Japanese anime is drawing impressive global audiences in cinemas in line with an ever-growing appetite for Japanese IP. This hunger is exemplified by the box-office success of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle, director Haruo Sotozaki’s adaptation of Koyoharu Gotouge’s episodic manga volumes.
The film has grossed $733m worldwide as of early December, making it the highest-grossing anime film worldwide, the second-highest-grossing film of all time in Japan and one of the top five films globally in 2025, according to Comscore.
Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle is the story of a young warrior who is thrown into an otherworldly demon-haunted realm and steels himself for the final battle between good and evil. Set during Japan’s Taisho period (1912-1926), it marks the first part of a planned film trilogy based on the Gotouge’s 23 manga volumes, first published between 2016 and 2020.
It approximately spans the last eight volumes of the manga, diving into the final showdown. The manga has also been adapted into a wildly popular Japanese TV series.
The film is produced by Tokyo-based studio ufotable, founded in October 2000 by former Telecom animation film producer Hikaru Kondō, who wrote the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle screenplay. Sony Pictures-owned Crunchyroll is handling the film’s international distribution. Crunchyroll president Rahul Purini has described anime as “one of the fastest growing entertainment sectors in the world”.
Helen McCarthy, a British author, lecturer, and expert on anime and manga, said anime films are not always based on manga.
“We don’t always start with manga for anime. Quite often we start with games. Sometimes, we start with just wild, crazy ideas,” said McCarthy during an on-stage conversation with Wendy Ide, Screen International’s senior international critic, at a Screen FYC consideration screening event in London.
McCarthy pointed out awareness of Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle was high among manga fans prior to the film, thanks mainly to the TV series.
“The manga ran for four years, so it was doing pretty well. But it wasn’t until the TV anime came along that the manga really took off,” she explained. “After the first TV anime [adaptation] in 2019 had finished airing and gone to streaming, suddenly, the word of mouth went crazy, and sales of the manga started ticking up.”
By the time the third TV series was broadcast in 2024, the manga had over 230 million digital and physical copies in circulation, making it the seventh best-selling manga series to date. The audience was ready and waiting.
Young populations
According to the Association of Japanese Animations, the overseas anime market has overtaken the Japanese anime market in the last two years.
McCarthy, who has published over a dozen books, translated into eight languages, on Japanese anime, manga, history, art and craft, said two big factors are driving the anime boom.
“There is availability for free, and there is technical access,” McCarthy noted. “Up until about 2015, when we started to hit serious broadband penetration and serious smartphone availability, it could be expensive and difficult to access. Now, if you’ve got a smartphone and you can get near a signal, you can stream anime straight to your phone.
“All over Saudi Arabia, all over Africa, all over Asia, all over South America, anime is massive on streaming services.”
McCarthy drew parallels to the atmosphere in Japan at the end of the Second World War, when only a very elite class had any money.
“Some people were starving. There wasn’t much money around. But if you could scrape a few pennies together, maybe sharing with mates, you could go down to a local rental manga library, and you could read yourself silly on visions of a better future,” McCarthy said.
“Today, anime is going out to a huge young, hungry audience that can suddenly access it and afford it. It’s the ultimate in video democracy.”
In many countries across Africa, India, South America and the Middle East and North Africa, where the appeal of anime is growing, it is significant that around 20% of the population is aged under 16. Investors are taking notice: Sony is investing in animation studios in India, and Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund is backing an anime talent academy to attract Japanese artists to train a fresh generation of Arab anime makers. There are also plans for a Dragon Ball Z theme park in the Kingdom.
McCarthy ended the lively conversation with a warning against the cultural appropriation of Japanese manga by filmmakers.
“By all means, add your own elements to what it is, but let it be primarily anime-inspired, whether your film is live action or drawn anime,” McCarthy said. “Don’t just buy the title and say ‘we’re going to do it the way we want to do it’. You have to understand and respect the IP, otherwise, it will fail.”
No comments yet