The biggest movie of 2025 is an absurd fantasy epic that the average American will likely have never heard of. Released at the end of January this year, Ne Zha II, the Chinese animated sequel to 2019’s Ne Zha directed and written by Jiaozi, made 1.1 billion yuan (approximately $137 million in U.S. dollars) in its first three days. In just eight days, it had broken the record for the highest-grossing animated film in mainland China. And by the end of March 2025, it had become the biggest movie of the year, and the fifth-highest-grossing movie ever. Now, finally, it’s making its way stateside. And U.S. audiences may not be ready.
The Ne Zha films loosely adapt tales from Xu Zhonglin’s 16th century novel Investiture of the Gods, a hugely influential collection of Chinese myths and folklore. Ne Zha 1 and 2 specifically follow the misadventures of Ne Zha, the reincarnation of the Demon Orb, one-half of a sentient object born from the primordial essences of heaven and earth. The other half is the Spirit Pearl, which is reincarnated in the form of the dragon prince Ao Bing, the antagonist of the first film before he becomes Ne Zha’s closest friend. The first film chronicles Ne Zha’s troubled childhood grappling with his demonic nature and ends with him and Ao Bing finally coming to terms with their deeply entwined connection (and saving the world, of course). The second is… a bit more complicated.
