Netflix has officially announced the season series of Squid Game is coming, as well as a real-life Squid Game reality television series its billing as “the biggest reality competition ever.”
Season two of Squid Game has a lot banking on it. The show debuted in September and is Netflix’s most popular show ever, with 1.65 billion viewing hours in the first 28 days of release.
Creator Hwang Dong-Hyuk took twelve years to bring the first season to life, but has only had months to make the second series, while also heavily promoting the first season during awards season.
Squid Game: The Challenge, is also coming: a ten-episode reality TV series that will pit 456 players against each other in a series of games for the chance to win US$4.56 million.
Netflix is calling this “the largest lump-sum cash prize in TV history”.
“Squid Game took the world by storm with Hwang Dong-hyuk’s captivating story and iconic imagery,” said Brandon Riegg, Netflix Vice President of unscripted and documentary series.
“We’re grateful for his support as we turn the fictional world into reality in this massive competition and social experiment.
“Fans of the drama series are in for a fascinating and unpredictable journey as our 456 real world contestants navigate the biggest competition series ever, full of tension and twists, with the biggest-ever cash prize at the end.”
Netflix has signalled it expects to shed a further two million subscribers by the end of this month, on top of the 200,000 it lost in the last quarter.
It needs to pick up a number of those in shed based on the Squid Game interest, which, hopefully for the streaming giant, wasn’t a Tiger King-esque flash in the pan.
