Geeky Nerd

This post will be about the Biblical/Christian themes and topics that I have found in the lyrics of songs from one of the most animated films of 2025 – K-pop Demon Hinters. I decided to make it a separate post from my film review since I feared that the lyrics may make it too long and they did. I am talking about all songs in short but I would give examples only from the songs that fit the title to shorten it even more.

All lyrics have been taken from Genius: https://genius.com/albums/Kpop-demon-hunters-cast-huntr-x-saja-boys-and-netflix/Kpop-demon-hunters-soundtrack-from-the-netflix-film

How It’s Done

This is the introductory song to the film’s protagonists, the Huntr\x. It is meant to establish the characters more than any of the film’s themes, so I couldn’t really find any specific Christian references in it’s lyrics.

Of course the “heels, nail blade, mascara/ Fit check for my napalm era” is the best part of the song for me. These lyrics are not only great in their performance, but also their meaning. They talk about both their image as k-pop idols and their demon hunters job but rather subtly.

Golden

The most basic meaning of gold is wealth and value (usually monetary) but beside that in Christianity and the Bible, gold can be met as a sign of refinement. This especially is represented by pure gold. In the film, when the Hunt\x sing the song Golden they refer partially to the value meaning, in the sense that they have found and embraced their own worth. At the same time the group wishes to create the golden Honmoon with this song, the refined and invincible Honmoon which will seal the demons away forever.

This song can also be seen as a “refined” version of the “What it sounds like”, since both of them are meant to represent the girls’ journey. The difference is, “Golden” is their k-pop stars’ journey which is a pure disguise for the public eye while “what it sounds like” is a representation of their hunters’ journey, their truest selves.

Regardless, there are no specific lyrics in this one that I would like to mention. Most of the interesting part like “Put these patterns all in the past now” deal with the context of the film rather than any Biblical or Christian reference.

Free

Honesty and facing the issues that bother you. These are the themes that are raised in this song in a very graceful manner. It’s message can be read even without the context of the film, the plot simply adds up to the already good message.

Another topic of the song is shame and guilt, and how we sometimes try to run away from them because it’s easier than facing the consequences of our actions. Shame in general is a rare theme to be explored in media and this is a nice example of how to do it.

Church often relies on shame as means of guiding people towards the “right path”. I will explore this topic later in the song “What it sound like” but for now all I can say is that shame is good when you realise that you did something bad and this feeling pushes you to do better. This is basically Jinu’s story as Rumi gave him hope to truly get away from his regret by helping him fight for what is right.

As for some lyrics I want to mention here, one example would be: “Yeah, hope only hurts, so I just forget it/
But you’re breaking through all the dark in me when I thought that nobody could”. Hopelessness is dark and hope is our guiding light in the darkest times. This is what faith should help with and helped me many times.

There is also: “Ain’t no choice when all these voices keep me pointing towards no end”, which I suppose, talks about how Gwi-Ma controlled Jinu through guilt. Haunting a person with guilt is indeed a good way of control, not of growth. Rumi gave him not only hope but a path to growth which he believed was sealed for him. Luckily, he decided to follow this light out of his desperation.

Soda Pop

At first glance it’s meant to be a rather catchy easy pop somg with an upbeat rithm about a person wishing to drink some refreshing soda on a hot summer day but if we inspect the lyrics closely they are more about obsession that anything else.

Regardless, this song is more interesting to disect on its own but this would go far from the theme of this post, so I won’t cover it here. It’s still a fascinating piece if you take “the soda” as a metaphor for fans’ attention.

Takedown

Ah, the sin of wrath, one of the seven deadly sins. It’s written all over the song. The lyrics focus on the hatred of demons but in reality what it means is that the group’s thoughts are fully consumed by the demons, they control the group’s thoughts and feelings with this unrestrained anger. And that’s why this sin is considered deadly, instead of love you fill your heart with hate not allowing yourself to see what truly matters in life.

Which is worse, since Rumi is partially demon, these lyrics hurt her emotionally and psycologically without her friends ever realising it. Thus we can see how damaging unrestrained wrath can become. Again comes the topic on sin and deception which is closely related to demons: “So sweet, so easy on the eyes, but hideous on the inside“, “‘Cause I see your real face, and it’s ugly as sin/Time to put you in your place, ’cause you’re rotten within“. Thus, this song undermined both girls’ emotional balance and Rumi’s confidence and self-worth.

Your Idol

This is a real gem when it comes to Biblical references. The very name “your idol” already refers to the act of blasphemy since in the Bible God states ”””’not to create idols of gold or or other to worship”””’. A very fitting song for a group of demons, don’t you find?

To begin with, it starts with Dies Irae hymn which is often sang at funerals. Just this detail already sets the tone of their whole performance.

To continue with, lyrics like “I’m the only one who’ll love your sins” and “You gave me your heart now I’m here for the soul” refer to a broader understanding of demons in Christian tradition as they, the demons, are meant to be vile creatures who temps people to sin and make deals for humans to sell their souls to them.

Another interesting detail is the religious symbolism used in the lyrics: “Listen ’cause I’m preachin’ to the choir”, “Don’t you know I’m here to save you?“… Wait this part should be viewed as a whole:

“Don’t you know I’m here to save you?
Now we runnin’ wild
Yeah, I’m all you need, I’ma be your idol“

Salvation of the soul is a prominent idea of Christianity and idol basically refers to a “false god”… Yeah, this was definitely a good job on the lyrics. I like it.

What It Sounds Like

The song celebrating openness, truth, and acceptance. It starts with “Nothing but the truth now/ Nothing but the proof of what I am”.

Another broad topic to discuss here is one of shame which Rumi confesses. In her case it’s the shame of hiding truth away from her friends. The real problem, though, lies in the fact that she was ashamed of being part demon, something she had no control over.

Now, I’m not a church goer myself, but I studied literature and many times an author was mentioning church it was in context of a pastor preaching about the eternal punishment after death. This is a trick to make people feel guilty and seek salvation, presumably in religion. I find this trick to do more with human psychology rather than Christianity itself but the church institute is inseparable from religion, so I feel obliged to mention it here.

This topic is very prominent in Rumi’s opening lyrics: “The worst of what I came from, patterns I’m ashamed of” – yet this shame served no purpose but to make her life isolated. That’s why later she sings: “My head was twisted, my heart divided/ My lies all collided/ I don’t know why I didn’t trust you to be on my side” – this is her confession to her best friend and found family. She should have trusted and in her heart she wished to but she was threatened with shame and doubt. Thankfully, all was resolved with this apology. That’s why later her friends would sing: “Why did I cover up the colors stuck inside my head?/ I should’ve let the jagged edges meet the light instead” – they agree with her that openness and sincerity is the key to finding harmony in their relationship again.

Conclusion

To sum up, I want to say that there are a few other minor examples that might have been worth mentioning but at this point, it would have been more sensible to just copy-paste the lyrics and provide annotations which I didn’t want to do, so I removed them.

P.S. Thank you for reading this post. I don’t want to overheat my laptop, so my time on it is limited, thus my posts are so scarce in summer. After all, I also work from it, and I cannot allow my bread and butter to crash. Thank you for your understanding. Have a nice day.