There’s a moment in K‑Pop Demon Hunters, When Zoey sings:

“I’ve lived two lives, tried to play both sides, but I couldn’t find my own place.”

She’s talking about growing up in the US and becoming a kpop idol. However, it doesn’t sound like a random line, it sounds like someone reading your internal monologue back to you.

For those living with neurodivergence (ADHD, autism or AuDHD), it doesn’t land like fiction.

It lands like finally being understood.

Zoey may be neurodivergent coded with precision.

You see it in her people-pleasing nature, her niche hyperfocus on turtles.
Her loyalty, her contradiction, her need for control that masks a deeper overwhelm.
She’s the comic relief, the sidekick, and the “quirky genius.”

She’s the center… aaaand she’s complicated.

Let’s examine her character a bit more….

“I’ve lived two lives…”

That’s the cost of masking, of performing neurotypical in systems that punish pattern-recognizers for being too much, and task-switchers for being not enough.

You build one version of yourself for people, and another version to protect what matters.

Neither of them are complete or enough for the people around you.

“Tried to play both sides…”

Autism says: build structure.
ADHD says: chase sparks.
You become fluent in both, but fluent doesn’t mean comfortable.

To the outside world, this looks like inconsistency. To those who live it, it’s adaptation held in the body.

“But I couldn’t find my own place.”

This is the gut punch, the truth behind it all… no matter how many sides you play, no matter how well you mask or mirror or survive in the neurotypical world.

You still don’t belong.

None of these systems were designed with you in mind.

I love K-Pop Demon Hunters.

Yes, it’s about K-pop idols who moonlight as demon hunters.
Yes, there are magical boundaries and a rival demonic boy band.
If you look a little closer, if you want to, you can see…

What happens when the world only values your precision or your passion, but never both at once?

My theory, as imperfect as it is, is pointing to what Zoey is fighting.

Not just demons… but unlivable binaries.

“Why did I cover up the colour stuck inside my head?”

That’s the other sentence that spoke to me… it’s about what we lose when we contort ourselves to fit.

It’s about the internal vividness: the imagination, the vision, the excitement, that gets dulled down to be palatable.

For many with autism, ADHD, or both, it’s not just colour… it’s who the world told them to be more manageable.

Here’s what the film does that most stories don’t:

It doesn’t “fix” Zoey, it doesn’t pathologize her contradictions. Her friends Rumi and Mira never once shamed her for who she is. She didn’t have to choose between being focused or scattered, brilliant or awkward, loyal or reactive.

I’m looking forward to a sequel, if it is happening, and maybe seeing her integrate. Maybe she stops covering up the colours, she stops playing sides, she becomes whole by reclaiming what was hers all along.

The future will be made brighter by neurodivergent minds.

If you’ve never watched Kpop Demon Hunters, please do us all a favour and watch it on Netflix. Even if you’re not a big fan of k-pop. 🙂

This film doesn’t say the word “neurodivergent”, it doesn’t have to.

It knows there’s an entire community watching, and see themselves in the magic.

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Note: this is a personal reflection and is not as data-driven or evidence-based as my usual writing. That’s what notes to self are for. If you want less personal and more professional, you’re in the wrong place! Please visit The Blog instead! 😊