We had to wait almost two and a half years to find player no. 456. But that’s it, season 2 of Squid Game is (finally) indeed imminent. For better or for worse. If you probably remember the main points of the k-drama, water has flowed under the bridge since the broadcast of the first episodes of the series. The least we can say is that a summary of Squid Game won’t hurt anyone.
What to remember from season 1 of Squid Game?
*Given the subject of this article, a disclaimer does not seem necessary but in doubt: this article contains spoilers from season 1 of Squid Game. If you have not seen this series, we strongly advise you not to continue reading. However, you can bookmark this article and come back to read it when you have watched the first season of Squid Game.*
To say that season 1 of Squid Game was full of emotions would be an understatement. Since its launch on Netflix in September 2021, the series directed and imagined by Hwang Dong-hyuk has been a hit all over the world. It is no longer a series but a real phenomenon with an undeniable impact on pop culture in just a few weeks.
In season 1 of Squid Gamewe meet Gi-hun, a man overwhelmed by debt, living off his mother since her redundancy years earlier. From then on, the man squandered his money and that of his mother by betting on horse races.
Divorced, relationships with his ex-wife and his 7-year-old daughter are complicated. Especially when he learns that they plan to leave South Korea for the United States. While his creditors put pressure on him to recover their dues, he crosses paths with a strange man in a suit on the subway. He offers to play the game ddakji. If he wins the game, he wins the sum of 100,000 won (around 66 euros). Otherwise, he must give them away. Penniless, he can pay his debt another way: by getting slapped. After the game, his opponent slips him a mysterious card and offers him to win a lot more money…
Also read – Squid Game review: why you absolutely have to watch this series
After accepting this strange proposition, Gi-hun gets into a van and is immediately asleep. Welcome to the Squid Game! When he wakes up, he is in a huge dormitory and is wearing a green tracksuit with the number 456. Around him? 455 other people, all ready to participate in a very special tournament to win money. Their interlocutors? Guards dressed in red jumpsuits (or pink, depending on your eyes) wearing masks with a symbol: a circle, a square or a triangle. Oh, and they’re armed. The principle? Participate in games intended for children.
But when they start to play the first game (1, 2, 3, sun), it is disillusionment and fear that seizes everyone. Because when we lose, we are eliminated for real. To put it simply: to lose is to die. Player #456 survives this first ordeal, thanks to the help of a former classmate (Sang-woo #218) and #199.
While more than half of the participants were killed in cold blood during 1, 2, 3, sun, several players asked to stop the game. If the majority wanted, they could all leave… But without receiving a single cent. They were all narrowly released and sent home. Gi-hun rushes to the police station and tries to alert the authorities but no one believes him and he seems crazy. There is only one police officer, Detective Hwang Jun-ho, who discreetly listens. The latter’s brother disappeared after receiving a similar mysterious card.
Thus, most players realize that the life that awaits them outside is not sweet and that they need the money promised by this hellish game to get by. Many of them are therefore returning to the arena of their own free will. Detective Hwang Jun-ho takes the opportunity to infiltrate the game by disguising himself as a masked guard.
The trials pass, the deaths too. Over the course of the games, Gi-hun joins forces with number 218 (Sang-woo, his childhood friend), number 199 (Ali, a Pakistani immigrant), number 001 (an old man suffering from a tumor in his brain) and number 067 (Sae-byeok, a North Korean who stole money from him before the Squid Game). Sang-woo shows his will to win at all costs on several occasions while Gi-hun seems to want to believe in each other’s goodness despite the hell they experience together. Everything gets worse when they realize that they can kill each other without any impunity: the guards do not intervene. The night also becomes dangerous for the players…
At the same time, detective Hwang Jun-ho continues his infiltration in search of his brother. He discovers that the game has existed for 30 years and that his missing brother won the 2015 edition. We then understand that this game is only intended to entertain “VIPs”, certainly rich Western men who bet on their favorites, like common racing hair.
As players die one by one, Gi-hun (#456), Sang-woo (#218), and Sae-byeok (#067) are the finalists. If Sang-woo does not seem more moved by what he had to do and experience to get there, this is not the case for these two rivals, particularly traumatized by the events they go through. The marbles event was particularly overwhelming, for both players and spectators. Number 456 is having trouble recovering from the death of Number 001, who made him believe he was losing his mind during the marbles test to let him win.
The one who seems to manage everything is, in reality, not the creator of Squid Game. The Agent (or Front-Man) is a former winner, the brother of the undercover policeman. One chasing the other, they finally find themselves face to face at the top of a cliff. The detective refuses to join his brother, he shoots him in the shoulder, causing a fall that we imagine is fatal. But before this confrontation, the young man called his boss, and tried to send him proof of what he was saying. Unfortunately, on an island in the middle of nowhere, the network is unreliable. To see if the authorities will intervene in season 2…
Injured in the penultimate event, number 067 died the day before the final. If Gi-hun tries to save her, Sang-woo kills her to end her suffering, which enrages his opponent. The numbers 456 and 218 are therefore the two participants still alive and victory is decided during the squid game. This is a children’s game from South Korea known for its violence. No. 456 manages to beat his friend, but refuses to kill him. Sang-woo therefore decides to take his own life so that Gi-hun can win the sum of 45.6 billion won, or more than 30 million euros.
Free and alive, Gi-hun returns to his daily life but reality is not kind. His mother died during his absence and the man is traumatized by everything he has experienced. After a year, he still refuses to use his money. Until a mysterious phone call. Turnaround: Player 001 is not dead, as we were led to believe. He was the one who created the Squid Game and he asked to see Gi-hun before he took his last breath. He imagined this terrible game to entertain rich people who, like him, were bored, and wants to prove that humans seriously lack empathy.
At the end of season 1 of Squid GameGi-hun prepares to join his daughter in Los Angeles. But everything changes when he meets the man who hired him again in the metro, playing the same game with another totally desperate man. He decides to find out who is now running the game and intends to take revenge. Before the end of the final episode, Gi-hun turns back, deciding to abandon his plan to reunite with his daughter in the United States.
The Squid Game events in season 1
- 1, 2, 3, sun
- Dalgonas
- Tug of war
- The marbles
- The corridor of glasses
- The squid game
There you go, you know almost everything about season 1 of Squid Game. We had to hang on! We imagine that a summary was not an option. You are now ready to discover season 2 of Squid Game. It’s on Netflix from this Thursday, December 26, 2024 at 9:01 a.m. A nice Christmas present, finally…
Also read – “No, I won’t watch Squid Game”
