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Squid Game is a South Korean dystopian survival thriller series with lots of behind-the-scenes Squid Game facts. Created, written, and directed by Hwang Dong-hyuk, it stars Lee-Jung-jae, Lee Byung-hun, and others. The series is about a mysterious contest that invites 456 players to play various games.
However, all the players come from financially poor conditions, and once they are in the game, they cannot leave. Further, the games are dangerous and built to test the players’ perseverance, and can kill all those who do not follow the rules. As the games get harder with each level, the players scramble to protect their lives and win the 45.6 billion won prize.
The show’s first season was an instant hit and received widespread critical and commercial acclaim for its commentary on class disparity, the intricate games and set designs, and the performances and backstories of the characters.
The show recently released its second season on December 26, 2024, and its third season is scheduled to release on June 27, 2025. The show is like a maze with lots of interesting twists and turns, and has several behind-the-scenes facts that viewers would love to know. Here are seven of them.
An expert on dalgona, a real phone number, and other interesting Squid Game facts from the show
1. The workers' strike was real
An important aspect of Gi-Hun’s backstory is that he is haunted by his past. This part of his, focuses on how he witnessed his own best friend dying in a workers’ strike at a major car factory.
However, many fans of the show might not know that this aspect of Squid Game was taken from a real-life incident. In 2009, an actual strike took place at the Ssangyong Motors plant in Korea. And like the instance shown in the show, the real-life strike was also violent, and many workers lost their lives.
The real strike began as a protest against the curbing of workers’ rights. This escalated into a massive occupation. While Riot police attempted to stop the protest by using tear gas and water cannons, the workers responded by using Molotov cocktails and slingshots.
The strike turned bloody and violent,t and some even died as a result. The reference to a real-life incident once again symbolizes the primary focus of the show, which focuses on class differences and economic disparity.
2. The symbolism behind the coffins
One of the more interesting Squid Game facts pertains to the famous symbol of a black coffin with a pastel pink ribbon, which is used whenever a death occurs in the series. The suspenseful show has a lot of deaths as players give it their all to win the ominous game.
However, there is an important symbolism behind the choice of the colors. The show’s art director, Chae Kyung-sun, mentions in an interview with Netflix Korea on YouTube that she wanted to go into the mind of the creator of the game and visualize what he would have thought of the coffin.
As the viewers know, the old man who creates the game thinks of himself as a God. Therefore, the coffin with the bow is a final gift to the players. Even the act of disposing of the bodies in the incinerator is a show of his mercy.
The reason why the pink ribbon was selected is that Hwang wanted to maintain a combination of the guards’ bright pink uniforms and The Front Man’s all-black ensemble. This blend therefore, resulted in the iconic baby pink ribbons that have now become a popular image in the fandom of the show.
3. A Dalgona expert was present
Perhaps one of the most exciting Squid Game facts is the revelation that the show hired a dalgona expert to smoothly carry out the shooting of the second level of the series. One of the most viral games in the show is the dalgona game in the second round, where players have to lick shapes out of dalgona candies.
Once again, the series’ art director mentions in the Netflix Korea interview that working with the candies was not easy, as it is a complex prop to work with, and the shoot was outside. Therefore, the crew of Squid Game hired an expert who kept making the candies in batches of hundreds.
There was even a prop team that helped him make the sweets and stamped each one. Further, each actor had his or her own prop manager that made sure that the candy was replaced if it had to be shot from a new angle or if it started melting.
4. The set design is inspired by art
Whether one has viewed the series or not, everyone knows that Squid Game has some of the most colorful and intricate set pieces. These set designs look like works of art, and that is because it is inspired by it.
The show has many interesting Squid Game facts, and one of these relates to creating visually striking sets for the show. The series is about a group of people entering into a mysterious competition that offers them a huge cash reward. However, the games are dangerous, and the players are now stuck. Therefore, to capture this bizarreness, production designer Chae Kyoung-Sun decided to take inspiration from art pieces like M.C. Escher’s print, Relativity.
The design has abstract staircases that go to different places but don’t have an end. Kyoung-Sun took it upon herself to make this structure, as it also reflected the restraints that were put on the contestants, who had nowhere to go.
According to an interview with Architectural Digest, the striking pink and yellow stairs were hard to create, with lots of pieces being used. The show has intriguing and beautiful set designs that showcase the brilliance and detail that the crew of the show put together to create a visual masterpiece.
5. The show was meant to be a movie
Many fans of Squid Game might not know one of the most interesting Squid Game facts about the show. Interestingly, the show was initially meant to be a movie. As many viewers might know, director Hwang Dong-Hyuk confirmed in an interview with the Wall Street Journal that he first wrote the show a decade ago, in 2008.
This was also the time when his family was in debt. However, Hwang’s script kept getting rejected because of its violence. It was only when Netflix picked it up as a series that Squid Game saw the light of day. The show was written by Hwang, who was inspired by his own economic burdens.
Netflix saw the class struggles in the show and thought that it was authentic. During this time, Hwang was in a dilemma about whether he should make it in a 2-hour movie. But he was against it as it would not be enough to cover the games and the backstories. But when Netflix agreed to adapt it as a series, Hwang was able to add more stories to the plot and even introduced the character of Jun-Ho, who was not there in the original script.
6. The phone number on the card is real
There are a lot of interesting aspects in the show Squid Game, and it is these small details that make it one of the most popular shows in recent times. Many viewers might remember that the dangerous games begin when various down-on-their-luck people receive a card with symbols and a mysterious eight-digit phone number on the back.
But one of the interesting Squid Game facts is that the number provided in the show is real. The production team accidentally removed the first three digits of the number, instead of slashing the number from the middle or the end. Therefore, callers in Korea can connect to the number near the area if all the last eight digits are entered correctly.
This resulted in a huge problem as there were two people with that number, and they began to get hundreds of calls and texts from fans. Interestingly, one of South Korea’s presidential candidates, Huh Kyung-young, even offered 100 million won to anyone who would buy the number.
7. A machine was present in the tug-of-war game
One of the most suspenseful and grueling games in Squid Game is the tug-of-war game, which happens during the latter half of the show and involves some of the primary contestants in the game.
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However, even this game has some interesting Squid Game facts behind it. The reason why the characters’ struggles felt so real in the game is because a machine was actually pulling them from the other side. Therefore, it was deliberately made difficult for the actors to fight back and realistically show their strength.
In an interview with Netflix Korea, director Hwang mentions that even Lee Jung-jae and other actors were very tired from the shoot. Even though Lee has starred in action movies like Typhoon, he told Hwang that the tug-of-war game was his most difficult scene to date. Hwang also mentioned that Lee almost got knocked out during the filming.
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