2026 Spy Movie That Flopped In Theaters Becomes Instant Global Netflix Hit
By Published Apr 3, 2026, 10:23 AM EDT Brennan Klein (he/him) is a senior news writer at Screen Rant, host of the podcast, and contributor at and . He has been writing and podcasting about pop culture (especially horror movies) for over a decade at platforms including Blumhouse, Fangoria, Dread Central, The Backlot, and Arrow in the Head. Summary Generate a summary of this story follow Follow followed Followed Like Like Log in Here is a fact-based summary of the story contents: Try something different: Show me the facts Explain it like I’m 5 Give me a lighthearted recap
Humint has snuck into audiences' hearts on streaming.
The South Korean spy movie was written and directed by Ryoo Seung-wan and is the third installment in a loose trilogy that includes 2013's The Berlin File (which grossed $49 million against a reported $9 million budget) and 2026's Escape from Mogadishu (which was the highest-grossing Korean movie of the year). Humint (which stands for "Human Intelligence") follows South Korean and North Korean agents working together on a mission that is complicated by love. It was the first entry from the to flop in theaters, grossing just $13.3 million against a reported $16 million budget.
However, after Humint premiered on Netflix on March 31, it quickly rose to the top of the global streaming charts. Per FlixPatrol, which uses proprietary methodology to determine streaming success, the new movie is No. 1 on the daily global chart of the most-watched Netflix movies as of April 3.
The movie has managed to surpass a number of other contemporary Netflix hits. In, fact of the current Top 10 movies, seven of them are 2026 titles. These include the , the Cillian Murphy-led continuation Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, and the Thai crime movie The Red Line. Below, see the full global Top 10 movies list for Netflix on April 3:
Humint has appeared on an increasing number of individual regions' Top 10 Netflix movie charts. The day after it arrived on Netflix, it made its debut on 38 Top 10 charts, but just two days later, it is on just one region shy of seven dozen. Among those 83 territories, it is No. 1 in 17 of them, including Hong Kong, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, Qatar, Romania, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Taiwan, Vietnam, and its home territory of South Korea.
One major territory where Humint has not yet taken off is the United States. At the time of writing, the region's entire Top 10 chart is made up of English-language movies, including the , 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, The Bad Guys 2, Bohemian Rhapsody, and Minions: The Rise of Gru (which has a sequel coming to theaters in July).
However, the United States (which is one of Netflix's biggest territories) has become increasingly welcoming to South Korean movies and series on the platform in the wake of the success of the survival thriller Squid Game, which ran for three seasons. All three of those seasons currently top the all-time chart of Netflix's most-watched non-English series of all time. Overall, Squid Game season 1 is still the streamer's most-watched season in general, while season 2 is No. 3 (behind Wednesday season 1) and season 3 is No. 4.
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U.S. viewers have helped make hits out of a number of other South Korean projects, including the YA zombie series All Of Us Are Dead, the disaster movie The Great Flood, the black comedy Good News, and the K-drama When Life Gives You Tangerines. Should the region pick up on Humint in the wake of its international success, it could become an even bigger streaming smash, making up for its lackluster theatrical performance.
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