👹 Okay y’all… Demon Hunters just took over my entire brain 😂🔥

What was YOUR favorite moment from the performance? The choreo? The vocals? The visuals?! 시청해주셔서 감사합니다 💗💗

The tiger didn’t want to steal the lyrics. He wanted to stand up the waste basket. Just like the flower pot earlier.

"I don't know a lot about the K-Pop world"....

Proceeds to reference and understand visual lead dancers, maknaes and Stray Kidz in the first 5 mins. 😂

The Soda Pop song is 3 layers deep.  There is what the kids hear then there is the risqué double entendre that the parents hear and then is what the song is about. It's about demons "slurping" up human souls.  :face-blue-wide-eyes:

references to Korean mythology in this film:

- the first hunters are mudang, traditional Korean shamans using a combination of ritualistic weaponry and performance arts (song and dance) for exorcisms. The girls are basically a modernized version that switched up modern forms of music to continue connecting with the people so they can keep up the Honmoon (which translates to “soul gate”).

- all the weapons used by the girls are actual historical Korean weapons, mostly ceremonial weapons used for exorcisms. Rumi uses a sainchamsageom, or “Four Tiger Demon Slaying Sword” (called that because it was a ceremonial sword that could only be forged in the Hour of the Tiger, on the Day of the Tiger, on the Month of the Tiger, in the Year of the Tiger). Mira uses a Gokdo, an ancient Korean polearm design; Zoey uses a type of shinkal (“Divine Knife”) known as a daeshinkal (literally “Large Divine Knife”). Rumi’s second sword following Jinu’s sacrifice is a Chilseongkal (Seven Star Knife), another, much larger form of shin-kal.

- The flashback to Rumi’s childhood shows that Celine raised her on Jeju Island (and still lives there) based on the stone statue and the landscape. Jeju Island served as the last stronghold of Korean shamanism in the 20th century due to its isolation.

- the tiger and magpie are a reference to Jakhodo, which is an art composition featuring a stylized tiger/leopard/both (Koreans did not distinguish between the two until recently, and both animals are native to Korea though currently exticnt from there) and a magpie. The initial purpose of these paintings was as a talisman (the tiger would scare off demons and the magpie symbolized good fortune); later on they also became a form of social commentary, with the tiger representing the incompetent ruling class and the magpie the common people.

- The demons are mostly based on Korean folklore (the water demons for example are based on mulgwishin, aka ghosts of drowned people who try to drown living people, and the Saja Boys and Rumi’s father as revealed in concept art are jeoseung Saja/“underworld messenger”, whose job it is to bring the souls of the dead to the underworld).

No one EXPECTS to get emotional, but we all do. Golden is being submitted for the best original song Oscar and the movie is being submitted for best animated feature film. I’d be surprised if they don’t also get at least Grammy nominations, if not awards.

Okay, soooo, in less than 2 hours I’ll be going with my wife to the movie theatre  to watch the sing-along KDH here in New Zealand!!!❤

I had seen bits and pieces of this movie as my 4 year old daughter was watching it and I'm in and out mowing the lawn or something. We took her took her and her older sister's to the Sing Along in theaters back in August, so of course I finally sat down and watched the movie in its entirety...I wasn't ready to be a grown man hoping nobody notices me wiping away tears during the movie. 😂  The emotion captured in this story is incredible...hell, I still can't listen to Rumi's acapella before the end fight without tearing up. This movie is a beautiful lightning strike. ❤

In Korea, they got this music shows shown weekly by all the Korean broadcasting companies (ie. SBS' Inkigayo, KBS' Music Bank, Mnet's M Countdown, etc). An idol group typically do 2-4 weeks of promotion for a new song, essentially going around and performing at these music shows almost everyday for the duration for the promotion, all the while competing in these shows by a combination of album sales, fan voting, and judges panel. This is what happened in the scene where Huntrix and Saja Boys alternating winning shows. In the real live, a show win is highly coveted by idol groups, particularly by not-so-well-known ones, as it can significantly boost their popularity and therefore their album sales & streaming.

The Idol Awards in this movie is equivalent to the big end of the year music awards, again held by the major broadcasting companies (i.e. MAMA Awards, AAA, Golden Disk, etc). In these award shows they hand out all the major yearly awards of the Korean music industry, including the most prestigious which is Artist of The Year, in which Huntrix & Saja Boys compete in in the film.

Gwi-Ma is made up for the movie, from an actual Korean demon name, Ma-Gwi.

Well they are real now, Huntrix had their live debut on Jimmy Fallen show, they singed Golden, not sure if you seen it yet, but that's the very first live performance of our 3 amazing talented Huntrix girls.

The top 5 Halloween costume searches for 2025 were Rumi, Zoey, Mira, Jinu and Baby Saja, with Derpy the Tiger placed at number 8, so I would say your prediction was dead on! There were not nearly enough costumes on sale due to lack of belief the movie would be popular, so this year many families went back to the old days of making their own costumes, which is how it should be anyway.

They had different voices for the acting and for singing.

The singing voices are Ejae for Rumi, Rei Ami for Zoey, and Audrey Nuna for Mira.
They performed Golden live on the Tonight Show.
Ejae also wrote a few of the songs including Golden.

Sony Pictures Animation producer Michelle Wong, wanted a connection to an actually Kpop group.  So they got Twice to sing a cover of "Take Down"

Twice only sang "Take Down" for the credits.  That confused everyone about who sang the songs in the film.

"All we get to do is live with our pain, our misery. That's all we deserve."

'Not Rumi, maybe you.'

lol so cold.

I don't think derpy (yes the tiger is called derpy 😂)  was going to steal the lyrics he saw the can was knocked over and wanted to upright it like with the plant pot earlier 😂😂😂

In the film, the sword wielded by Rumi is called the Sa-in Sword, a legendary Korean blade.

The Sa-in Sword (literally “Four Tigers” Sword)
The Sa-in Sword is a legendary Korean blade, said to be born only under the alignment of the Four Tigers. It can be forged solely in the Year of the Tiger, during the Month of the Tiger, on the Day of the Tiger, and at the Hour of the Tiger — and even then, only within the royal palace where the king resides.

Once every twelve years, there comes a fleeting window of merely two hours when the forging is possible. Because of this, the Sa-in Sword is exceedingly rare. Upon its blade are inscriptions of sacred incantations to repel evil spirits, alongside constellations engraved in silver or gold, giving the weapon its divine aura.

The Sa-in Sword is more than a weapon; it is a symbol of kingship and sanctity, a bridge between the mortal realm and the spirit world. Legends tell that in times of great peril — when dynasties faltered or calamity struck the nation — the Sa-in Sword would reappear, its light guiding the chosen one.

For those who are curious about the Sa-in Sword, please refer to the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuynvB_wNpM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag3cW6N8sZg

Gwi-Ma is such a master gaslighter. He offered Jinu an amazing singing voice in exchange for Jinu taking in his patterns. Jinu accepted because he wanted to provide for his family. Once Jinu was scouted by the King, he gleefully took his mom and younger sister with him. Unfortunately, during that time period, royal palaces strictly forbade commoners from entering except a few specific professions, including musicians. So Jinu's mom and sister were barred at the gates. It was too late for Jinu to turn back at that point. If he did, the three of them will be executed for insulting the royal family.

Jinu could have still helped his family once he stabilized his position, but that could have taken several months to over a year. But Gwi-Ma told him that his family lived miserably and have already died untimely deaths. In truth, we saw Jinu's mom and sister being saved by the first-generation demon hunters in the opening. In one of the unused storyboards (cut to keep the runtime under 90 minutes), Jinu's sister even became a second-generation demon hunter. So, the OG demon hunters likely took the saved villagers with them after the demons devastated their village. So, even if Jinu checked later, he would have only found a ruined village.

Gwi-Ma eventually convinced Jinu that he chose to abandon his family by constantly whispering to him about what happened at the gates. Even if Jinu succeeded and Gwi-Ma erased his memories of his family, Gwi-Ma would have just switched to whispering to Jinu about his betrayal of Rumi. So, Jinu's torment would have continued even if the demons won.

The tiger and the crow (the tiger is very specifically styled for traditional Korean art, the crow is a more fun take) are classic Korean art motifs- they are harbingers of unexpected guests (sometimes unwelcome guests)

So love that you've reacted to my two current obsessions - Arcane and KPop Demon Hunters! To answer some of your questions, this movie is steeped in Korean folklore and culture - the tiger and the magpie are from traditional Korean art, for example. The voice actors are different from the singing voices. The singing voice for Rumi also did a lot of the songwriting for the movie. Her name is EJAE, and her story is really worth looking into.

Fun fact - this was released to theaters this weekend as a sing-along event, and is apparently selling out. Really hoping to see this win Oscars for best animated film and best original song. Golden was #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 last week, and there are six other songs from the soundtrack in the top 30.

The Tiger and the Magpie is an actual classic Korean story folktale