2 weeks Ago By Si Jia
share 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 It’s a double blessing for fans of Ne Zha this Lunar New Year, as the release of its highly-anticipated sequel has finally been firmed up. The follow-up to the Chinese animated blockbuster (哪吒之魔童闹海) will hit theatres on 29 January 2025 , coinciding with the first day of the annual celebration. The news comes by way of the movie’s official Weibo account , shown through an 11-second teaser featuring a battle-ready Nezha with a spear in hand.
Two posters have also been unveiled, with one set against the backdrop of a fire dragon and the other boasting a sea/water motif — a reference to the deuteragonist and dragon prince Ao Bing — alongside a tagline that translates roughly to “The demon child returns, kicking off the year with the forces of wind and fire.” Director Yu Yang, credited as Jiaozi, will return to helm the sequel. The first film was released in 2019 and would later become the highest-grossing animated movie in China, earning over five billion yuan (US$695 million).
It also made history as the first Chinese-produced animated feature to launch in IMAX format and was selected as the Chinese entry for Best International Feature Film at the 92nd Academy Awards, though it ultimately failed to be nominated. Advertisement ▼ Loosely based on the classic 16th-century novel Investiture of the Gods , attributed to Xu Zhonglin, Ne Zha follows the titular Chinese mythological character, who’s born with unique powers and recruited to fight demons while saving the community that fears him. It serves as the opening act of a fictional universe based on the stories told in the book, with Legend of Deification , featuring Jiang Ziya, coming in as the next entry in the franchise.
“The Primus extracts a Mixed Yuan Bead into a spirit bead and a demon bead. The spirit bead can be reincarnated in a human to help King Zhou establish a new dynasty, while the demon bead will create a devil and harm humans,” reads the film’s synopsis. “Ne Zha is the one who should be the spirit bead hero but becomes a devil incarnate, because the spirit bead and the demon bead were switched.
” The follow-up joins a heavyweight lineup for 2025, which includes Tsui Hark’s adaptation of Louis Cha’s wuxia classic The Legend of the Condor Heroes (射雕英雄传:侠之大者), the epic fantasy sequel Creation of the Gods II (封神第二部:战火西岐), and Boonie Bears: Future Reborn (熊出没·重启未来). It will hit theatres in China on 29 January next year. Si Jia Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get.
A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really. Ne Zha Ne Zha 2.
