With the upcoming second season of “Squid Game” placing Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) back in the fighting ring — now with a determination to end the game from within — what better time to look back at where this sensational South Korean show began?
After releasing on Netflix in September 2021, “Squid Game” quickly became an international sensation, becoming the streaming giant’s most-watched TV series ever. The show, created and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk, went on to win six Primetime Emmy awards, including for actors Lee Jung-jae and Lee You-mi.
Read below for a refresher on the bloody events that went down in the first season, the reality show that capitalized on the show’s success and what audiences can expect from the second season before it drops Dec. 26 on Netflix.
What Transpired in That Fateful First Season
With a demented twist on childhood games, “Squid Game” follows 456 participants in South Korea who accept a mysterious invitation for the chance to win $45.6 billion won (roughly just over $31 million USD) after struggling to pay off their debts. What the participants don’t realize is that the games are a fight to the death, with the first “Red Light, Green Light” competition ending in the gruesome death of all the losing contestants.
Gi-hun is one of the people who fatefully survives that first game alongside Cho Sang-woo (Park Hae-soo), Kang Sae-byeok (Jung Ho-yeon), Jang Deok-su (Heo Seong-tae), Abdul Ali (Anupam Tripathi) and Oh Il-nam (O Yeong-su), all of whom Gi-hun gets to know over the course of the season before their game-related deaths.
The games continue on throughout each episode, ranging from tug-of-war, glass-bridge walk, dalgona to marbles. The audience begins to learn some of the mysterious underpinnings of the organization behind the Squid Games and the VIPs that take pleasure in the demise of the poor people fighting for survival in their thirst for money. As “Squid Game” shows the popularity of betting on horse races among lower classes in Korea, this fight-to-the-death competition provides the same thrill for the elite.
Detective Hwang Jung-Ho (Wi Ha-joon) goes undercover to find his missing brother and discovers that he was a previous winner of the games. After being confronted by The Front Man (Lee Byung-hun), Jung-Ho shockingly discovers that his brother is now the head guard of the whole operation. Jung-Ho doesn’t agree to join his brother and is shot off a cliff, presumably dead.
The first season ends with Gi-hun winning the prize money in a final fight to the death with his last remaining competitor Sang-woo but sinking to an all-time low depression after the traumatic experience of watching hundreds of people around him die, including, Sang-woo, his childhood best friend who sacrificed himself in the final round after playing viciously up until that point. He doesn’t touch the money for a year.
Gi-hun soon discovers that Player 001, the sick old man Oh Il-nam, actually created the Squid Games and put himself through them this time around to feel the rush of the stakes in his favorite childhood games. After Gi-hun wins a bet to learn about the game’s secrets, Oh Il-nam dies before he can reveal anything.
Gi-hun gives Sang-woo’s mother part of his winnings and decides to go home to see his daughter in the United States. But after spotting more people being recruited on the way to the airport, indicating that the games are continuing, he decides to stay put and go back to end the games from within.
The ‘Squid Game’ Universe in the Meantime
Capitalizing off the success of the first season, Netflix brought the “Squid Game” craze to the world of reality TV with “Squid Game: The Challenge,” which released November 2023. The UK-based show recreated many of the original infamous games, even replicating the exact number of contestants, albeit with the prize money amount reduced to a more modest $4.56 million USD vs. $45.6 billion South Korean won. It was renewed for a second season last December.
But a reality show based on a show about a group of poor people being exploited for entertainment and violence didn’t come without its own controversy. In her review for Variety, Alison Herman described how “the contradictions only heighten with ‘Squid Game: The Challenge,’ a competition series that brings Hwang [Dong-hyuk]’s vision to life, minus the mass murder and most of the social commentary.’”
In February 2023, Manori Ravindran published a piece in Variety detailing experiences from contestants on the show about alleged poor conditions. Netflix and producers Studio Lambert and The Garden went on the record claiming that all necessary safety and health precautions had been taken.
The expansive experiences haven’t stopped there as an in-person activation called “Squid Game Experience” has already launched in New York City, Madrid and Sydney. These real-life versions of the games aim to replicate the experience of participating in the challenges — minus the cold-blooded murder.
What Season 2 Has in Store
The second season of “Squid Game” promises more violence with Gi-hun, once again Player 456, giving up on returning home and instead re-entering the arena after already winning the cash prize. “I’m trying to put an end to the game,” Gi-hun proclaims during the official trailer, which teases new games and contestants that Gi-hun will have to go up against.
In an interview with writer and director Hwang Dong-hyuk, he teased that Season 2 will feature “Gi-hun [being] faced with his memories of the first game — the experiences of going through a new realization and awakening and returning once again to the game in order to stop this unjust game.”
The Front Man, detective Jun-ho and the Squid Games recruiter (Gong Yoo) are all set to return for the second season while being joined by a brand new cast of contestants including Yim Si-wan, Kang Ha-neul, Park Gyu-young, Park Sung-hoon, Jo Yu-ri, Lee David and many more.
The third season is set to premiere on Netflix in 2025.
English (US) ·