Note: contains spoilers
First of all: Squid Game is awesome. The must-see show of 2021. If you haven’t yet seen Squid Game, I highly suggest you hop over to Netflix right now, get caught up, and then come back to this post.
I. LOVE. SQUID GAME.
This South Korean horror-drama-thriller came out of nowhere in the latter half of 2021 and captivated the hearts and souls of everyone with a Netflix account.
If you’re unaware of the plot, it’s as follows: a group of people who are down on their luck financially are cajoled into participating into a series of challenges for a chance to win a large sum of money.
The catch? The challenges consist of children’s games one would expect on a playground, and the penalty for failure is death.
WELCOME TO SQUID GAME.
Throughout the 9-part limited series, we follow a few characters to find out what motivates them to participate in this deadly battle royale. There’s the deadbeat dad who wants to do right by his daughter, his best friend who’s the success of their neighborhood and pride of his mother, the defector from North Korea who wants to earn enough money to rescue her mother and brother and buy a house…it really gets you into the mind and psyche of why all these characters would be so desperate to play games with their very lives.
But I love it.
As you watch the show, you get an accurate depiction of the human condition, of what can drive a soul to commit horrendous atrocities.
In other words, Squid Game demonstrates why we, as a society, can’t have nice things.
Take the actions of the participants shortly after the first game. They had just witnessed about half the players shot and murdered in cold blood, and then tasked to take a vote to see if they would proceed.
In the end, the majority voted to suspend the games. But an overwhelming number of participants would have still kept playing, even after the desperate pleas of others to stop.
This suggestion to vote is brought up again when a man has to play against his wife and she is killed; he no longer wants to play the games, but at this stage, the desires of the other contestants override their concern for his insurmountable grief.
Then there’s Jang Deok-soo, the Korean gangster (think of Korean version of Snake Jailbird from The Simpsons). He and his cronies cut the line for food to take from others in need, then gleefully murder other players at night as a way to thin the herd.
In the penultimate game with the bridge of glass, when things looked dire for himself, he opts to sabotage everyone else by refusing to move forward.
Even the main character, the deadbeat dad, Seong Gi‑hun, exercised deceit against an old man in a marble game in order to ensure his preservation.
The point I’m trying to make is: when push comes to shove, people are going to do what is suitable for THEM.
Notice I didn’t say they’ll do what they need to do to survive: in many instances that is the case. But sometimes people operate out of sheer spite, others be damned.
It made me reflect on our current situation amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, and why I think we’ll be facing this virus for a very, very long time.
I’m not getting into the politics of vaccinated and unvaccinated status. I merely want you to consider WHY we are in our current predicament through the lens of human behaviour displayed in Squid Game.
Because human beings are inherently selfish.
Because we are hardwired to satisfy our self-preservation, whether of the body, mind or ego.
Because we are messy and don’t always operate out of the interest of the greater good.
Unfortunately, I can posit no solution to our current predicament. The world is currently undergoing its own form of global Squid Game. The ones who survive won’t necessarily be the strongest or the smartest or the most cunning.
But they’ll have to live with the consequences.
In the meantime, the best thing we can do is be like old man Oh Il-nam and make the most of the doomed ride.
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Photo Credit: Image by Ishwar Artist from Pixabay