The 8 Show

A psychological thriller with a simple set-up

Binged all 8 episodes in one night after seeing a tiktok about it. What interested me more were the comments being split so 50/50 on whether it's a show worth watching or not. After completing the series I will say, if you're a fan of psychological thrillers then you'd likely enjoy the show.

STORY:
It's a very simple set-up, all of them are poor or struggling when they come across this "show" that lets them earn money each minute. I won't spoil too much but the show starts to slowly complicate this simple set-up which is what kick starts the psychological thriller aspects. This is a story heavily carried by the characters. It's interesting (and disgusting) to see how a group of 8 different characters work together to earn money in a confined isolated space. There's crazy, smart, immoral, kind, and most importantly, there's so much misfortune. The characters are truly something else. The story itself is not that interesting when you take out the characters hence the 8 stars

ACTING:
10/10 seriously they brought their characters to live. There are some top notch actors who have been in this field for a long long time. You forget that the actors are playing characters....that's how good they were. Listen, Ryu Junyeol might be a shit boyfriend, but he is and always has been an undeniably good actor so as expected he did very well in this show. Though, the 2 actors that caught my attention was Chun Woohee and Bae Sungwoo. Phenomenal acting, they deserve plenty praise.

MUSIC:
I don't really watch shows for their music score so I don't thave much to say. I didn't think anything was out of place so the music does fit the scenes

REWATCH VALUE:
Yeah well as with all psychological thrillers, rewatch values is quite low. The charm of these shows is seeing the story progress. Once you know how it progresses it's not that fun anymore so I personally wouldn't rewatch it.

OVERALL:
A good short watch for anyone who likes premises like this. Power through the first episode where our main character laments about how broke he is and it starts to get better.

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My opinion on this recent drama “The 8 Show”

tbh i LOVED it. the acting, casting, and story was so captivating. i usually point out flaws but i wasn’t even paying attention of the small flaws of the show. if u like a show that the characters have to fight for survival like “Alice in Borderland” and “Squid Game”, then you’ll definitely love this. the cinematography was amazing and the story omgomg AHHH! the acting was actually amazing. you can tell that the actors really wanted to act good and rlly went deep with their character. the characters each have TOTALLY different personalities and they have to work together to survive. however as in every show, there comes a multiple problems throughout the show and conflicts which makes the show been more captivating.

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Beware if you can't stand cruelty

I truly loved the first 2 episodes. Until about episode 4 I found the show exciting and then things took a turn for the worse. Life can already so miserable so if you're looking for an escape, this show isn't it. It depicts the worst of human nature, frustrating characters, the insanity and of course the sadistic aspect. It was extremely hard to stomach. It hit me like a gut punch and that's where I started to lose interest and had to speed up just to get through to the end.

Would a show with pleaasant people have been as entertaining? Perhaps not for such a genre. But then I also do not find these kinds of horrific shows entertaining and I keep forgetting to check details of Netflix Korean dramas which tend to contain nudity (male in this one) and extreme forms of violence (torture) compared to what ordinary Korean dramas would consider depicting. Basically I just read the synopsis and went in blind.

Another aspect that I disliked is the awful ending that is quite underwhelming but teases a second season. I'll pass thanks.

I have rated it a 6.5 because I thought the concept was quite good (a bit like Squid Game - similar set-up but worse in many ways). Also because I enjoyed the first half as well as the mystery behind each character. However I still don't understand the actions of some of the characters while some were just a victim of lazy writing or ignored entirely. The only positive is the unpredictability of many characters and the perspective and conundrum of a very ordinary unspectacular male lead.

If you aren't triggered easily then you might find this show more enjogable than I did. Personally, I will never be able to rewatch this.

I didn't notice the OST other than the "i'm so lonely" sped up as the intro. It was meh.

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THE8SHOW IS NOT BAD!

As someone who LOVES psychological thriller, this one is not bad! But I don't think I would recommend this too much, because honestly, everything is just crazy. The plot, the characters, everything! But then, it's not that horrible compared to the bad reviews they are getting.

At first, I thought it was like SQUID GAME in terms of plot. A game with players, all wanting to go home with money. But in the first episode, the rules were "the show will automatically end once killing is involved"(or something), so I THOUGHT it was kind of LIGHTER than squid game. BUT I WAS WRONG. IT WAS NOT LIGHT AT ALL. Due to the fact that the players can't straightly kill each other, they went with torture. Which for me, was 10x worst. You get to watch the players suffer. From them playing human piñata everyday by hitting the players with a baseball bat in their head and then healing them afterwards, to putting clips in their EYES to keep them from BLINKING and SLEEPING for DAYS, it was a little traumatizing.

Plus the fact that they didn't really showed everyone the real reason why the game was made, except for the fact that someone is watching them. (BUT WHO ARE THEY??)

But although I have a lot of questions towards this drama, I still kind of enjoyed watching it.

The actors were good and portrayed their characters well!

CHUN WOO-HEE U SLAYED!!!!!

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How far will you go to reach your (money)goal?

A good written thriller that is a reflection of how society works. I first thought this was a reality show, little did I know. As soon as I saw Korean actors I knew it was based on a webtoon.

In the first episode when they needed to change their clothes I thought will it be something like Susunu Denpa Shonen? Although I think certain stuff have been inspired by that show. 8 totally different people (who are a representation of society) will be living together earning money by being in the show, everything is being recorded (and aired as well), yup just like our capitalistic world.

If they want to extend their time there they have to ‘earn time’ so they can earn money (by participating). But soon they find out they have to find different ways to earn time, which includes behaving is ways that are usually not acceptable/ethical. It drives people to the edge just to survive for the money. You see how greedy human beings are and how their “higher status” makes them behave and look down on others. Just like in society were having more/earning more money makes you have a higher status and power.

It is a very interesting psychological thriller that makes you guess what everyone’s motive is for acting in a certain way. I was blown away by the first 4 episodes and after those episodes I was wondering how everything will enfold. Overall very well written script and 8 episodes were enough to get the main message, but I also have so many questions unanswered.

Similar shows: El hoyo (Spanish movie), Squid game, Night has come, Happiness (Korean movie), , Alice in Borderland (Japanese series)

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This was such a difficult watch. I can understand why some people have rated this so poorly. I honestly couldnt stomach the violence after some time and by the end i just watched on x1.5 speed to find out how it all ends. I like the premise of the show and there were some scenes that literally had me laughing out loud, floor 3 played by Ryu Jun Yeol was HILARIOUS. His inner monologue was comedic gold - (that scene where he boasts about how he can best the game because he is so good at being poor and then sleeps on a bed off newspapers & cardboard😂😭. And that time he inserts a bidet into his mouth because he thinks its an electric flosser 😭). the dark comedy was done so well. I saw the humanity in all the characters except floor 8 honestly. I found her character to be a caricature and it didnt make any sense. Even floor 6 made some sense to me, we know people are capable of torturing people for money & power but floor 8 was shedding fake tears, prancing around, behaving erratically, - she was not a real person and i hated her so so much. I am gutted she wasnt once slapped or punched in the face. Overall, i didnt hate the show but it could have been less gratuitous. Also epsiode 7 scarred me so bad and by the end i wanted someone to die just so floor 3, 7 and 2 could leave and the game could end. In some ways i felt like the sadistic people behind the cameras watching them because i couldnt turn away from all the gore -- which was probably why the writer made the decision to not reveal the ppl behind the camera

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Boring

this show is a joke, full of bullshit.
After watching so many genres of this kind, this one was very disappointing. They really failed at giving something new and original, everything was predictable, and pretty much a copy-paste of some shows and movies, very bad plot twists, poor writing, very weak character developemet, also a lot of plot holes and stupid decisions. However, the acting was pretty good (10/10)!
If you want to watch something to kill time, you can watch it.
And I don't see a second season happening because at least for me this show can't offer more.
I was wondering when they kept showing the reference of the 8 and ∞ infinity symbol that maybe either one of the participants is already stuck in the game like the 8th or 1st floor or maybe all the participants won't beat the game unless they die, but i guess it doesn't have a meaning. Then the ending was breaking the cameras and just like that, they were free, and it was the only rule they broke, pretty disappointing, I also had no attachment to the characters except for the 1st floor.
They made the show from the 3rd floor's pov, and made him the endgame, again another weak character like the lead of squid game. with no skills suddnely he's good at shooting (what the,,,,)
The 8 and 1st floor were the only characters that made me continue watching.
They tried to portray different personnalities like bringing kind, or selfish or smart characters. Number 7 had to be the worst smart charachter ever.
The show's idea was pretty cool, they could've done better, but it kept getting worse especially the ending.

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"Blurry Game: The Confused Quest with an Unknown Host"

Trying to be cheap version of squid game and not up to it's level. It was frustrating to watch this show , it was so lagging in many areas and the host of game what is he wants from them is very unclear, it is not like squid game too like punishing them or making them to do some difficult tasks like that! The host is existing or not, i feel sometimes it is big boss game show and i feel that so entertaining than this. I wasted so much in this bullshit series. It is only 1 time watchable , if you have so much free time you can waste your time on this series or else just watch some other ongoing kdrama which are much better than this. It is torture for them or for us, idk it feels torture for me to watch this show.

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An low budget Squid Game

I can't help but compare this to Squid Game in terms of the game show form of a thriller. More accurately, this is like Squid Game meets Survivor meets Lord of the Flies.

I don't know why this has such a low rating. The show starts off slow but that's because they're figuring out the rules. Once they have, then it's about competition and strategy - betrayal, alliances, and backstabbing are inevitable.

This show is about the experience of humanity and what it means to be human - in all its raw ugliness or stark beauty. There's never a dull moment but full attention is required to watch the show. It is a highly intelligent show but only after much reflection. It's probably commentary on the state of politics and society at large -about the failure of democracy, the down trodden and the different classes of society. But for now, I'm just going to take it at face value and say it's a bloody (literally) awfully good show.

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Squid Game yes, this? NOO.

We added this on a whim based on trailer and we got into episode 5, didn't finish the ep and closed it out and removed it. I could not handle seeing abuse especially to a disabled person with NO consequences. My partner was also not happy about it, I'm going to talk about things (spoilers) but I think its important to know if you dont want to see certain stuff.
We didn't read the manwha, or whatever this is based from. Maybe its supposed to run off the Squid Game hype as a 'crude' game show type. (We like squid game, and we watched The Platform and also enjoyed that)

The first couple eps are promising, the way it's filmed with the smaller ratio screens when they're picking numbers. To how they handle camera movement and emotion is well done, but it can only carry this so far. The top 2 floors are the most rude and annoying sh-tty people to watch, and they basically turn the game into capitalism by ep 5. Where they just hurt and beat the other contestants to near death multiple times by this point and nothing is justified. Its stressful, its not about being fair but I am not down to watch abuse for abuse-sake with no relevant story plot or for actual compelling story points. Does the writer hate disabled people and women? The only strong outward woman for some reason grows meek and changes her personality by ep 4.

The contestants are shady backgrounds, so its not about the show being fair to win time for more money. I can see the vision but the story ain't there, the plot is not well done. It's a netflix show so maybe that's why, I did enjoy a couple of the actors so I think i'll check out other works they're in instead. Women deserve better, I don't think I'd recommend this to anyone unfortunately. Maybe it turns around right before it ends and justice is served but we're not going to hate-watch to get to that point or sit through what feels like not well-written characters to see it.

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The h8te show

I just finished watching this and It truly is only something a sadist can enjoy the only moral I got out of it was “if you are in poverty you will never get out of it and if you are rich you can do whatever you want with no consequences”. The characters made out-of-character choices, the writing was sloppy, the plot was repetitive and there was too much unnecessary suffering that could have been prevented. There was absolutely no justice and I regret watching it. I skipped so many of the torture scenes because I knew the perpetrators would not get hurt back. If you enjoy watching people who are already down, get hurt over and over again then this is your cup of tea. I love films that have social commentary but it feels like this was written by some rich ignorant that has never met a poor person before. If you think all poor people have hearts of gold and would never hurt someone despite them being ruthlessly tortured by said person, u are soooooo wrong. This was an unpleasant watch to say the least I have seen and watched many dark or real shows/movies and I’m not bothered easily but this was so annoying at some point I stopped caring for the characters because they stopped using their heads and I didn’t care about what happened to them cause I thought everything was deserved. The plot was interesting but was carried out so poorly, lots of lost potential. Very unsatisfying.

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BETTER THAN SQUID GAME

I don't like comparing two dramas just to favor my favorite one, but just this one time, I wanna say, "THIS WAS BETTER THAN SQUID GAME".....O! MYYYY! LORDDDDD! THIS IS HOW A PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER IS DONE....
Every episode depicts a new dark element of our society. But it also shows some humane sides. We, as a society have fallen soooooo low that we've started normalizing ABSOLUTE satanic behaviors, yet some people still have some what of a human side to them. Greed, lust, wrath are forbidden for a reason, they not only rot our souls but also the core of our society.

THIS DRAMA COVERS A WIDE ARRAY OF EMOTIONS, felt by both characters and the audience.

Overall, I highly recommend this drama if you can handle a huge amount of psychological and physical torture.

p.s, I gave a low score to music because there's something VERY CREEPY about those songs in this drama.

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