Squid Game Review

Unless you’ve been living under a rock the past few weeks, you’ve likely heard of Squid Game, the Korean drama on Netflix that has taken the world by storm. You’ve also probably asked yourself if it’s worth it to dive into the series. Well, let me tell you the answer to that question is an emphatic yes.

The basics of the story aren’t all that new – especially to anyone who has seen The Hunger Games, its Japanese precursor Battle Royale, or really any dystopian story that involves normal people going to extreme lengths to survive in a physically and mentally challenging game with a huge prize at the end. Here, 456 desperate individuals agree to join a game, and are told that if they manage to win at six children’s games, they will share in a massive cash prize (ultimately, about 45 billion Korean won, or roughly $38 million). What they aren’t told is that failure to win a game will result in the participant’s death. So, when game one – a seemingly simple game of Red Light, Green Light – ends with a heap of bodies littering the playing field, things become frighteningly real for both the characters and the audience.

But Squid Game, the brainchild of the excellent writer-director Hwang Dong-hyuk (working in television for the first time), isn’t just an excuse to watch various characters die whilst playing children’s games. Amidst the violence (and yes, it is violent), there’s a compelling set of characters who we get to know incredibly well over the course of a mere nine episodes (perhaps the series’ greatest feat is how its character development and exposition never feel heavy or clunky – every moment feels earned, each beat interesting, and by the infamous sixth episode, you are wholly invested in the fates of the show’s main characters) and an equally compelling message about the painful horrors of capitalism when you are living on the fringes of economic ruin.

This isn’t a series that hits you over the head with its central message – which would be unchecked capitalism leads to a world where ordinary people are faced with the choice of continuing to fall deeper and deeper into debt whilst those with money, prestige, and power are able to treat those below the poverty line as subhuman, if they even bother to think about them at all – although a late episode in the series wherein the game’s rich benefactors discuss and bet on contestants gets close. Without the compelling central characters – namely Lee Jung-jae’s Seong Gi-hun, a whiny manchild who has an arc that takes him from a character I could hardly stand to one you can’t help but root for, and Jung Ho-yeon’s Kang Sae-byeok, who slowly opens up more as the story builds, and whose performance in the later episodes of the series is just plain sensational – the story would feel preachy and over saturated with its violent elements. Each of the main characters (which also include Park Hae-soo’s morally gray Cho Sang-woo, O Yeong-su’s lovely, elderly 001, and Anupam Tripathi’s heartbreakingly kind Abdul Ali) is provided a clear arc over their time on the series, and all characters feel multi-dimensional – even those we only get to spend a brief bit of time with.

It’s truly something to have a series where you start out resenting the boorish nature of the main character (Gi-hun is pretty awful in the premiere) but find yourself invested not only in his success but also find yourself proud of who he becomes throughout the short series. And that’s the case with a number of the show’s characters – you begin unsure of who to trust or why you should care, but as you learn their personal stories and it becomes clear that not all of them will make it out alive, each character becomes richer and their loss as painful to you as it is to their fellow participants. And then there’s episode six, which will leave you fully gutted. It’s one of the finest hours of television of the year, with a script that allows for each member of the cast to shine and for each remaining character to have their moment in the sun. The emotional impact of that piece of television cannot be understated.

Finally, yes, the series is Korean and there is an option to have it play dubbed with English voice actors. But I would ask that you opt for the subtitle option if you can. There’s something special about actors delivering their own line readings to match their physical performance that is missing when dubbing is used. And, as an added bonus, using subtitles means you have to give the series your full attention – you can’t simply have the show on in the background while you play on your phone or wash dishes. For a series as complex and rewarding as Squid Game, it’s worth your time to really watch it. You won’t be disappointed that you did.

Squid Game is currently streaming all nine episodes on Netflix.