“Squid Game” almost got a different ending: This is how season 2 of the Netflix hit influenced series news

Film and series maker Hwang Dong-hyuk is currently a very sought-after man. Interviews with him are in great demand, the presence of his hit series “Squid Game” in the media and the popularity of the fans do not leave him without a trace. When he opposite the Associated Press revealed that he would be doing Squid Game Season 2, he also stated that it felt like he was given little choice.

Entertainment Weekly also recently conducted one of the countless interviews with the man who gave Netflix its biggest hit to date. And in it, Hwang Dong-hyuk revealed that season 1 of “Squid Game” had wavered between two different endings.

Warning, spoilers for “Squid Game” will follow!

Anyone who has watched the nine episodes of the first season to the end knows that the main character Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) is on the phone with an unknown mastermind behind the Death Games shortly before boarding the plane to Los Angeles – and him Fight. At the last second he decides not to get on the plane and stay in Korea to clean up the games and the organization behind them once and for all.

Alternative ending: Gi-hun gets on the plane

But Gi-hun almost made a different decision so Hwang Dong-hyuk: “We wavered between two different scenarios for the end. There was the alternative ending, Gi-hun getting on the plane and leaving. “

But there seems to be something about this end that would be understandable, after all, Gi-hun wanted to visit his daughter in Los Angeles and finally be a good father to her, not to have felt quite right for Hwang and his team: “We have each other asked all along whether it was really right for Gi-hun to choose to fly away, to see his family, and to pursue his own happiness. Would that be the right way for us to convey the question or the message that we wanted to convey with this series? “

Conscious cliffhanger for season 2?

One could of course assume that Gi-hun would decide to take up the fight against the game makers in order to have a clliffhanger for season 2 – a departure would have been the much rounder, final ending. But Hwang explains that it was another reason that led to the decision:

“We concluded that the question we were talking about would not have worked if he had got on the plane. The question we want to answer – how did the world become the way it is? – can only be answered or can only be asked if Gi-hun turns around and approaches the camera. “

That sounds rather vague, but it can be interpreted as follows: Gi-hun can after all the suffering and bloodbath that he has experienced, and especially after his confrontation with the old man Oh Il-nam (Oh Yeong-su ) and his devastating view of the world and the nature of man simply no longer turn a blind eye and take care of his own happiness. Gi-hun wants to change something in the world – and no longer just in his world. Because everything could look good in it now, rich as he is now, and with a daughter who is waiting for him in Los Angeles.

Season 2 would be more exciting with the alternative ending

For the upcoming second season of “Squid Game” the alternative ending would of course have meant that Gi-hun’s change of heart would have been shifted from the first to the second season. It was only in the USA, or maybe even only after his return to South Korea, that his guilty conscience or perhaps another encounter with the game’s henchmen would have driven him to take up the chase.

The audience would of course have started season 2 with completely different expectations, the content of the new episodes would have been a much bigger secret. By moving Gi-hun’s challenge to the finale of season 1, the direction for season 2 is relatively clear: Now it’s Gi-hun vs. the VIPs and game organizers. Hwang has also already confirmed that Gi-hun will be back in season 2 “doing something for the world”.

Had Gi-hun got on the plane, it would have been absolutely open whether we’d ever see him again in season 2. The games could have continued with new candidates, for example, who would then have moved into the focus of the narrative. Regarding Gi-hun one should have puzzled: Will he perhaps do something after all? Or has he finished with the story?

A clear message in the season finale was more important

The fact that Gi-hun’s decision to fight evil and misanthropists was already made in the first season works wonderfully as a cliffhanger for season 2, but would have been all the more important and relevant if there had been NO second season (and Hwang resisted this for quite a while).

Because Hwang would have made his point clear at the end of “Squid Game”, which would then have remained a mini-series: Even if everything has been done to drive out his belief in the good in people, Gi-hun will work for other people. We just wouldn’t have seen him do it then.

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