TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Squid Game: South Korea's latest cultural phenomenon
It features South Korea's most marginalised, including the deeply in debt, a migrant worker and a North Korean defector, competing in traditional children's games for the chance to win 45.6 billion won ($38 million) in mysterious circumstances.
Change Size
This handout image Courtesy of Netflix shows a scene of South Korea's 'Squid Game' (AFP/Netflix)
A
dystopian vision of a polarised society, Netflix smash hit "Squid Game" blends a tight plot, social allegory and uncompromising violence to create the latest South Korean cultural phenomenon to go global.
It features South Korea's most marginalised, including the deeply in debt, a migrant worker and a North Korean defector, competing in traditional children's games for the chance to win 45.6 billion won ($38 million) in mysterious circumstances.
And losing players are killed.
The juxtaposition of innocent childhood pastimes and terminal consequences -- coupled with high production values and sumptuous set design -- has proved wildly popular around the world.
Within days of its release last month, Netflix's top executive said there was "a very good chance it's going to be our biggest show ever".
It is the latest manifestation of the ever-growing influence of South Korea's popular culture, epitomised by K-pop sensation BTS and the subtitled Oscar-winning movie "Parasite".
Critics say that regardless of its Korean setting, the show's themes and its critique of the ills of capitalism are relevant everywhere -- doubly so with the coronavirus pandemic exacerbating global inequalities -- and are key to its ubiquitous appeal.
