Lead cast: Lee Jung-jae, Lee Byung-hun, Im Si-wan, Wi Ha-joon, Kang Ha-neul, Park Gyu-young
Korean filmmaker Hwang Dong-hyuk’s death-game spectacle Squid Game returns for its third and reportedly final season with six new episodes that follow on directly from the mid-tournament cliffhanger at the conclusion of December’s season 2.
We will steer clear of spoilers here, but this article does assume that readers are caught up until the end of season 2. It should also be noted that critics were able to screen all but the final episode of the new batch.
Viewers should already know that the previous season of Squid Game featured a new cast of players, most of whom scraped through the first three rounds, which claimed the lives of hundreds of other players.
The only returnees from season 1 were Seong Gi-hun (aka Player 456, played by Lee Jung-jae), the winner of that season who returns to the arena; the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun), who orchestrates the games; and Hwang Jun-ho (Wi Ha-joon), the detective searching for the games and his brother.
Needless to say, the winnowing becomes far more aggressive as we embark on the final three rounds. Be prepared for shocking and emotional deaths, which come thick and fast.
The new season opens in the aftermath of the failed rebellion led by Gi-hun. Gi-hun is carted back to the games, seemingly the only survivor, his resolve and spirit crushed.
Gone is the man who stands up to villainy and tries to move the masses with impassioned pleas. Chained to a bed between rounds, he is a shell of his former self, consumed by anger following the death of his friend Park Jung-bae (Lee Seo-hwan).
While Gi-hun should be focusing his rage on the games, he instead becomes consumed by a desire for revenge against the cowardly Kang Dae-ho (Kang Ha-neul), who failed to resupply the rebellion with ammo, ensuring its failure.
Once again, the challenges that the hapless players are subjected to offer tension in spades, but compared to earlier seasons, season 3 struggles with the moments between. This is partly due to numbers, as the shrinking pool of contestants leaves fewer options for social interaction.
The thrilling team building we witnessed in season 2 has fallen to pieces and as the remaining players grapple with increasingly dire odds, they no longer have someone to turn to.
Then there is the fallout from the chief innovations of season 2: the voting process to continue or stop the games that follow each round, and the Front Man’s secret participation as one of the players.
Paralleling the many stark ideological divides of a modern society driven by instant online interactions that leave little room for healthy debate, the voting process was a thematically rich addition to the games.
That effect wears off slightly here as the outcomes of the remaining votes seem clearer, yet the show still makes us watch everyone, leads and extras alike, furrowing their brows as they cogitate over which button to press.
Lee Byung-hun was one of the highlights of season 2 as the Front Man masquerading as Player 001, using the made-up name Oh Young-il. This fake character “dies” in the rebellion and the Front Man goes back to running the games, mostly from behind his big black mask. One wonders how, as a genial and master manipulator, he could have continued to toy with Gi-hun and the other players out on the field.
The much-maligned masked VIPs, the debauched foreign audience of the games from season 1, also return. While the all-new cast is an improvement, it is a marginal one as they remain the weak link of the series.
A zeitgeist-grabbing show as bold and brilliant as Squid Game invites nitpicking, which makes any downsides more apparent, but make no mistake – the series remains a breathless and gripping ride throughout this final set of episodes.
The gorgeous photography, sets and costumes are once again a highlight, and the wrenching emotional highs of these episodes offer Parasite composer Jung Jae-il in particular an opportunity to shine.
The show’s madcap Day-Glo aesthetic invites us to revel in the fun, turning us into a complicit audience in what amounts to a modern-day equivalent of gladiatorial combat.
Show creator Hwang has always viewed the world with coolly cynical eyes – he does not really do happy endings – and Squid Game has always been a scathing commentary on the deep inequalities of society and the malleable morality of just about anyone under the sun, given the right circumstances.
With season 3, he probes his darkest depths yet. Souls are crushed as one despicable scenario after another unfolds, bleaker and meaner than the last, each trampling over the dying embers of morality and decency.
The question now, as we contemplate a Squid Game-less world – the touted American spin-off will surely have a different title – is: where will Hwang the mastermind next poke holes in the thin veneer of society?
Squid Game season 3 is streaming on Netflix.