The following contains full spoilers for the third/final season of Squid Game, now streaming on Netflix. (Read recap, get scoop on the series-ending cameo, and rant about the VIPs.)
When it comes to Netflix’s original Squid Game, it’s all over but the (baby) crying.
The Netflix megahit’s third and final, six-episode season dropped on June 27, and with it came the bittersweet conclusion to Gi-hun aka Player 456’s (Emmy winner Lee Jung-jae) mostly death-defying odyssey.
Season 3 subjected the players who’d survived Season 2 to games of Hide & Seek and Jump Rope; featured the Korean thriller’s first newborn competitor; saw both detective Jun-ho (Wi Ha-jun) and undercover guard No-eul (Park Gyu-young) succeed in their missions; and closed things out with an Academy Award winner’s rousing cameo.
Days after my binge, though, more than a dozen questions remain, as detailed below. Review my at-times tongue-in-cheek ruminating, and weigh in with your own burning Qs….
Could the knives handed out for Hide & Seek looked any more chintzy?
That hilt looks like the kind you see on a toy sword you get at an amusement park! Was it any surprise that one broke upon being lightly dropped?
Should the Hide & Seek maze have had more booby traps?
It was pretty cool when Gi-hun/Player 456 nearly chased cowardly Dae-ho/Player 388 into a center chasm hidden behind a door. But… that was the extent of the “traps.” Seems like you coulda had a hungry alligator inside one of the anterooms, or something.
Just how much MDMA did Thanos’ cross hold…?
What, did he only pack 12 hits inside the cross that he, Nam-gyu/Player 125 and Min-su/Player 124 all partook of? Or, were there two layers? Because that stash seemed to last forever.
In Hide & Seek, how’d Dae-ho get to a lower level — and on the opposite side — within seconds of Gi-hun sparing him?
This one really bothered me, how Dae-ho/Player 388 re-appeared across the atrium, on a lower level, some seven seconds after Gi-hun spared his life. (It’d be one thing if the players were intimately familiar with the maze-like layout and stairwells, but…)
Of all the featured players’ deaths, who was done dirtiest?
It was absolutely devastating when Hyun-ju/Player 120 was accidentally-ish stabbed to death by a kill-y Myung-gi. But say what you will about the witchy shaman aka Seon-nyeo/Player 044, her getting offed by a PTSD-ing Min-su/Player 125 was pretty random, too.
Did one of the guards have to make a quick CVS run for baby formula…?
Or, in recruiting Ji-hun/Player 222 — assuming they knew she was (quite) pregnant — did they proactively prep a sleek, Squid Game-y bottle with warmer, plus a bassinet? Were there also diapers and/or a “tracksuit” onesie we didn’t see?
Where do the barracks go?
After Jump Rope, the survivors returned to a dorm that had been stripped of its stacked beds/staircases, and winnowed down to just seven beds. That room got broken down, its contents moved to where, in just a little over 20 minutes…?
Should everyone have been told that at least four needed to survive Jump Rope?
Privately meeting after Jump Rope and the formal dinner, the Front Man offered Gi-hun a knife with which to kill the other players in their sleep, explaining that the final game could not be played with just two people (Gi-hun and the baby).
Should that detail have been shared with everyone entering the Jump Rope round, or would it have made the game play strategy especially ruthless?
Should the underwater entrance have better (meaning: any) security?
Sure, it’s inherently hard to get to, but Jun-ho was able to just sidle up to the interior dock and walk through an unlocked door to access the ladder going upstairs?
Did you think Sky Squid Game would require them to jump from platform to platform?
When the Sky Squid Game playfield was first revealed to Gi-hun et al, did you suspect players would have to make a running leap to each of the next platforms?
How convenient was that rebar handle?
Of all the places on the final, circular platform that Gi-hun and Myung-gi could have toppled off, how great was it that an exposed piece of rebar was there for Gi-hun to grab onto? And that he spotted it/acted quickly enough to indeed grab onto it?
Hey, can we maybe place the baby more towards the middle of the platform?
Gi-hun sure was counting on the little lady not squirming out of her swaddling and wriggling a few inches away!
If there is an American Squid Game, what will the VIPs be like?
If a language barrier and/or a desire for social satire/commentary was to blame for Squid Game Seasons 1 and 3 giving us the infamously cartoonish, painfully boorish VIPs, might those who back a Stateside edition be one half of a smidgen more nuanced? And will they be mostly foreign, if the Korean series largely cast its VIPs with Americans?
What is Gi-hun’s daughter to make of Dad’s (blood-stained!) tracksuit?
And can we assume that In-ho supplied her with a clearly marked PIN code for the debit card, assuming she wouldn’t think to enter 0456?
Did you do a double or a triple take when Cate Blanchett showed up as a U.S. recruiter?
And, um, where does one sign up to get slapped by Cate…?
Those are our lingering questions about Squid Game Season 3. What are yours?
