Player 456: A Squid Game Podcast

Episode nine of Squid Game is “One Lucky Day”. Join Player 456’s hosts Jack and Colin as they finally deep dive into the ninth episode of Netflix’s most popular show of all time. They offer their insight, thoughts and appreciation, and also cover your questions, queries and theories.

“When we were kids, we would play just like this, and our moms would call us in for dinner. But no one calls us anymore.”

An original production from Glasgower

Produced by Jack Shaw and Colin McMilan

Episode eight of Squid Game is “Front Man”. Join Player 456’s hosts Jack and Colin as they deep dive into the eighth episode of Netflix’s most popular show of all time.

They want to hear more of your questions, queries and theories - along with your hopes for season two, so please get in touch!

The shortest episode of Squid Game by some way, but the show’s eighth instalment, “Front Man,” is full of deaths that matter. With only one episode to go, perhaps that was to be expected?

Every remaining death means something, because every remaining character is a major one. There’s no escaping the pain that comes with the deaths.

Jack and Colin discuss Jun-ho's island adventure, one of the best reveal's in TV history and Gi-hun, Sang-woo and Sae-byeok's final meal - alongside some murder.

Jack cries again.

Episode seven of Squid Game is “VIPS”. Join Player 456’s hosts Jack and Colin as they deep dive into the seventh episode of Netflix’s most popular show of all time. They offer their insight, thoughts and appreciation, and also cover your questions, queries and theories.

VIPs overall purpose: an introduction to the horrible, wealthy men this organized homicidal tournament is meant to entertain.

The Front Man juggles searching for Jun-ho and greeting the VIPs while the players get one potato for their dinner today.

Sang-woo starts to reveals a certain logical brutality and becomes the ultimate heel after the last six episodes have been leading to this.

The fifth game involves a glass stepping-stone bridge and is the first solo game since the honeycomb candy. The circus setting is different again but highlights how much of a game and how much fun these VIPs find these games – also, it is somewhere you only go as a child, or with children.

VIPs is a clear try at satire - does it work? You better listen to hear Jack and Colin's thoughts.

Episode six of Squid Game is “Gganbu”. Join Player 456’s hosts Jack and Colin as they deep dive into the sixth episode of Netflix’s most popular show of all time. They offer their insight, thoughts and appreciation, and also cover your questions, queries and theories.

Squid Game has largely eschewed tugging on the heartstrings - until now…

Apart from a short scene in which Jun-ho overhears the Front Man taking a telephone call about the arrival of the games’ VIPs, the action is focused on the players and their next game - marbles.

Player 101 vs Player 278:

Player 101 winds up winning after petitioning his guard to change the game they’d been playing (and at which he’d been losing badly).

Player 067 vs Player 240:

Neither Sae-byeok nor her partner 240 know how to play marbles - 240 dismisses the game as the province of “boomers”.

Player 218 vs Player 199:

Sang-woo and Ali begin by guessing whether their opponent is holding either an even or odd number of marbles in his hand. Sang-woo gets mad when Ali takes a big lead, accusing him of cheating, then begging for his life, and finally devising an alternate plan.

Player 456 vs Player 001:

Gi-hun and Player 001 also play the guessing game, though it takes some doing to get there, as the dementia-addled old man believes the fake street to be the street where he grew up.

One of the best things about Squid Game is that, for all its brutality, it does not seem to share the games’ sadism itself. The scenarios are awful to contemplate, but the awfulness is the point.

Creator Hwang Dong-hyuk values the interpersonal connections he’s creating, even as he destroys them. It’s an exploration of violence, not an exploitation of violence. 

Dong-hyuk makes sure that when he kills people you care about, you know their names.