SPOILERS FOR THE ENTIRE SERIES
Netflix has produced multiple award-winning shows that have topped the charts. Recently a new show titled “Squid Game” has become Netflix’s number one most streamed show.
Popular Netflix shows like Orange Is the New Black, The Queen’s Gambit, Ozark and, many more are all American series. This is the first time an international series tops the charts.
Squid Game is a nine-episode Korean series written and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk.. Each episode makes you sit at the edge of your seat with the constant rising action and the continuous mystery. The show began streaming on Netflix Sept. 17, 2021, and has gained popularity over time. It is rated MA for its display of violence and mature themes.
The plot centers around the main character Seong Gi-hun who is also known as player 456, played by Korean actor Lee Jung-jae. Gi-hun is a divorced chauffeur who has a horrible gambling addiction and is in incredible debt. One night after being harassed by the loan sharks, Gi-hun meets a man at the train station who invites him to play a kid game called ddakji for money. After Gi-hun finally won, the man offers him a chance to play more games for more money. This enters the main character into a series of child games along with 455 debt-ridden contestants on a secret island to win a large prize money.
They play a series of deadly children’s games, including red light green light, marbles, dalgona, tug of war, crossing a glass bridge, and finally squid game as the final challenge. Players who fail to win these games are brutally murdered. The more members who are eliminated, the more the grand prize increases. Each death is worth 100 million in Korean currency.
Gi-hun teams up with other players including player 218 Cho Sang-woo who is also Gi-hun’s childhood friend, player 001 an old man who is dying of a brain tumor, player 199 Abdul Ali who is a foreign worker from Pakistan, and player 067 Kang Sae-byeok who is a pick pocketer trying to win the money to retrieve her family. As the series goes on Sang-woo begins to back stab other members of the group to win.
As the show ensues players begin to get eliminated after each game. It is a struggle to survive the physical and psychological twists of the game. The players are put through harsh conditions and are constantly being watched by masked guards in pink suits, who are overseen by the front man.
The games have been running for over 30 years for the entertainment of bored rich men. There are also other story lines in the series including one of the players illegally harvesting losing players organs for money, a detective who snuck onto the island and posed as a solider to find his brother who was the winner of the game years ago and later finds out his brother is the front man.
In the last episode, the three remaining players are Gi-hun, Sang-woo, and Sae-byeok. After the second to last game Sae-byeok was badly hurt and was bleeding out, Gi-hun tries to help her but Sang- woo kills her. The last game is squid game, and it is down between the two friends. The two fight to death and Gi-hun ends up beating Sang-woo but refuses to kill his friend and asks him to vote to stop the game. Sang-woo ends up killing himself and tells Gi-hun to take care of his mother. Gi-hun wins the prize money and is returned home. A year later Gi-hun still has not gotten over what happened at the games and has not touched his prize money. One day he receives a card which he finds out is from player 001 who he though had died in the games. He sees him and finds out that player 001 is the creator of the games. Later, Gin-hun is about to board a plane to visit his daughter when he sees the same man who recruited him the first time playing the same game with another person. Gin-hun takes the business card and is now determined to find out who these people are and to try to stop the games from happening again.
Alyson Rodriguez may be reached at [email protected]; @alyson_rod1127 on Twitter.
