HoYeon Jung as Kang Sae-byeok (강새벽, Korean pronunciation:, 067), a North Korean defector.Wi Ha-joon as Hwang Jun-ho (황준호, Korean pronunciation: ), a police officer who sneaks into the game as a guard to find his missing brother.He is wanted by the police for stealing money from his clients, and racking up massive debts from bad investments. He was a junior classmate to Gi-hun, and studied at Seoul National University. Park Hae-soo as Cho Sang-woo (조상우, Korean pronunciation:, 218 ), the former head of an investment team at a securities company.He participates in the game to settle his many debts, and to prove himself financially stable enough to have custody of his daughter, who is to leave for the United States with her mother and stepfather. He lives with his mother and struggles to support his daughter financially.
Seong Gi-hun, a divorced father and indebted gambler who lives with his elderly mother, is invited to play a series of children's games for a chance at a large cash prize. Netflix is also developing a reality competition program based on Squid Game, featuring 456 players competing for a large cash prize. In June 2022, the series was renewed for a second season, which is slated to be broadcast by late 2023 or early 2024. The series has also received numerous accolades, including the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Series, Miniseries or Television Film for O Yeong-su and the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series and Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series for Lee Jung-jae and HoYeon Jung, respectively, with all three making history as the first Korean actors to win in those categories. It is Netflix's most-watched series, becoming the top-viewed program in 94 countries and attracting more than 142 million member households and amassing 1.65 billion viewing hours during its first four weeks from launch, surpassing Bridgerton for the title of most watched show. Squid Game was released worldwide on September 17, 2021, to critical acclaim and international attention. Though he had initially written it in 2009, he was unable to find a production company to fund the idea until Netflix took an interest around 2019 as part of their drive to expand their foreign programming offerings. Hwang had conceived of the idea based on his own economic struggles early in life, as well as the class disparity in South Korea and capitalism. The title of the series draws from a similarly named Korean children's game. The series revolves around a contest where 456 players, all of whom are in deep financial hardship, risk their lives to play a series of deadly children's games for the chance to win a ₩45.6 billion ( US$38 million, €33 million, or GB£29 million as of broadcast) prize. Its cast includes Lee Jung-jae, Park Hae-soo, Wi Ha-joon, HoYeon Jung, O Yeong-su, Heo Sung-tae, Anupam Tripathi, and Kim Joo-ryoung.
Squid Game ( Korean: 오징어 게임 RR: Ojing-eo Geim) is a South Korean survival drama television series created by Hwang Dong-hyuk for Netflix.