PLOT SUMMARY: When hundreds of people who are in debt get a mysterious invitation to participate in a tournament of children's games, they are unaware of how dangerous the rules are.
Let's talk about Squid Game. It's not only a TV show but a global phenomenon that has caused a surge in Netflix's stock prices. It's a show where the characters have become popular, merchandise is selling like hotcakes and everywhere you go there is a meme or a reference online.
But is Squid Game truly worthy of all the hype?
Yes. Yes, it is.
My first thought while watching this drama was that it played a lot like a Bollywood drama. There's the ailing mother, the irresponsible son and father who learns his lessons towards the end, betrayal from the one you trust the most, and lots of sacrifices.
But that notion didn't put me off even if it seemed like a trope. If anything, it help me connect with the show even more because it made me realize that stories are global. That if Bollywood makes these stories there are other countries who do that too.
This is the first TV show I watched that was in a foreign language and it made me want to check out more shows akin to this.
Now, Squid Game is an actual game played by kids and it includes having a diagram of a squid drawn on the ground.
What is Squid Game About? Plot explained with Spoilers!
The show begins with a flashback of kids playing Squid Game and the rules are explained. There's a time jump and we meet Seong Gi-Hun. He's not the ideal hero who saves lives and is the dutiful son or father. He's down on his luck and lives with his elderly mother who sells vegetables to make ends meet. He, on the other hand, resorts to gambling to make some easy money only to lose it most of the time.
On his daughter's birthday, he borrows money from his mother but then also steals the credit card so he can go gamble. He is surprised to learn that his grandmother has chosen his daughter's birth date as her pin code.
With that money, he heads off to the horse races and somehow manages to win. But then he notices some thugs outside and runs, bumps into a young woman and hides in the bathroom. The thugs are men to whom Gi-hun owes money. He offers to settle part of the loan only to find he's been pickpocketed. This results in him getting beaten up and then signing a physical contract wherein his organs will be donated.
Dejected, Gi-hun tries to look for a birthday present for his daughter and goes to an arcade to play the claw machine. Taking pity on him, a boy plays the game for him and Gi-hun manages to win a gift-wrapped box that he doesn't open. He assumes it must be a toy because he was playing in an arcade after all.
When he meets his daughter, he feels terrible for not getting her the dinner she deserves and the gift turns out to be a lighter made to look like a real gun. The daughter is disappointed but doesn't let her father know. Gi-hun pockets the gun because he can't let his ex-wife see what he gave his daughter.
Gi-hun drops her home, has a small argument with his wife and then goes to the train station. That is when a well-dressed man approaches him and asks him if he's interested in playing a game: ddakji.
Gi-hun has already played in the arcade, and now ddakji, another children's game, where one must flip the opponent's card with their own. These games are definitely different from the usual gambling games…
Gi-hun is initially hesitant but a suitcase full of money changes his mind and he agrees. He loses the first time and reveals to his opponent that he doesn't have any money to give. The stranger smiles and tells him he can pay another way, by letting himself get slapped.
Gi-hun has only money on his mind. The slaps and humiliation don't matter. Several tries later, he wins and is ready to slap the stranger when he reminds him that he was playing for money, not slaps.
Gi-hun happily takes the money but the stranger gives him a card and invites him to play more kids games.
Easy money, right?
Gi-hun places the call when he finds out his daughter will be taken to the US by her stepfather unless he makes some money, and soon enough finds himself standing on a secluded street, in the middle of the night. A car approaches and once he gets in, a gas knocks him out.
Gi-hun awakens in a large room on a bed. He's wearing a green jumpsuit with the number 456. There are several other people in the room and they are all lined up for an announcement. There he spots his childhood friend Cho Sang-Woo. His friend was supposed to be the pride of their little town since he went to a prestigious university and landed a great job. But Sang-Woo looks embarrassed. He has been accused of embezzlement and is in debt.
The participants are welcomed by men wearing pink jumpsuits with masks that have video game controller signs on them. They are told they each owe a lot of money, and that once they have been initiated into the game they can't leave. However, if the majority of people want to leave, the game ends.
Everyone is excited for the games to begin and the first one is Red Light, Green Light (also the title of the episode). You know the one where one calls out "green" light without looking back and the others move forward. And when "red" light is called, all players have to freeze on the spot or they lose. Squid Game gives a deadly twist to this innocent little game. The players move forward when a large doll calls out "green" light. The minute "red" light is called, players freeze. The doll has the ability to detect even the tiniest movements. One of the players moves just a little bit and is immediately shot.
Blood splatters on the other players. Realization hits that this isn't just any childish game. Life depends on winning it. Chaos occurs and players make a run for the exit. They are killed instantly. Gi-hun almost trips over a dead body when "red" light is called but is saved by another player.
Gi-hun barely makes it to the finish line. The rest who don't make it within the time limit are executed.
The players are shocked by this horrifying turn of events. Sure they are in debt but they aren't ready to lose their life. The men in pink jumpsuits announce that they can leave the game if the majority votes to leave.
Everyone votes. The last vote is left to Player Number One: Il-Nam. He votes to leave. All the players are unceremoniously thrown out of cars on the streets, in their underwear.
Gi-Hun and Kang Sae-byok are thrown out of the same car. She's the one who had pickpocketed Gi-hun. Her story is that she's a defector from North Korea who wants to earn enough money to get her mother here from China. Her brother is in a shelter with no idea that his sister has resorted to thievery.
She carries a pocketknife at all times and gets Gi-hun to cut the ropes around her wrists. When it's time to cut his binds, she starts to walk away. He beckons her, promising on his mother that he won't ask for the stolen money and doing exactly when he's freed. In retrospect, Gi-hun shouldn't have sworn on his mother and broken that promise considering what happens later.
The players go back to their miserable lives where creditors are after them and they decide a life playing childish games is better than running about the streets. They will either be killed by the debt collectors or in the game. Why not die doing something fun, right? But for the players it is more about the money; a chance to win 45.6 billion Won.
Most of the players return, including the player who had created a hullabaloo over his life being too precious to lose in a kid's game. But this time, they haven't come alone.
A detective called Hwang Jun-ho has come to look for his brother after he received a card all the other participants did. Except, his brother never returned and hasn't been heard of.
Sae-byeok has returned too but she has made sure to cover her mouth and nose when the players are gassed. She also makes sure to hide her pocket knife in her jumpsuit when she's changed by the men in pink jumpsuits.
Sae-byeok makes it her mission to find out what is going on in this place. While Mi-Nyeo, another contestant, makes a fuss about going to the bathroom and manages to get the door opened at night, Sae-byeok also sneaks out and goes into the vents through the ceiling.
She finds herself above a kitchen and finds people stirring something in large pots.
She makes it back just before the guard appears. She is asked what she saw by both Mi-Nyeo and Sang-Woo and she reveals she saw the guards melting something sweet. Sang-Woo seems to guess what the next game is going to be.
By this time Gi-Hun; the stranger who helped him before he could fall, Ali; Il-Nam and Sang-Woo have formed a group. They decide to help each other but in a game of survival, is anyone really anyone's friend and well-wisher?
Sang-Woo is definitely not. As soon as Sae-byeok tells Sang-Woo what she saw and she sees his expression change, she realizes he's guessed what the game is and decides to follow his lead.
The players are taken to a playground arena and told to choose one of the four shapes and form a line.
Star, Triangle, Circle and Umbrella.
Sang-Woo chooses the triangle. Sae-byeok watches him and chooses the triangle too. Gi-hun ends up with the most difficult shape: the umbrella.
But he doesn't know it until he opens a box and finds a dalgona inside. The participants have to use a needle to carve out the chosen shape from their honeycomb.
Mi-Nyeo uses her lighter to heat up the pin to carve out her shape and then lends her lighter to Deok-su, a gangster whose group she wants to get into.
As time passes and the participants who crack their honeycomb are eliminated, Gi-hun gets nervous and sweats over his honeycomb. An idea forms in his mind as he sees the soggy part. He begins licking the honeycomb and manages to get his shape out. The other contestants follow suit.
The four main characters meet again and after a follow-up midnight brawl where more participants are killed, Sae-byeok joins the gang.
The next game is the tug of war and Sang-Woo isn't too happy that his teammates include women and an old man. Mi-Nyeo joins their team after being dumped by her one-night stand in the restroom, Deok-su. He prefers having all males in his team.
The game is won by the underdogs due to Il-nam's advice about each participant standing on opposite sides of each other and bending over backwards. But it is Sang-woo's advice to go forward three steps and then pull that cinches the win.
These characters are all supposed to be the good ones in the show, yet they are here to survive and so while they regretfully watch their opponents fall to their death, they are happy that they aren't the ones that died.
The glass piggy bank keeps filling up with cash, Jun-ho still isn't close to finding out what happened to his brother except for managing to infiltrate the pink tracksuits guards and then discovering that the losers who are still intact after death, have their organs harvested and sold.
The surgeon who performs these procedures is also one of the contestants who gets into a fight with one of the guards and is killed. The guard is in turn killed by the Frontman who wears all black. The rest of the participants are told that they are all equals here.
The fourth game is marbles. Participants can pick any game with marbles they like. Mi-Nyeo doesn't get a partner since an odd number of contestants are left after the doctor is killed. She is dragged away by the guards.
Sae-byeok befriends Ji-Yeong who agrees to be her partner. When the contestants enter the arena that is made to look like a village, they are shocked to discover that they mustn't play with their partner but against them.
The contestants have no choice but to obey the game rules. Sae-byeok and Ji-Yeong decide to bet all their marbles in one game rather than prolong the agony. They have thirty minutes, so why not chat? They can play one round when time is almost up. They learn the tragedies of each other's life before the time ends and Ji-Yeong gives up her life because she thinks her friend has more to look forward to if she got out and won the game.
Il-Nam chooses this moment to let the symptoms of dementia get to him. He roams around the village area reminiscing while Gi-hun worriedly looks at the clock. In a game of survival, he realizes he must trick his friend too in a game of odd and even marbles. Il-nam plays along before time gets over and he asks his young friend if it was fair to fool his friend. Gi-hun feels bad but as time gets over, he tricks his old friend one last time before he walks away and we hear the gunshot. We do not get to see the old man fall or his body taken away. More on this later...
And now comes the most tragic part. Sang-woo and Ali have teamed up and as the latter doesn't know any marble games, the former teaches him the odd and evens game.
Ali's beginner luck makes Sang-woo nervous and he at first accuses his opponent of cheating before coming up with a devious plan. He offers a ploy where they cheat and end up with a tie. He reasons that the guards will have no choice but to hold a tie-breaker and so there was a chance that they could team up and play against other teams.
Ali agrees and to show he can trust him, Sang-woo tears off his T-shirt and makes a cloth pouch for Ali to carry his marbles in.
Ali goes around the arena looking for teams that may end up in a tiebreaker with him.
Sang-woo walks up to the guard and hands over all twenty marbles reminding him that the rules stated that the marbles cannot be taken by force. Sang-woo had used deceit to acquire his opponent's marbles.
The time gets over and Ali returns only to see Sang-Woo exit the arena. The guard comes over to shoot Ali.
When the remaining contestants return, they are surprised to see Mi-Nyeo on her bed, gloating. Since she didn't have a teammate she was allowed not to play. The others clearly wish they didn't have partners.
They are all haunted by what they have done. The one contestant who was paired with his wife commits suicide because his wife had to be killed in the marbles game.
The next game is the glass bridge game. This is presented in front of the VIPs who indulge in a lot of open debaucheries.
The glass tiles on the bridge are either tempered or normal glass. The contestants have no idea which is which but get to choose the order in which they can go by picking a number.
Gi-hun is left picking number one but another contestant exchanges it with him citing that he wanted to show courage. Gi-hun gets to go last because he's also the protagonist.
One by one the contestants are eliminated as they step on the normal glass and fall to their deaths for the VIPs amusement.
Mi-Nyeo picks this moment to get her revenge on Deok-Su. She had warned him never to betray her but he did by not including her in his tug of war team and then ignoring her and insulting her publicly.
She wraps her arms around him and lets herself fall back. There was a chance that the glass could have been tempered and her suicide plan would have been foiled but it turns out to be normal.
The VIPS are disappointed by the bets they placed on the contestants.
At this point, it seems the contestants feel like they won't get out alive and have nothing to lose now.
One of the contestants informs the remaining that he used to work at a glass manufacturing factory. He can tell the difference and didn't speak up before because it was every man for himself here after all.
He tries to look for the way the lights hit the glass and the sounds they make. Once the frontman confirms that the contestant was indeed a factory worker and can differentiate between glass types, he turns off the light. Gi-hun gives away a marble he had kept in remembrance of his friend Il-Nam. The contestant tosses the marble on a tile but can't reconfirm because there's nothing else to throw.
He hesitates and Sang-Woo takes it upon himself to make the decision as the timer is about to expire. He pushes the contestant and off he falls through the glass.
Gi-hun is shocked at his friend's violence but he and Sae-byeok make it through just in time.
The remaining glass tiles explode and the shards injure the trio.
One of the shards has cut Sae-byeok in the stomach but she doesn't reveal her injuries to anyone. Did she think the guards won't help them? Would the guards have killed her had they found out she was injured? Was it established that injured contestants would immediately be eliminated?
One would think a fair game was being played if the VIPs are betting on the contestants and would want all of them to be not wounded. It doesn't explain why the glass bridge is exploded. A shard could have simply slit someone's neck and then who would have played the finals?
Anyway, Sae-byeok is bleeding out and ties a makeshift bandage around her torso.
The three contestants are rewarded with a special dinner and made to wear formal clothes. Gi-hun and Sang-Woo enjoy their steaks while Sae-byeok struggles to sit upright and sweats profusely.
As soon as the dinner plates are cleared, the guards leave the knives next to the contestants. The knives are used and still have food on them.
It is obviously implied that the guards expect the remaining contestants to fight and kill each other rather than rest in preparation for the final game. Imagine if they had all gotten into a knife fight and killed each other?
There was plenty of opportunity it seems for the final round to not take place. The glass tiles exploding could have killed the contestants, they could have knifed each other...but for some reason the mastermind behind these games correctly guesses how each contestant will react.
Luckily the remaining three contestants don't get into a fight and they stay up all night, watching each other warily.
Squid Game Ending Explained.
Gi-hun approaches Sae-byeok with an offer to team up. He observes she didn't eat her dinner and then notices her wounds when she gasps to not kill his friend after he considers doing so.
He calls the guards for medical help and the doors slide open, but they are carrying a coffin, one that looks like a present; one that sort of looks like the present Gi-hun had won for his daughter.
He turns around and sees Sang-woo standing over Sae-byeok, a bloodstained knife in his hands. While Gi-hun was distracted, Sang-woo had slit Sae-byeok's throat.
Gi-hun is a changed man now. It is all about doing whatever it takes to survive, even kill his childhood friend. His friend is after all not the person he used to drop off school to.
The last game is the Squid game, rules of which were explained to us in the first scene although it is a bit confusing, especially for the VIPs.
Jun-hoo has meanwhile made a discovery that the frontman is none other than the brother he had come looking for. He barely makes contact with the police when his brother shoots him and Jun-hoo falls off a cliff. So, yes, chances are he survived. Anyone who falls off a cliff, usually does, don't they?
The last game begins and of course, it is raining for dramatic effect. The friends get into a fistfight which results in Gi-hun almost winning. But he has second thoughts and tells the guards that both he and his friend would like to quit and according to the rules if the majority quits then the games have to end.
Sang-woo doesn't want to go back to his life where his mother will be disappointed in him. He uses the knife to stab himself in the neck.
Gi-hun is the winner. He is taken in a car and thrown on the streets with a credit card in his pocket. The credit card has all of his winnings.
Gi-hun returns home only to find his sick mother has passed away and laying alone and cold on the floor.
A year passes and Gi-hun has not touched the money because he's too traumatised and thinks of it as blood money. It has after all made him do terrible things.
He receives a message on a squid game card with a reference to an endearment term the old man had given him. He goes to the address in a tower and finds Il-nam still alive and the mastermind behind the games.
He tells him he is dying but he's old and didn't know what to do with all this money. He also wanted to see how far people would go for money and if there was any humanity left in the world.
He makes one last bet with Gi-hun; to see if a homeless man on the street can get any help in a stipulated time.
No one helps the passed-out homeless man and Gi-hun too watches anxiously, wondering if there is any hope for humanity yet.
With a minute left, a police car stops and helps the homeless man but the old man has already passed away before Gi-hun could tell him he lost.
Gi-hun believes in humanity again and remembers he has promises to keep, a year later. He takes Sae-byeok's brother out of the shelter and sends him to live with Sang-woo's mother who is quite old but must now take on the responsibility of a young child. But she is also gifted a suitcase filled with money. Maybe she can hire a nanny with that?
Gi-hun, meanwhile, gets a makeover rather than taking care of the young boy or go be there for his daughter. He decides he wants to get red hair.
As he's walking inside the airport and heading to the plane to go see his daughter in the US, he spots the very salesman he had met, luring another player into the games.
Gi-hun rushes over but the salesman makes a hasty exit on a train. Gi-hun snatches the card out of the hands of the hapless man and sees a new number on it.
He calls it and wonders who is in charge of the games now.
The voice on the other end recognises him as player 456 and advises him to board the plane.
Gi-hun is determined to get in the tournament again and turns away from the plane.
Who could be in charge of the games now?
Perhaps Il-nam had children who have decided to continue the twisted games? Il-nam just wanted to recreate his childhood by playing those games and then participated in them himself because he was bored.
Is the frontman in charge of the games now?
A second season will explain who has decided to host the games and if Gi-hun will decide to return to his normal hair color or keep the red? And will his daughter want anything to do with him again?
The Squid Game is a must-watch TV show and there is no doubt that you will be hooked from the very first episode.
Every character has a story arc and all of the actors impress.
The games too are thrilling and of course, there is a chance you might opt to recreate them.
Play safe. No violence.
Or just opt for the dalgona game. The winner gets another dalgona. The loser gets to eat the broken pieces.
Fair?
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