Right after its live-action film rocked theaters in Japan, it looks like Tokyo Revengers is getting a whole lot of attention but for a much worse reason. Recently, new merchandise was released for fans to purchase including several hoodies, shirts, and jackets. This sounds great on the surface, but some of the clothing featuring a symbol that looks suspiciously like the Nazi swastika has anime fans up in arms.
In the series, the “Tokyo Manji Gang” features the left-facing symbol known as a manji (卍), an ancient Buddhist symbol for good luck and prosperity with much significance in Japan. However, not all fans recognize this, instead seeing the infamous right-facing Nazi symbol (卐) which also hold significance in Hinduism, but has since been maligned due to its connections with the fascist group.
While many fans think the merch looks amazing, quite a few are sad that they could never wear it without the potential implications of they themselves being Nazis in other parts of the world.
And while many did outright mistake the symbol as a swastika…
Others tried to educate the masses about the history of the manji.
While western releases of Tokyo Revengers have since censored the manji that appears, it seems they can’t entirely stop audiences outside of Japan from getting angry every time they see the manji in other forms of merchandise. It seems that many fans of the show and manga won’t be touching any of this new merch for obvious reasons.
