‘Squid Recreation’ Season 3 sequence evaluation : Dystopian thriller takes a chaotic path to a sobering end 

The eerie songs are again, the stakes are excessive, the video games are deadlier, and contestants drop lifeless like flies by the minute in Squid Video games’ closing season. There may be a lot hype to dwell as much as in fact, given how the present has cemented itself as most likely some of the compelling dystopian thrillers of our instances. In six episodes, the ultimate season has a lot to unpack, reply and wrap up with a neat little bow. Does all of this come collectively? 

Season 3 picks off the place Season 2 ends, within the aftermath of a failed revolt that leaves Seong Gi-hun/ contestant 456(Lee Jung-jae) a dejected shell of his former idealistic, rage-fuelled self following the demise of his buddy Park Jung-bae(Lee Search engine marketing-hwan). Rebellions and chaos nevertheless don’t matter on this creepy world of pinks and greens, and the present should go on. Hwang In-ho/The Entrance Man(Lee Byung-hun) is as soon as once more on the highest of issues and ensures the brutal video games get again on observe. 

There are tensions persevering with to simmer among the many contestants as nicely. Gi-hun’s vows revenge and stalks Dae-ho(Kang Ha-neul) given how he suspiciously deserted the revolt halfway, Myung-gi(Im Si-wan) continues to be his seemingly egocentric self in direction of his pregnant ex-girlfriend Jun-hee(Yu-ri), and Hyun-ju(Park Sung-hoon) and Geum-ja(Kang Ae-sim) battle to do their greatest to avoid wasting themselves and Jun-hee. We even have No-eul(Park Gyu-young), a pink soldier who units out to avoid wasting a contestant, and elsewhere, detective Jun-ho(Wi Ha-jun) plods alongside by means of his painfully arduous seek for the lethal island the place the video games are going down. 

A nonetheless from ‘Squid Recreation’ Season 3
| Picture Credit score:
Netflix

If Season 1 did a superb job of depicting the dystopian trappings of capitalism, the financial disparity it breeds and a bloody combat for survival, Season 2 turned its deal with Gi-hun trying to problem The Entrance Man and a conflict of ideologies — how based on him, humanity would all the time conquer greed and desperation. In Season 3, with every sport getting even bloodier than standard, the contestants nearly appear to be in a battle of types to carry out their wicked greatest. If the ‘good ones’ like Hyun-joo (a terrific Park Sung-hoon), Geum-ja and Jun-hee try to get by, the evil ones really start to run amok. The 2 new video games, ‘Conceal-and-Search’ and ‘Leap Rope’, sees new villains emerge and the heart-breaking deaths of a few of our favourites — it’s all in regards to the survival of essentially the most conniving, even when there’s a child concerned. 

These at the moment are roles that Lee Jung-jae and Lee Byung-hun are nicely acquainted with and given how glorious their huge confrontation is once they lastly come face-to-face with one another, one needs they got extra display screen time collectively on this season. The ultimate season belongs to the present’s supporting forged; Park Sung-hoon as soon as once more makes us root for Hyun-joo and breaks our hearts, Yu-ri shines because the weak, conflicted Jun-hee and Im Si-wan lastly will get to sink his tooth into a personality who retains you guessing proper till the tip. 

If you happen to had revelled within the absence of the VIPs, the cringey, English-speaking overlords purportedly funding and betting on the contestants within the brutal video games in Season 2, they’re sadly again at it with renewed vigour this time round. Of their prolonged display screen time, they flip into commentators of types on the video games taking place and appear to have been written into the script solely to be an unwarranted distraction from the proceedings. It nonetheless baffles me as to why the makers didn’t decide to forged established actors for the brand new season, given how the suggestions after Season 1 for these characters had been overwhelmingly damaging. 

A nonetheless from ‘Squid Recreation’ Season 3
| Picture Credit score:
Netflix

The run as much as the largely heartbreaking, but anticipated finale whereas tightly written, feels chaotic given the a number of parallel storylines. Jun-ho’s storyline particularly feels largely irritating, given how his search at this level feels a lot too overdrawn, with some pointless bloodshed thrown in as nicely. 

And whereas the present doesn’t exit with a bang, the sobering conclusion feels anticipated. There isn’t a expiry date on greed and what desperation can drive one to do, and when Gi-hun determined in Season 2 to enter the video games as soon as once more, what adopted felt inevitable. It does nevertheless really feel like a punch to the intestine each time a contestant we had been rooting for dies in Season 3(there are MANY deaths), and that is most likely Hwang Dong-hyuk’s largest success as a creator and a author — to present us characters to root for regardless of the grimness of all of it. 

Squid Recreation Season 3 will not be an ideal season of tv — that distinction sadly solely belongs to Season 1, the place the bar was set so excessive that Season 2 struggled beneath the load of the expectations that adopted. Whereas we’re left with many questions we had been hoping to get solutions for, we most likely must contend ourselves with the present’s chief takeaway: that within the tussle between humanness and greed right here, a sliver of hope will emerge a winner. Nicely, a minimum of form of. 

Squid Recreation Season 3 is presently streaming on Netflix

Revealed – June 29, 2025 12:05 pm IST