Netflix's New Action Movie Is Being Compared To John Wick, But I Think It Has More In Common With A Different Revenge Thriller

For the past decade or so, countless action thrillers have arrived in theaters or on the best streaming services and have been compared to John Wick. Similar to the “Speed on a [insert mode of transportation]” trope of the 1990s, the “John Wick in [insert setting or situation]” concept has taken the world by storm. The 2025 Netflix movie, Demon City, has been compared to the Keanu Reeves action franchise, but I think it has more in common with another, bloodier, revenge thriller.

I recently watched Demon City with my Netflix subscription, and though it wasn’t the best 2025 movie I’ve watched so far, this brutal, blood-soaked revenge saga had me wanting to watch one of the most violent and messed-up movies of the 21st century: Park Chan-wook’s Oldboy.

Demon City Is A Brutal Revenge Thriller With A Whole Lot Of Lore And Mystery

SPOILER ALERT: The following sections contain major spoilers for Demon City. If you’ve yet to watch Netflix’s new action movie, please exercise extreme caution.

There was a lot to love about Demon City, Seiji Tanaka’s stripped-down adaptation of the iconic Onigoroshi manga series, but the best thing about the outrageously violent movie is the brutal story of revenge at its core. Toma Ikuta’s Sakata, a former yakuza hitman framed for the deaths of his wife and daughter before being left to die, is a spectre-like figure who comes out of a vegetative state after 12 years to enact revenge against a group of very powerful men hiding their identities behind traditional Japanese demon masks. And boy, does he get his revenge…

Over the course of the movie’s nearly two-hour runtime, Sakata kills wave after wave of armed goons, henchmen, and high-level gangsters as he attempts to avenge both his family and a life that could have been. As he works his way to the top of the proverbial food chain of Shingo City’s criminal underbelly, he learns much about his attackers, their supporters, and those he once thought were his friends.

But, on top of all that, Demon City has a whole lot of lore and mystery. At times, it feels like a great Japanese horror movie with talk of a wayward demon in Shingo who has long sought a proper vessel so that they can help them make the evildoers of the city pay for their transgressions.

I Can See Where The John Wick Comparisons Are Coming From, Both With The Story And Action

There are a ton of articles all over the internet saying Demon City is comparable to the John Wick movies, with outlets like Total Film (via GamesRadar) writing that “fans might find themselves in familiar territory” with the new Japanese action thriller. And I can totally see it.

Both movies follow hitmen of few words who wanted nothing more than to put a life of contract killings behind them and enjoy time with their respective families before being thrown back into the action following severe tragedies. Demon City and John Wick both have a series of increasingly violent and well-choreographed fight and action sequences that up the ante for the genre. And both stories center on revenge.

Demon City has more in common with John Wick than it doesn’t, but there’s another movie that I kept thinking about throughout my viewing, one that’s a whole lot more messed up than anything Keanu Reeves has been involved in over the years.

But Honestly, I Think It Has More In Common With Old Boy

Demon City is a Japanese action movie in which the hero may or may not be possessed by a demon, and Oldboy is a Korean thriller about a man trying to figure out why he’s been imprisoned in a hotel room for 15 years, but I couldn’t stop comparing the two during my viewing. Not only are both films brilliant revenge stories about crazed men going to hell and back (again and again) to find answers and get vengeance, but they are also two of the most incredibly violent movies I’ve ever seen.

These movies, above all, are gratuitously violent and don’t pull a single punch from start to finish. Blood being splattered on walls, kids getting shot, body parts being cut off, bad guys dying in terrifying ways. There are these long and elaborate fight sequences that go on forever, but never become boring, exhausting, or overdone, which is a rare feat in cinema. And, with both being great movies based on comic books, the comparisons just keep coming.

Then there's the whole business with both movies being about fathers reconnecting with their daughters. It's just that Demon City never goes as extreme as Oldboy, which I was happy to see.

Demon City's Ending Isn't As Unnerving As Oldboy, But That's Pretty Much Impossible

As I mentioned above, Demon City and Oldboy have father-daughter relationships at their core. While the former never comes close to touching the levels of heartbreak, anguish, and disgust as the latter, this doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have some messed up stuff going on.

To this day, the Oldboy reveal, which I won’t disclose for the sake of my own sanity and to not to ruin the twist for the uninitiated, is one of the most messed up endings of all time. It would be next to impossible for Demon City to outdo that truly gut-wrenching and traumatizing moment, or even come close for that matter. In fact, maybe that's for the best.

A Colleague Also Compared Demon City To The Crow, And Now I Can't Stop Thinking About That

Just before I started writing this, a colleague messaged me and drew a comparison between Demon City and The Crow (the 1994 Brandon Lee movie, not the 2024 travesty). And you know, ever since he mentioned that, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about how much the two movies have in common. Both center on anti-heroes who were essentially brought back from the dead due to some supernatural entities, both are grueling revenge thrillers, and both are dark as hell.

Perhaps in the future I’ll go back and do a point-by-point breakdown of the two and how many ideas and concepts they share. Until next time…

Demon City was one of the biggest surprises of the year so far, and it’s not just because it made me think about Oldboy for the first time in a very long time.