This weekend, movie history was made. For the first time ever, Netflix had the number one movie at the box office with its megahit KPop Demon Hunters. However, while every single other film distributor would’ve celebrated this fact, the streamer didn’t report the numbers. Instead, it put the version of the film in theaters immediately onto its streamer. The message was clear. This wasn’t meant to be a huge money grab or play for theatrical dominance. It was more of a thank you to the fans who streamed the film in record numbers and an elaborate advertisement for Netflix. But the film’s undeniable success brings up many questions about how and why this happened, if it could be repeated, and what all that means.
The biggest question among those is whether KPop Demon Hunters would have been as big a success had it been exclusively released in theaters? The film debuted on Netflix in late June and was immediately embraced by everyone who watched it. Critics, fans, and anyone who saw it loved it, and its Rotten Tomatoes score remains at 97%. At that time, Netflix also released the film in three theaters for one week back in June to qualify it for the Academy Awards. The streamer never reported that data, but we can tell you, it was not number one at the box office. The awareness and popularity were just beginning, and they haven’t stopped.
Slowly but surely, KPop Demon Hunters became one of Netflix’s biggest hits ever. Word of mouth, coupled with ease of accessibility, made it arguably the pop culture sensation of the summer. Songs from the film are on the Billboard Top 10, gaining airplay on national radio and streaming services. Toy companies have come calling to make merchandise. There’s talk of sequels, spin-offs, and over two months since its initial release, it’s on its way to being Netflix’s most successful original movie of all time, live action or animated.
All of which happened before this weekend. In Hollywood today, the traditional way of thinking is that a film being on streaming kills its box office prospects. If people can stream it at home, they will not go to the theaters. And there is surely data to back that up. Most people think the perfect formula is for something to be released exclusively in theaters, where it can generate great buzz and box office, which then drives interest towards the home release. So a studio makes money on a film in theaters, for its digital release, physical release, and then the streaming release. A quadruple dip with excitement and publicity, ideally, driving new viewers to each format.
KPop Demon Hunters, though, changes all that. It wasn’t released on Netflix with a ton of publicity. Even its recent theatrical release wasn’t backed with hundreds of millions of dollars of marketing. The film became a hit on Netflix because a) it’s good, obviously, and b) people could watch it immediately after their friends told them about it. It was there. It was available. We were already paying for it. And by the time, months later, the film got a larger theatrical release, it had permeated the culture to become less a first-run hit and almost a repertory movie. A movie that fans are so familiar with, they pay to see it in theaters just for the experience.
Historically, those kinds of movies can be box office successes, but not always. Star Wars, for example, going all the way back to the 1980s, through the Special Editions of the 1990s, and to the prequel releases in recent years, proves that. But those movies had already been available at home for a long time. KPop Demon Hunters is generally thought of as a new title. Which it is, in terms of days. But in terms of popularity and awareness, thanks to the incredible speed with which we consume content in 2025, it’s already well established beyond its age.
Twenty-six million watched KPop Demon Hunters over its ninth week of release from August 11 to 17 (which is the most recent data Netflix has released as of publication). Crudely, if you pretend each one of those people paid $10 to see the movie, that’s $260 million, about what Spider-Man: No Way Home made in its opening weekend. The point being, months after release, people are still streaming the crap out of it in wild numbers. Would the film have made even close to that if it had gone the traditional route to theaters? Not in its ninth week, to be sure. Would kids of all ages have gone to theaters over and over to watch the movie in record numbers? Maybe. But the fact that it had already become something everyone could enjoy certainly aided in this case.
If a movie can debut on streaming first, find its audience, and then retroactively become a box office hit, all bets are off. It’s a complete inversion of the traditional way of thinking in Hollywood. No one wants to give something away for free if people are willing to pay for it. Well, the message with KPop Demon Hunters is that people will pay for it even if it is free because it’s so good and fun and they love it. In this case, Netflix was the ultimate marketing tool for the weekend’s biggest box office hit.
KPop Demon Hunters, as well as the new sing-along version, which played in theaters this weekend, is on Netflix.
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