The first season of Squid Game had audiences by the throat right from the jump with its premise of adults in South Korea playing children’s games for money and getting killed if they lose or don’t follow the rules. Viewers loved specific contestants, which made it hit even harder when those characters were eventually taken out. According to creator Hwang Dong-hyuk, season two won’t let up, and if anything, everything’s about to get even more painful for both the cast and everyone watching them.
Hwang’s previously talked about using this season to talk about the different types of division that have taken center stage in recent years, and he further noted to Empire Magazine how things “are getting worse [out there]. Our lives are not improving.” Compared to 2021, he feels the world’s taken a turn for the worst thanks to “worse climate change, more wars, and more people dying.” Basically, he said fans should prepare themselves for some pain: this isn’t just be a “deeper, more advanced story,” it’ll also be “much crueller, scarier and more gruesome” in reflection of how harsher he feels the world has become.
That’s a lot to promise for any show, let alone one that Netflix is hoping to turn into a larger enterprise. Hwang told Empire he’s tried his best to focus on the season, but he admitted this sophomore effort wasn’t easy on him, either “physically or mentally. Some of the sequences we shot were the most challenging in my whole career. It was…Hell.” How bad are we talking? According to him, things got to a point where he asked himself if he was making something “too much for people to handle.” Yaaaaay?
We’ll see how bad things can get when Squid Game returns for season two on December 26.