A Real-Life 'Squid Game' Is In The Works Because We're In A Real-Life Dystopia

Netflix invites contestants to compete for a $4.56 million prize by completing the nightmare games featured in a cautionary tale about wealth disparity.
Production still from “Squid Game.”
Production still from “Squid Game.”
Noh Juhan | NetflixNetflix

Here’s just hoping Netflix execs won’t be featured on the show wearing elaborate animal masks.

The streamer announced Tuesday that a reality competition series called “Squid Game: The Challenge” based on its Korean smash-hit series “Squid Game” is in the works.

Like the original scripted series, the reality show will feature “456 real players” who “will enter the game in pursuit of a life-changing reward of $4.56 million,” according to a press release.

“As they compete through a series of games inspired by the original show — plus surprising new additions — their strategies, alliances, and character will be put to the test while competitors are eliminated around them,” it reads.

And what will these “surprising new additions” be? Hopscotch? Heads Up, Seven Up? Dodgeball With Explosives?

Well, maybe not the latter — because Netflix also noted that “in this game the worst fate is going home empty-handed.”

So it doesn’t seem like any of the actual contestants will die.

Recruitment for the series is currently open to English language speakers from anywhere in the world.

Although the reality show got the red light, green light, “Squid Game” fans have said that making the fictionalized games into a reality show misses the point of the original series’ first season. (A second season of the scripted series was also announced earlier this week.)

Season 1 of “Squid Game” is a cautionary tale about wealth disparity. In the show, financially desperate people kill one another in a series of kids’ games to win a life-changing cash prize for a few wealthy VIPs’ entertainment. “Squid Game” creator Hwang Dong-hyuk even likened one of the VIPs in the show to former President Donald Trump.

But if you’re just a pleb who wants to see actual people murder this concept on Twitter, scroll down.

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