Well, this is both special and surprising. Netflix ended up earning the top spot at the domestic box office this weekend, edging out Zach Cregger‘s “Weapons” with their animated musical “KPop Demon Hunters,” hailing from Sony Animation Studios with directors Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans at the helm.
According to trade outlets such as Deadline, tracking the film’s box office performance, “Kpop Demon Hunters” is said to have earned $19.2 million, as “Weapons” was able to make another $15.4 million.
This was quite the feat as the animated film connected with a large swath of audiences despite being released on the streaming platform back in June, but a sing-along version was released this weekend and became quite the sleeper hit. Also, Netflix’s first number one at the weekend box office, which was just as much of a shock to them, we assume.
The voice cast consists of Arden Cho, Ahn Hyo-seop, May Hong, Ji-young Yoo, Yunjin Kim, Daniel Dae Kim, Ken Jeong, and Lee Byung-hun.
An official synopsis for the animated hit:
When they aren’t selling out stadiums, Kpop superstars Rumi, Mira, and Zoey use their secret identities as badass demon hunters to protect their fans from an ever-present supernatural threat. Together, they must face their biggest enemy yet – an irresistible rival boy band of demons in disguise.
Kang has recently teased sequel ideas that could potentially revolve around exploring character origins while speaking with Entertainment Weekly, despite the follow-up not being officially greenlit.
“We were trying to do a non-origin origin story with a concept that’s brand new to people,” Kang explained. “What is it about these girls that brought them into HUNTR/X, and made them demon hunters? What is each of their backstory? How did they get chosen? What is that journey like?…”There was really not a space for the movie to show all that. So we really had to make these choices of what is essential to the story, and that is the information that we will show. I think that was one of the hardest things we kept getting asked: ‘Please show us this.’ ‘I think the audience is going to want to know this or that,'” Kang told EW. “We just made decisions to be like, ‘Nope, that is not essential to this story for this movie, and maybe that can be shown some other time.'” If that sequel comes together between Sony/Netflix, Kang added, “Then we can reveal more of that backstory.”
Does this mean Netflix will seriously consider wider releases for their originals?
That’s quite plausible down the line as projects such as Guillermo del Toro‘s gothic horror tale “Frankenstein” is confirmed to be getting a much bigger theatrical push than originally thought, and there is a strong chance Greta Gerwig‘s new “Narnia” prequel (said to be getting a theatrical window, too) could end up with a similar run. Then again, going from previous sentiments and stances from CEO Ted Sarandos, theatrical isn’t really a huge focus for the company.
Hard not to point out that the extra cash from releasing Netflix originals in theaters could help pay for the growing production costs that are often offloaded on app subscribers with increasing monthly fees. Animation could be a good way to test those waters for Netflix, given the popularity of the medium and these impressive box office numbers for “KPop Demon Hunters,” which they’ve claimed earlier in the month (via Variety) was the most viewed animated film and fourth most-popular English-language movie on the platform.
What isn’t surprising is that the animation studio behind the massively popular “Spider-Verse” movies would be able to make a fresh and original feature that obviously amassed an audience, another win for studios taking chances on original ideas.
‘KPOP DEMON HUNTERS’ becomes the first soundtrack to have three songs simultaneously rank in the top 5 on the Hot 100 since ‘SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER’ (1978).
— Film Updates (@FilmUpdates) August 25, 2025
(via: @chartdata) pic.twitter.com/3ogX9okWBe
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