Entertainment 6 – Season 3: We have not hated the players, but it is enough for the old Netflix global phenomenon coming to an end (is it?) With a confusing, unsatisfactory season – and a special participation in the New Writing

Formerly, a special participation in the final scene of Round 6 would have been exciting, and very consistent with the status of the drama of Netflix as the largest and most commented series on the planet. But now – after a second season that seemed to exist just because its creator was badly paid in doing the first, and a third slow and disappointing season – the scene sounds more like a nostalgic memory of the success that the series was in its first year.

Or perhaps, as a cynical attempt to keep the franchise alive, even with clear public disinterest since season two. But we will return to the very special guest and what your presence may or may not mean for the future of Round 6. Before, we need to talk about Anticlimax that was this season to this point.

This text contains spoilers of the third and last season of Round 6now available in Netflix.

The problem of season two was not just that HWANG DONG-HYUK He seemed to have exhausted what he had to say about income inequality and the monstrosity of ultraricos, expressed in the violent and grotesque versions of children’s play by which the – indebted players – competed.

It was that the decision to share an idea designed for a single season destroyed the relentless rhythm and the tension that made the first so engaging, even with its dark theme. Games that once started and finished in a single episode now dragged on two, or just didn’t happen. And the season spent an absurd time on survivors’ votes deciding whether they were still in the game or shared the prize equally.

Somehow the third season insists even more on voting. There is a vote in the first episode. In the third. In the fifth. At one point, players stop in the middle of a game to vote. It’s amazing how much time is dedicated to this – mainly because we know that the game can’t end early, or there would be no more season.

In one of the votes, the camera cuts to the luxurious box where the vip billionaires follow and bet on games, and one of them really says: “Walked the vote this year? Very fun!” and another, amendment: “More exciting than the games themselves!” It is difficult to know if Hwang is being ironic or if it is a direct comment on the concessions made to the Netflix to have more episodes diluted longer. In any case, These votes drain all the energy of the series – And she never completely recovers.

Six months have passed since season two – which today is almost a short interval, considering that large series (like Round 6between the 1st and 2nd) disappear for years. Still, six months is a long time to remember who is who in a series with dozens of characters, many of them wearing the same overalls or masks.

Lee Jung-JAE remains striking as Seong Gi-hunour protagonist from the beginning. Some newcomers soon stand out, such as the trans character CHO HYUN-JO (Park Sung-Hoon) and the double mother and son JANG GEUM-JA (Kang ae-shim) and Park Yong-Sik (YANG DONG-GUN). But many of the conflicts depend on past relationships that require an explanatory video in the Youtube or a guide from Wikipedia open to accompany.

A key moment of the final episode involves Park Min -u (Lee David) Having a hallucination with a player who he let him die in season two – scene that loses impact if you don’t remember who is who.

And, strangely, most finalists – taking Gi-hunthe baby under his care after the death of his mother, and the child’s father, the crypton Lee Myung-gi (Im si-wan) – These are undeveloped characters, which empties any emotion in the inevitable betrayals of the final stretch.

When Gi-hun suicide to ensure that the baby (now a “player” in place of the mother) survives, the moment should be grand – especially with the impeccable performance of Lee Jung-JAE – But the season is so breathless that the impact of the scene, and its last words (“We are not horses! We are human! And human are …”), ends up being smaller than it should.

Even the action subplots involving out -of -game characters do not result in much. The North Korean Desertor Kang no-Eul (Park Gyu-Young) invades the front man’s office, also known as HWANG IN-HO (Lee byung-hun), to burn all the records of the players – but that is nothing, because In-hole explodes the entire base of the game when finding that his police brother, HWANG JUN-HO(Wi ha-jon), located the island and brought the coast guard there.

June even point a gun to In-holebut don’t shoot-and it’s not clear if it’s because it is holding the baby on your lap or because, even after all the atrocities you saw your brother commit, June It still can’t kill him.

The epilogue is relatively discreet: we see that No-Eul He survived his injuries and got a clue about his daughter who believed he was dead. In-hole leaves the baby – and the whole prize in cash, as it is technically the winner of the current edition of the Squid Game – under the care of Juneand travel to Los Angeles in order to deliver what is left of the gains of Gi-hun from the game before your distant daughter.

No punishment falls on it, nor about the VIPs, the guards, or any other figure in the organization. This may match the central themes that Hwang I wanted to explore, but it is dramatically unsatisfactory for a series with such a pulp and exaggerated aesthetics.

While In-hole is being carried away from the house of the daughter of Gi-hunhe hears a familiar sound from a close alley and sees a woman in a suit playing Ddakji with a man who is clearly in extreme poverty – just as they were Gi-hun and the others when they entered the game.

In-hole It is surprised to see that, suggesting that not even him, with his high position in the organization, knows everything that is happening. He exchanges looks with the new version of the “recruiter” he has already employed, and she is …

… The winner of two Oscars Cate Blanchett. She faces In-hole It is cold – it is not known if she recognizes that they are, in a way, on the same side – but it is clear that he is very well dressed to be a possible participant. Then she slaps the new candidate again, every time he misses the game.

Why Blanchett Are you here? Is she just a big fan of the series? Did you ask your agent to accept it on any role that involved suits? (She didn’t take the third Oscar for Okaybut perhaps the costume has been enough reward.) Or is that just the Netflix Showing that you can call a consecrated movie star to make a tip at the end of one of its greatest productions?

Or is Blanchett here to launch Round 6: Los Angeles?

For now, a source near the production said the end It was not planned to open new stories “at this time”a flexible phrase that can mean anything. Perhaps this “moment” is “July 2025”, and after the fireworks of Independence Day, the Netflix Announce an American spin-off. Perhaps it is just an idea stored in the drawer if the copies of Yellowstoneas Ransom Canyon and The pier cannot keep the subscriber base after the big successes as Round 6 and Stranger Thingscome to an end.

Or maybe it’s just a fun participation of a famous fan – and also a form of HWANG DONG-HYUK Make it clear that this kind of sin does not disappear so easily from the earth.

THE Round 6 It may need to disappear from South Korea for a while, but there are poor people in every corner of the world, feeling the weight of an oppressive system that exists to benefit those who bet on bloody sports (and, for some reason, gets excited about voting). This new recruiter is not so sense to use Ddakjiinstead of a more typically American game, but a lot in the series should not be taken to the letter.

Round 6 It has always seemed planned as a short and self -sufficient work. But it was created in an industry where success inevitably leads to excess – and where a success is rarely allowed to leave the scene when it makes more creative sense.

The idea of ​​the series does not seem to be supported to become a franchise – as we have seen with Round 6: The Challengea reality show that completely ignored the purpose of the original work. The final scene suggests that as long as there are desperate people, there will always be room for a new game. And as long as there are equally desperate streaming executives, there will always be a chance of a unnecessary spin-off-even if, for now, nothing is officially in the plans.

Also read: the 9 best films of the 21st century, according to Bong Joon-ho

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