Studio Ghibli has historically been fairly permissive with non-commercial fan tributes compared to Disney or other animation studios, which is part of why we see these wonderful community expressions flourish in Japan.

Not to defend anti-creativity, but it's my understanding that at least in the US you have to defend your copyright and go after violations or I guess a real serious violation could say "but this other person did it and had no consequences so that's unfair"

You’re thinking of trademark law, not copyright.

> This is awesomeness happening because copyright can't sabotage it.

If this were a Disney character, it would have been destroyed a long time ago.