There are 62 screenings of KPop Demon Hunters this weekend at the Cinemark Century multiplex in Daly City, just south of San Francisco. The box office staff said they added a few at the last minute to meet the demand.
The wildly popular animated Netflix movie about a fictitious all-girl rock band's battle against evil spirits is jumping from the streaming platform to nearly 1,800 movie theaters around the country this weekend only. After launching on the streaming platform in June, it's hitting the big screen — this time as a singalong experience.
E.J. Yanesa is at the theater with his children and a bunch of other parents and kids from a local elementary school. "There's probably 60 of us," Yanesa said.
Wearing a Hawaiian shirt and yellow beanie, Yanesa is dressed up as Abby, a member of Saja Boys, the evil boy band that's out to destroy the heroic girl band, HUNTR/X.
It's only 10 a.m. and Yanesa said his family had already watched the movie at home today before coming out to see it on the big screen. "Good songs, good storyline, good drawing," Yanesa said. "They hit a home run with this one."
KPop Demon Hunters is about as big a home run as it gets for a new, animated movie. Netflix's first foray into singalongs is set to become the platform's most-watched film ever. According to Netflix, many of the screenings around the country this weekend sold out. And, as of Sunday seven of the songs on the soundtrack were among the top 20 most-played-tracks on Spotify.
"There's really nothing in the league of this that we've seen so far making the leap from streaming to the big screen," said Shawn Robbins, Fandango's director of movie analytics. Robbins said it's highly unusual for streaming giant Netflix to work with movie theaters.
In a statement to NPR, Netflix described the weekend of Demon Hunters singalongs as "a special gift for the fans."
Robbins said the theatrical event also makes strategic sense. "It's both serving a desire for the fans to go out and experience the film this way, but it also is a promotional means to maybe expose the movie to more people who haven't watched it yet on streaming," he said.
With the film's creators talking about a potential sequel, Robbins said Demon Hunters could become a major franchise. "It could be merchandise. It could be theme parks. It could be more soundtracks," he said. "The possibilities with this particular property are really endless."
Judging by this singalong event, fans can't seem to get enough. They take selfies in their HUNTR/X T-shirts and dance about with glow sticks to the songs. Even people who aren't necessarily big K-pop fans, like Jackie Fernandez, who's at the theater with her daughter, Zenina — ("I'm just being a supportive parent!") — fall for the movie.
"It was great," Fernandez said on her way out of the theater. "I'm turning the soundtrack on in the car."
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