Generally I don’t watch many animation musicals, or have anything for musicals at all. In fact I’ve mostly stopped listening to new music for years now, because it all just seemed the same to me. When a co-worker recommended that I check out KPop Demon Hunters and told me what it was about, I wasn’t sure. It kinda sounded like Jem and the Holograms cartoon from the 80s. The weeks leading up to actually watching it, I had forgotten all about it every time I got home from work. My co-worker then wrote it down so that I wouldn’t forget.

One night at home, I was wanting to watch something new, I thought, “let’s check out Netflix tonight”, and there it was. I figured, “okay” and started to watch it. The animation style was pretty sweet, not at all what I had imagined (no I didn’t watch a trailer first). The songs didn’t sound like some Disney mashup, it actually brought me in and in a good mood-set. The underline story and the plot draw you in, the action sequences were also very cool.

The songs are very catchy, especially “Golden” (it now has permanent residence in my head!). I like the inclusion of some Korean lyrics within the songs too. If you’re not a native speaker, it makes you want to know what they are saying, so you keep listening to the song over and over. You eventually find the lyrics and have google say the Korean lyrics and you study what it sounds like, that way when you listen to the song again, you can understand the meaning and actually know the words being spoken. You know, rather than making up lyrics in your head to sound like the actual ones, you now can say them in your head. Plus, to see the differences in how language works in other cultures is fascinating to me.

I was interested to find out the story behind the song writer for most of the songs in the movie, Kim Eun-jae “Ejae“. Ejae is a South Korean and American songwriter that experienced her own difficulties moving up in the industry. When I learned that she actually is the singing vocalist for one of the characters, I thought “that’s pretty damn awesome!”. From the few movies I’ve watched with singing in them, the actual writer never sings their own songs. She has a nice singing voice, from a raspy sound to high pitch.

I look forward to more from this universe, and from what I hear more sequels are to come.