PAGE 18 • GO! MAGAZINE
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 21, 2021 • THE BULLETIN
MOVIES & SHOWTIMES
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‘Squid Game’ takes on capitalism
BY MAKENZIE WHITTLE • The Bulletin
B
y now, you’ve probably at least heard about Netflix’s smash hit TV show out of South Korea, “Squid Game.” This past weekend, Saturday Night Live even
featured a musical sketch with host Rami Malek and Pete Davidson highlighting the nature of the show in a fun country song. The show, like other South
Korean film and television projects, is a stirring, uneasy and scathing commentary on capitalism and wealth inequality told through a kind of Willy Wonka
meets “Battle Royale” story.
At only nine episodes just under an hour
each, it’s ideal for binge-watching over a
weekend (or in my case a day), though con-
sidering the subject matter, you may want to
pace yourself.
The story follows a group of South Ko-
reans of various ages, all plagued by debt,
crime and more. They’re brought together at
a secret island compound and made to play
a series of six children’s games for the chance
to win 45 billion South Korean won (about
$39.4 million).
However, if you lose these games, you die.
All of them are there of their own volition
and accept the terms of the games realizing
that even though they will most likely die
trying for the money, life in the real world is
hell and will probably kill them anyway.
While the main stories boil down to sim-
ple survival with the characters of Senog Gi-
Hun (Lee Jung-jae), Cho Sang-woo (Park
Hae-soo), Kang Sae-byeok (Jung Hoyen),
Ali Abdul (Anupam Tripathi) and Oh Il-
nam (Oh Yeong-su), we also get a glimpse
at what goes on behind the scenes of this
massive deadly game courtesy of a detective
searching for his missing brother (Wi Ha-
Joon).
South Korean dramas seem to be able
to handle these kinds of anti-capitalist so-
cial commentary subjects better than most
Western studios can, taking outlandish ap-
proaches to the topics and starkly drawing
connections between this hyper-violent
world and our hopefully less gory one.
The violence of the show is pretty grue-
some at times — viewers be warned — but
it’s the overall characterizations and sus-
pense that make it a brilliantly crafted show.
While a lot of the plot is pretty predict-
able, it still gets your heart pumping with the
superb script and the acting. Lee Jung-jae,
specifically, is top-notch.
He is able to grow this character from
Netflix
A scene from “Squid Game.”
some super whiny, kind of despicably self-
ish, mostly absent father into someone who
you root for through it all. Plus, his scenes
as he slowly grows further apart from his
childhood friend Sang-woo are subtle and
captivating.
“Squid Game” is not entirely perfect, as
the last episode is a bit less enticing than the
rest of the series and the introduction of the
“VIPs” is laughably bad (this may be a lost
in translation thing though).
But those aren’t the moments that stick
with you. Instead, you’re left reeling from
the atrocious nature of the world that drove
these characters to this game, with themes
More Information
“Squid Game”
Nine hour-long episodes
TV-MA
of trust, accountability and the true evils
that erupt within humanity when given the
opportunity and the motivation to win at all
costs.
While the tone of the show overall is
pretty dark and grim, this is juxtaposed with
the naivete of the games themselves, and the
production design the show employs.
Using a bright and happy color palette
along with cutesy iconography and mixing it
with this Escher-like world of never-ending,
self-accepted torture of the players is pretty
perfect.
While there are apparently no plans for
a second season, the series is left open to
more, and given the show’s meteoric popu-
larity, it is more than likely that we’ll see an-
other installment eventually.
Reporter: 541-383-0304, mwhittle@bendbulletin.com