I know some people are watching, what do we think so far?

Clayton, someone in the ndim org sphere is in the cast! 120!

It's been pretty fun.

I found the editing so cringey at first that I almost stopped during ep 1, but I'm glad I stuck with it. I wish there were more compelling characters but the challenges have been really good. I thought it'd be handicapped by the contestants already knowing the challenges ahead of time, but the twists they add to it makes them feel fresh

The mid-season cliffhanger was great, looking forward to the rest

Spoiler

+

the marbles twist was great, surprised more didn't see it coming (although maybe they just didn't show the ones who figured it out). Especially thought the mom and son would split up, even before the reveal I thought they should've 432 was a good villain, I was sad to see him go out so early. Need MORE like that! Especially going out on the battleship challenge was kinda BS, that's the one challenge I hated. I get why they skipped tug-of-war but wish they would've found a better replacement. All that talk of "strategy" made me roll my eyes so hard...there's like NO strategy in Battleship. That's 99% random luck My favorite part without a doubt was the Team Umbrella captain having an absolute breakdown during that challenge. Like I felt kinda bad but god what a spectacle. Imagine having your family and friends back home watching you on the ground sobbing and dry heaving while you and most of your "team" gets eliminated around you. Brutal

Spoiler	+
I really wanted to find the gif of him looking over at 101’s cookie as it’s broken with the funniest face ever.

It was... uh, ok. I will definitely finish the rest when it comes out. The amount of people trying to compare it to the actual show are very silly. It is cool to see real people play the show out and that's about it for me.

Spoiler

+

I was rooting for Rick and Stephen a lot so I was pretty gutted to see them eliminated and in such a... really flat way. Which is the problem with this show big time so far. You have your biggest villain go out in battleship to absolutely no fanfare. They build up Kyle as a snake only for him to go out in the cookie challenge to not buzz. Editing in general in this show is just really weird. They keep building up these big characters who just... get eliminated. I get the point of Squid Game is that anybody could die/get eliminated at any time, but this is a reality show that has 456 people to choose from when you're building stories and now it feels like the only ones who have been built up significantly entering the second half of the show is the mom and son, who are inevitably about to be split up in the first episode due to marbles.

Spoiler

+

But if you look at the actual show, we didn't get the first major death until Marbles. Obviously quite a few side characters got killed in the meantime but the first one that really hit you was 001 and 199's demises. And man was I looking forward to Stephen/Rick being paired up in marbles, that would have been great. I think they did pretty good with some of the smaller arcs. Like the umbrella man's quick demise, the girl who was an "expert at battlehsip", Trey being devestated at Figgy not returning from a game, Stephen's best friend pretty much going out first. But it just feels like too many major characters are already gone and especially due to these dumb "tests" in the dorms. Not a fan of those at all and I feel like they go against the spirit of the game. If Bryton didn't randomly go out in battleship, he was guaranteed to be eliminated in one of these dumb vote offs and that would have been even worse. Imagine Jang Deok-su just getting "voted out" in the show? lol. The whole thing just feels too reality TV-esque and encourages people to be invisible and boring so they don't stand out and get eliminated randomly. I'll stop bitching though as I'm definitely going to finish it regardless.

Through ep 5

Spoiler

+

I'm kinda....loving it? It feels so fresh to me, especially the way it's edited tbh. I'm definitely sad to see Stephen and Rick go and was a bit bummed to see Bryton* or whatever have such a lame elimination (biggest nitpick with the show so far is the poor people being eliminated in Battleship having absolutely no say). But at the same time, when you get behind the idea that these first five episodes were less about building up the endgame contenders and more about building up the people who get eliminated early in brutal or savage or sad ways, it's way easier to stomach *Hated Bryton ftr, couldn’t wait to see him leave. Kinda just wish he fucked up and embarrassed himself instead of luck I looove the way having a ton of players allows them to tell quick stories about people's swift demise. The chocolate muffin guy, that weird doctor, the other mullet man and his carrot peeling partner, Stephen's best friend, SPENCER, the guy who pretended to wanna leave, the guy who got the reward, the people who got eliminated by not agreeing to the cookie shape, Dash, Lorenzo, etc. I also love how you start to remember obscure background characters for tiny things they were involved in earlier in the show. I'm always like "oh yeah that guy was the one who did xyz". That's how I felt watching Squid Game too SHOCKED people didn't split up for the picnic, I guess they were really tricked but it seemed so obvious. Very sad to have to see the mother and son split up now though, I hope whoever survives it goes on to win. But they prob won't! The Spencer sequence was by far my favorite, poor guy lol. The lean to look at mullet's broken cookie that Dyl mentioned was the funniest fucking thing

Watched to Ep 9!

Spoiler

+

What a random final three lol. Although I do LIKE all three of them. I feel like Sam was 100% invisible until this back half of episodes but I 100% remember seeing him in the background since the first episode and he was the one invisible character I was rooting for, so to see him not only suddenly get character development but actually have a chance to win is pretty funny. I liked Mai a bunch throughout this stretch and... did not understand why Ashley wasn't considered more of a villain for what she did? She literally fucked Trey over and disregarded what everyone agreed upon. I was shocked everyone was mad at Mai for giving her a taste of her own medicine. She is an awful liar though. Sam asking who eliminated Roland was hilarious. "Did... you give Roland the gift?" "Me? No..." "Who did you give yours to?" "Oh.... uh.... who did I give it to?" Yiiiikes. Her nailing down the English dude was a pretty great moment too. This was great! Much better back half to the series. Smaller cast allowed for some more rich development to the characters and the games were all very good. Marbles was as great as I expected it to be. Glass bridge was so tense to watch and I really enjoyed the way they gave out numbers. TJ's big ol' inspiring speech turning into him getting Russell Franklin'd on the first jump was absolutely hysterical. I fucking died. And the rest of the bridge was very tense. Some GREAT people eliminated in that game too.. which is how it should be! And that gift challenge was actually very fun. Still not a fan of the random ass vote offs. Although the schoolyard pick em' was a little bit better than just outright being able to eliminate someone, so I did enjoy that portion as it gave everyone a chance instead of just putting one person's fate in another's. Was a sad way to see Dan get eliminated, though I guess it was poetic since that whole alliance was pretty much gutted at that point. And RIP to that poor ORGer who never even got a line through the whole show. Definitely get that a big purge like that was necessary heading into the final stretch however. I'm pretty excited for the finale and I'm rooting heavily for Sam

I found the first 5 eps to be some of the most unsatisfying of any reality competition show I've seen in a while. I do think there were a couple compelling characters, but the majority of them get eliminated by luck and other bs. Who thought random chance box openings, or randomly giving ppl the power to eliminate one person would be satisyfing? Instead of rewarding the players based on their skills, they are punished for standing out in ANY way. And that battleship competition... I know these shows aren't fair, but yikes at taking away the agency of your players. Really bad decisions from the creators unless their goal was to create an unfair, unsatisfying, rng type show.

Finale

Spoiler

+

Yeah that was sadly anticlimactic. On one hand I get it and I understand why they leaned on luck things here and there, it seemed like it was meant to highlight how silly the whole thing was, like the fact that it was all based on kids games. The actual show had a lot of luck too, whether or not you get the umbrella, which order you go on glass bridge, etc. They obviously sat down and were like...if some of these are gonna be dumb luck then let's continue that trend. Kinda highlights the cruel joke - so many people competing for the largest prize ever but it takes little to no actual skill to make it through and maybe win BUT! I'm still not sure I love the decision, I would rather see soooome opportunity for skill or bluffing or social maneuvering in every single challenge. Like the present one was pretty perfect. The dice one was bad because the players made it bad tbf, that would've been a lot of fun if they didn't kumbaya it. But these finale two were meh. I think they made a big mistake making us wait a week for this, it should've aired last week with the other batch of episodes, it just wasn't strong enough to wait for Thrilled that Mai won though, she really emerged as the star in the second half. I especially liked her during the present game, her reads were great and that Roland cut was pretty fucking hardcore. Phill and Sam were cool too but she deserved it I liked the cheesy ending montage showing everyone 'alive and well'. I wish they showed MIKIE! Guy was robbed, he was emerging as one of my favorites. I also loved Chad and Bee down the stretch. Highlight of that segment was showing Spencer enjoying a nice cookie. Highlight of the entire show was the Spencer arc tbh Overall really enjoyed it for how dumb it was, I thought it had no shot of being interesting when it was first announced but it won me over pretty quickly. The production was pretty impressive (controversies aside I guess) and the way they followed the show was perfect. Very interested to see what they do for s2

I was pleased with the winner. It was very anticlimactic but not sure if it was because we had to wait a week just for that lol