After Squid Game broke Netflix’s audience records, the streamer decided to bring writer and director Hwang Dong-hyuk back for two more seasons. Three years later, season 2 of Squid Game finally premieres, trying to catch lightning in a bottle twice in a row.
From a commercial perspective, expanding the story of Squid Game makes sense. However, the sequel had the risk of diluting the powerful anticapitalistic message of the first season. Aside from its final episode, Squid Game’s season 1 tells a self-contained story in which children’s games get a deadly twist for the amusement of the wealthiest 1%, who enjoy betting on which poor player will die next. The games are spectacular, partly explaining Squid Game‘s success. Still, if the series resonated with millions worldwide, it’s because of its character-focused approach and universal discussion of the soul-crushing experience of financial despair.
It wouldn’t be enough just to create another tournament for season 2. At the same time, the sequel season had to get back to the games somehow, as they are at the core of the show’s identity. It’s a tricky balancing act, but Hwang did it again, delivering a season that stays thematically relevant while crafting breathtaking set pieces revolving around the games. It’s not all good, as season 2 has pacing issues that were absent in the first season. Yet, in its sophomore season, Squid Game proves its success was no mere accident, and the show remains one of the best of its generation.
Set three years after season 1’s championship ends, Squid Game season 2 follows Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) as he uses his money prize to find the people running the games. While the logistics of tracking down the most influential humans on the planet is a challenge in itself, Gi-hun’s goals make the task even harder. Gi-hun doesn’t want to kill the people on top, as that would unlikely end the game — as long as there’s profit involved and a moral justification for the barbaric competition, there will always be people willing to exploit other’s misfortune. Instead, Gi-hun is out to convince the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) to end the games.
As Netflix’s market campaign betrays, Gi-hun’s quest will put him back into the tournament, as he joins 455 players to survive six trials in a blood-soaked gauntlet. However, things are not the same this time around. From the inside, Gi-hun is willing to use his champion expertise to save as many people as possible, convincing other players that solidarity is their only tool to beat a rigged system. Meanwhile, the Front Man mixes up the game’s rules to prove to Gi-hun that humans are inherently selfish and people don’t care about each other if they can make some money.
What makes season 2 of Squid Game so enticing is how it revolves around Gi-hun and the Front Man’s psychological warfare. For Gi-hun to win, he has to stick with his principles and show the administration of the games human life is priceless. The Front Man, in his turn, keeps pushing Gi-hun so he will finally put a price on other people, accepting that the ends can justify the means. It’s a powerful concept that’s explored their ethical limits, giving renewed meaning to the competition.
The return of the games also offers Hwang the opportunity to introduce new characters, each exemplifying how the hegemonic economic system is designed for people to fail. Despite moral inclinations, personal beliefs, or even intellectual acumen, every player is a prisoner of their personal tragedy, carrying the blame for their condition even if the odds were stacked against them from the start.
It doesn’t take long for the players to be split into two large groups, each unaware they align with Gi-hun and the Front Man. There are clear underdogs written to win the audience’s heart, like Geum-ja (Kang Ae-shim), an elderly mother who accepts the invitation to pay off the debts of her son, Yong-sik (Yang Dong-geun), who also gets drafted into the games. Then, there are the characters people will love to hate, such as the junkie rapper Thanos (Choi Seung-hyun).
Apart from the players, season 2 of Squid Game also has new and returning characters that help explore the function of the games from the administration’s perspective. That’s a welcome angle that helps understand how such a complex scheme can function. Meanwhile, the people Gi-hun enlisted on the outside serve to exemplify how far-reaching the tentacles of the wealthy are. Regardless of their role in the Hwang’s master plan for the Squid Game, season 2 keeps the show’s impeccable acting streak, with the whole cast committed to delivering layered and credible characters.
Unfortunately, not every character gets enough screen time. With so many faces to handle in seven episodes, instead of the nine the first season had, some characters drew the shorter stick, getting removed from the games before leaving their mark. Meanwhile, the season’s abrupt ending leaves almost every survivor with incomplete and unsatisfactory character arcs.
The biggest flaw of season 2 is how it’s just half a story and not the whole thing. There’s nothing inherently wrong with cliffhangers, especially in television. Still, season 2 of Squid Game ends before any of its main plot points get resolved. Season 1 of the show still left enough threads hanging, but by the time the credits roll, it’s clear that’s the end of one story and the beginning of another. However, season 2 suddenly stops, leaving everything for season 3 to resolve. The second season feels frustratingly incomplete without a denouement, souring the awe it instigates for most of its seven episodes.
Understandably, Hwang is thinking ahead, given that Netflix greenlighted two seasons at once. However, each TV show season needs to have a purpose in itself, lest it risk alienating the audience rather than keeping people engaged for multiple years. Or, if the goal is to tell a single story and split it in half, it’s essential to put in place a release strategy that tells fans exactly when they will see the ending of the current narrative.
Season 2’s pacing issues are not only due to its sudden ending but also to how it starts. The season takes almost two full episodes to set all the pieces on the board before the games begin. This slow-paced approach allows Hwang to invest some necessary time into worldbuilding, fleshing out the nature of Squid Game’s central conflict. Nevertheless, given the shortened season and the lack of a proper conclusion, it becomes evident how some episodes are better than others.
Credit where credit is due, Squid Game is still eye-popping in its second season, with the competition giving birth to even more impressive set pieces. Because of that, Netflix’s hit series can be socially relevant while highly entertaining, keeping you on the edge of your seat watching innocent children’s games warped into a depraved contest. All things considered, the good vastly compensates the bad, and season 2 of Squid Game is fated to ensnare the public’s imagination just like the first season once did.