“Squid Game”, season 2: Netflix hopes to repeat the feat

A giant promotional doll for “Squid Game”, in Seoul, December 26, 2024. AHN YOUNG-JOON / AP In 2021, the global success of this Korean social satire in the form of bloody children’s games, organized to entertain the most fortunate , surprised everyone. Starting with Netflix, where the first part of Squid Game attracted more than 330 million viewers, or more than 2.8 billion hours of viewing, becoming the most viewed series on the platform. Its director, Hwang Dong-hyuk, did not expect such enthusiasm for the dark universe inspired by the principles of reality TV, and even less to reopen the arena of this “squid game” (named after a hopscotch game in South Korea), K-dramas usually conclude in one season. Three years later, the frenzy, this time expected, preceded the release of the second part on the platform, Thursday December 26. In New York, an escape game designed by Netflix allows fans of the series to test their own survival instincts. In Paris, a thousand participants competed in a One, two, three, giant sun on the Champs-Elysées, closed for the occasion. From Madrid to Los Angeles, fans enjoyed “player menus” at Burger King, competed over 4.56 kilometers to win a place at the preview… Everyone is ready to meet “player 456” , real name Seong Gi-hun, tortured winner of the first game, determined to avenge his friends who fell under the gaze of the masked organizers. Read also | Article reserved for our subscribers “Squid Game”, or the reasons for the success of a South Korean series with a globalized discourse Read later Criticism of a polarized world The director and screenwriter Hwang Dong-hyuk, who claims to have been inspired to the series of a real chapter in the sometimes bloody history of social conflicts in South Korea, has not finished denouncing the excesses of capitalism and the inequalities of its country. While it took him years to imagine the first season, guided by his own struggles at the start of his career, it only took him six months to write a sequel, and even a season 3, planned for 2025, to the series. whose universe in green and pink is available to infinity. Faced with a Seong Gi-hun determined to put an end to the murderous games, Mr. Hwang features in seven episodes a new army of candidates in debt. And players divided into two groups: those who want to end the battle in the arena, and those ready to risk their lives to win the jackpot. A criticism of a world “more polarized” than ever, claimed by the director to the New York Times: “In the United States, it could be race. In South Korea, that’s the way it is. In the Middle East, it may be religion. » Whatever denunciation fans choose to see in this new season, Netflix still hopes that by talking about South Korea, Squid Game will speak to everyone, to repeat the feat. The platform is already reporting, according to the American magazine Variety, a 60% increase in the audience for the first season, re-promoted on Netflix, since the end of October, and the release of the trailer for the new season . A predicted success which could further strengthen the cultural influence of South Korea, already carried, in 2019, by the multiple award-winning film Parasite or by K-pop stars like the group BTS. Read the review of the first season (2021): Article reserved for our subscribers “Squid Game”: Korean darkness, Netflix version, invades the planet Read later Le Monde



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