I’m truly sorry. To anyone who has had the misfortune of crossing paths with me in the last few days, I wholeheartedly apologise. I can’t imagine how annoying and ear-aggravating it must have been having to endure my efforts at singing a bunch of lung-busting K-Pop girl band songs. I assure you, it was entirely unconscious. I tried to stop many times, but I just couldn’t, and it wasn’t my fault. I blame KPop Demon Hunters. And so should you. And then you should watch it. Directed by Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans from a screenplay they also worked on alongside Danya Jimenez and Hanna McMechan, the latest release from Sony Pictures Animation is nothing short of a triumph, and is up there with the very best of that studio’s stable, the Spider-Verse films.
In some ways, a name like KPop Demon Hunters makes a film writer’s job very easy. Because what else needs to be said? The film’s called KPop Demon Hunters. It tells you everything you need to know. Nevertheless, the story here follows a three-piece K-Pop girl band called HUNTR/X (‘Huntrix’), made up of Rumi (speaking voice: Arden Cho, singing voice: K-Pop star EJAE), Mira (speaking voice: May Hong, singing voice: Audrey Nuna), and Zoey (speaking voice: Ji-young Yoo, singing voice: Rei Ami). Together, they make up the latest incarnation of a trio of women that are born time and time again throughout history in order to keep the evil demon king, Gwi-Ma (Lee Byung-hun) at bay, and to help maintain the barrier known as Honmoon that keeps the demon world away from the human world. Huntrix finds themselves at a particularly dramatic point in the history of the Honmoon, as they have the opportunity to strengthen the barrier so much so as to finally seal the demon world away for good, but they also have to face off against a truly devious plan devised by Gwi-Ma that could destroy the barrier and the human world with it (spoiler alert: It’s a group of demons masquerading as a rival K-Pop boy band, natch).
One of the most impressive things about KPop Demon Hunters is the wide variety of tones it manages to pack into its ninety-minute run time. There are great slapstick, verbal, and visual gags here, but so too moments of genuine pathos and relatable experience. They are never at odds, instead reinforcing each other and playing off the film’s themes. Despite its strikingly modern aesthetic and production values, it hearkens back to a different era of animation, when films ostensibly aimed at children and younger people were not afraid to explore the more sombre side of the human condition. There is insecurity and fear, and self-loathing and guilt here. It refracts on all these universal feelings through a lens of cultural specificity, with the filmmakers’ intent to make something distinctly Korean writ large not just in the musical subject matter, but a myriad of cultural and historical markers. This is all punctuated by frequent action sequences that are excellent throughout and sometimes spectacular, cut to the rhythm of the banging soundtrack and making full use of the medium (impossible movements, a mixture of 2D, 3D, chibi-style moments—the film throws it all at the wall and most of it sticks).
KPop Demon Hunters features a strong, yet also quite subtle, critique of the structures and systemic pressures of the K-pop industry, portraying it in the ways that its stars internalise the demands and grapple with its contradictions. The women have to be perfect goddesses, while also being relatably human—but not too much, of course, god forbid! There’s a good recurring gag here about how much the three just want to chill on their sofa together in oversized, comfy hoodies, and eat ramyun, yet at key points you can also see them struggle against that, confused about what they actually want, so deep does the conditioning run. Keeping humanity safe from world-destroying demon hordes, or making sure that next single goes straight to number one—which is more stressful? The film has fun with this and plenty of other inventive metaphors it throws into the mix. On top of that, it weaves into its story a strand of generational trauma, which adds an additional level of depth and feeling that comes across not as particularly complex, yet powerful nonetheless.
As someone who has only a sideways knowledge of K-pop and its world, KPop Demon Hunters is truly one of the of the biggest surprises of the year for me. I was laughing out loud throughout, and felt genuinely invested in the characters and their journeys—its central theme and arc proving compelling and touching. And, it has to be said again, that soundtrack really is just wall to wall bangers. To everyone that’s had to listen to my version of ‘Golden’, I truly am sorry. Netflix, release this film in the cinema, you mugs!
