Squid Game Season 2 Review: Phenomenal anti-capitalist narrative works well but doesn't surpass the greatness of the original

Squid Game 2 Review

Since its premiere in 2021, Squid Game has quickly emerged as the most brutal takedown of capitalism with strong ‘eat-the-rich” sentiment. A bunch of debt-ridden South Koreans are kidnapped and forced to participate in a sick, twisted game all for the voyeuristic pleasure of the elite ‘VIPs’ who watch these players kill each other in the most brutal way possible.

I mean, isn’t this exactly the world we live in? The poor fighting with each other for bread as the rich elite watch the travesty unfold from a distance?

Squid Game Season 2: Plot

In a telling scene from the first episode, the Squid Game recruiter (played by Gong Yoo), is seen giving the poor a choice between ‘Bread’ (food) and ‘Lottery’ (trying their luck). The scene is an unwitting commentary on human nature and greed. Those who cannot afford a meal would rather not choose the bread but try their luck with the Lottery. This burning desire to pull down others in a bid to rise to the top, rather than organizing and organizing to fight the VIPs, and their ill-begotten wealth.

To that end, our red-haired protagonist (Seong Gi-hun, Player 456) is different. As the recruiter and Gi-Hun come face-to-face, we realize it wasn’t just luck that helped Gi-Hun win the games. It was his morals and principals that allowed him to emerge victorious. In a telling scene, Gi-Hun refuses to shoot the recruiter as they play a game of Russian Roulette. They say fortune favours the bold. Gi-Hun isn’t afraid of death and continues playing the game, knowing fully well he could end up dead. There is an honesty in his defiance. He wouldn’t cheat, even if he ends up dead. In a sick, twisted world, Gi-Hun is one of the few who would fight for the right.

Squid Game Season 2: What Works, What Doesn’t

In the second episode, a Mardi Gras parade—complete with fun roller coaster rides, giant bunnies in colourful costumes—meanders through the streets of Seoul. A young girl enters the make-up room, where adults are panting for breath. After a tiring day of handing out candies to kids, many of them are overheated in their costumes. In a heartwarming scene, these (presumably) underpaid, overworked adults) put on their head gears as soon as they see the child enter. It is a heartwarming moment in a show that is otherwise full of murders, cruelty and straight-up deranged behaviour.

The young girl needs a bone marrow transplant. A blood cancer survivor, the young girl befriends No-eul (Park Gyu-young), a North Korean defector, who left her daughter in the draconian country, to settle in South Korea. She now lives in her car and has tried to self-harm. In an unlikely turn of events, she receives an invite to participate in the game. Gi-hun is still on the lookout for the mysterious island. As is Hwang Jun-ho (Wi Ha-joon) police-officer-turned-traffic-cop who gives out speeding tickets to unsuspecting people. “They look for people who have reached a dead end, people who are hanging by a thread and manipulate them”, Gi-hun tells the Frontman.

Squid Game Season 2: Ending Explained

In an unlikely turn of events, Gi-hun agrees to participate in the games. He is taken to the island where he joins the rest of the players. This, as Hwang Jun-ho and Woo-seok (Jun Suk-ho) follow his location via a GPS tracker. Will Gi-hun be able to stop the games? The second season of Squid Game introduces plenty of new players. There is a nail-paint-wearing, purple-haired rapper Thanos (Choi Seung-hyun, player 230), who incurred debt because a crypto bro advised him to invest in bitcoin.

To complicate matters further, the crypto influencer who misguided him, Myung-gi (Yim Si-wan, player 333), is also a part of the games. Myung-gi, a deadbeat father who abandoned his pregnant wife, Jun-hee (Jo Yu-ri, player 222), who is forced to participate in the games. We also have a mother-son duo who enter the games to pay off their family debt. Gi-hun’s friend, an ex-marine, is also in the mix. It is revealed that No-uel, the single mother from North Korea, works as a guard. Not only is she ruthless but she quite brazenly defies orders from superiors.

Squid Game Season 2: What Works, What Doesn’t

What works for Squid Game season 2 is the many ethical and moral dilemmas that the game explores. Much to Gi-hun’s surprise, the creators have changed the games. He tries—by crying, yelling and screaming—to convince the players that quitting the games might be the best option. Gi-hun is taken aback when the pink soldiers make players sign the consent form, and allow them to divide the accumulated wealth (46.5 billion won) and walk out of the games if they wish to. It is a moment of reckoning for Gi-hun. Human greed overpowers all emotions.

In a surprising turn of events, the Frontman joins the game as player 001 and befriends Gi-hun. While the first three episodes of the show are off to a good start, things go completely haywire in the fourth and fifth episodes. Agreed, one is bound to get desensitized to death while playing the games. Pray, why are the showrunners making a mockery out of players dying.

I kid you not, I was shocked at the way ‘Six Legs’ (Ep 4) unfolded. There are people dying, blood spilling on the floor, gunshots galore and the background music is rather quirky. The interactions between the players are rather bizarre. They aren’t half as terrified as the players in the first season, given that they are in a life or death situation. So of course, there are jokes about marines and a grandmother learning about trans people.

Squid Game season 2 begins as an intense exploration of human greed and how it overpowers one’s moral judgement. It seemed like a timely anti-capitalist take but as the games get going in the penultimate episodes, the show becomes unserious, almost childlike, and the gravitas of a live/death situation is entirely lost. The greatness (both in terms of scale and artistry) of the first season of Squid Games remains unmatched.

Star rating: 3.5 / 5 stars

All episodes of Squid Game season 2 are now streaming on Netflix.