I haven’t seen KPop Demon Hunters yet, but I have seen the Bad Bunny SNL skit about it an embarrassing number of times. If you haven’t seen it, watch it, but the shortest possible summary I can give is that, at a brunch with friends, Bad Bunny argues and sulks because they don’t want to discuss the hit movie. At one point, he utters a line about the movie that many of us have heard before when discussing media: “It’s actually not for kids.”
While this refusal to describe the work as intended for children is played for laughs, this sentiment is not an unfamiliar one. In my own life, I have heard the same said about such works as Miraculous: Tales of Ladybug and Cat Noir, Bluey, Avatar: The Last Airbender, and, well, just about every Pixar movie ever.
There seems to be a prevailing belief that, when works of media have darker themes or touch on complex messaging, they must not be truly intended for younger audiences at all. It can’t be a “kids show” if it touches on topics such as death, and in-depth explorations of fascism are clearly outside the realm of young adult (YA) literature, so it must all be a mistake – a widespread epidemic of miscategorization.
Kids and YA media are largely non-restrictive labels describing the general demographic a work is largely expected to be consumed and enjoyed by; and, thus, is mainly being marketed towards. Because of the rapid development that occurs during this period, these guidelines can get specific. The difference between PG-13 and R ratings is only four years, and age-related literature categorizations are being broken down further and further, with more focus on the in-between demographics, like pre-teen, or a possible differentiation between teen literature and a true “young adult” category. It all gets complicated pretty fast.
The reasoning behind age ratings comes from a few different directions: there’s the concerned-parent, Federal Communications Commission (FCC)-angle, wherein the aim is to protect younger audiences from disagreeable content or negative influences. Then there’s the development and marketing perspective – who do we prioritize “selling” this media to? While creators most often want their work to be enjoyed by the most – and widest range of – individuals possible, a focus on a key demographic provides initial direction.
Age guidelines – with a few rare exceptions, like toy box labels stopping at age 10 for no apparent reason – move exponentially upwards. Streaming services may restrict child accounts from listing certain options, and attendants at R-rated movies may check ID, but there’s never a pop-up saying “Are you sure? You’re [insert adult age here].” So why does it matter so much whether works like KPop Demon Hunters are largely considered to be targeted towards kids and preteens?
While putting an eight-year-old in front of a slasher or a three-hour exploration into the complexities of grief might not be the best idea, I think that it’s important that we be exposed to some degree of complex concepts during these key developmental stages. A lot of the argument about where pieces of media fit into the world of age categorizations relies around the presence of concepts or references that most children and adolescents would not be reasonably expected to understand. While this may be true, the beauty of well-executed media is that it shouldn’t really matter.
I believe that different audiences will pick up on the messaging at the level they are able, only to comprehend more as they develop, learn, and grow. Excellent media will contain something new every time we revisit it, because we and our perspectives are ever evolving. Tactful exposure to these complex concepts at a younger age helps children develop these ideas and concepts early, easing the transition into difficult understandings later in life. Some people do bad things. Some people prioritize power over good. Some fights don’t have a noble purpose. Sometimes we lose people. Arguing that kids could not understand these truths prevents them from being able to learn them, and, most often, the nuanced craftsmanship of youth-oriented media is a much gentler teacher than life.
None of this prevents adults from enjoying and finding value in these same works. “It’s not for kids” has become a reflexive defense mechanism against social stigma, because we do not want to admit finding joy and learning in works perceived to be below our abilities. We should want to challenge ourselves and consume media that is at our ability or above it. We should want to stretch our minds and perspectives. However, I have two notes on this. For one, media comprehendible by younger audiences can also still be a challenge to older audiences, maybe not in terms of vocabulary or digging for hidden messaging, but by going to the heart of deeply human experiences and making us reexamine our own lives. It’s not easy to sit back for a few hours and be bombarded by questions about our own mortality, or the meaning of empathy, but hey, that’s Pixar. Second: just consume more media. As we age, our options should be widening, not narrowing in one direction (upwards). At 21, I can proudly watch Guadetama: An Eggcellent Adventure on Netflix just as easily as I can buy an R-rated movie ticket. That’s the privilege of adulthood, baby.
There are, of course, exceptions wherein media is genuinely miscategorized. There is increasing concern that some BookTok-era YA is definitely not YA as the range is typically defined. Animation often gets umbrella-ed as kid’s media, when works like Grave of the Fireflies or cartoons like Family Guy and South Park demonstrate that this assumption is certainly not a rule. These examples are another reason why age guidelines persist, even though for older audiences they may seem trivial. Yet these misunderstandings are rarely based on misleading categorizations but rather lack of attention to them.
So, no, there’s not a worldwide ploy to mislabel your favorite works as youth-oriented to downplay the complexity of their contents. It’s not that everybody else just doesn’t get it the way you do. It’s just that we all care too much about what people think of the things we enjoy, and that a lot of us (including myself) sometimes care too much about what other people enjoy. The constant need to justify our media consumption is just going to make us all miserable, when we should be celebrating the existence of art, and our ability to find complex messaging in works so beautifully and meaningfully crafted by others – even if they happened to have a different audience at the forefront of their minds.
I think we should rid ourselves of the impulse to defend our favorite works as actually being really serious and really complex and mature, because the bottom line is that it doesn’t matter. A work might be for kids, or for middle schoolers, or high schoolers, but that doesn’t mean it can’t also be for you. Nobody else’s understanding changes the value you find in what you love, and if people do not understand that, then maybe they aren’t people worth sharing that love with.
So, in conclusion, Bad Bunny, invite me to brunch next time. I’ll let you talk about KPop Demon Hunters or whatever.