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Squid Game season 2 release date: When does the hit South Korean series return to Netflix?

It's still one of the streamer's biggest shows ever.

squid Game season 2 reveal screenshot
Image credit: Netflix
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Guide by Fran Ruiz Contributor
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Following a very brief teaser, Squid Game season two is now set to become one of Netflix's biggest releases of 2024. Here's everything we know about its arrival.

Can Gi-hun find those in power who are behind the games and shut down their operations? Is Detective Hwang well and alive? What's next for his brother, the villainous Front Man? Squid Game's explosive season one finale was anything but fully conclusive, so viewers 100% knew a second volume was coming. The question was: when?

Well, we now have received confirmation that it's coming later this year. Moreover, Netflix shared the first-ever images last week, featuring "Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), Front Man (Lee Byung-hun), Recruiter (Gong Yoo) and Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), and a new character played by Park Gyu-young." But what about a specific release date?

When is the Squid Game season 2 release date?

Aside from assuring us that it will be out sometime in 2024, Netflix has yet to announce the release date for Squid Game season two, but star Lee Jung-jae, who plays Seong Gi-hun in the hit show, may have accidentally let slip a major hint about when the second season will drop. Speaking to Business Insider in May 2024, Lee said - through a translator - that Squid Game season two would "be released in December."

Now, that seems pretty definitive, but we need to take even a leak like that with a pinch of salt. Because the interview was conducted through a translator, the possibility of a language barrier causing the slip is always there. With seven months between the interview and December, Netflix could move the release date up or down. The fact that the streamer hasn't actually confirmed the December release date for Squid Game season two means we can't quite set our calendars by it just yet.

What is Squid Game about?

Squid Game - Hoyeon
Image credit: Netflix

In South Korea, hundreds of cash-strapped people receive and accept a strange invitation to compete in quite familiar children's games. Inside the unknown location where the games are held, the tempting prize of ₩45.6 billion awaits, but the stakes are deadly: several survival games in which every error results in death.

Seong Gi-hun, a divorced father and indebted gambler who lives with his elderly mother, is the main character, but the series is more of a rather large ensemble, and the story quickly becomes more complex and layered than anticipated.

Series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk conceived the idea based on his own economic struggles, as well as the common class disparity seen in South Korea and rampant capitalism.

Squid Game diehards received an extra something in 2023 in the shape of Squid Game: The Challenge, a real-life game show based on the TV series. Whether that was a good idea or not is up for debate, and we had our thoughts.
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