Squid Game Season 2 (2024)

Half a season

There are some interesting premises and character dynamics here: reunited exes, Gi-hun and the Front Man, the perspective of No-Eul as a guard...but nothing really comes to fruition because S2 feels incomplete. I think calling it S2 and S3 is kind of a stretch; it's S2 part 1 and S2 part 2. I like seeing the push-and-pull between the character pairings, and the show does a good job of adding tension using dramatic irony, but other than that, it's a lot of set-up without any pay-off.

I have the patience to wait for S3, but it just feels like Gi-hun, as a returning character, is quite under-utilized. I'm not sure I buy into the idea that he's some kind of revolutionary leader who everyone falls in line behind, and I also feel like he's approached the games on too much of a surface level. He yells for everyone to listen and follow him to overthrow the game makers, but doesn't spend actual time thinking about why the games exist, or if they planted a player the way they did in the last game. Wi Ha-jun's character (whose name I can't even remember) is underutilized too. He's on a boat, but largely irrelevant.

I also think the games just aren't as good. I understand that the show needed to go beyond the games this time and couldn't just have the same thing play out again, but I felt like there was a missed opportunity here. Now that we have a guard character, I imagine — what if the protagonists planted people in the guards the same way the antagonists had planted a player? Or what if the players found loopholes to the games? Part of the chart of S1 was that the games were very simple: cut out this shape, pull the rope, cross the bridge, play marbles. This time, in making the game so complicated — have a team of five with each person playing a different childhood game as you walk around the track with your legs tied together — it felt like we lost something. We didn't get to see how each character approached a simple game because there were too many characters and games and we were just flashing through all of them.

Regardless of all this, I think this season is a decent set-up for whatever comes next.

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Season 2 lacking everything that made Squid Game such a good series.

I was so hyped for Season 2. Squid Game was one of my all time favorite Korean dramas.

Season 1 had everything.
* Good acting
* Deep stories behind contestants
* Good characters with good sympathy characters and villains, like you could really feel what they felt, the despair and sadness and anger with the villains.
* Mystery about literally everything

Season 2 ruined pretty much everything about all of this.
* The acting was so bad from many of the characters it became annoying.
* The stories about characters was shallow and overall so boring.
* Characters was just so boring, there was no good villain (thanos was a joke)
* Literally zero mystery, it's a pure open book about everything which just made it boring.
* The games? Like what, zero suspense, I did not get drawn into a single game compared to first season where i felt i was in the game myself.

I don't know why they decided to just go in 180 degree about everything in Season 2.
It felt like a bad ripoff where they wanted to involve everything "new" to cater to young people. Like bitcon, so many young shallow characters etc.

I have zero hopes about the last part will save this horrible season 2, I am just so sad they ruined the series this bad.

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I enjoyed it even more than Season 1

I've never written a review before but I just finished watching Season 2, and the making of, and I truly enjoyed it. Reading many reviews here giving low ratings and saying negative things about it made me want to give my opinion because it's exactly the opposite and I truly don't understand anything they say. (But obviously, we all see things differently.)

To be honest, I also didn't expect a lot of this season because while I liked season 1, I told my friends "It's a good show but there are better Korean shows which are not known/this famous which I'd recommend first if you were to ask me," so yeah, I wasn't a fanatic by any means but I could see the quality of it in many aspects.

So, here is the thing: I have been very surprised by season 2 and there's nothing I didn't like or I'd change, reason why I'll give it a 10/10. I like all the dynamics between the characters, I love all the performances, I enjoyed more these games and I like the character development and the writing. I think the new elements they introduced made the story more interesting. I'm gonna mention my favorite character because this performance and how it is written is award-winning and just this person would make this season better than S1 for me. I don't wanna say any spoilers, so just saying that Park Sung Hoon's Performance of Cho Hyeon Ju / No .120 is one of those you know you'll never forget... (not gonna try to explain why, you have to watch it) and I'll recommend everybody season 2 just for him alone... even if everything about it is really good.

Summing up, S1 didn't have this impact on me and I'm really looking forward to watching S3.

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They should stop till here, it's not enjoyable anymore

This drama is being recycled over and over again and each new version gets worse, if they kept it to one part it would have been valuable and people would remember it and its story would still be unique, but they keep making empty parts and the story is becoming dull and not interesting anymore, it was unique because it was something new when it first came out so people were impressed by it even those who are not fans of Korean dramas but now the story is really not as interesting as before، they should stop it here, i don't know how will they film the next season i can't expect anything, but they may bring some famous stars to save it.

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HONEST REVIEW: Rushed Plotlines Leave Too Many Questions

This Season left me feeling disappointed, particularly with how it ended. The story felt incomplete, leaving too many unanswered questions...like what will happen to the surviving players? The season only featured 3 games instead of the expected 6, which made it feel rushed and unfinished.

On the positive side, I appreciated the deeper exploration of the players’ backstories and how they ended up in the game. The added focus on the masked soldiers' lives and motivations was refreshing, as this wasn’t covered in Season 1. However, these elements felt like they were only partially developed, raising more questions than answers. It’s like baking a cake but leaving out some essential ingredients—sure, I could add my own frosting to make it better, but it would’ve been much more satisfying if it was complete and delicious on its own.

The black comedy they incorporated added a fun twist, and the scenes outside the Game Arena, especially the search for the Arena’s location, brought a new perspective. Despite these strengths, the overall story lacked balance and closure, which made the season feel disjointed.

While I understand the open ending is meant to pave the way for Season 3, I firmly believe each season should have its own complete and satisfying story arc. As a viewer, it’s frustrating when the storytelling doesn’t deliver on its promise. The lead actor did an excellent job, but I found his role this season less compelling compared to his potential.

Despite my disappointment, I’ll still give Season 3 a chance and hope it will provide a more cohesive and satisfying experience. I just wish the writers would prioritize the viewers’ perspective and deliver a story that feels complete, even within a serialized format.

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Quite disappointing and funny

Well just finished episode 7 of season 2 and at first it was slow and confusing then the sudden plot twist of No-Eul being one of the soldiers but to be honest, game was good and all that but what really annoyed me was Gi Hun, yes he played the game before but most of the scenes were expected, there were a few surprising scenes like the one at the end of episode 7 where there's the doll from Red Light, Green Light but there was another doll too which was surprising and the Six Legs and Mingle Game surprised me, I already knew there was a villain (Thanos) as Netflix showed us in the trailers but the end of the season was way too obvious, you'd think after 2 or 3 years since Gi Hun played the game and coming back that he would be suspicious of Player 001 especially when Player 001 never played the first game but next shows up to vote on whether to stay or not and the fact that Gi Hun never suspected him at all was annoying, I did find it disappointing on how it was going to end with the betrayal and of course now no one can trust Gi Hun, I hope he uses his brain more and stop trusting or believing anyone too easily, he literally saw how it went in first season and second season was the same except storylines were expected even before watching it, now I bet No-Eul is going to kill In Ho right?

All in all, some scenes were hilarious and others were emotional but it never felt like how season 1 was, we knew who were up to somethings and who was going to die and stuff, I hope next season shows us something that is less expecting like the Mingle and Six Legs game, also love the lights out scene but this season, it felt like that scene was basically because Thanos died and that guy Nam-Gyu wanted to get revenge hence the lights out and killing.

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