World War II left an indelible mark on Japan’s collective consciousness. In the early postwar years, memories of defeat and devastation were often kept private or repressed, as Japan grappled with being both a victim of atomic attacks and the perpetrator of imperial war. This created ‘a gap’ in the tradition of familial storytelling, and social stigma around retelling painful experiences. Over time, new media forms became crucial platforms to fill that gap. Specifically, Japanese anime and manga began to ‘speak for history’ in place of ordinary witnesses. Anime works like Barefoot Gen (Manga -1973; Anime -1983) and Grave of the Fireflies (short story – 1967; Anime -1988) transform personal trauma into collective memory through powerful visual narratives. Anime also blends history with myth, as Susan J. Napier notes, animation allows “history and memory [to] transform into myth and even into fantasy,” offering viewers a way to “work through” historical trauma (Napier 2005, 1). Yet this very mediation of memory raises tensions, as critic Lisa Yoneyama warns (cited by Napier), “memory has often been associated with myth or fiction” and must be carefully handled because any portrayal of the past is “always enmeshed in the exercise of power” (Napier 2005, 1). Thus, postwar anime/manga serve as digitized war archives that preserve the past in narrative form while inviting scrutiny of their authenticity.