They may exist in a fictional space, but there’s no doubt that movies and TV shows can have a significant impact on society in the real world. Just take the 1993 Jonathan Demme drama Philadelphia starring Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington, which brought the conversation around AIDS into the public discourse, or the 2001 anime classic Spirited Away by director Hayao Miyazaki that solidified the credibility of the art form in the Western world. 

More often than not, the change that we see in fictional drama is done in the social space, with films and TV raising urgent conversations about equality, climate change and more. It is far rare, however, for these fictional pieces to physically change the world around us, with there only a handful of examples in this realm, with one even forcing a major raccoon problem in Japan. 

The story starts back in 1977 when Nippon Animation made 52 episodes of the TV series Rascal the Raccoon, thrilling a strong contingent of loyal fans. Based on the American children’s book and autobiographical novel named Rascal, A Memoir of a Better Era by Sterling North, the series told the story of a young boy who takes home an orphaned baby racoon and forms a strong bond with it.

Thrilling audiences across Japan, largely thanks to its adorable animation, the sales of racoons spiked with young children across the nation desperate to get their hands on a Rascal of their own. 

Before the authorities could keep up, approximately 1,500 of them were imported every year. But, the nocturnal mammals can be quite temperamental to look after, requiring high maintenance to control their unpredictable behaviour, which, in many cases, caused countless bite marks and even led to homes to be near enough destroyed by their frenetic energy and sharp claws.

As a result, many of these animals were released back into the wild, and with no natural predators, they were free to breed and spread across the country. The rise of racoons has caused problems for local birds, with eggs being the perfect snacks for the mammals, and just like the houses they ransacked, they were also responsible for damaging sacred temples and other important buildings across the country. 

Many decades later, there are now extremely tight restrictions on racoon imports, with the animal now considered pests. In 2003, the government in Hokkaido even attempted to implement a ten-year plan to totally exterminate all racoons in Japan; however, due to a lack of financial support, this was never properly carried out. 

Racoons have since become a key part of Japanese culture, with Studio Ghibli making an anime about them in 1994 in the form of the environmental drama Pom Poko. One of the anime studio’s greatest-ever movies, the story follows a pack of racoon dogs who are being forced from their habitat due to a new housing development.