K-drama ● Review: Squid Game 3

Very Average Joe
Jul 7
3 min read

Updated: Sep 2

English Title: Squid Game 3

Korean Title: 오징어 게임 3

Director(s): Hwang Dong-hyuk

Screenwriter(s): Hwang Dong-hyuk

Studio: Siren Pictures

Released: 2025

Runtime: 6 episodes, ~1h each.

Starring: Lee Jung-jae, Lee Byung-hun, Wi Ha-joon, Kang Ha-neul, Jo Yu-ri, Park Sung-hoon, Lee Seo-hwan, Park Gyu-young, Kang Ae-shim, Noh Jae-won, Yim Si-wan

My Verdict: As before, good production, decent pacing and moderately entertaining. But conclusion is somewhat rushed. Not that I expected much to begin with.

● This review assumes one has seen Season 1 and Season 2.

● Picking up directly from the failed takeover attempt led by Seong Gi-hoon (Lee Jung-jae), the games resume for the survivors.

● As can be predicted, the six episodes chart whoever is left to the final game.

● As set up by Season 2, there are three threads: Gi-hoon and other players, with particular focus on Kim Jun-hui (Jo Yu-ri) and her baby; Hwang Jun-ho (Wi Ha-joon) and his team trying to find the island; and Kang No-eul (Park Gyu-young) as she tries to help Park Gyeong-seok/Player 246 (Lee Jin-wook) escape.

● Jun-hui’s baby is an obvious device to complicate matters for Gi-hoon and for dramatic tension. It is also presumably expanding on the theme of how the faceless (masked) puppeteers’ control of the world impacts the unborn and newly born.

● No-eul’s arc can be more substantial as there are not enough scenes of her. Her motivations were mentioned in Season 2 but this job is just a means. There does not need to be anything more but some other connection may make the plot more complex and interesting. Despite that, however, Park Gyu-young consistently conveys a cold resignation as well as determination even with the mask.

● There is also the emphasis on how “democracy” doesn’t work if the voting population have no decency and/or the system is run by the aforementioned faceless controllers. Again, this is an expansion of the established themes.

● The performances by the Korean cast are solid. However, like Season 1, the English-speaking cast is not convincing.

● The production is good. The game set in a maze is a good idea—if anything, it is a surprise that the idea was not used earlier—but the layout is repetitive. Whilst this may be partly deliberate to confuse the players, the repetition takes away the sense of scale for the audience.

● The pacing for each episode and across the six episodes is steady and fast enough. Since this season is essentially the final act, it mostly avoids the “setup” episodes.

● Despite the runtime of about one hour, the conclusion is convenient in the sense that each thread is given very little treatment. It comes across as trying to be neat but is too brief and even rushed.

● As for the conclusion itself for the main characters, it is generally predictable. Gi-hoon either lives with a sufficiently happy ending or dies a heroic death—one knows it’s one of those two options. Given the premise and genre, it is not an easy story to end satisfactorily. Both of the abovementioned can be dissatisfying if not cheese. With that in mind, Season 3 is not bad, but I never expected much to begin with.