After the third season (which is really just the second half of the second season), I started reading the manga Liar Game. I noticed that in Liar Game there is an overarching theme that honesty, vigilant intelligence and strength of will defeats even the most narcissistic and malicious people.
I really never got that sense of justice-triumphs-over-all from Squid Game...even with the save-the-child plot at the end of the show. I really think this show was perhaps ruined by how desperate Netflix is for a long-lasting, but viral hit with audiences.
It's not a bad show, or a bad ending, but I would not recommend people take it very seriously. The dramatic tension throughout the show gets weaker as each episode passes.
It's too bad because there are a lot of plot points which are really good (most of them involving family members outside the games themselves, strangely).
'Despite the weird rating'. Other people's rating influences your enjoyment of the show? I'm confused. I don't…
Smaller websites with rating systems tend to have 'bloated' or extremely polarizing scores. I would consider a positive-minded site like this to have 'bloated' scores.
Rotten Tomatoes audience scores is a good example of 'polarizing' scores. Not a lot of users actually rate and catalogue things on that site. You'll see most 'good' movies on RT with scores of the high 7s to the high 8s and 9s and you'll see mediocre movies with scores in the 3s, 4s and 5s.
Intuitively (when a lot of people rate something) you'd think a mediocre movie wouldn't be rated as badly as a 3 out of 10 or a 4 out of 10; likewise, you'd think a really good television show would hit that high 6 or mid 7 range.
I think this show does a very good job of showing the positive side of people relating to each other through anonymity rather than face-to-face. The blind date segment where all the women have too many preconceptions of who Hyeon-jun is very relatable.
The show is slow rolling the romance of the two leads, which makes me think the sparks between them won't fly until 3/4s of the way through the plot.
I saw the tag of martial arts above and also of wuxia, but where is martial arts in it? yes if you only call CGI…
While this series doesn't hold up physically to older martial arts films from Taiwan / HK, the action is still quite good. Sometimes 'living' through the fiction on the screen or having something 'extremely realistic' isn't necessary.
You also have to realise that some of those older films were geared towards all ages, whereas I think this series is made for teenagers and college-aged students in particular.
Keanu's characterisation is difficult to grasp, but he is not a happy person while being homeless. Hell, he's not even homeless. His inability to talk to people is something of a quiet rage at his situation; he laughs to hide his discomfort. For most of the series he is a type of rich nihilist, this is why his nickname is 'Keanu' (Keanu Reeves is famous for being insanely rich but living like a bum and avoiding social contact).
Keanu also does not like Jae Hyuk at all, so he has no reason to warn others about how mentally ill Jae Hyuk really is. To put it another way, Jae Hyuk going on a rampage of sorts would be to Keanu's benefit as this would discredit Jae Hyuk as a journalist.
I thought this season was just as good, if not better, than the first. Kishitani is a great character. The only episode that really left me with a sour taste in my mouth was the first one, which had a really lame 'intellectual' battle scene between Yukawa and the cult-leader.
I really never got that sense of justice-triumphs-over-all from Squid Game...even with the save-the-child plot at the end of the show. I really think this show was perhaps ruined by how desperate Netflix is for a long-lasting, but viral hit with audiences.
It's not a bad show, or a bad ending, but I would not recommend people take it very seriously.
The dramatic tension throughout the show gets weaker as each episode passes.
It's too bad because there are a lot of plot points which are really good (most of them involving family members outside the games themselves, strangely).
Rotten Tomatoes audience scores is a good example of 'polarizing' scores. Not a lot of users actually rate and catalogue things on that site. You'll see most 'good' movies on RT with scores of the high 7s to the high 8s and 9s and you'll see mediocre movies with scores in the 3s, 4s and 5s.
Intuitively (when a lot of people rate something) you'd think a mediocre movie wouldn't be rated as badly as a 3 out of 10 or a 4 out of 10; likewise, you'd think a really good television show would hit that high 6 or mid 7 range.
I think this show is both a slow-burn, lightly romantic tale with a lot of wholesome comedy.
Most of the popular, highly rated rom-coms on this site seem to involve slapstick comedy or extremely melodramatic / tragic stories.
The show is slow rolling the romance of the two leads, which makes me think the sparks between them won't fly until 3/4s of the way through the plot.
You also have to realise that some of those older films were geared towards all ages, whereas I think this series is made for teenagers and college-aged students in particular.
Keanu also does not like Jae Hyuk at all, so he has no reason to warn others about how mentally ill Jae Hyuk really is. To put it another way, Jae Hyuk going on a rampage of sorts would be to Keanu's benefit as this would discredit Jae Hyuk as a journalist.
After horror or crime drama that is the one I would want. Good quiz.