While Netflix continues to dominate the global K-drama scene with a huge slate of adaptations and originals, Disney+ is about to fire back with one of its biggest action shows. Two years after the first season became a huge word-of-mouth hit, <em>A Shop for Killers</em> Season 2 is officially just one week away. Based on the novel The Murderer’s Shopping Mall, the action thriller quickly became one of the platform’s biggest surprises, and the way season 1 ended, the excitement around its return makes complete sense.
The first season delivered one of the best survival thrillers in recent memory. It all starts when Jeong Ji-an (played by Kim Hye-jun, best known for Kingdom) inherits what looks like a boring agricultural hose business after the sudden and highly suspicious death of her uncle, Jeong Jin-man (played by Lee Dong-wook, best known for Guardian: The Lonely and Great God). Then the company server comes online and reveals Murthehelp, a massive dark-web operation supplying military-grade weapons to the criminal underworld.
Before Ji-an even has time to process any of it, her home is being torn apart by sniper fire, weaponized drones, and elite mercenaries from the Babylon syndicate. Her only chance of surviving is to dig up the brutal lessons her uncle had secretly been drilling into her since childhood.
That ridiculous setup could have easily fallen apart, but A Shop for Killers made it work with slick gun-fu, tightly choreographed action, and an underworld that kept getting more interesting with every reveal. It is another reminder of how much the K-drama scene has changed. The industry is no longer living under the old rom-com label, with recent shows like Teach You a Lesson and The WONDERfools pushing into completely different territory. Now, with one of Disney+’s best action series about to return, the K-drama calendar is getting a lot more exciting.
A Shop For Killers Returns To Disney+ And Hulu With An Action-Packed Eight-Episode Second Season
After 2 years of waiting, A Shop for Killers Season 2 is officially set to release on July 22, 2026, streaming on Disney+ internationally and Hulu in the US. The new season picks up right where that wild season 1 cliffhanger left off, with eight episodes ready to keep the story moving. Viewers will not have to wait a full week for every chapter, either. Two new episodes will drop every Wednesday, carrying the action straight through to the August 12 finale.
A Shop for Killers’ comparisons to John Wick started almost immediately after its debut, and for good reason. The Disney+ series delivered some of the slickest gun-fu and close-quarters action seen in a K-drama, turning Ji-an’s home into a full-blown battlefield as one assassin after another came hunting for her. Watching Kim Hye-jun’s Ji-an go from a regular college student to someone capable of surviving that siege was one hell of a ride, especially as she slowly realized her supposedly boring uncle had been preparing her for this life since childhood.
How Well Do You Know Disney Movies?
“When you wish upon a star…”
Steamboat EraBlack-and-white Mickey
The PrincessesSnow White onward
90s RenaissanceLion King & Aladdin
Pixar LampToy Story onward
Modern EraFrozen & beyond
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On November 18, 1928, Walt Disney premiered a seven-minute black-and-white short at the Colony Theatre in New York — the first Mickey Mouse cartoon released to the public, and one of the earliest sound cartoons ever made. Whistling Mickey at the helm of a riverboat became the studio’s first iconic image. Name the short.
✓ Correct! Steamboat Willie. Mickey actually finished production first on the silent short Plane Crazy earlier that year, but Walt and his brother Roy bet the studio’s entire future on retooling Steamboat Willie with synchronised sound — a brand-new technology that had only just appeared with The Jazz Singer (1927). The gamble worked: Steamboat Willie’s November 1928 release made Mickey an instant national icon and put Disney on the map. The short entered the public domain in January 2024, exactly 95 years after release.
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✗ Wrong. The answer is Steamboat Willie. Plane Crazy was actually animated first (May 1928, silent) but didn’t find a distributor. The Gallopin’ Gaucho was the second Mickey short, also originally silent. The Karnival Kid (1929) is where Mickey first speaks. The breakthrough — the first publicly released, sound-synchronised Mickey short — is Steamboat Willie.
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<Walt Disney sankthe studio’s entire balance sheet plus a heavy mortgage on his home into a project Hollywood derisively called Disney’s Folly —the first full-length cel-animated feature film ever made in English. It premiered December21,1937 at the Carthay Circle Theatre in Los Angeles to a standing ovation.Name the film.
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<A Pinocchio
<B Bambi
<C Snow White andthe Seven Dwarfs
<D Fantasia
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✓ Correct! Snow White andthe Seven Dwarfs (1937).The83-minute film cost$1.49 million—an enormous gamble at the height ofthe Depression—and grossed $8 million onits initial release,the highest-grossing sound film made up tothat point.Walt won an honorary Oscar(one large statuetteand seven small ones,presented by Shirley Temple).The film’s success fundedthe constructionofDisney’s Burbank studioand effectively createdthe feature-animation industry.
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✗ Wrong.The answer is Snow Whiteandthe Seven Dwarfs.Pinocchio(1940)is thesecondDisneyfeature.Fantasia(1940)is the third.Bambi(1942)is the fifth.Snow Whitewas the bet-the-studio first—ridiculedin production asDisney’s Follybefore becomingthehighest-grossing sound film evermade up to1937.
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<Walt Disney’s visionof afilm-quality theme park openedto achaotic oversold Black Sunday debut—counterfeit tickets,a gas leak,and asphalt soft enough to swallow women’s heels.The Anaheim park was builton160 acresoforange grovesin just12 months.In which yeardid Disneyland open?
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<A 1948
<B 1955
<C 1962
<D 1971
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✓ Correct! July17,1955—press preview day,dubbed Black SundayinDisney companylore.ABC broadcastalivetwo-hourTVspecialfeaturingRonaldReagan,BobCummingsandArtLinkletter(collectivelywingingthescriptasthingswentwrong).DisneylandwasbuiltonAnaheimorangegrovesWaltmortgagedhis hometo fund.WaltDisneyWorldopenedin1971inOrlando,sixyearsafterWalt’sdeath—that’s thedatemanypeopleconfusewith Disneyland’s opening.
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✗ Wrong.The answer is1955—specificallyJuly17.1948iswhenWaltfirstsketchedtheconcept.1962doesn’tmarkamajorDisneyparkmilestone.1971iswhenWaltDisneyWorldopenedinFlorida(sixyearsafterWalt’sdeath)—that’s thedatemostoftenconfusedwith Disneyland’s.TheoriginalAnaheimparkopened in1955.
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<The Lion King(1994)was pitchedinternally asBambi meets…aparticular Shakespeareplay—andtheparallelsareunmissable:ayoungprince’sfatherismurderedbyhisuncle,who usurpsthethrone;theprincelaterreturnstoavengehim.WhichShakespearetragedyprovidedthebonesofthestory?
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<A Macbeth
<B Othello
<C Hamlet
<D King Lear
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✓ Correct! Hamlet.TheinternalpitchwasfamouslyBambi meetsHamlet(or,in someretellings,Hamletwithlions):Mufasaisthemurderedking-father(HamletSr.),Scaristheusurpinguncle(Claudius),Simbaistheexiledprince(Hamlet),andeventheghost-on-a-cliffappearanceplaysoutbeat-for-beat.TheLionKinggrossed$968millionworldwideandremainedthehighest-grossinganimatedfilmfor16yearsuntilToyStory3brokethe record in2010.
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✗ Wrong.The answerisHamlet.Macbethisthe“ambitiouswifepusheshusbandtomurderthekingstory”(thecloserDisneyparallelthereistheFrollo/EsmeraldynamicinHunchback).Othelloisthejealousytragedy.KingLearisthedividedkingdomtragedy.TheLionKing’sbonesareunambiguouslyHamlet’s—ghost,uncle-murderer,exiled-princeandall.
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The biggest hook going into season 2 remainsA Shop for Killers’ ridiculous ending. After Ji-an barely survives the siege and brokers a shaky truce with the remaining mercenaries, a taxi randomly pulls up outside the wrecked house. Out steps Jin-man, covered in blood, badly battered, and very much alive, confirming that his supposed suicide was never what it seemed.
Every K-Drama Coming To Netflix,Hulu,and More In July2026
AnabsolutelypackedJulyliesaheadforK-dramafansworldwide.
Now,A Shop for Killers Season 2 has to explain where he disappearedto what really happened in his off-screen war withthe psychotic Bale,and where Ji-an fits into allof this after taking control of Murthehelp herself.With that many questions hanging overthestory,eight episodessuddenly do not feel like nearly enough.
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The biggest hook going into season 2 remainsA Shop for Killers‘ ridiculous ending…
