Squid Game’s characters, their troubles and their humanity resonate with the experiences of societies globally. This is not a story unique to South Korea of course. Unsurprisingly, disillusionment with some members of the political elite and the church has led many in an increasingly secular country to dispute the truth of Christianity’s claim to serve the poor and oppressed in South Korea. However, corruption was rife among politicians and chaebol (conglomerate) families who served as church elders while embezzling funds and building their private empires. Throughout this time, worldly success was seen as a sign of blessing and mega-churches were booming. The supposed Protestant work ethic was a cornerstone of South Korea’s authoritarian-era economic “miracle”, during which three decades of ambitious economic plans transformed the country into a high-income economy. The show mocks Christianity repeatedly, expressing the growing turn in opinion of South Korea’s rapid development during the 1970s and 1980s and its connection with the growth of the church at the time. North Korean defectors feature too, as individuals who must fight on many fronts to achieve both financial stability and social inclusion. A factory employer’s callous exploitation of a migrant worker who is forced to enter the game is representative of the barriers to upward mobility for those from south and southeast Asia. Squid Game’s inclusion of other characters representative of South Korea’s disadvantaged minorities highlights the consequences of socio-economic inequality for these groups also.
While few may find themselves in the hands of gangsters threatening to harvest their organs for sale, as shown in Squid Game, the burden of overwhelming debt is a deepening social problem – not to mention the leading cause of suicide in South Korea. Such a choice leaves many at the mercy of debt collectors if the slightest change in their circumstances causes them to default on repayments. The top 20% of earners in the country have a net worth 166 times that of the bottom 20%, a disparity which has increased by half since 2017.īut attempts to curb borrowing have led to some people turning to higher cost and higher risk lenders instead. Household debt in South Korea has risen sharply in recent years to over 100% of its GDP – the highest in Asia. South Korea’s struggle with household debt More specifically, it speaks to the deepening household debt crisis affecting the lower and middle classes. Squid Game adds to other recent South Korean screen productions, most notably the 2020 Oscar-winning film Parasite, in providing a sharp critique of the socio-economic inequality that plagues the lives of many in South Korea. A Pakistani migrant worker and a gangster, along with hundreds of other equally hapless individuals who have fallen foul of South Korean capitalism, gamble it all. An elderly man dying of cancer plays the game alongside a North Korean defector. A man who was made redundant and then indebted by failed business ventures and gambling is joined by an unsuccessful fund manager.
ITS PLC REAL GAMES SERIES
Audiences see a series of very different lives, but each is mired in debt and misery. The losers will die by a ruthless process of elimination, and the single winner will take away 46.5bn South Korean won (around £29m).Įarly episodes show the circumstances that have led central characters to place everything on the line. The drama takes viewers on a high-suspense ride across nine episodes where a group of people mired in debt and personal misfortune enter a series of six survival games, modelled on familiar South Korean children’s games.
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