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This Article Contains Spoilers -
WARNING: This article contains major spoilers. If you do not wish to know vital information on plot / character elements in a story, you may not wish to read beyond this warning: We hold no responsibility for any negative effects these facts may have on your enjoyment of said media should you continue. That is all. |
This is how most demons were made, never born. Because this is one of the levels of how far "a deal with the devil" could make you.
| “ | Gwi-Ma: That's funny. I thought for a moment you actually believed you could be free. (Proceeds to maniacally laugh). Jinu: Yeah, that's... that's funny. Gwi-Ma: Because if you really believed her, if you really thought you could escape what you are, what you did... you would have told her the truth. You betrayed your own family. You left them behind. Don't forget about our deal, Jinu, because I can turn those voices up. Or they can be gone. Don't think you can escape what you are. |
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| ~ Practically the worst means of Bad Boss behavior; reminding your servants what they've done via a deal they've approached. |
2 weeks has passed and this is another monthly proposal from yours truly. It's been kinda awkward since I'm not as active here than usual and honestly, it's kinda better that way since I am more interested in everything elsewhere in TH and my life outside. For the meantime, who knew K-Pop stars became a trending genre in the animation media? And that is something you never expect to see everyday in the norm.
That said, very solid and funny characters, great animation style, lots of K-Pop (My little Soda Pop being an all-time fav for me), the chemistry between Rumi and Jinu, and one-percent of having a rather uninteresting villain, y'know, the typical "conquer all and devour souls" kind, but nevertheless he is indeed a qualifier. Shocker, to nobody's best guess. And who gone and figure said candidate is question in the actual Korean dub was voiced by none other than The Front Man himself, I'll give pointers for that. That aside, let's begin this week's discussion and on the day of the 4th of July no less, this is Gwi-Ma.
What's the Work?[]
KPop Demon Hunters is the 2025 musical fantasy animated film directed by Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans, one of the latest entries of Sony Animated Pictures Studios. Basically, context of the film is that a fictional K-Pop group pose as demon hunters at nighttime hunt and kill off demons to defend the Earth from their terrorizing reign.
Current demon-hunter trio, HUNTR/X (Rumi, Mira, and Zoey), are the latest generation carrying out their predecessors' duty of slaying demons back into the underworld while living the K-Pop fame of performing live on stage. However, when the demons got more creative with a new approach, they sent out a demonic K-Pop boy band to rival against the trio. What started out as a rivalry between two faction groups slowly descends both leading members develop a K-Drama stylized romance between the two and a battle of the bands to determine the fate of the world.
Who is He? What has He Done?[]
Gwi-Ma is the demonic master and progenitor of the demon race who devours souls to harness strength and wishes to conquer the human world. He serves as HUNTR/X's biggest arch-nemesis.
For centuries, Gwi-Ma and his demonic kindred terrorized humanity to expand his reign over the mortal realm, having his demonic minions absorb their souls and have them channeled into Gwi-Ma for him to devour, strengthening him. Besides devour souls, Gwi-ma loved to make very sadistic deals to those unfortunate, especially preying on their insecurities and shame. The most exemplified was Jinu, a peasant trying to provide for his family with his biwa-playing but to no luck. Approaching him, Gwi-Ma improved his singing talent in exchange of servitude and forsaking his humanity to become a demon servant for all eternity, all while abandoning his family to live a luxurious life. Something Gwi-Ma used to psychologically torment Jinu in his control. However, his reign was short-lived when the first demon hunters vanquished him and his kind back to the underworld via creating the Honmoon.
Generation after generation, Gwi-Ma continuously sent his demonic minions to wreak havoc and kill each new trio of demon hunters, only to fail again and again over a very massive amount of time that Gwi-Ma furiously incinerates them alive for failure, which he so happens to do so recently with a stewardess demon that failed to kill HUNTR/X, the latest trio of demon hunters, that it's no wonder the demon kindred are so easily afraid of him. Running out of options and new plans to get rid of HUNTR/X and break the Honmoon, Gwi-Ma was approached by Jinu's idea of forming a K-Pop boy band to garner millions of fans and absorb their souls down to the underworld. At first thought it was ridiculous, Gwi-Ma endorsed it anyways until it's revealed to be a blowing success in exchange of a deal Jinu made to have his memories of abandoning his family erased.
Throughout the Saja Boys' popularity, the group managed to breach over 50 million fans and have their souls one by one absorbed to be devoured to harness Gwi-Ma's strength to fruition. When Jinu started reconsidering Rumi's plan to seal the Honmoon for his freedom upon developing feelings for her, Gwi-Ma wasn't going to have any of that and decides to remind Jinu that he owns him; simply make him revisit the memories of abandoning his family in psychological torment, ultimately getting his full compliance, albeit reluctant. After Jinu sabotaged HUNTR/X's performance for the Idol Awards via exposing her heritage of being half-demon to both her teammates, the Golden Honmoon begins to crumble slowly as Gwi-Ma preps on psychologically preying on people's insecurities and mistakes (including Mira, Zoey, and Larry), having them march onto the Namsan Tower where the Saja Boys' concert was held.
With over millions of participants in the audience, Gwi-Ma has the Saja Boys perform Idol to lure them towards their master as he gets ready to feast on them all and devour their souls. However, a newly-determined Rumi overcomes her insecurities through This is What it Sounds Like that manages to reach out to her teammates, banding once more as Gwi-Ma orders his horde and the Saja Boys to kill them, though quickly changes his mind and absorbs dozens to hundreds of his horde to further empower himself to the point of having an actual face. Prepping to kill Rumi instead with intense fire breathing, Jinu takes the hit for her and ends up killing him instead. Though through his departing words to her, Rumi and her teammates harness the souls of the audience empowering them to create a new Honmoon and vanquish Gwi-Ma once and for all.
Heinous Standards[]
Easily sets it home for the film. As a powerful demon master of an entire demon race and channels himself through devouring souls, Gwi-Ma has a very hefty rapsheet.
GIMME YOUR SOULS!!!
Terrorizing villages with his servants absorbing dozens of souls for Gwi-Ma to devour, making sadistic deals that tricked people into forsaking their humanity to become his demon servants unwillingly for eternity, regularly incinerating his minions alive, psychologically abusing said servants with memories of their worst acts and shame whilst preying on their insecurities, and there's endorsing Jinu's K-Pop Boy Band idea to gather millions of followers and absorb their souls for Gwi-Ma to feast upon. Then to brainwashing hundreds to thousands by preying on their insecurities to gather at the Namsan Tower's stadium in preparation to terrorize humanity once more, starting by feasting on the entire audience's souls.
It's also made explicit time-to-time that absorbing souls and feeding them to Gwi-Ma adds the possibility that they cannot be brought back to their original bodies if his vanquish sees not even one soul returning when a new Honmoon emerged, if the plane steward staff demons' implication of "eating" innocent people says otherwise, we can throw off Fridge Horror on inverting the "Never Say Die" rule.
Personal villainy is also best mentioned on Jinu's case, as Gwi-Ma's the reason for how he became the way he is; making a deal with him in exchange of serving him and abandoning his family, continuously psychologically torment him with his worst act in order to keep him under his belt to the point of believing he has no chance to regaining his human soul until now, even being responsible for his death when he sacrificed himself in front of Rumi. I'd say he's a solid easy pass.
Mitigating Factors[]
| “ | Jinu: I know what it feels like to have them. Rumi: Feel? You're a demon. Demons don't feel anything. Jinu: Is that what you think? That's all demons do. Feel. Feel our shame, our misery. It's how Gwi-Ma controls us. Do you not hear him in your ear? |
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| ~ Jinu knew exactly what he's talking about, demons are just as capable of feeling as humans do. |
Moral agency is not an issue here. No evidence shows the demon race and Gwi-Ma in general are Made of Evil, and as far as I am confident to say, obvious proof stems from Rumi and Jinu. Rumi is a hybrid between both human and demon, exactly why Gwi-Ma has zero control over her, as she has full control over her personality and who she is deep down. The same can be said for Jinu, who was originally human himself, and even under Gwi-Ma's influence, he has the integrity and right to do good and even gone far to sacrifice his life for Rumi. If Jinu's words heed true as quoted above, it means the demons are capable of remorse, albeit used against them under Gwi-Ma's control.
Just to reiterate Jinu's case, it's likely not all of them are unwillingly serving Gwi-Ma out of fear, as Rumi's first encounter of questioning them this gave out a sadistic smile, meaning to an extent, some of them do serve their master willingly. Also helps how far loose agency for them seems more humane than evil-incarnate entirely, and for a little known fact I forgot to mention, Jinu's pet Tiger Demon and Raven are the only ones still capable of entering Earth despite Gwi-Ma's defeat - especially since they come off being friendly than hostile.
We also not need to worry for characterization. Sure, Gwi-Ma doesn't have much screentime to the point some may mistake him for a Generic Doomsday Villain. I'd say he has quite enough actually, he is a manipulative deal maker at best, preying on the insecurities and mistakes of those unfortunate and takes absolute kicks off of it, as well as being very power-hungry and controlling, otherwise even a small sense of humor if finding the whole K-Pop Boy Band Jinu suggested was ridiculous at first.
Speaking of which, the film has over-the-top facial expressions and the Saja Boys participating in a hot sauce challenge similarly dressed as babies (ironically, one of their members is named after), but when it comes to Gwi-Ma, he is treated as a serious threat when it comes to his much darker actions like the psychological torment on Jinu and his sadistic deals, not to mention when he's ready to feast on thousands to millions of souls from start to end. And as a certified Bad Boss, he clearly treats majority of his demon servants above and despite praising Jinu's efforts, he is still not exception to his abuse with the continuous torment to keep him at bay and is perfectly fine with killing him. So zilch.
Final Verdict[]
Very easy yes to the living fiery pit.