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‘KPop Demon Hunters’ is boosting more than just Netflix: Korean music, politics ride the craze
At South Korea’s largest amusement park, crowds of people wait for hours to be a part of the “KPop Demon Hunters” craze.
U.S. streaming giant Netflix, the distributor of the Sony Pictures Animation film, has collaborated with the Everland park outside of the capital city Seoul to create a themed zone featuring whack-a-mole, dance games and snacks from the movie.
It’s the latest iteration of the “KPop Demon Hunters” frenzy as the film takes Netflix by storm — and delivers a boost to the $10 billion K-pop music industry along with it.
Netflix said in August that “KPop Demon Hunters” had become the most popular Netflix film ever. In October, the streamer said “KPop Demon Hunters” had exceeded 325 million views.
The company has sought to capitalize on the popularity, offering two limited-window theatrical screenings for the film and striking consumer product deals with Hasbro and Mattel to get “KPop Demon Hunters” toys and merch on shelves.
Agnes Lee helped cast the movie and scout locations from Seoul as an associate producer for the film.
“K-pop and K-culture was such a huge and important part of this movie,” Lee told CNBC in Seoul. “We wanted to be authentic.”
Once popular mainly in Asia, K-pop music has become a global phenomenon. Artists like PSY, who shot to international stardom in 2012 with his viral music video “Gangnam Style,” put an international spotlight on K-pop. PSY’s hit song became YouTube’s most-watched video that year.
Since then, other K-pop acts have run up impressive numbers, too. BTS’ song “Dynamite” has exceeded 2 billion streams on Spotify. BLACKPINK’s 2023 tour became the highest-grossing by a female group on record, according to stats at the time from Touring Data.
Now, even “KPop Demon Hunters'” fictional bands are topping the global music charts.
Audrey Nuna, EJAE and Rei Ami attend the KPop Demon Hunters Special Screening at Netflix Tudum Theater on June 16, 2025 in Los Angeles, California., U.S.
Charley Gallay | Getty Images Entertainment | Getty Images
“I think people watched ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ in spite of that ‘K-pop’ in the title. And then, after watching it, they realized, ‘Oh, wow. I’m a K-pop fan,'” said Danny Chung, a K-pop producer and the voice of the film’s character, Baby Saja. “And now there’s a whole back catalogue of three decades of K-pop music that they have to dive into.”
And there’s plenty more to come: BLACKPINK is expected to release a new album. BTS is planning a comeback in 2026 after members of the band completed South Korea’s mandatory military service.
Enthusiastic investors have pumped up the stock prices of South Korea’s “Big Four” K-pop companies. Shares of HYBE, JYP Entertainment, SM Entertainment and YG Entertainment are all up double-digits year to date. YG is up more than 100%.
The impact of the film’s rise may not stop at music.
“The breakout success of ‘KPop Demon Hunters,’ which could become one of Netflix’s most-watched content items, underscores K-content phenomenon in global market,” Mirae Asset Global Investments said in an Oct. 19 report. “We believe this cultural boom is a key catalyst driving increased international consumption of Korean cosmetics and food products such as noodles.”
On the political front, speculation is high that China, which blocked K-pop and other South Korean cultural exports under President Xi Jinping’s campaign to promote what Beijing considers proper socialist values, could soften its restrictions.
The countries’ presidents had a positive meeting on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Gyeongju, South Korea.
“We continue to see K-pop as a direct beneficiary of thawing Korea-China relations,” Mirae said.
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Target faces a new boycott over ICE response as retailer presses ahead with turnaround
A major teachers’ union is calling for its members to skip Target when buying back-to-school supplies, the latest twist in a series of boycotts that have targeted the big-box retailer as its turnaround shows signs of life, CNBC has learned.
The AFT, or American Federation of Teachers, passed a resolution Thursday that calls on its 1.8 million members and others to shop at local stores and not at Target, saying the company did not respond adequately to the surge of federal immigration enforcement in the retailer’s hometown of Minneapolis this winter. Federal agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, during the operation.
The labor union, which is affiliated with the AFL-CIO, plans to urge a similar resolution at AFL-CIO’s convention in Minneapolis this summer and at conventions held by other organizations, including the NAACP and LULAC, AFT President Randi Weingarten said.
Target declined to comment specifically on the AFT’s resolution but said in a statement that it has “a longstanding commitment to strengthening the communities we serve,” including donating 5% of profits since the company’s founding and offering a discount to educators as part of a teacher appreciation program.
Target’s annual sales have declined for the past three years in a row, but the company’s new CEO Michael Fiddelke laid out an ambitious plan earlier this month to refresh its stores, add more enticing merchandise and return to sales growth. The retailer said it expects net sales to rise about 2% this fiscal year compared with the prior year and anticipates sales will grow every quarter.
It is unclear if and how much the AFT’s call for a back-to-school boycott could hurt Target, which is trying to win back customers. Earlier this month, Atlanta area pastor Jamal Harrison Bryant announced the end of a yearlong boycott of the company, called Target Fast, which had started because of the company’s rollback of major diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.
At a press conference, Bryant said Target has demonstrated its commitment to the Black community with investments in Black businesses and donations to Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Yet other activists leading a separate boycott, including former Ohio state Sen. Nina Turner, have said they continue to call for shoppers to steer clear of Target.
The AFT previously supported and participated in the Target boycott over its DEI rollback.
The retailer has attributed some of its sales losses to backlash to its DEI decision, along with other factors including company missteps with merchandise, a weaker store experience and softer discretionary spending.
At an investor meeting in Minneapolis in early March, Fiddelke stressed that it’s “a new chapter for Target.” He said the company is “doing the work to build connection with new guests, deepen relationships with existing guests and earn back trust with guests we’ve disappointed.”
In a separate email to Target employees earlier this month, Fiddelke highlighted how the retailer is putting its strategy into action, including through its move to cut prices on more than 3,000 items and the opening of its 2,000th store. He said Target has made progress with winning back trust, too, noting the end of the Target Fast boycott.
He said Target has had “ongoing conversations with the organizers” of the boycott, who have “acknowledged the meaningful contributions Target has made, and will continue to make, to the Black community.”
In an interview with CNBC, Weingarten said the AFT’s boycott is focused on what she called Target’s lack of response to the surge of aggressive and violent immigration enforcement in its own backyard. Weingarten said the AFT sent a letter to Target and met with Target staff to encourage them to speak up before the union moved to pass the resolution.
“Target was negotiating with our colleagues in the civil rights community for weeks and weeks and weeks,” she said. “They could have very easily dealt with both [concerns about DEI and immigration enforcement] and they chose not to.”
She said Target is “more worried about standing with the Trump administration than the communities that made them a profitable company.”
Fiddelke joined dozens of executives from Minnesota-based corporations in co-signing a letter in late January calling for an “immediate de-escalation” in the state after the fatal shooting of Pretti. However, the letter did not name the shooting victims Pretti or Good or call out the president, his immigration policies or federal agents.
Fiddelke also shared a video message with employees that more directly acknowledged current events, but stopped short of calling for ICE agents to leave the city or for accountability in the two shooting deaths.
Weingarten described the CEOs’ letter as “insulting” and said it “basically blamed both sides.”
She said the union, which includes many teachers, can have the greatest financial impact during the back-to-school shopping season this summer and fall. By passing the resolution now, she said, the AFT can get the word out to members and “give Target enough time to come back to its senses.”
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