Four films. Four soundtracks. One era-defining shift in how music and cinema work together.
Something changed in 2025. It was not that film soundtracks started mattering; they always mattered. It was that they stopped being a side product and became the main event. Four films released between June and December 2025 did not just produce good music; they produced chart records, Grammy wins, viral phenomena, and cultural moments that lived well beyond the credits. KPop Demon Hunters, Zootopia 2, Avatar: Fire and Ash, and Wicked: For Good collectively redefined what a movie soundtrack can be and do in 2026.
CKDS Radio covers all four; the films, the music, the moments, and what it all means.
KPop Demon Hunters
Netflix / Sony Pictures Animation | Released June 20, 2025 | Directors: Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans
The premise sounds like it was designed in a lab to dominate the internet; a K-pop girl group who are secretly supernatural warriors defending their fanbase from a demonic boy band. And yet KPop Demon Hunters is genuinely one of the most thoughtful animated films in years, using its gleefully unhinged concept to say something real about the music industry, parasocial relationships, and the cost of fame.
Directed by Maggie Kang and Chris Appelhans for Netflix and Sony Pictures Animation; with a production budget exceeding $100 million fully covered by Netflix; the film follows Huntrix (Rumi, Mira, and Zoey) as they take on the Saja Boys, a rival group revealed to be demons who have crossed into the human world through the Honmoon barrier. The Saja Boys; Jinu, Mystery, Abby, Romance, and Baby; are designed to be irresistibly charming on the surface and entirely soulless underneath. The name Saja carries three meanings in Korean; lion, the dead, and messenger. The film earns every layer of that.
The Saja Boys were designed to be “the most appealing, innocent, charming people” on the surface; mindless monsters who have lost their souls to the demonic king Gwi-Ma.
The film became the most-watched Netflix original in history, clocking over 500 million views and 541 million hours globally. A sing-along version released theatrically in late 2025 became the first Netflix theatrical release to officially top the weekend box office. Sony Pictures Imageworks’ kaleidoscopic visual style; full of combat choreography that echoes real idol training regimens; is spectacular throughout.
The Music; How It Made Chart History
The soundtrack was produced in collaboration with THEBLACKLABEL; the powerhouse behind BLACKPINK; with music direction from Ian Eisendrath. The brief was to make music indistinguishable from top-tier real-world K-pop. They succeeded so completely that four songs from the film simultaneously occupied the top ten of the Billboard Hot 100; an unprecedented achievement in film music history.
“Golden” spent five non-consecutive weeks at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and topped charts in over 30 countries. It features a three-octave range culminating in a high A5 note; a genuine technical rarity in idol music; and became the first K-pop-style song in Grammy history to win Best Song Written for Visual Media. “Soda Pop” was adapted from a seven-year-old guitar demo and engineered to be, in the songwriters’ own words, “intentionally annoyingly infectious.” It is. “Your Idol” uses Latin sequences like Dies Irae and choral arrangements inspired by EXO’s Mama to create cathedral-grade dread during the film’s climax at Namsan Tower.
The deluxe soundtrack edition, released September 5, 2025, added acapella and instrumental versions that triggered a wave of covers across TikTok and Instagram that has not entirely stopped.
Zootopia 2
Walt Disney Animation Studios | Released November 26, 2025 | Directors: Jared Bush and Byron Howard
Nine years after the original, Judy Hopps and Nick Wilde are back; and this time the city of Zootopia has a reptile problem. Zootopia 2 introduces a hidden population of cold-blooded citizens living on the fringes of mammalian society in a region called the Marshlands, with the mystery centering on Gary De’Snake; a pit viper voiced by Ke Huy Quan; whose presence challenges the city’s foundational laws.
Where the 2016 original focused on individual prejudice, the sequel broadens its scope to examine systemic intolerance and the institutional failure to accommodate difference. Critics praised the “endearing energy” between the two leads and the film’s ability to entertain children while keeping adults engaged with (among other things) Stanley Kubrick shout-outs. A few felt it was “film-by-numbers” compared to its predecessor. The box office told its own story; $1.86 billion globally, surpassing Inside Out 2 to become the second-highest-grossing animated film of all time. Rotten Tomatoes certified it fresh at 91%.
The Music; Shakira, Ed Sheeran, and a Purple Vinyl Single
Shakira returns as Gazelle and brings a new anthem; “Zoo”; co-written and produced with Ed Sheeran and Blake Slatkin. The track blends Latin tropical sounds, champeta, and urban pop into something that feels both organic to the Zootopia world and completely contemporary. Sheeran and Slatkin appear in the film as cameos; voicing sheep named “Ed Shearin” and “Baalake Lambkin,” which is the kind of detail that rewards paying attention.
“Zoo” launched with an exclusive first listen on SiriusXM Disney Hits on October 8, 2025, and a collectible 7-inch purple vinyl single release. In Japan, a localised version titled “Zoo (Kimi ga Iru kara)” was performed by Dream Ami, the Japanese voice of Gazelle; maintaining the film’s global reach with genuine local investment rather than simple dubbing.
The score was composed by Academy Award-winner Michael Giacchino and released on November 21; noted for its “energetic and dazzling” motifs that match the film’s considerable pace. Gazelle’s combined streaming numbers across both films now exceed 3.2 billion, which makes her comfortably one of the most-streamed artists on Earth; fictional or otherwise.
Avatar: Fire and Ash
20th Century Studios / Disney | Released December 19, 2025 | Director: James Cameron
James Cameron’s third Avatar film moves the saga from ocean to volcano. After the oceanic beauty of The Way of Water, Fire and Ash takes Jake Sully and Neytiri into the volcanic landscapes of the Mangkwan; the Ash People; a tribe hardened by hardship and severed from Eywa, who have formed a military alliance with Colonel Quaritch and the RDA. Their matriarch Varang; played by Oona Chaplin; enters a romantic relationship with Quaritch, who provides her people with human firearms and flamethrowers. It is a darker film than its predecessors and unambiguously intends to be.
The most intriguing narrative thread belongs to Spider, whose body becomes infused with mycelia after a connection to the Spirit Tree; granting him the ability to breathe Pandora’s air unaided and grow a neural queue. Scientists Max Patel and Norm Spellman realise the process could theoretically be replicated for all humans on Pandora, which carries enormous implications for the franchise’s future. Cameron is clearly playing a long game.
The Music; Miley Cyrus, Mark Ronson, and New Instruments
For the film’s lead single, Cameron chose Miley Cyrus; a decision that turned out to be one of the more inspired pairings of the year. “Dream As One,” released November 14, 2025, is a powerful anthem of unity and resilience, co-produced with Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt. Cyrus drew directly on her own experience of the 2019 Woolsey Fire that destroyed her Malibu home; connecting the “Fire and Ash” of the film’s title to something genuinely personal in her own life.
Cyrus connected the film’s Fire and Ash theme to the 2019 Woolsey Fire that destroyed her Malibu home; making the song something far more personal than a standard film tie-in.
The track received Golden Globe and Satellite Award nominations for Best Original Song, and Cyrus was honoured with the Outstanding Artistic Achievement Award at the Palm Springs International Film Festival for her contribution.
The score was composed by Simon Franglen, who has spent seven years developing the music for the Avatar sequels since taking over from the late James Horner. For Fire and Ash, Franglen built two entirely new instruments; one string-based, one percussion-based; specifically designed to be played by Na’vi characters on screen. The score was recorded at Abbey Road and the Newman Scoring Stage, and won the Hollywood Music in Media Award for Best Original Score in a Sci-Fi/Fantasy Film.
Wicked: For Good
Universal Pictures | Released November 21, 2025 | Director: Jon M. Chu
The second half of Jon M. Chu’s two-part Wicked adaptation is a darker, bolder, and more politically ambitious film than the first. Cynthia Erivo’s Elphaba becomes a public scapegoat for the Wizard’s authoritarian regime while Ariana Grande’s Glinda is elevated to “Glinda the Good”; a benevolent figurehead whose goodness is itself a form of complicity. The film does not shy away from that tension, and it is better for it.
New scenes and songs flesh out the world considerably. The propaganda machine operated by Michelle Yeoh’s Madame Morrible; including a bubble wand gift used to cement Glinda’s magical image; is given proper screen time. The Ozians’ “lynch mob” mentality is shown rather than implied. And the film’s most celebrated sequence; a juxtaposition of Glinda’s wedding with Elphaba’s discovery of caged animals; delivers genuine emotional weight through visual storytelling alone.
The ending departs from the stage show in beautiful ways. Where the musical implies escape, the film shows Elphaba and Fiyero crossing the unending desert toward lands beyond Oz. The final frame recreates the original Broadway poster; Glinda in white leaning toward Elphaba in a poppy field at Shiz. It brought audiences to tears across every screening. Deservedly.
The Music; Erivo, Grande, and a Grammy for the Ages
The soundtrack; released by Republic and Verve; debuted at number two on the Billboard 200 and topped both the Soundtrack and Vinyl charts. Seven songs charted on the Billboard Hot 100. The emotional centrepiece is “For Good,” the farewell duet between Erivo and Grande; expanded to six minutes and seventeen seconds with full orchestration, reaching #43 on the Hot 100 and #21 in Ireland. The album reached number one in Australia, the Netherlands, and on the UK Soundtrack chart.
Two new songs stand out alongside the Broadway canon. Erivo’s “No Place Like Home” is an anthem for animal rights and personal resilience that earns its place among the musical’s originals. Grande’s “The Girl in the Bubble” is a reflective solo on the gilded cage of fame that feels uncomfortably personal in the best possible way. “No Good Deed” remains the cathartic peak it always was; described by critics as a “vengeful mini rock opera,” Erivo delivers it with everything.
The Grammy for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance went to Erivo and Grande for “Defying Gravity” [from Part One]; the first film musical to win that category in years and a recognition of a vocal partnership that genuinely deserved it.
What It All Adds Up To
Four films. A Grammy for K-pop. A box office record for animation. Miley Cyrus writing about her own house fire. Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande making the Broadway faithful weep. Shakira and Ed Sheeran playing animated sheep. This was not a normal year for film music.
What connects all four is the complete erasure of the old hierarchy where the film comes first and the soundtrack is the merchandise. In every case here; the music was integral to the story, created by artists who brought genuine personal investment, and released with enough strategic intelligence to make it live independently of the film that inspired it.
“Golden” by HUNTR/X is a number-one hit that happens to come from an animated film. “Dream As One” is a Miley Cyrus record that happens to accompany an Avatar film. “For Good” is a Broadway standard that happens to have been filmed. The distinction between “film music” and “music” has effectively collapsed; and the charts, the streaming numbers, and the awards ceremonies all reflect it.
The 2025/2026 era will be remembered as the moment the soundtrack stopped being a side product and became the main event.
If you have not seen all four of these films; or heard all four soundtracks; you have some very enjoyable catching up to do.
CKDS Radio | Film and Music Features | 2025/2026
