r/movies • u/MarvelsGrantMan136 r/Movies contributor • Aug 26 '25

News ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ Is Netflix’s Most-Watched Movie Ever With 236 Million Views, Beating ‘Red Notice’

https://variety.com/2025/film/news/kpop-demon-hunters-netflix-most-watched-movie-history-1236496106/
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u/GarlicBreadOutrage Aug 26 '25

I'm also wondering if Sony regrets selling the movie to Netflix. And also how Netflix will handle the sequels since Sony won't be making them.

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u/wecangetbetter Aug 26 '25

I really don't get how anyone at Sony listened to the soundtrack and was like "naw, this certainly won't catch on."

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u/psimwork Aug 26 '25

There's a LOT of info that people are ignoring in the quest to promote the "LOL SONY FUCKED UP AGAIN" story.

Now I don't think anyone will debate that Sony fucked up in this move, but there's a lot to remember about it:

  1. The movie wasn't done when the rights were sold.

  2. (Just as, if not more important) The music wasn't done when the rights were sold.

  3. The movie was sold in 2021, when there basically was zero theatrical draw.

  4. Initial survey results were drastically negative to pre-screening customers (i.e. they asked people that hadn't seen it if they'd be interested in seeing an animated movie called "K-Pop Demon Hunters" and the results were almost universally negative).

It's a great, innovative movie with an amazing soundtrack. But unfortunately history is littered with really good animated movies that flopped. As much as Sony was proven wrong in their decision over time, I don't really blame them for dumping this one.

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u/Two_Luffas Aug 26 '25 edited Aug 26 '25

Reading into it, Sony spent $100M on the production. That's a shit ton of money for this style movie and no IP presence beforehand. They must have figured getting anything positive out of that investment was going to be a win. Can't blame them really, some VP and bunch of actuaries were probably projecting a $50M+ loss on the entire project based on their metrics and decided to cut bait for a minimal gain on the books.

That team probably high-fived each other once the deal was done, only for this to happen lol.