It’s not the first big-screen outing for an unruly demon child who battled dragons and defied destiny to become humanity’s saviour, but this year marks the first time that it’s receiving global recognition. Following a phenomenal showing at the Chinese box office, Ne Zha 2 has surpassed Inside Out 2 as the world’s top-grossing animated film, and the hype is just getting started as it ventures further into international waters.
Closer to home, the highly-anticipated sequel to the 2019 original is slated to premiere on 6 March in Singapore. The announcement comes by way of film distributor Encore Films on social media, which offered some insights into its performance milestones.
“Nezha returns and it’s breaking Chinese film box office records. It’s now the highest-grossing non-English film, the highest-grossing animated film, and the eighth highest-grossing film worldwide,” reads the accompanying caption.
Released over the Chinese New Year period, Ne Zha 2 has earned over ¥13.9 billion (US$1.92 billion / S$2.48 billion) and is the first non-Hollywood film to break into the all-time global top 20 of highest-grossing movies. Director Yu Yang, credited as Jiaozi, returns to helm the sequel loosely based on the classic 16th-century novel Investiture of the Gods (Fengshen Yanyi), attributed to Xu Zhonglin.
Both Ne Zha and its continuation follow the titular Chinese mythological character, who’s born with unique powers and recruited to fight demons while saving the community that fears him. It also features other characters from the original work, including Ao Bing, the Dragon King’s third son, Tai Zhenren, Nezha’s master, and former villain Shen Gongbao.
The synopsis for the 2019 fantasy pic is as follows:
“The Primus extracts a Mixed Yuan Bead into a spirit bead and a demon bead. The spirit bead can be reincarnated in a human to help King Zhou establish a new dynasty, while the demon bead will create a devil and harm humans. Ne Zha is the one who should be the spirit bead hero but becomes a devil incarnate, because the spirit bead and the demon bead were switched.”
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really.
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Yong Le
