Magic’s KPop Demon Hunters Secret Lair Is a Total Letdown

Published Sep 30, 2026, 4:00 PM EDT

After Tuesday’s mysterious and spooky teaser for Magic: The Gathering’s upcoming Secret Lair Corn Maze Superdrop confirmed that a KPop Demon Hunters crossover was imminent, my anticipation grew higher than that one note Rumi struggles to hit in “Golden.” When I first watched the Netflix animated movie last year around this time, my wife and youngest daughter had passed out on the couch after our annual Halloween party. My eldest daughter was still in her vampire costume, and I still had my zombie makeup on. We were on the edge of our seats, just two ghouls jamming out to some great tunes while Huntr/x used the power of friendship and music to defeat the demon king, Gwi-Ma.

Sure, my two kids are pretty much the target audience — we’ve all watched the movie dozens of times since, and still routinely scream-sing “Golden” and “What It Sounds Like” in the car — but I unabashedly love KPop Demon Hunters on my own terms. That’s why I was so disappointed by what Corn Maze actually has to offer.

Corn Maze is great, but "How It's Done" is not

Don’t get me wrong: This is one of the best-looking Superdrops I’ve seen in a while, with some truly excellent reprint value. Every single Labyrinth card is absolutely gorgeous. The Veronique Meignaud artist series Drop also has a self-contained focus on strong black staples, which is great to see. The Marvel Zombies reprints are all pitch-perfect (Zombie Captain America recruits more zombies, Zombie Giant-Man gets bigger the more your creatures die, and Zombie Thor refuses to actually die). Even the treefolk-focused Drop illustrated by Ashley Dreyfus is the perfect combination of a cohesive theme with dreamy, colorful art.

I was expecting a lot more from the much-hyped KPop Demon Hunters crossover. The art, predominantly drawn by Scott Watabane, is stunning, capturing a good mix of iconic moments and beloved characters. Swan Song, a one-mana counterspell that creates a weak little bird for the opponent it targets, features the hat-wearing demon bird Sussie — and that’s downright hilarious. Between that card and an incredible printing of Underworld Breach with art by Helen Chen, you’ve almost enough raw reprint value to justify the Drop's $29.99 non-foil price point. (Both cards usually cost around $11.) Unbreakable Formation, Demonic Counsel, and Tempt With Immortality are all on-point thematically here, whereas Dawn's Truce and Freed from the Real feel a bit half-cooked.

Image: Wizards of the Coast

I seldom go out of my way to buy Secret Lair Drops, but I probably will this time around because I love KPop Demon Hunters so much. These are some solid cards, and even though I have most of them, the art is good enough that I still want to put them in some of my decks. But this Drop is missing the obvious: Where is Huntr/x? Where are the Saja Boys?

I expected Corn Maze to include at least two individual KPop Demon Hunters Drops, one for each musical group, and for it to be mostly legendary creatures (ideally mechanically unique new legends, which a lot of people seem to despise). Maybe another with different kinds of demons, like the water demons that Mira hates so much, represented as some random demon in Dimir (blue-black). We’ve already seen what Secret Lair can do with musically inclined reprints through the Hatsune Miku preconstructed Commander Deck. Heck, I would take another Trostani, Selesnya's Voice, with Huntr/x on it if I had to. Or just give us a reskinned version of Halana and Alena, Partners — anything I can put in the Command Zone and build a deck around. Because what I really want here is Rumi as my Commander (probably Partnered with a Mira and Zoey team-up card).

Image: Wizards of the Coast

My one hope here is that the “How It’s Done” Drop is merely a timid first step on the way to something much more interesting. We still don’t know anything about the three Universes Beyond sets that Wizards of the Coast has planned for 2027. One is bound to be another based on Marvel, and since World of Warcraft is crossing over with Dungeons & Dragons in a matter of weeks, that seems like another strong possibility. Is it possible that this is Wizards paving the way for a full-on KPop Demon Hunters expansion in 2027?

Even if it’s on the smaller side, like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or The Hobbit, there’s probably enough material for a full UB set. And if Wizards really is testing the waters, I hope it finds a water demon in there — along with the courage to show us what KPop Demon Hunters in Magic could actually sound like.