Squid Game has officially reached 111 million fans — making it Netflix’s biggest series launch ever!

Warning: the following article contains spoilers for Squid Game

Squid Game released on September 17, seems to have taken over the internet with thousands of fans talking about it on social media. It focuses on an indebted group of people in South Korea, as they enter a competition risking their lives to win 45.6 billion Korean won which will help them survive. These games are based on popular children’s games. Also, viewers know that only one person can win the prize, meaning all the other contestants will die, which makes the show more intense and appealing to keep watching, many viewers claimed: “the show is very violent and they couldn't keep their minds off it.” In the series, it is obvious that society is divided into districts and socio-economic classes; the games seem to be the only fair place for the contestants, with the emphasis being on how they are all equal. There are dialogues that talk about how all the participants, who have received unequal treatment in the real world, have one chance to win a fair competition.

The characters on Squid Game.

The show’s protagonist is “Seong Gi-hun” played by a famous Korean actor -Lee Jung Jae- his character is a laid-off autoworker coping with a broken family and struggling with constant business failures and gambling problems. It is clear to the viewers that he has a desire to win but also has a good heart, with strategies to win, which sets him apart from the rest of the cast. All of the players are labeled by numbers from 01 to 456, they all are in dire situations and seem to be desperate to earn money so they can pay off their debt. Many of the main characters have families that they need to support, and their emotional backstories are speak to the viewers’ hearts. Whether it is an unemployed man with a gambling problem, a North Korean defector struggling to support her brother, or a Pakistani labor worker trying to make ends meet. These characters' backstories made the whole series harder to watch as the viewers knew only one could survive. Many of the players held a lot of greed at the beginning but as they saw their partners and friends die, they started to question whether the money was worth it at all. Another very important character to the plot is Joon- Ho played by Wi Ha-Joon, he is a rogue police officer who accidentally stumbles behind the scenes of the game. His mission to find his lost brother quickly shifts gears as he investigates the cause of the game.

These players are not the only characters that supply a big role to the story, there are workers that seem to be doing this all for money too, they were red suits and masks with shapes. These shapes are categories as a staff member wearing a circle on their mask is just a goon, at the bottom of the hierarchy. A triangle on the mask means this person is a soldier and they are the ones who are armed, and Anyone who is wearing a square is a manager, and out of the three shapes the squares have the most power. They oversee the soldiers and workers. If the worker’s faces are revealed they are killed, they follow strict rules, and are working for the mastermind behind the Games.

Season 1 theories ( major spoilers ahead)

There have been many theories surfacing around the internet that have made viewers want to rewatch the show just to speculate and spot them.

The first theory is what sorts out a player and a worker. A man approaches citizens around places finding the one that needs money, he challenges them to a game called “Ddakji” the goal of the game is to flip one tile by slamming it with the other. It takes a lot of practice to succeed at it though. If the players accept to play and flip the tile they win money, but if they lose they are slapped by the man. However, before the game starts he asks the player to pick between tiles red and blue, these colors are very similar tones to the uniforms. The theory is that if you pick the blue tile you will be a player and if you pick red you will be a worker.

The second theory is that the old man (001) might be the father of the protagonist Seong Gi-hun (456) In the marble game they are partnered up to play against each other but before that the old man says that he lived in a neighborhood similar to the setting there were in to play the game, and Seong Gi-hun says the same, in the same game the old man asks what day it was and Seong Gi-hun says it was the 24th. He says he asked this because his son's birthday was coming up and he wanted to get him a gift. In the ATM machine, Seong Gi-hun puts his birthday number hoping to get the money he puts in 08-26th which made fans speculate more and create another theory that if there is a season 2, Seong Gi-hun will find out the old man was his dad the whole time.

Origin of the red light green light doll

In the game “red light green light”, the goal is for a seeker to stay still at the other end of the room and Everyone else runs until the singing stops. In The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon the cast says in the interview that the doll is based on a character in a Korean textbook and a lot of Korean kids growing up know this character. There is a boy and a girl, the boy’s name is Chulsoo and the girl’s ( doll) name is Younghee and that was the inspiration they had for the creepy doll.