OpenAI’s latest image-generation update has taken social media by storm, as users are flooding X, Instagram, and Reddit with Studio Ghibli-style images generated by AI.
However, amid the viral trend, an old clip of Studio Ghibli co-founder Hayao Miyazaki expressing his disdain for AI-generated animation has resurfaced.
Before diving into Miyazaki’s words, let’s take a look at how the trend began.
On March 25, OpenAI launched its “most advanced image generator yet” as part of GPT‑4o, boasting highly accurate and stylized visuals.
Users quickly discovered that the tool excels at replicating Studio Ghibli’s iconic hand-drawn aesthetic, prompting a surge of AI-generated portraits, landscapes, and reimagined pop culture moments in Ghibli-style.
Hashtags like #GhibliStyle and #AIGhibli have since taken over social media feeds, with even OpenAI CEO Sam Altman joining in on the trend by sharing an AI-generated Ghibli-style version of himself – which is now his profile picture on X.
Now coming back to Miyazaki’s thoughts on AI, a widely shared video from 2016 shows the legendary animator reacting with disgust to an AI-generated animation demo.
The footage captures Miyazaki watching an unsettling AI-generated sequence of a grotesque, zombie-like creature dragging itself along the floor. When the developers present it as an example of AI’s potential in animation, Miyazaki responds with sharp criticism.
“Every morning, I see my friend who has a disability,” Miyazaki says in the clip. “It’s so hard for him just to do a high five. Now, thinking of him, I can’t watch this stuff and find it interesting. Whoever creates this stuff has no idea what pain is.”
He goes on to call AI-generated animation “an insult to life itself” and makes it clear that he would never incorporate such technology into his work.
As the AI-generated Ghibli-style trend gained traction, many artists and anime fans echoed Miyazaki’s concerns.
Netizens pointed out that Miyazaki’s vision – the one we see on screen today – was achieved thanks to the efforts and dedication put in not just by him, but entire teams of animators who worked tirelessly. And the fact that AI was simply copying that style without any repercussions did not sit well with them.
— Trung Phan (@TrungTPhan) March 26, 2025Since Studio Ghibli is trending, worth noting the mind-boggling effort Hayao Miyazaki and his team put into a film.
Each has 60k-70k frames, all hand-drawn and painted with water color.
This 4-second clip (“The Wind Rises”) took one animator 15 months to do.
In the documentary… pic.twitter.com/BwvipsyVCl
According to them, this was yet another example of how AI was mercilessly ripping off works of artists without giving them any due compensation.
Beyond concerns of copyright and compensation, there were also many who felt that being able to recreate Ghibli style artwork with little to no effort was not just insulting to the artist, but was also taking away everything that they worked for.
— Robbie Shilstone (@shilstone_arts) March 26, 2025Miyazaki spent his entire life building one of the most expansive and imaginative bodies of work, all so you could rip it off and use it as a filter for your vacation photos.
Not into this one bit. Protect artists.
irony is dead and all but it’s pretty depressing to see Ghibli A.I. slop on the timeline not only because Miyazaki famously thinks A.I. art is disgusting but because he’s spent the last 50 years making art about environmental waste for petty human uses
— Brendan Hodges (@metaplexmovies) March 27, 2025
A troubling paradox: iconic aesthetics from artists like Hayao Miyazaki & Studio Ghibli, crafted over decades, are now commodified into quick, consumable, even vapid content.
— Chris Paik (@cpaik) March 26, 2025
Imagine being Miyazaki, pouring decades of heart and soul into making this transcendent beautiful tender style of anime, and then seeing it get sloppified by linear algebra
— Nabeel S. Qureshi (@nabeelqu) March 26, 2025
It needs to be seen if Altman will address this issue in the coming days, or whether GPT‑4o and it’s Ghibli trend will continue.
Ami Nazru has been working as an anime journalist for over 3 years, and is an editor at Animehunch. She discovered the world of anime though Sailor Moon years ago and has been a weeb ever since. Reading psychological coming-of-age drama and torturing her soul is a certified addiction for Ami, and this includes Shuzo Oshimi works. She lives for the drama, and most of her time is spent on digging up animanga industry controversies.