Numlock News: September 15, 2025 • Babylon, Demon Slayer, White Ibis

Sep 15, 2025

Demon Slayer

The Japanese anime sequel Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba — the Movie Infinity Castle smashed already high expectations, making $70 million domestically and notching the top opening of the year for an animated movie. The movie has made over $400 million worldwide, of which $200 million was in Japan. Meanwhile, over in the orthogonal quadrant of whatever audience demographic was going to Demon Slayer, the movie Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale opened strong for a worldwide start of $30.4 million, skewing 72 percent female and 55 percent over the age of 55.

Pamela McClintock, The Hollywood Reporter

Monarchs

The number of areas occupied by Monarch butterflies in Mexico during the winter has decreased from an average of 21 acres from 1993 to 2002 to just 4.4 acres as of last winter. Fewer butterflies are making it to their breeding grounds, and scientists blame it on the loss of the once-abundant milkweed that monarch caterpillars eat. Though abundant across the Midwest in days past, the plant has since been decimated by herbicides. From 1999 to 2014, herbicides and grassland destruction killed 860 million stems of milkweed across the Midwest.

Benji Jones, Vox

Mushrooms

Researchers tested 12 edible products sold in Portland that claimed to be “magic mushrooms,” but found no trace of psilocybin in any of them. Seven of the products contained an undisclosed active ingredient like cannabis extract or a synthetic psychedelic that was added just to make the consumer feel something. As legal scrutiny around psychedelics is revised in some areas without the requisite federal government oversight, mislabeling might become a big problem.

Allison Parshall, Scientific American

Babylon

Located about 80 kilometers south of Baghdad, the ruins of the ancient city of Babylon are being renovated and turned into a major tourist attraction in the region. The site has survived the rise and fall of empires, and with investment from the US embassy in Baghdad, a number of infrastructural and restoration projects are underway in an attempt to make the place an economically viable tourist site. In 2024, Babylon hosted 43,530 Iraqi tourists and 5,370 foreign tourists, which was up from 36,957 local and 4,109 foreigners in 2023.

Hadani Ditmars, The Art Newspaper

SharkNinja

Home appliance company SharkNinja has been able to rack up serious market share in a number of home staples thanks to a savvy marketing strategy and an R&D process making desirable gadgets for the Gen Z crowd. SharkNinja has a 41.1 percent market share in vacuums (an increase from 28 percent in 2020), a 28.7 percent market share in air cleaners (up from zero percent in 2020), as well as a healthy 35.9 percent market share in blenders and 20.9 percent in fryers, skillets and woks.

Chris Stokel-Walker, Sherwood News

Ibis

White ibis are tropical birds native to Florida, though rising temperatures in the early 20th century have expanded that range as high as South Carolina. By the 1970s, the species made it to Virginia. In 2020, the first white ibis was spotted in the Ocean City rookery in New Jersey, a 1,300-kilometer move from its original Florida home. This is a bit worrying since lots of native New Jersey birds already use that rookery. Not to mention the limited space — so a community of what is now over 200 white ibis nests is a concern.

Michael Adams, bioGraphic

Table Rice

Demand for table rice in Japan will increase by up to 380,000 metric tons, the farm ministry estimates, thanks in large part to increased overseas tourism. Every year, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries forecasts a 100,000-ton decrease due to population declines. However, the demand for rice is now spiking from 6.73 million tons for the 2024 rice crop to anywhere between 6.97 million tons and 7.11 million tons by June 2026.

Jun Yamazaki, Nikkei Asia

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