2023: The Year Japan's Sun Rose Again

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The story for much of the last decade was that Japan’s cultural influence was on the wane. In 2012, Quartz wrote “Why it was so easy for Korea to overtake Japan in the pop culture wars” while CNBC fretted about “Japan Losing its Cool.” Thinkpieces like these emerged like clockwork over the years to come. They painted a bleak narrative of Japan’s once-po…