PicoBlog

On March 11, 2011, Japan experienced the strongest earthquake in its recorded history, and the 4th most powerful earthquake ever recorded on planet earth.

A magnitude 9.0 quake, it lasted for 6 minutes and had an epicenter 72 kilometers east of the Oshika Peninsula of Tohoku.

It immediately triggered a tsunami, and residents of Sendai had eight minutes of warning to evacuate the area.

The ensuing waves claimed the lives of 15,000 people, and hundreds of evacuation sites were washed away in the chaos.

At the end of the day, more than 450,000 people became homeless, and the tsunami severely crippled the infrastructure of the country.

This is the natural disaster that Suzume is based on, and it’s embedded into the fabric of the movie in many beautiful and heartbreaking ways.

Let’s talk about that and some other hidden messages you might’ve missed when watching this movie.

If you want to watch the video version of this article (it’s cool, trust me), click here.

Suzume mentions a few big cataclysms, namely the one that took the life of Suzume’s mother 12 years ago, and the earthquake that decimated the Kanto region 100 years ago. We learn about that in one of Souta’s books.

In fact, Japan did have a major earthquake in 1923, exactly 100 years before Suzume was released.

The earthquake claimed the lives of a staggering 100,000 people, and lasted between four and ten minutes. They call it the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake.

The cataclysm that took the life of Suzume’s mother was the 2011 Tohoku tsunami, which we already discussed at the start of the article.

When Suzume digs up her time machine box at the end of the film, she finds and looks at her childhood journal. The date alongside her drawing of the Ever-After door is, in fact, March 11, 2011, the same date of the Tohuku tsunami.

Also, when child Suzume opens the door to go back to the real world, we can see it’s snowing on the other side. This is a reference to the snowfall that accompanied the tsunami. Ishinomaki, the city with the most deaths, was 0 degrees Celsius as the tsunami hit, and the ensuing snowfall hindered rescue operations greatly.

Also Souta, when he falls asleep as a chair, has visions of himself sitting on a chair on the beach, where the bones of sea creatures line the sand. This is an obvious reference to the 2011 tsunami as well.

Butterflies are shown A LOT in this film. The film opens with little Suzume wandering through the Ever-After. As a mysterious figure approaches her, butterflies hover around her body. Then Suzume wakes up, realizing it’s a dream, while butterflies hover above her bed.

Take my word for it—butterflies are everywhere in this movie and you’ll see them everywhere next time you watch it.

The significance of the butterfly is obvious—it’s a sign of change and metamorphosis.

In Japanese culture, butterflies are symbols of love, joy, resilience, hope and freedom.

This article from visitjapan.blog writes:

The butterfly’s delicate nature has also come to signify fragility, but also strength and courage due to its ability to transcend seemingly impossible obstacles such as death or despair; they serve as inspiration for those facing their own struggles. Additionally, butterflies are often used in artworks in Japan because they represent joyous occasions or positive outcomes after difficult times.

The butterfly’s delicate nature has also come to signify fragility, but also strength and courage due to its ability to transcend seemingly impossible obstacles such as death or despair; they serve as inspiration for those facing their own struggles. Additionally, butterflies are often used in artworks in Japan because they represent joyous occasions or positive outcomes after difficult times.

Suzume is the butterfly of this story. Despite losing her mother at a vulnerable age, she pressed on, and became the woman that she is today despite it.

Like a caterpillar inside a cocoon, she was in danger, but managed to escape that danger and come out the other side.

Butterflies can also be seen as messengers between the dead and the living. Visitjapan.blog writes:

In some cases, they are even viewed as messengers between people on Earth and those in Heaven. In traditional Shinto weddings, it is believed that butterflies bring luck to newlyweds by delivering messages from their ancestors who have passed away.

This makes sense, since little Suzume always thought the figure she saw in the Ever-After was her mother, who had butterflies surrounding her.

In Suzume, there’s a worm living in the Ever-After that breaks free from certain “gates” and threatens to wreak havoc on earth.

This is taken from the Japanese legend of the Namazu, a giant catfish living in underground rivers responsible for causing earthquakes. It did so as it swam in the underground seas and rivers.

It was subdued by the thunder-god, Takemikazuchi-no-mikoto.

The thunder god had a special stone that, when placed on the Namazu’s head, would weigh it down and restrict his movements. This obviously ties into Suzume’s keystones.

While I would’ve loved to see a catfish swimming above Tokyo instead of a worm, I can see why they altered the myth slightly in Suzume to make it look less ridiculous.

I wish I could tell you there’s some big significance to the Daijn and Sadaijn that connects back to Japanese culture and mythology, but it’s not true.

Instead, the answer comes from Makoto Shinkai himself, who in a Q/A at Suzume’s Premiere in Thailand said that the cats represent nature.

Cats are beautiful and majestic yet unpredictable just like nature, he said. He continued saying “The ocean can be a peaceful place when you’re on the beach, but it can also cause a tsunami.”

And remember when Daijn becomes weak and disheveled after Suzume said she doesn’t love it? That represents humans neglecting nature and the negative effects it causes. Conversely, when Suzume accepts the cat, it’s strength regains, representing humans caring for nature.

I also saw the two cats with a yin/yang energy. The Sadaijn, apparently, possesses Suzume’s aunt to the point where she yells and screams at her, saying things she doesn’t mean.

The black Sadaijn could represent the destructive side of nature.

The Daijn, conversely, represents the positive side of nature, able to give us peace and lead us on the correct path, as it does many times showing Suzume and Souta the correct doors.

And isn’t it weird how Suzume has no idea the Daijn is actually helping them the entire movie? This could represent the idea that nature does destructive things we can’t understand, and we initially take it as negative, but in the end that destruction makes room for more life and new opportunities for other living things.

And we can’t understand that until later.

There’s numerous other visual motifs that appear in Suzume, like birds, the moon, rain, and the stars.

When Suzume meets Souta at home, there’s so many shots of seagulls flying above them. And if you remember, birds always flock to where the worm is. In the Tokyo part, we zoom in on a bird’s eye to see the worm reflected in its pupils.

The birds can see these invisible creatures, that much is clear.

What’s Suzume trying to say here with birds, then?

The fact the birds can see the worm puts them on a pedestal above humans, I think. They’re more insightful, more aware of the spiritual world. And to show the entirety of Tokyo sucked into their phones, completely unaware that a cataclysmic event is approaching just highlights one simple fact:

We’re so out of touch with nature.

This is also highlighted when everybody takes pictures of the Daijn and uploads them to social media. Or when Miki sees the Daijn at the bar and thinks it’s just a customer. She’s not even aware it’s a cat. That was a weird part that makes sense now in this context.

Suzume has many close-up shots of plants, grass, flowers, insects, and foliage. Both in natural environments and in the abandoned locations Souta and Suzume frequent.

For me this is a message screaming to us that nature is always going to win. No matter what we build or accomplish, nature will tear it all down, climb up its walls, and overtake it all in a sea of green.

For a movie about natural disasters, it makes sense to spend a significant amount of time showing nature—like the moon, stars, sky, animals, butterflies, foliage, flowers, and more.

The last thing I want to talk about is the chair. What the heck did it mean? First, I found it interesting that Souta’s right arm is hurt at the beginning of the film, which corresponds to the front right “leg” of the chair being missing.

I also thought that the missing leg signifies the hole left behind when a loved one gets taken too soon from us.

So many families were forever changed after the events of the 2011 tsunami. Like Suzume’s chair, there’s a part of them forever missing that they’ll never be able to get back.

Suzume’s director actually talked about why they made Souta a chair in this movie. Apparently it was a reference to him feeling trapped during the COVID-19 lockdowns.

They also decided to make Souta a chair to avoid making this film too much of a romance movie, and to lighten the mood a little bit, since this story focuses on heavy topics.

What did you think of my breakdown? Comment down below what you saw in Suzume. I’d love to talk about it! :)

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