just six hours’ notice, Studio Ghibli shut down its main X (formerly Twitter) account.
According to SoraNews24, @JP_Ghibli announced to its 1.8 million followers that the channel would shut down at 12:00 a.m. on November 3 (JST), leaving Ghibli’s official North American account and Ghibli account Park is the company’s only remaining X channel. While @JP_Ghibli’s farewell post does not clarify the reason behind the account’s closure, it does express appreciation for those who have supported it since the account was first created in 2020. With With little information to go on, Ghibli fans have begun speculating about the reason behind the account’s shutdown. Closed.
Some Ghibli fans on the studio’s subreddit blamed Elon Musk and his changes to the time disparaging Musk and the “racists and religious extremists” present on social media on X. Rumicposting, who shared a screenshot of @JP_Ghibli’s last post, expressed sadness about the closure also calls attention to the fact that its main purpose was to help promote Ghibli’s latest animated film, The Boy and the Heron.
While Ghibli fans are understandably disappointed, some have deciphered a hidden message in @JP_Ghibli’s post that was interpreted as a reassuring nod to the studio’s fan base. The two characters at the end of the message read “Kahe”. Back in July, these same characters, written in a long repeating string, were featured in a post by singer-songwriter and Ghibli collaborator Kenshi Yonezu. Although it may initially seem meaningless, the message when translated into Morse code reads “Listen to Chikyuugi.” The word “chikyuugi” roughly translates to “Spinning Ball”, which is the main theme song of The Boy and the Heron.
Although Ghibli has a significant social media presence, it still leans more toward traditional marketing than many of its contemporaries. Since Ghibli co-founder Hayao Miyazaki is now retired again and is working on his next animation project, the company may consider the account’s existence unnecessary. Additionally, the closure may also be related to Nippon Televsion’s acquisition of Studio Ghibli, which was announced in September. Representatives of both companies clarified that the main goal of this partnership is to ensure successor for future projects, as Hayao Miyazaki’s son Goro officially refused to take over the company from his father.
The Boy and Heron opens in theaters in North America on December 8. Studio Ghibli’s collection of animated films is available on Max.
Source: X (Twitter) via SoraNews24, Reddit
