Released during the Chinese New Year, Ne zha 2 I was imposed itself as the greatest cinematographic success of 2025, dropping records hitherto only owned by Hollywood blockbusters. This Chinese animation overlapping, carried out by Yu Yang-Professionally under the name of Jiaozi-has generated more than $ 2 billion in revenue (around 1.7 billion euros), exceeding the performance of any School of Star Wars or Disney film at the Global Box-Office, reports an article by The Atlantic.
The film draws from Chinese folklore and revisits the myth of the half-god ne zha: a rebellious child with supernatural powers who must find his place in a world as wonderful as they are hosting. Its quest, between rebellion and social integration, seduces all audiences and allows the deductible to embody a universal figure in adolescence and surpassing oneself. Six years after the release of the first part, Ne zha 2 broke all records.
Its success is a real surge: in a few days, the film has raised more than a billion dollars in revenue (around 854,000 euros) just in China, and its popularity has since stopped growing in the rest of the world. The film literally explodes the local and international box office. He has also become the most profitable non-English-speaking film in history.
Why such a craze? The film seems to have found a perfect recipe mixing tradition and modernity: spectacular cartoon, burlesque humor, epic clashes and technical animation which now competes with Pixar or Disney. Ne zha 2 Western codes is overwhelming while borrowing from the best of international blockbuster, offering dazzling visuals and rapid and nervous narration.
The realization is titanic: more than 4,000 animators and a hundred studios have collaborated to create a universe where golden dragons cross, floating cities, cosmic fights and hybrid creatures. Each plan is full of details, traditional sets with pop references while celebrating multiple influences from world cinema.
It’s better in vo
This triumph is also based on the ability of Chinese cinema to unite around a national story, but not only. The story of Ne Zha echoes the cultural developments of the country, to the desire to emancipate its youth and to an increasing opening towards the rest of the world. Spectators find there not only the excitement of a mythological adventure, but also a more introspective reading, a mirror of their own questions.
In the United States, the English version did not find its audience, despite a casting of stars with dubbing. This is not the case with the original subtitles version which has almost generated more times more income, proof of new curiosity for Asian stories and their visual richness in its purest form.
Ne zha 2 Also illustrates the rapid transformation of the Chinese film market, which now competes with Hollywood in terms of creativity, technique and notoriety. Local studios have bet on a production quality that has nothing to envy to the giants of world animation and the spectators seem to have understood this.
The arrival of the film in France and in Europe perhaps marks a turning point: French audiences, long fascinated by the Japanese and Korean animated, are ready to confront the diversity of Asian imaginations. Ne zha 2 could mark the start of a new wave of Chinese animation on our screens.
In the end, Ne zha 2 is not only a commercial feat, it is the symbol of a new world cinema, capable of uniting a background anchored in tradition, with the ambition of large modern productions.
