General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20264 min read

Ghiblies: Episode 2 (ギブリーズ episode2)

Ghiblies: Episode 2 (ギブリーズ episode2, Giburīzu episode 2) is a 25-minute Japanese animated theatrical short produced by Studio Ghibli in 2002, written and directed by Yoshiyuki Momose and screened in cinemas on a double bill with The Cat Returns.¹^•² It is an anthology of six digitally created vignettes depicting the daily lives of characters who work at the fictitious Studio "Giburi," a studio whose building and staff resemble the real Studio Ghibli and its employees.²

Key fact	Detail
Release	July 20, 2002, distributed by Toho, on a double bill with The Cat Returns¹
Running time	About 25 minutes¹
Director and writer	Yoshiyuki Momose¹
Producer	Toshio Suzuki; character original designs by Suzuki, with special character designs by cartoonist Hisaichi Ishii¹^•²
Music	Manto Watanobe, with an insert song by Tina¹
Structure	Six vignettes, each with a different art style and music²^•³
Predecessor	A 12-minute Ghiblies short aired on April 8, 2000 during an NTV television special about Studio Ghibli⁴
Home video	Released in Japan on the same DVD as The Cat Returns in 2003²

Spoilers

Content

The vignettes center on small, everyday situations rather than plots. Reviewers describe four principal segments: Ghibli staff taking a spicy curry challenge at a local restaurant, where employees must endure scalding-hot curry or pay double; a scene in which the mascot character Nonaka, the studio's copyright manager, deals with a pretty stranger falling asleep on his shoulder on the train; the longest segment, in which Nonaka recalls his first crush in elementary school, a remake of the best-regarded part of the first short; and a brief closing piece about a sketchy staff member leaving work early.⁵^•⁶ The characters are caricatures of real studio personnel, and the studio building shown in the film is the actual Ghibli building.³

Origin and production

The title's "episode 2" refers to the first Ghiblies, a 12-minute short broadcast on April 8, 2000 as part of an NTV special about the studio. That earlier film followed the staff of the fictitious Studio Giburi and was made to give junior staff experience producing a complete work and to test digital production techniques that would have had little chance of being used in a feature by Isao Takahata or Hayao Miyazaki.⁴ Episode 2 is both a continuation and a revision of that short, with a longer running time and higher production values for the big screen.²

Producer Toshio Suzuki drew the original character designs, and the manga artist Hisaichi Ishii, the cartoonist behind My Neighbors the Yamadas, contributed special character designs.¹^•² At the film's completion press conference in Tokyo on June 25, 2002, Momose said that although the material might look like an inside joke, it was not intended as one: the stories were, in his words, matters anyone could relate to.³ The voice cast includes Masahiko Nishimura, Kyoka Suzuki, Arata Furuta, Satoru Saito, Tomoe Shinohara, Koji Imada, and Kaoru Kobayashi.¹

Animation style

The short is best known for its range of techniques. Each vignette is animated in a different art style, and the film mixes experimental 3-D computer animation with hand-drawn work, digital imitations of paper dolls, a scrawled colored-pencil look, brightly colored cel-style animation, and backgrounds ranging from nearly photorealistic to childlike scribbles.²^•⁷ The visual style continues the flat, television-like look of Takahata's My Neighbors the Yamadas (1999), but with feature-level production values.⁶ Commentators have read the film as a demonstration of what Ghibli's animators could do with computer-aided animation at the time, showing an aesthetic variety that almost none of which appeared in the studio's later features.⁷

Reception and availability

The film holds a 7.0/10 rating on IMDb from 324 votes⁸ and a 70% audience score on Moviefone.⁹ Critics have generally treated it as a minor but technically striking work: the curry skit and the first-love reminiscence are usually singled out as the strongest segments, while the remaining material is described as near-experimental animation testing.⁵ One reviewer noted that, despite running twice as long as the first short, it felt shorter, and that the film is more interested in demonstrating ideas than telling stories.⁷

It was released in Japan on the same DVD as The Cat Returns in 2003.² As of recent listings it is not available to stream, rent, or buy online in some regions.⁹

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 21, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026