‘Ne Zha 2’ is the Highest-Grossing Animated Film of All-Time. It's Also a Total Blast

In the immediate aftermath of both the COVID-19 lockdown and the summer of industry-wide strikes, Hollywood has struggled to get back to its golden days. There’s an argument to be made that said peak will never return and that we were entering a period of decline well before we knew what the coronavirus was. Billion-dollar hits seem less guaranteed than they were only five years ago, even as budgets balloon to obscene new heights. Maybe a few of those Summer blockbusters will hit ten-figures. But it seems unlikely that any movie in 2025 will top Ne Zha 2.

Made on a budget of around $80 million USD, Ne Zha 2 became the first animated film in history to hit the $2 billion mark. It’s the fifth highest-grossing film ever, ahead of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Avengers: Infinity War. Almost all of that money has come from the film’s native China, where it is an era-defining cinematic success. The film is a sequel to the 2019 hit Ne Zha, a film by a first-time feature diirector, Jiaozi that grossed over $742 million. Audiences loved it and word-of-mouth was strong. With the sequel, a combination of strong reviews, audience hype, and a prime release date coinciding with the first day of the Chinese New Year meant it was always going to be a hit, although few could have predicted how big it would become.

Now the film is being released outside of China, and with pretty solid responses. In Los Angeles, the film’s premiere at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre was an immediate sell-out success. In my neck of the woods, it’s received a sturdy multiplex release, and the night I saw it, it was very busy. It’s uncommon but not unprecedented for non-American animation to break out like this. Consider Aardman, Studio Ghibli, or the recent success of Latvian indie hit Flow. But $2 billion? That’s new.

And honestly? I think it deserves it. I am here to tell you, as a very white lady who hadn’t seen the first film and has zero history with Chinese animation, that Ne Zha 2 kind of rocks.

The film is based on classic Chinese mythology and the 16th-century novel Investiture of the Gods. In the first one, a Chaos Pearl was split into two parts, the Spirit Pearl and the Demon Orb. The former became Ao Bing, the son of the Dragon King, and the latter was born into Ne Zha, a chaotic demon child born of gods. This film picks up with the pair, nemeses turned friends, getting back their physical bodies after being struck by heavenly lightning. Ao Bing ends up sharing a body with Ne Zha, and the pair must complete a series of trials that will allow them to become immortal. But there’s drama afoot, involving imprisoned dragons, monster soldiers, and a clan of marmots with a grudge.

Ne Zha 2 is non-stop action from start to finish, with several impressive set-pieces and some stunning moments of animation. It’s also overwhelmed with story that makes its third-act twist an out-of-nowhere jolt and features more than its fair share of fart and puke jokes (the universal language of our planet - laughing at farts.) It’s indisputably Chinese but the animation style and character designs feel highly inspired by the likes of DreamWorks, Pixar, and Illumination. Ne Zha and his hot twinky teen pal Ao Bing wouldn’t look out of place in a Minions film, although the fight choreography and painter-esque backgrounds far exceed what Hollywood is doing on a similar budget.

Certainly, you can see how Ne Zha 2 is influenced by Hollywood’s decades-long domination of animated films. There are goofy-voiced sidekicks and lots of talking animals who kick a lot of butt. This makes the film pretty accessible for those of us who don’t have any familiarity with Chinese mythology and also gives it appeal to a wide range of ages. Maybe your five-year-old won’t care too much about the grandeur of the battle between demons versus gods, but they’ll definitely laugh at Ne Zha accidentally drinking his own pee. Unlike many American animated films, however, Ne Zha 2 doesn’t make its appeal to adults a bunch of pop culture references or bawdy jokes. That comes more through character development.

This is one of the things I appreciated most about the film. It’s all about how dividing people into a good-bad binary is a bad idea that will only worsen the problem and reinforce crooked power structures. Being a demon doesn’t make you any more intrinsically malicious than being an immortal god makes you benevolent or wise. This is explored across pretty much every major supporting character in the narrative. Shen Gongbao, a surly but elegant leopard demon who works for the Dragon King, is merciless in his command of war, but he still gets moments of quiet with his family and to reflect on the price of his loyalty to one side over another. For a film with non-stop pacing that runs well over 140 minutes, it’s not afraid to let things breathe.

Ne Zha 2 often feels like a spaghetti-against-the-wall splurge of ideas. Its emotions are extreme, going from characters watching their loved ones die to a kid puking then eating it up (the gross-out humour feels way more aggressive than you’d expect in a family movie, honestly.) These wild shifts in tone often happen within one character arc. Shen Gongbao goes from Jeremy Irons-esque Disney villain to slapstick stooge to misunderstood figure of empathic complexity. It should feel rushed or bogged down but it doesn’t, mostly because there’s a full-throated earnestness to the film and its themes. Well, that and it’s also just a blast to watch. It’s funny, sad, exciting, weird, familiar yet not, and stunning to look at.

Frankly, I think I would benefit from watching the first film since the sequel is clearly building upon the character work of its predecessor, but newbies can jump into Ne Zha 2 with little trouble. And you should, if it’s screening in your area. Those vibrant and balletic gods vs. demons action scenes demand a screen as large as the film’s ambition. Where else are you going to get moral complexities over the nature of good and evil in the same story as a giant farting pig who uses his large ears to fly?

Ne Zha 2 is currently screening in North American and British theatres in a limited release.