Squid Game season one recap: Who won, who died, who wore the masks?
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As the smash hit dystopian survival thriller returns, Kevin E G Perry looks back at the gruesome events of its first season. When Squid Game first arrived on our screens in September 2021, it very quickly took the world by storm. Within just four weeks, the blood-soaked dystopian survival series had racked up 1.65 billion viewing hours, surpassing Bridgerton as the most-watched show in Netflix history.
![[On the brink: Lee Jung-jae in ‘Squid Game’]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2024/12/20/15/The_Stream_06840.jpg)
Since then, Squid Game has spawned several spinoffs including the reality competition show Squid Game: The Challenge and a video game, Squid Game: Unleashed. With the second season of the Korean thriller now streaming, here’s everything you need to remember about the gripping first season that got the world hooked.
![[Within four weeks of its release, season one had racked up 1.65 billion viewing hours]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2022/07/12/18/Emmy_Nominations_23129.jpg)
When Squid Game begins, we’re introduced to Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), a divorced chauffeur and gambling addict with massive debts. One day while taking the subway in Seoul, a well-dressed man invites Gi-hun to play ddakji, a traditional Korean children’s game played with folded paper. They play for money, and the man proceeds to offer him the chance to play more games for higher stakes. When he accepts, Gi-hun is sedated and eventually awakens in a dormitory along with 455 other competitors, all identified only by the numbers on their matching green tracksuits.
Masked guards in pink jumpsuits arrive and inform the players that they will win a massive prize of 45.6bn won (around $31m, or £24m) if they are successful over the coming six games. The contests are overseen by the Front Man, who is also masked and dresses in black.
