Maggie Kang and Chris Applehans | Making K-Pop Demon Hunters

In Episode 8 of All Lit Up! we were joined by Maggie Kang and Chris Applehans for a no-holds barred telling of what it took to make the smash hit of 2025, the glorious KPop Demon Hunters. Maggie and Chris share the steps they took to push their film forward, when they had to push back instead, and how an idea pitched over brunch became a multi-million-dollar production.

Hosted by interviewer extraordinaire, Gilly Fogg.

Listen to Episode 8 now, or read on for a summary of this fascinating interview!

First things First

Gilly Fogg:

Maggie and Chris, you are in the midst of mega success with K‑Pop Demon Hunters. I thought it might be interesting to discuss the conditions that allowed you to do so much research and development. Could we go back to the very beginning?

Maggie Kang:
Well, the idea originated from me. I had been working in animation for about 13 years and I’d always wanted to see a feature‑level animation that showcased Korean culture. I waited and waited, and nothing ever came across my table.

So I started with Korean culture, really focused on mythology and demonology, and landed on a kind of demon‑hunter female superhero idea. K‑pop was actually added in as a last ingredient. I always say: I pitched this very marketable idea, but underneath, I wanted to make it as Korean as possible and showcase many aspects of our culture.

At the time I was freelancing for Illumination. I had just had a child and was doing mostly mom duties while working maybe half the time of a full‑time employee.

Aron Warner, producer on Wish Dragon, had worked with me and we had been talking about doing something together. He was at Sony, and he said he loved his experience on that film with a director‑writer, and a more international concept, so asked if I had something similar to pitch and I said yes, even though I didn’t!

I spent a few days thinking and came up with this concept, then pitched it to him.

It was a Sunday over brunch in our neighbourhood. He brought his dog, we brought our baby in a car seat, and I pitched the concept: a group of K‑pop girls who are secretly demon hunters.

He said, “I love it, let’s make this.” I thought he was joking, but the next week he had a deal ready at Sony.

"Just Go Board Something"

Gilly Fogg:
Had you worked at Sony before?

Maggie Kang:
No. But Kristine Belson, the president of Sony Animation, had been a producer at DreamWorks. I’d never worked with her, but she knew who I was and my reputation. When I pitched it to her—first‑time director—it was a little… uncertain. But the movie wasn’t bought as a big‑budget film. The idea was to find foreign financing. We wanted to use Korea, but there wasn’t a CG pipeline that could handle it.

During development, things got murky. Development is hard everywhere; you have to be proactive. Aron was worried. He told me, “Just go board something. You really have to prove you can do this movie.” So as a story artist, I boarded the plane fight scene at the beginning of the movie to an existing song—just as a proof of concept.

Toward the Green Light

Gilly Fogg:
And it’s the producer, Aron, who brings on Chris?

Chris Applehans:
I don’t even know. Maybe Sony did.

Maggie Kang:
Yeah, I’m not sure either. At the time, Chris had done Wish Dragon with Aron, which started outside the system with a Chinese VFX company that wanted to get into animation. They co‑financed with Sony, and Kristine was a champion of the project. The movie did so well on Netflix that Sony said, “Go find another one like that.” That was part of the domino effect.

Chris Applehans:
It showed that a story that seems culturally niche can find a huge audience. Sony began looking for more projects like that.

Gilly Fogg:
And you had written Wish Dragon.

Chris Applehans:
Yeah, it was based on a personal relationship. A friend of mine who grew up in Shanghai—I’d known him for twelve years—so it was as personal a project as it could be. At some point, when they decided this (K‑Pop Demon Hunters) was going to be a bigger idea than the $25‑million version, they said, “Let’s get another person involved.”

Maggie Kang:
Kristine said, “This is going to be a big movie, Maggie. You can’t do this on your own.” And I said, “Yes, I can! Why aren’t you letting me do this alone?” So we looked for a partner for a long time. Maybe a year and a half. We tried to find a Korean woman—our top choice—but we couldn’t. A few came from live‑action TV, but they were too expensive.

Ultimately, after about six months, Kristine said we needed someone with experience making a CG movie. So we looked with that in mind. At the time, my husband—Radford Seacrest—was Chris’s head of story on Wish Dragon, so we were hanging out a lot and I got to know Chris.

I asked Aron one day, “What about Chris?” Chris’s wife is Korean, so culturally he’s very immersed, just like I try to make my husband as Korean as possible. And Chris had lived in China for two years making a culturally Chinese movie with Chinese talent, which I had huge respect for.

Gilly Fogg:
Okay, so you have a studio that has had one success with this type of movie, open to pitches from people they know and trust—like you. They option your idea and give you financial support and security to develop it?

Maggie Kang:
Yes, but the financial support in development is very slim.

Gilly Fogg:
Meaning you weren’t employed full‑time?

Maggie Kang:
No. I wasn’t.

Gilly Fogg:
So you were doing this on your own time as Maggie Kang for about a year?

Maggie Kang:
For about a year.

Gilly Fogg:
So what is the key that unlocks more money and confidence within Sony, bringing in more resources?

Maggie Kang:
Once they decided it was a bigger movie. To me it was immediately huge—like an enormous, amazing concert film. But the shift felt sudden. We were called into Kristine’s office one day—my husband and I, because at the time we were pitching different ideas together—and she said, “This feels like a bigger movie. It needs to be big. It’s a musical, there’s so much music, the world is rich, there’s potential for other stories. This is a bigger idea.”

At first it was very Wish Dragon-style: writer/director, small team. Once it became bigger, they said they needed other writers and another director. My role actually got smaller as the movie got bigger. And I was saying, “No, I can do this on my own,” but thank goodness Chris was there because this was massive. At times we even thought a third brain might be helpful!

Chris Applehans:
I had just directed something “by myself,” except I had people like Rad and Aron pulling so much weight. They were writing, helping crack scenes, working in editorial.

My agent said, “Why do you want to co‑direct? That’s a downgrade.” But I said, “Not for this movie.”

There was a naive belief in the project—this thing needed to happen. Let’s get as many amazing people as possible.

Gilly Fogg:
So in the background, Sony elevates the project and starts investing resources. Were you given a timeline or strategy to get to greenlight?

Maggie Kang:
We knew we needed a script, because that’s what you need to present to “big Sony.”

Gilly Fogg:
“Big Sony”?

Maggie Kang:
Sony Animation is under the larger Sony Entertainment. For them to make an original animated feature, they need approval from the top. So we developed the screenplay to give to the president of Sony.

We also brought on Helen Chen and Ami Thompson. They generated five years’ worth of art in three months. Unbelievable.

Gilly Fogg:
So the project is hot and now you need a script and artwork. At this stage, were you employed full‑time?

Maggie Kang:
Yes.

Chris Applehans:
Yes.

Gilly Fogg:
How long did it take to finish the script?

Chris Applehans:
Less than a year. First draft in seven months.

Maggie Kang:
We powered through. Finished it by the end of the year. Turned it in before the holidays.

Gilly Fogg:
And your confidence is building. Conditions‑wise, you now have the full focus of the studio and resources?

Maggie Kang:
As much as they needed to give us—limited, but yes. Two artists, screenwriting help, and us.

Gilly Fogg:
What changed to take you to the next level?

Maggie Kang:
We had a robust pitch packet: lots of art, some music, three sequences I boarded and cut into an animatic to show tone. That’s the only way to express tone. We presented that.

Sony felt it was a hard movie for them to make theatrically. They didn’t fully understand the K‑pop audience yet. BTS was huge, but it wasn’t guaranteed the trend would continue.

Gilly Fogg:
So the trajectory could have been peaking?

Maggie Kang:
Exactly. But we believed in it. Always.

Sony found it hard to commit as a theatrical release. The next option was Netflix.

Sony was already talking to them after Mitchells and Vivo. We pitched it; they loved it.

Gilly Fogg:
How soon after that did you go into production?

Maggie Kang:
Well, it was funny. They said they wanted to proceed, and we were thrilled. We had a big party at Kristine’s house. But it took a while for the deal to close and financing to finalise, so we had to wait a couple of months and couldn’t crew up as quickly as we wanted.

Getting Intimidated by Spider-Verse 2

Gilly Fogg:
When did you get the OK that you’d be working with Imageworks? Did you have to “audition” for them?

Chris Applehans:
No. That was part of the sell—that we would work with Imageworks. It appealed to Netflix, because Imageworks had done Mitchells and Vivo, and their reputation is great.

Gilly Fogg:
When you were going out to bring people in, you were able to say, “We’re with Sony. Sony is Spider‑Verse.” You were in that world.

Maggie Kang:
Yes, but we hadn’t seen the second Spider‑Verse movie yet because it was still being produced while we were… I don’t know, what phase were we in when we saw it?

Chris Applehans:
Maybe we were just starting animation.

Maggie Kang:
Yes, because we were horrified.

Chris Applehans:
It was a traumatic bonding experience.

Gilly Fogg:
Why?

Maggie Kang:
Because we had just brought on—or decided on—our head of character animation, who had been the head of character animation for the first Spider‑Verse film.

We were excited to work with him because they had done so much innovation for that movie and we were invited to the premiere of the second film, but we didn’t sit together—opposite sides of the theater. In the first sequence with Gwen, just the colors and everything, I thought, “Uh‑oh.”

I texted Chris during the screening: “Oh no, it’s so good. How are we going to live up to this? This is beyond amazing.” It blew my mind.

Afterward, I told one of the directors, “How did you do this? How?” And he said, “Imageworks is so great—you’re in good hands.”

Gilly Fogg:
And once Netflix said yes, when did production start?

Maggie Kang:
We celebrated quickly, but it took a couple of months for the deal to close. We couldn’t crew up until that happened. That’s just the nature of deals.

Chris Applehans:
Now, looking back at even our own crew—board artists who saw the animation later would say, “I didn’t imagine this.”

We’d say, “It’s a spectacular concert film,” but that’s a big mental leap for people.

 

Maggie Kang:
Even for me, on the next Sony film—I’d seen the animatic and some art, and then the trailer came out, and I thought, “Wow, I didn’t expect it to come together like that.” So even for me it was surprising.

We didn’t realize how surprising it would be for people who worked on our film.

Make the Mould before you Break the Mould

Gilly Fogg:
Sometimes a concept is so pure as a storytelling device that you don’t need to imagine the spectacle. But this one—the spectacle, the visual sophistication—is what makes it work. Tone too. Hard to communicate that in a pitch.

Chris Applehans:
Exactly. The pitch of the story alone doesn’t convey what the experience will be.

Gilly Fogg:
You’ve both worked on or near major projects—Trolls, Puss in Boots. Were there conditions in the development or execution of this film that you didn’t have before—conditions you would insist on next time?

Maggie Kang:
The biggest thing that was a total mystery when pitching was the lack of comps—comparables. You’re always asked for comps. It was almost impossible to provide them. Even for me, I had an idea of the tone, but it was hard to explain. I wanted multiple tones at once. I would give comps like, “Guardians of the Galaxy meets Sailor Moon meets K‑dramas,” but even then, what part of those things are you referencing?

The only way to express what I was imagining was through storyboards and animatic. That was the only way to show what I was feeling, even though those were just early iterations.

There was a lot of trust, which was great.

Chris Applehans:
Even though “no comps” is scary and makes pitching harder, I like that. It means you aren’t following a road that’s already been walked.

Maggie Kang:
And because they were up for that, we tried things—mashing things together, putting elements together that you normally wouldn’t. Chris and I have so much experience working on films that are typical. You can’t break the mold unless you know how to make the mold. Because we knew how to do that, we were able to play.

It challenged us enormously. There were moments I thought about for days—trying different versions of a joke. Every time we tried something new, I’d record scratch dialogue, editors would recut, and sometimes it failed. But I knew I had to crack it.

Gilly Fogg:
So a major condition was a studio giving you the space to do that—and the time.

Maggie Kang:
Yes. Multiple screenings, test screenings. And we went through many iterations of the music. We worked closely with choreographers, had tons of video research… but all of that was fun. Figuring out the story was extremely difficult—getting the tone right. For the first two or three screenings, the movie was too serious. We lost the comedy and were reminded harshly that it needed to be lighter. We were dealing with dark themes, but we lost sight of the comedy, so we brought that back in two weeks—tweaking scenes, shifting perspective. Once we brought comedy back, the tone fell into balance.

Chris Applehans:
Being good storytellers—good at making great sequences—that was our contribution. I remember going to Black Label—one of the best music producers in the world—and we pitched him. He thought it was cool, but once we showed him a sequence with humor and action, you could see him buy in. He said, “I didn’t expect it to be so fun.”

Everyone who saw animatic sequences reacted that way. “Oh, you’re good at something. We’re happy to bring our skills into something that already works.”

Gilly Fogg:
If you had to name three things in the structure and conditions of this production—the things you would insist upon for your next film—what would they be? I suppose your combined experience is invaluable. As you said, you need to know how to make the mold so you can break the mold.

Maggie Kang:
I think that’s one of the biggest things people don’t realize when they step into directing. A lot of creators say, “I want to direct,” and that’s fine—many people have something to say. But you have to be able to do the job. If you can’t, other people will do it for you—and “other people” can be the studio. We were both in a position where we were writers, we could execute, and with strong story backgrounds we could control the story.

Chris Applehans:
Yeah—decades of experience in writing. The type of education Maggie got as a story artist at DreamWorks for a decade is priceless. I learned much of that secondhand, working with heads of story from the same “school,” what they have is a standard of clarity and entertainment.

People see my CV and think: production designer, then seven years later director, but those seven years were spent writing screenplays, developing them, selling them, not getting greenlights, writing a new one from scratch.

By the time we got to this project, there was so much foundation—fifteen years of groundwork—to let you know what the starting point should be and then challenge yourself on top of that.

Maggie Kang:
Miyazaki was about 40 before he directed. It takes time to understand the whole puzzle. And to have that time, you need an industry with entry‑level and mid‑level jobs that cultivate you. A studio like Lighthouse, where you can talk to people and observe—that is invaluable.

The process has gotten so quick that a lot of that training is disappearing. Even with story artists, to save time, we’ve stopped pitching. Story artists sometimes don’t understand what a pitch is. It’s not just presenting drawings—you’re working in an audiovisual medium. You have to present how you picture the scene as an editor, as a performer.

I watched the best of the best pitch ideas—rooms on the floor laughing, with voices and sound effects and full performance. You learn when jokes land. You build your sensibilities by standing in front of a crowd and performing. That helped me so much. I didn’t even know it at the time.

Later, when we needed scratch actors for our characters—three main female characters—we had a full female story team. We had them all audition; they were shy. And then I ended up doing all the voices at one point—for about two years. All the main characters.

That came from pitching. Seeing characters as people with voices and personalities—not drawings. I’d do scratch for a scene, literally me doing three characters talking to each other.

Chris Applehans:
Yeah—Liza Minnelli style. A one‑person play with nine characters. I’d watch Maggie in the scratch booth going, “Mira… Zoe… Rumi… Rumi… Zoe… Mira,” switching instantly. I thought her head would explode. And you could tell each character apart.

Get Out of the Comfort Zone

Gilly Fogg:
Where do you think story pitches are still happening? Do you know if they’re still happening?

Maggie Kang:
We try to keep them alive. But it does get hard.

Gilly Fogg:
So that was not a condition taken for granted—you had to insist?

Maggie Kang:
Yes. Recreate it. It was missing.

Gilly Fogg:
Was that a discussion with production?

Maggie Kang:
Of course. Yes.

Gilly Fogg:
Do you think it’s staying in Sony Pictures? Presumably they use it in Spider‑Verse?

Chris Applehans:
Every show has its own culture. But I’ve noticed pitching has gone away a bit.

Maggie Kang:
As a story artist on other shows, yes—it has. I’ve pitched only to a director and producer, not the whole crew. That’s also a problem.

Chris Applehans:
A lot of people are too shy to pitch.

Maggie Kang:
That’s part of the job. Too bad. You have to do it. I didn’t know at first. I thought, “Oh gosh, I have to do that?” Same with directing—your job is to entertain and emotionally pitch your movie over and over, concisely. We do it even now, after having finished the movie.

Chris Applehans:
It’s a job where you have to be in front of people. Artists sometimes forget that. And since COVID, many introverts—I mean, we’re introverts too—have stayed comfortable behind screens. I’ve realized how introverted I am during this awards campaign, constantly traveling and talking. I have to force myself out of it, almost put on a character, to present the film.

The challenge is that more pipelines are remote now—send your storyboard PDF, don’t meet in person. COVID made that normal. Great for some things, but limiting.

...And Do it In-Person

Gilly Fogg:
So that’s one condition you’d insist upon next time—story artists pitching. What are the other two?

Chris Applehans:
Being in person.

Maggie Kang:
Absolutely. Editorial especially—almost impossible to do remotely. We drove an hour one way every day to be there.

Chris Applehans:
And so much of the creative conversation happens between the formal moments. You leave a meeting with no answer, and then while walking to editorial you say, “Do you think… would this be funnier…?” You solve things there. When a Zoom ends, you’re alone in your room. A whole layer of creative problem‑solving disappears.

As an artist, you also want to know your directors as people—your clients—in order to work effectively with them. Hard to do that without shared space.

Maggie Kang:
At DreamWorks, the culture was amazing. Directors would sit with artists at lunch. You’d talk about life, get to know them. You understood them, and that translated into the work.

Chris Applehans:
I remember during Wish Dragon, Rad and I were waiting outside Aron’s office for someone to come out of the bathroom so we could go to lunch and Rad said, “I feel like the third act… the dragon needs to give something up.” We had worked on that act for ages. And suddenly it clicked—we needed a sacrifice. That tiny hallway moment made the movie better by the end of the week.

You can’t replace that.

Gilly Fogg:
So:

1. Story artists need to pitch.
2. In person.
   One more condition?

Chris Applehans:
I’m only making movies with incredibly hot characters. Because it’s so fun to watch them turn in the light. You’re like, “Yes, let’s watch this look‑dev one more time.”

Gilly Fogg:
Okay, that’s a wrap. Thank you so much, Maggie and Chris. It’s been such a pleasure to talk to you. As we record this, your film is still number one—all‑time smash hit. Congratulations.

Maggie Kang:
Unbelievable. Thank you to all the fans.

Chris Applehans:
What a great community you have here.

Maggie Kang:
And thank you for the tough questions. Those were hard!