Animated movie’s real-life settings now pilgrimage websites for followers of Netflix’s most-watched authentic movie of all time
KPop Demon Hunter.
SEOUL:
Australian customer Nhung Nguyen made the hike up steep steps to a shocking Seoul park exactly due to its star flip in mega-hit “KPop Demon Hunters”.
The true-life settings of the animated movie, contemporary off a double Oscars win, have turn out to be a pilgrimage website for followers of Netflix’s most-watched authentic movie of all time.
Naksan Park sits on a ridge excessive above the South Korean metropolis that features components of an 18.6-kilometre (11.5-mile) fortress wall constructed to encompass the capital a whole lot of years in the past.
“I believed the placement was very lovely and I came upon that it is an actual location so I got here right here,” stated 29-year-old Nguyen, who stated she grew up listening to Okay-pop.
The film tells the story of HUNTR/X, a well-liked Okay-pop lady group whose members dwell double lives as weapons-wielding demon slayers. Their songs assist create a magical barrier referred to as the Honmoon that protects humanity.
It received finest animated characteristic and an Academy Award for finest authentic track for “Golden”, the movie’s infectious anthem about empowerment, self-reliance and private development. It was the primary Okay-pop track to win the class.
Within the film, Naksan Park is the place the principle character, the half-human Rumi, meets clandestinely with a star-crossed love curiosity.
Nguyen was thrilled to be excessive above town of 9.3 million on the website of particular phase of the movie that’s set to a thumping soundtrack.
“It was a scene in ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ the place they sung ‘Free’,” she enthused. “The wall I really feel… may be very iconic.”
She wasn’t the one one who had the thought to make the journey on Tuesday, simply days after the film’s Academy Award triumph.
“We got here to Korea for a household trip however we actually preferred ‘KPop Demon Hunters’. So with the children we wished to return and see this place,” stated Emily Han from Florida in the US.
The film had helped add “curiosity to totally different locations that we will go and see”, stated Han, who was adopted from South Korea as a baby.
Okay-crazy
The film was seen as the newest instance of the “Okay-syndrome” — the world’s irresistible urge for food for motion pictures, music, books, trend and delicacies showcasing Korean life and experiences.
Bong Joon-ho’s 2019 Palme d’Or and Oscar finest image profitable movie “Parasite”, and the massively fashionable tv sequence “Squid Sport” are simply a number of the different examples of productions out of South Korea which have made a world splash.
This will likely be additional in proof on Saturday when boy band BTS carry out for his or her first live performance in nearly 4 years — an extravaganza prone to be watched by hundreds of thousands worldwide.
However “KPop Demon Hunters” is not strictly talking South Korean.
It was made by Sony, directed by a Korean-Canadian and an American — Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans — and it is initially principally in English.
“That is for Korea and Koreans in all places,” Kang stated in her emotional acceptance speech.
“It is a good form of East meets West form of film,” stated Nguyen, an Asian-Australian of Vietnamese descent. “It was a very good illustration of that.”
KPop Demon Hunters originated from Kang’s want to create a narrative impressed by her Korean heritage, drawing on components of mythology, demonology, and Okay-pop to craft a visually distinct and culturally rooted movie. It had entered manufacturing by March 2021, with the total inventive staff hooked up. The visuals had been influenced by live performance lighting, editorial pictures, music movies, and anime and Korean dramas. The soundtrack options authentic songs by a number of musicians and a rating by Marcelo Zarvos.
KPop Demon Hunters started streaming on Netflix on June 20, 2025, and have become the most-watched authentic title in Netflix historical past with over 500 million views. A sing-along model had restricted theatrical releases on August 23-24 and October 31-November 2. Its theatrical launch was the widest by variety of theaters for a Netflix movie, and the primary to prime the field workplace in the US.
