Finished watching Squid Game season 2, and considering that the first season exists perfectly fine as a self-contained story, I wasn't keeping expectations too high, but overall, I really, really liked it. Season 1 was brilliant, and impossible to top, and Season 2 doesn't do that, especially since it's only half of a season, but it's still a worthy continuation for sure.
S2 mainly suffers from the two unavoidable curses of the middle part of a trilogy: it doesn't pack the same punch as the first part, as the shock factor is not the same as when we were first discovering the games and what was actually going on there, and it doesn't offer any satisfying resolution, at least not until Season 3 comes out at some point soon-ish in 2025.
That said, it certainly takes the story to some interesting places, brings back some old characters and introduces several new ones that you can't help but be invested in and hope that, against the odds, they will get some sort of happy ending. And S2 also has its fair share of shocking, heartbreaking, but also really human moments too.
Above all, despite how commercialised the 'Squid Game' brand has become after the justified success of S1, it's good to see that the show remains focused on getting across its core message, with the symbolism and real-life parallels of the effects of insurmountable debt, greed, despair, gambling addiction, trauma, and social imbalances and division being very clear. If anything, it tones down the subtlety quite a bit, and focuses even more on the players, their incentives and the dynamic between them, and the themes of dehumanisation of those who are deemed as lesser or different.
Some scenes may have dragged a bit more than what felt necessary, and not all questions were answered, but that was to be expected since seasons 2 and 3 are basically one season split in two. But all in all, both the story and the characters remain compelling, so it is still a worthy watch with a promising setup for Season 3, and hopefully the show will stick the landing and offer a satisfying conclusion with how things eventually wrap up.
