Playing Squid Game can be fatal, and it making sounds almost as dangerous — at least for your teeth.
The creator of Netflix‘s South Korean hit series, Hwang Dong-hyuk, laughed as told the BBC he had lost “eight or nine” teeth due to the stress of making Season 1. It had previously been reported he’d lost six.
That might make you wonder why he’s returned to make more. Hwang revealed from the set of Season 2 that like desperate players in Squid Game compete in literal life-or-death competitions adapted from children’s games to win a huge cash prizes, money was the motivating factor that brought him back for a second run.
Hwang has often talked about how the license fee Netflix paid for his show, which he had been trying to make for more than a decade before it received a greenlight, cut him out of the huge back-end revenues Squid Game made when it unexpected blew up top become the streamer’s biggest hit in 2021.
“Even though the first series was such a huge global success, honestly, I didn’t make much,” he told the BBC. “So doing the second series will help compensate me for the success of the first one too. And I didn’t fully finish the story.”
Compensation has been a major topic of discussion in Korea, which has become one of Netflix’s main international priorities thanks to the creative rush coming from the country. Besides Squid Game, Korea has birthed The Glory and Extraordinary Attorney Woo among others, with the streamer pledging $2.5BN investment in Korean content in April 2023, to be spent over five years.
However, lawmakers are concerned about the profit-sharing model Netflix uses and about how its local dominance has driven up costs. In an interview with Deadline last year, the streamer’s VP of Content for Korea, Don Kang, said: “We’re working very hard to reward our creators fairly and at the most competitive level possible. We pay upfront sums that reflect what could be calculated as residuals, which in most cases lead to compensation at a higher level than if residuals were paid.” He also claimed residual systems were an industry-wide issue and should be treated as such.
Netflix made a profit of 12.1B won ($8.M), last year, and was the only streamer operating in the black, according to filings from earlier this year. Revenue jumped 6.5% to 823.3B won.
Squid Game‘s second season returns on December 26 around the world. It will star Lee Jung-jae, who reprises his role as protagonist Gi-hun. Taking place three years after Gi-hun won the first game, he returns to play again and destroy it after ditching his dream of traveling to the states. The BBC reported the dormitory where the contestants sleep at night is divided in two in Season 2, with players allowed to leave the game if a majority decides.
The BBC also revealed there would be more backstory to the villainous Front Man, who oversees the game.“People will see more of the Front Man’s past, his story and his emotions,” said actor Lee Byung-hun, who plays the character. “I don’t think this will make viewers warm to him, but it may help them better understand his choices.”
Hwang jokingly said that pressure of producing the second run meant his teeth were aching again: “I haven’t seen my dentist yet, but I’ll probably have to pull out a few more very soon,” he said.
Last month, we revealed David Fincher is developing a English-language Squid Game series, which would expand a universe that also includes the unscripted hit Squid Game: The Challenge.
