KPop Demon Hunters sweeps Oscars with animation and song wins

KPop Demon Hunters have done it again! The animated film that turned Netflix upside down made history at the 98th Academy Awards on Sunday, 16 March, becoming the first non-Disney or Pixar animated feature ever to win two Oscars in the same night — taking home Best Animated Feature and Best Original Song for "Golden" at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles.

The film, co-directed by Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans and produced by Sony Pictures Animation for Netflix, follows K-pop girl group Huntrix — superstars by day, demon hunters by night — as they face off against rival boy band the Saja Boys, who are secretly demons. It sounds gloriously absurd. It also happens to be the most-watched film in Netflix history.

Since its debut on June 20, 2025, the film has amassed over 500 million views and has become the most-streamed film of the year. Yet the numbers alone do not explain why audiences became so fiercely devoted to it. Fan-made videos routinely outperformed Netflix's official marketing, and its sing-along theatrical release — with over 1,300 sold-out screenings across the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK — felt less like a cinema trip and more like a collective experience.

Critics noted that the film embraces the delightfully ridiculous idea that music can literally save the world, blending pop stardom with supernatural warfare in a way that feels both playful and surprisingly heartfelt. But beneath the spectacle lies something more considered. Kang built the film's mythology from ancient Korean shamanism and mudang traditions, filtering everything — makeup, food, clothing, architecture — through a distinctly Korean lens. It is a film that wears its cultural identity not as a selling point but as a foundation.

The soundtrack proved just as unstoppable. It became the first film soundtrack to place four songs simultaneously in the Billboard Hot 100 top ten and was certified double platinum in the US. EJAE, who co-wrote and performed "Golden", made history as the first Korean-American female songwriter to receive a Grammy nomination for Song of the Year.

By the time Oscar night arrived, the wins felt like a foregone conclusion — the film had already swept both the Critics' Choice Awards and the Golden Globes in the same categories.

Kang, who had long hoped to create a deeply Korean film, said nobody — not even within Netflix — could have predicted the scale of what KPop Demon Hunters became. With a sequel now confirmed and both directors returning, the universe they built is only getting larger.

As Kang put it simply: "This is only the beginning."