Whether you live in a capitalistic environment or not, the universal term money is globally acknowledged as a main trade item for any kind of purchase. The interchangeable item is powerful enough to let anyone gain ownership of any item from miniscule stuffs to gigantic objects. With human’s eagerness of ownership, people could take extreme measures to reach their goals including being massively in debt thanks to their countless loans. Logically, for the boundless pledgees those loans can be hardly repaid. However, by stepping out of reality, if they were offered to earn an insanely huge amount of cash by playing several rounds of childhood games, perhaps they would like to give it a shot.

Welcome to Squid Game, players are welcomed to play six rounds of folk games in a span of six days. The winner is granted cash prize worth 45.6 billion won. Players are recruited unbeknownst of themselves by an anonymous company (that has a circle, triangle, and rectangle logo) at their lowest moments (in terms of debts). But at what cost? No one told them initially until it was revealed that losers of each rounds will be eliminated by literally being shot to death.

Squid Game has 456 players and many other extras. The show centers around Seong Gihun, a divorced man without proper occupation nor custody of his 10 year-old daughter. Additionally, Gihun has a high attraction for bettings. The ironic life Gihun was living depicted a harsh condition that perhaps a lot of people has ever experienced. Despite that, his humanity nature is delightful and brought a realistic touch to the character. His clever and notorious best friend, Cho Sangwoo, also happened to be in the game due to his business activities. From the short narrative alone, it is hardly surprising that Sangwoo turns out to be a sly, opportunistic, and egoist individual. Both characters are executed immensely by the actors.

On the other side, the supporting characters added dynamics within the players and the story in general. Kang Saebyeok, a North Korean defector with cold-yet-alluring persona was excellently performed by Jung Hoyeon (an impressive acting debut). The manipulative Han Minyeo, trustful Ali, thug-like Duseok, and the old man are some of other characters that made Squid Game interesting. Another important character, Hwang Junho, instantly became viewer’s favorite due to his fearless personality. Several other players noticeably added more fascinating elements to the drama.

Onto the story, Squid Game delivered a relatively slow yet thorough buildup from Gihun’s back story, player recruitment process, until the game itself. Some people might not enjoy the slower approach but I do think it gives the viewers a better idea in understanding the game, character’s emotion, and situations in which they were facing. Even though we must note that the main games are brought with rather sudden, thrilling, and sadistic approach. Within the tight span of 9 episodes, the 6 games and plots are generally distributed properly that it could raise many questions by the end of each episodes, leading to a binge-watching experience. Another point worth mentioning is Junho’s subplot. Although his character can be considered as an outlier, his infiltration to the game as a worker provided a nice different point of view of the game’s system in general.

While I do enjoy most of Squid Game, the series couldn’t hold its thrilling journey for the whole 9 episodes. It sort of wore off after the fifth game. Personally, I do think Squid Game was mostly carried by the dynamics and interactions of each characters. As soon as they kill the important roles, the excitement of this series began to let loose. Each episodes automatically have more gaps to be filled in. With a mountain-like structure, the Kdrama reached its climax on the sixth episode (fourth game) as it jumbled a mixture of vulnerability and moral dilemma that generated an emotional chaos for the viewers.

Another standout point of Squid Game is the fine extra attention to the details. Almost every single frame/scenes have its own symbolism or implicit messages. There are many moments worth mentioning but foremost it was in the dynamics of the players. During the team selection processes, the players depict several examples of discriminations—that can be generalized to communities across the globe. Whether it be racism to those who doesn’t look like a majority (in this case Ali for not looking like a Korean), sexism to women for being labeled as weak, or ageism (which only happened to the old man). Additionally, the VIPs being mostly old white man is a nice touch as to the picture of being colonized by white people or even their arguably terrible-yet-great acting in thinking they own “the world”.

The details didn’t stop there. Some people may or may not have noticed but the Squid Game creators actually dropped some hints ever since the very beginning of the drama (hence why I wasn’t really shocked for the twists). Gihun had been inescapably affiliated to the number 456: from his player number, until the amount of money he won from the horse betting (4.56 million won). He also gave his daughter a gun-shaped lighter as a present present inside a black box tied with pink ribbon—pretty similar to the “coffins” in the game. The old man was suspicious for numerous times including being excited on the first game, able to stop the night fight, and not wanting to switch shapes during the second game with Gihun—but he wrapped it perfectly with the dementia excuse.

The excessive details are honestly compelling yet some of them fell short and was left unfinished. Saebyeok climing arc was an interesting take with the screw not being attached properly. However, they just left her action the way it was—a wasted subplot there. Some questions were also left unanswered such as: how the workers get there, why Junho’s brother played such an important role and can remain MIA for over 5 years, The VIPs back stories, Junho and the police whereabouts. While those questions might bait the existence of a second season, I honestly pointed those out as Squid Game felt finished in general and it didn’t really have the necessity to continue especially if they are going to keep it centered around Gihun. Instead, if they decided to resume, it would be better to switch it into a spinoff about the workers.

A further point that made Squid Game distinguishable and attractive is the production. Having childhood games as the main theme, the series brought such sadistic and thrilling stories wrapped in colorful sets. The ironic contrast definitely left an eye-catching impression for all the viewers and even those who have only seen the short clips circulating on the internet. The consistency of the costumes also marked a strong point for Squid Game. Though the red jumpsuits of the workers might be similar to the ones in Spanish TV show Money Heist, the other styling still felt original and has its points of being iconic (that perhaps could be recited sometime in the future).

The viral sensation Korean Netflix Series, Squid Game, has an enormous amount of points to be remarkably acclaimed in the contemporary TV Shows landscape. Although, I must admit that the show wasn’t a completely perfect journey. Regardless of the decision whether the creator of Squid Game would like to continue onto the next seasons, the standalone 9 episodes (so far) are worthy to be the talk of the public.