Squid Game: The Challenge was released on Netflix on November 22nd of this year. Despite this show being a spin-off of the mega-popular show Squid Games, it has a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 44%, which is extremely low compared to its better counterpart.
In this show, 456 players competed and only one reigned supreme. With this many people playing, most people who left during the first few episodes hardly got screen time, which removed the pros of competing in this show. Many players wished to come out of the show with a future in acting or being an influencer; unfortunately, for most, this did not happen.
Those who did not achieve their dreams were upset. And so, claims came out against Netflix. During the first challenge – Red Light, Green Light – those on the show say instead of it lasting for five minutes, like shown on TV, it lasted for around nine hours.
These nine hours were miserable for the contestants because every time it was “red light” they would have to freeze for up to forty minutes. What made it worse was the cold temperatures. Some contestants claim to have suffered from severe nerve damage due to these conditions.
On top of this, contestants have reported the show being rigged. There was a mother-son duo in the show and players believed production was rigging the games so the duo would make it further because it makes for good TV. One competitor commented on the fact that the final song on Red Light, Green Light was slower than the rest and just long enough for the mother, in the mother-son duo, to cross the finish line.
It was not just this game that stirred up drama – people were also put off by the very idea of this show. The entire point of the original Squid Games was that lower class people were playing these games because it was their only hope for a better life. This explains why people would be upset if it was made into a reality show. The whole idea for the first show was to display what people would be willing to do in a life-or-death situation, which is completely different than the competition version of this show.
There were other games that confused viewers, like Battleship. Battleship was not in the original show at all, so viewers were rightfully annoyed when a new game showed up. It temporarily drifted away from the plot of the original show, which did not make sense as the rest of the show mostly aligned with Squid Games.
Despite these claims, the show is still interesting to watch. It is entertaining and the people in it all have vastly different personalities. Is it worth watching? The first few episodes are much more boring than the rest because you are being introduced to all the different people. So simply put, no, it is not something I would recommend or rewatch, but if you have nothing better to do at least it’s somewhat entertaining.
