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The Psychological Appeal of Squid Games: Why We Can’t Stop Watching
- Squid Games is a survival drama and cautionary tale that examines the extremes of social power, injustice, and privilege.
- It is timely because it encapsulates the powerlessness, frustration, and confusion of the pandemic.
- In Squid Games, the lack of empathy and cruel abuse of power is more difficult to watch than the violence.
Netflix’s Squid Games is a dystopian fiction that pits a group of desperate people against each other in deadly children’s games, lured by the salvation of a large cash prize. The main character is an initially unsympathetic gambling addict Seong Gi-hun who steals from his diabetic mother and can’t provide for his daughter. The games seem a viable last resort until Gi-hun and the 455 other players realize that elimination from the games is literally death.
Squid Games is a fictional extension of the ‘humiliating game show’ genre more common in Korea and Japan but unlike those, it is wrapped around a social message. It is undoubtedly full of Korean cultural references lost in translation for me as a Western viewer. Still, the social message about wealth disparity and privilege is loud and clear. It is also unsettling and violent, a kind of Hunger Games meets Battle Royale meets Lord of the Flies that continually pits humanity…
