A major vulnerability was discovered in PHP, the programming language used by roughly 70% of websites. Major Japanese companies and government agencies rushed to perform website maintenance around midnight on the 21st, causing widespread disruption. Websites that normally worked without issue suddenly went offline, while previously playable games were temporarily unavailable due to emergency maintenance.
The online chaos immediately reminded many Japanese users of the worlds depicted in two Mamoru Hosoda animated film projects, Summer Wars and Digimon Adventure: Our War Game! The apparent parallels with real life quickly became a major topic of discussion across Japanese social media.
The PHP incident temporarily knocked numerous websites and games offline, making it feel as though the plots of Summer Wars and Digimon Adventure: Our War Game! were playing out in reality, with trouble in the digital world spilling over into global chaos.
Summer Wars takes place in a society where the real world coexists with the virtual realm OZ. One day, a mysterious avatar appears inside OZ and begins destroying the virtual world's administrative systems, throwing the entire planet into turmoil. After his account is stolen, protagonist Kenji Koiso is mistakenly identified as the culprit. Under the leadership of Jinnouchi family matriarch Grandma Sakae, Kenji joins forces with the rest of the family to confront the enemy hiding within OZ.
Meanwhile, Digimon Adventure: Our War Game! is a theatrical installment in the hit Digimon Adventure anime series. A strange egg suddenly appears online and evolves into an extremely dangerous Digimon. As it spreads through the internet and plunges the world into chaos, Tai and his friends step up to battle the Digimon wreaking havoc across the digital realm.
Social media was soon flooded with comparisons between the PHP incident and both films. Some users invoked the battle between Omnimon and Diaboromon from Digimon Adventure: Our War Game! to explain the PHP problem, while others declared that the world of Summer Wars had effectively become reality.
Comments included: "The PHP problem right now is basically the battle between Omnimon and Diaboromon from the Digimon movie..." "Omnimon won... right??? I can believe I'm living in the timeline where Omnimon wins, right?" "Every company is basically dealing with a Summer Wars situation right now." "The real-life version of Summer Wars has officially begun!"
While the PHP issue left many Japanese users caught in a wave of online disruption, the comparisons to these two films also gave people an easy way to understand what was happening. The digital crises they portrayed suddenly feel a little too close to reality.