Move over, BTS: Two new K-pop groups are taking over the music charts — and they’ve never even performed live.
Saja Boys and HUNTR/X, fictional groups from the animated film “KPop Demon Hunters,” were brought to life by animators and filmmakers with help from a slew of people within the K-pop world. Now, they’ve become global superstars.
Within weeks, viewers of “KPop Demon Hunters” — which was produced by Sony Pictures Animation and released by Netflix — have flooded a Tumblr community page for the film with fan art. A Reddit thread continues to spark conversations about the movie, including speculation about whether there will be a sequel. On TikTok, videos of fans re-creating dances from the film, showing off their reactions to key scenes and debuting cosplays have amassed hundreds of millions of views. There are also Wiki pages dedicated to the groups.
From the “Josie and the Pussycats” cartoon TV show and movie to the boy band August Moon from the 2024 film “The Idea of You,” fictional on-screen artists have always been prominent in pop culture. But the popularity of Saja Boys and HUNTR/X has underscored something most in the music industry have known for years: K-pop and the fandoms surrounding the genre are a dominant cultural force.
Since it debuted on June 20, the film has been streamed by 33 million people, Netflix said, helping it rank among the platform’s top 10 movies in the 93 countries that are tracked. Billboard said this week that the film’s score is now the highest-charting soundtrack of 2025 and that it has surpassed Disney’s “Encanto” to become the highest-charting soundtrack to an animated film. Hits from the film, such as “Your Idol” and “Golden,” have also topped the U.S. Spotify charts in the K-pop categories in recent weeks.
“We go through, like, crying and happy and laughing,” Maggi Kang, a co-director of the film, said in a recent interview. “This whole last couple of weeks have just been like an emotional roller coaster, but in the best way.”
The film centers on HUNTR/X band members Rumi (Arden Cho), Mira (May Hong) and Zoey (Ji-young Yoo), who are tasked with maintaining a barrier to keep demons out of the human world through their music. The barrier can become permanent only once all demons are wiped from the human world, which becomes a core part of the plot.
As the group gears up to complete its final challenge, a new plot is hatched by a demon named Jinu Saja (Ahn Hyo-seop), who creates a rival group called The Saja Boys to harness energy from fans and weaken the barriers between the worlds. His goal is to feed the human souls to the demon ruler, Gwi-ma, and put an end to HUNTR/X’s demon-eradication mission.
Because music is such a vital part of the film, Kang and co-director Chris Appelhans used the knowledge of K-Pop gurus.
“The film features songs written by Danny Chung, IDO, Vince, KUSH, EJAE, Jenna Andrews, Stephen Kirk, Lindgren, Mark Sonnenblick, and Daniel Rojas. Plus, Marcelo Zarvos wrote the score,” according to Netflix’s editorial site, Tudum. “Music producers include Teddy Park, 24, IDO, DOMINSUK, Jenna Andrews, Stephen Kirk, Lindgren, and Ian Eisendrath. Meanwhile, original songs are performed by EJAE, Audrey Nuna, REI AMI, Andrew Choi, Danny Chung, Kevin Woo, samUIL Lee, Neckwav, and Lea Salonga. The film’s soundtrack also features an original song performed by Jeongyeon, Jihyo, and Chaeyoung of TWICE.”
But believe it or not, the film wasn’t always going to revolve around K-pop, Kang said.
“Initially, it was just a demon hunter idea, because I was looking for a project that would showcase Korean culture,” she said. “And I somehow just landed in demonology.”
Kang said the concept of demon-hunting “kind of naturally led to K-pop” because “demon hunting is usually done privately” and the characters she imagined would be fighting the demons “needed a public facing front.”
Kang said that about nine years ago, around the time she was first brainstorming her idea, BTS was very popular.
“And a lot of studios were trying to figure out a K-pop idea and K-pop IP,” or intellectual property, she said. “And no one had really cracked that nut yet. And oddly, when I put those two things together [demon hunting and K-pop], it was really fun. It became a musical.”
Kang and Appelhans wrote the script with Danya Jimenez and Hannah McMechan. Kang said that as the idea evolved into a musical featuring two rival K-pop groups, she faced her biggest hurdle: preventing the story from being too much like a traditional musical.
“The most challenging thing about the songwriting was that it had to be progressing the story, but also we could never lose the pop part of it,” Kang said. “So once it became a little too, like, traditional musical, we would send it back to those songwriters and say, like, you know, we’re losing that kind of cool, pop factor.”
Their efforts paid off, with the songs continuing to strike a chord with fans online.
Some K-pop artists who were involved also said they found the process rewarding.
Jeongyeon, Jihyo and Chaeyoung of TWICE told Netflix’s Tudum in a statement that it was “so exciting” to be part of the project “and connect with these brave characters through music.”
“It felt extra special because it brings together K-pop and animation,” they told the publication. “Two very creative worlds!”