When Devil May Cry, an animated TV series set in the world of the Capcom video game of the same name, launched on Netflix in April 2025, it debuted fourth on the streamer’s global TV chart. The story of demon hunter-for-hire Dante (voiced by Johnny Yong Bosch) was fun, funny, and action-packed. With a story driven by Indian-American showrunner Adi Shankar’s passion for the project, Devil May Cry was quickly renewed for a second season that dropped on Netflix this month. The secret sauce that helped Shankar execute his Devil May Cry vision? An animation studio on the other side of the world called Studio Mir.

“They're the best of the best,” Shankar tells IGN. When he started development of the project, Netflix gave him four choices of studios to work alongside. “I had a conversation with my executives, and they were like, ‘Look, this is gonna be a winning combo, you and [Studio Mir]. Because they will execute.’” And that is exactly what happened, with the individual directors who work at the South Korean studio able to bring to animated life “whatever I throw at them,” says Shankar, noting the scope in scene-type across Devil May Cry’s two seasons so far.

While Korean animation has yet to break through as a recognized cultural export in the same way as K-drama or K-pop, Studio Mir’s reputation as a consummate collaborator for international productions has been steadily and consistently proven over the past decade and a half. The South Korean studio was built in part from the massive success of Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was mostly animated in Korea. Industry veteran Yoo Jae-myung was an animation director on the Nickelodeon project at JM Animation, and decided to start his own studio alongside Han Kwang-il and Lee Seung-wook in 2010.

They decided to call the company Studio Mir after the Soviet space station, which gets its name from a Russian word that translates to English as “peace,” “world,” or “village.” “Studio Mir was made based on the lesson of space station ‘Mir,’ which is ‘advance through collaboration,’” states the company’s YouTube page.

South Korea’s History of Animating Iconic American Series

Studio Mir’s first project was Avatar spinoff The Legend of Korra, and Yoo tells IGN that the title was a “founding project and a landmark title that played a crucial role in introducing us as the brand to the North American animation industry.” This brand-centric introduction was notable because, in 2010, South Korean animators were often still seen solely as contractors perfect for “below the line” work rather than creatives in their own right.

America has a long history of outsourcing animation work to foreign studios with lower labor costs. While U.S. animation outsourcing has included Mexico, Czechoslovakia, Japan, Canada, India, and the Phillipines, South Korea has been a major outsourcing location for the U.S. animation industry over the last 50 years. In the 1990s, Animation World Magazine estimated that 30% of the world’s animation was being done in South Korea. Iconic American series like The Simpsons, Arthur, Ren and Stimpy, SpongeBob Squarepants, The Animaniacs, My Little Pony, Batman: The Animated Series, Family Guy, and Bob’s Burgers have been partially animated in Korea.

Building off of the trust Yoo developed with Nickelodeon while making Avatar: The Last Airbender, he launched Studio Mir. “

Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was originally broadcast from 2005 to 2008, represented the beginning of a shift in U.S. studios’ mindset towards and work process with Korean animators (a shift increasingly buoyed by the uptick in outsourcing across American industry, but that’s another article). Show creators Bryan Konietzko and Michael Dante DiMartino fought with Nickelodeon executives to get their Korean collaborators more creative leeway.

“In the animation industry, we have what’s called ‘an indication,’” Yoo explained in a 2013 interview with Arirang TV. “An indication contains information on each scene, giving instructions on every fine detail, including the movement of the characters as well as how and when they should move. This actually makes the animated characters’ movements appear robotic. So, when we were asked to work on the pilot film of Avatar: The Last Airbender, we asked the producers to scrap the indicator because it prevents us from making the movements appear natural.” They got approval, and the rest is animation history.

Building off of the trust Yoo developed with Nickelodeon while making Avatar: The Last Airbender, he launched Studio Mir. “[Legend of Korra] served as the foundation for Studio Mir’s distinctive production methodology, which integrates the entire pipeline from pre-production through animation production while drawing from the strengths of the American, Korean, and Japanese animation industries,” Yoo tells IGN. “Since then, we have continued to refine and evolve our workflows with every new project, but the core philosophy of our pipeline still traces back to our experience on The Legend of Korra.”

From Devil May Cry to X-Men and Beyond: The Scope of Studio Mir

Subsequent projects Studio Mir has taken on include The Boondocks, Voltron: Legendary Defender, The Death of Superman, Kipo and the Age of the Wonderbeasts, Harley Quinn, Dota: Dragon’s Blood, My Adventures with Superman, X-Men ‘97, Star Wars: Visions’ “Journey to the Dark Head,” and The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf. In the process, they have collaborated with many of the world’s major entertainment companies, including Sony, Dreamworks, Netflix, The Lego Group, Warner Bros., DC, HBO Max, Marvel, Disney, Toho Animation, Crunchyroll, Paramount, and Nickelodeon.

“The creative landscape has changed tremendously for us over the past 15 years, and the kind of detailed ‘indications’ has become a thing of the past,” says Yoo, when asked to reflect on that 2013 interview. “Today, we are given much greater creative trust and freedom to contribute ideas throughout the production process.” Studio Mir signed a five-year production line deal with Netflix in 2019 that Yoo calls “one of the biggest turning points” for the company, allowing “a strong foundation of mutual creative respect” to build. “Our artists’ voices are genuinely valued throughout the creative process in an environment where they feel a real sense of creative agency,” says Yoo of Studio Mir’s role as a collaborator.

Studio Mir EVP Lee Seung-wook says that the company typically works on four to five “long-term projects”—e.g. feature films and animated series—at once, overlapping across different stages of production. “On average, there are usually two to three projects in development, around two projects in animation production, and one to two projects in post-production simultaneously,” Lee tells IGN. Studio Mir also works on shorter-form projects “if the ideas are something we believe in or are interested in.” Past shorter-form projects have included a promotional short for the League of Legends World Championship Finals and a short featuring Tottenham Spurs striker Dominic Solanke.

Earlier this month, Studio Mir launched a virtual K-pop group called B:DAWN. The project combines K-pop and animation and is part of the company’s efforts to explore “new forms of confluence with other creative fields and [to] continue investing in R&D.” The focus on research and development is vital in an industry that is becoming “increasingly complex and demanding as audience expectations continue to rise,” according to Lee. “As a result, every new project requires a new creative and technical benchmark, and in order to meet those expectations, we often find ourselves rethinking or even rebuilding the way we traditionally work and taking on entirely new challenges.”

Yoo says Studio Mir has developed “a flexible work flow” to handle the time difference between Seoul and Los Angeles. (Seoul is currently 16 hours ahead of Los Angeles, and will be 17 hours ahead when Daylight Savings Time ends.) Studio Mir holds video meetings with U.S.-based teams during Korea’s morning and at the end of Los Angeles’ work day. The teams keep in touch via email the rest of the time. “Interestingly, the time difference can also work to our advantage,” says Yoo. “By sharing work at the end of our business day, our partners in the U.S. are often able to review it first thing the next morning [when they start their day] and provide feedback by the time we begin work again in Korea the next day. In many ways, this creates an almost continuous production and communication cycle.”

A dedicated team of in-house translators and interpreters is integral to Studio Mir’s work, facilitating communication between Korean and English, Japanese, Chinese, and other languages when needed. “Because so much of our communication revolves around creative materials such as scripts, storyboards, and designs, we believe translation must go far beyond simply converting from one language to another,” says Yoo. “It is integral to our workflow that our translators have a deep understanding of each project.”

For Devil May Cry, Studio Mir “took charge of the entire production process, from visual development through pre-production (including storyboards and design), animation, and post-production,” explains Lee, noting that at least 150 in-house staff and crew members were assigned to the project. (With freelancers and partners, Lee estimates the total around 200.) “We started by establishing the visual language for the characters and the world, and handled the designs, storyboards (animatic) and animation across both seasons, including both traditional 2D and CG animation.” Australia’s Powerglove helped create the series’ score, but all sound mixing and post-production was done in Korea.

'We believe translation must go far beyond simply converting from one language to another. It is integral to our workflow that our translators have a deep understanding of each project.'“

When asked about the biggest animation challenges in Devil May Cry Season 2, Lee points to the large-scale action sequences featuring Argosax in the finale episodes. “We have a series of massive battles to tackle, including Dante and Vergil facing off against Argosax, as well as the climactic confrontation between Argosax and Mundus, all while the brothers navigate the chaos created by these towering forces,” says Lee. “It was a challenge we took on, as it gave us an opportunity to really push and refine our action choreography and technical capabilities, bringing those moments to life in the most dynamic and visually compelling way possible.”

The Future of Korean Animation

While Korean dramas, film, and pop music have found global recognition in recent years, Korean animation has yet to reach the same pinnacle—perhaps, in part, because of the industry’s history and present as a location for outsourcing rather than domestic production. While KPop Demon Hunters has found unprecedented success, the animated film is an American production – rather than a Korean one – that draws deeply on Korean culture. In 2022, Studio Mir created a Korean-language animated drama for Netflix called Lookism; based on a popular webtoon of the same name, the series didn’t break out globally in the way many K-dramas do. Last year, Korean animator Han Ji-wan’s sci-fi romance Lost in Starlight was released on Netflix to little fanfare.

Yoo and Lee identify Studio Mir’s work on the Star Wars: Visions episode “Journey to the Dark Head” as a project in which “we consciously explored Korean culture and aesthetic sensibilities.” Directed by Park Hyeong-geun, the episode centers on the unlikely partnership between an optimistic mechanic named Ara and a disillusioned young Jedi named Toul as they try to turn the tide of a galactic war. Yoo and Lee agree that, since Star Wars itself was originally inspired by Eastern culture and philosophy, they wanted to reinterpret that universe through a Korean lens:

“We tried to incorporate Korean aesthetic and artistic sensibilities throughout the overall visual language of the project, not only through the artwork itself, but also through the music, emotional tone, and storytelling. That said, after completing the project, we still felt there was room for us to push those ideas even further.”

Yoo says the lack of global recognition for Korean animation is “something I find unfortunate,” but he has hope this will change. “While Korea has not yet produced an animated title with the kind of global impact as KPop Demon Hunters or other K-content has, I do believe there’s plenty of opportunity ahead and we’re actively working toward that future,” he says. “As for Studio Mir, if our journey over the past decade has been about building our creative strength, production expertise, and global experience, I feel that now is the time for us to create and present our own original works based on the experience and capabilities we have accumulated over the years.”

Studio Mir currently has several animated adaptations based on major Korean IPs in development, including one based on wuxia action webtoon Gosu and one based on Children of the Rune, one of Korea’s most iconic fantasy novel series. “It is true that the Korean animation industry is currently facing a period of stagnation,” says Yoo, “but I believe that once we have something that truly connects with audiences around the world, the industry as a whole will naturally regain momentum. We hope Studio Mir can serve as the starting point for that change.”

As for whether or not Studio Mir projects should count as Korean animation, Yoo says that is something for the audience and critics to decide. “Just as ‘anime’ can no longer be defined or claimed by any particular group of creators, I believe that genres and creative identities are not determined by those who make them,” he says. “They are shaped over time as audiences come to recognize and embrace them.” Yoo says that working on American or other foreign productions rather than domestic projects “is not something that weighs heavily on our artists,” adding: “Whether a project is in Korean or another language, we believe that creative work carries its own meaning and value beyond language or nationality.”

Perhaps it helps that Yoo has seen so much change since Studio Mir launched more than 15 years ago, and in the time before that. “Perceptions around Korean animation and the role of Korean studios have gradually evolved, but I think our mindset has evolved as well,” says Yoo. “Rather than being discouraged by those negative perceptions, we have stayed focused on the work itself and on raising the quality of what we make as creators. And we believe that the audience will naturally come to recognize and appreciate the artistry and creative contribution behind the work.”

In the meantime, Lee says the people at Studio Mir have been excited about the release of Devil May Cry Season 2, and are looking forward to the release of The Legend of Aang: The Last Airbender, which Studio Mir also worked on. The animated sequel film to Avatar: The Last Airbender is currently slated to be released on Paramount+ in October.

As Shankar reflects on the release of Devil May Cry Season 2, he hopes that he has played a role in bringing more respect and popularity to animation as something more than children’s entertainment in the West. “I think the work I've done or been a part of over the last decade has helped create the ecosystem, which has created more of the opportunities [for animation],” he says, referring to previous projects like The Guardians of Justice and Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix. “But, you know, in a lot of ways, Studio Mir predated it. It was like they were ready when the world caught up.”

Talk to Kayti Burt @kaytiburt.bsky.social, or find out more about her work at kaytiburt.com.