Roush Review: Playing the ‘Squid Game’ to the Bitter End

Squid Game

Matt's Rating:

Finally: the endgame. Or is it?

Only Netflix knows for sure. But after an incomplete second season of diminishing returns, the sadistically gripping South Korean action phenomenon, Squid Game, returns to grueling form in its third and allegedly final round.

It certainly feels like the end of the line for Season 1 champ Gi-hun (Emmy winner Lee Jung-jae), who spends the first few episodes of Squid Game 3 in a numbed stupor — we know how he feels — after leading a failed rebellion against the masterminds of a nihilistic survival contest involving perversely deadly twists on classic children’s games. A new example: Stumble playing jump rope at your peril.

“I still believe that you came here to save us all,” insists the most maternal of the players, No. 149 (Kang Ae-shim, terrific), whose pairing with her timid son No. 007 (Yang Dong-geun) is just one of many new complications this season. Her heartfelt effort to boost the dejected Gi-hun’s spirits and get his head back into the game pays off, when he eventually rallies and rises to the occasion on behalf of the most defenseless lives at stake in this play-to-the-death battle. With pregnant player No. 222 (Jo Yu-ri) among those still in the mix, you can guess what that means, even if you missed hearing a baby’s cry in one of the promotional teasers.

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The novelty of the franchise has largely worn off, and tiresome scenes of the wealthy masked VIPs betting on the grisly events from afar are as vapid as ever. But with the finish line in sight, writer-director Hwang Dong-hyuk wrings a fair amount of suspense as the net tightens around the game, with Detective Jun-ho (Wi Ha-Joon) getting ever closer to finding the elaborate arena’s secret island while rogue soldier/guard No-eul (Park Gyu-young) pursues her own violent agenda from within.

“Do you still have faith in people?” the game’s enigmatic and sorrowful Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) asks Gi-hun at a key moment. It’s a fair question, because amid the plentiful greed and treachery on display as the field relentlessly dwindles, we also witness moments of great bravery and sacrifice.

Such is the game of life.

Squid Game, Season 3 Premiere (six episodes), Friday, June 27, Netflix