Life imitates art, and sometimes reality takes its cues from popular TV series. Following the success of the South Korean show Squid Game, the Korean Cultural Center in Abu Dhadbi held its own set of tense challenges for players to compete in, taking inspiration from the Netflix TV series – minus all the murder.
Squid Game has taken the world by storm since releasing earlier this year. The Netflix show is reportedly the streaming services’ biggest success, having overtaken Bridgerton as the most-watched series on the platform. Telling the story of a group of players with huge debts, Squid Game revolves around characters competing in deadly children’s games for a massive cash prize. Thanks to its tense and addictive story, the show has gathered an impressive 91% on Rotten Tomatoes, and has become a global obsession.
With so much attention and acclaim surrounding the series, Squid Game was used as a jumping-off point for an event that took place in the Korean Cultural Centre in the United Arab Emirates. Two teams of 15 were made to compete in children’s games that we saw from the TV series, such as Red Light Green Light and the Dalgona Candy Challenge. However, unlike the challenges in Squid Game losing these games in real life didn’t result in death or bloodshed.
Besides using the same games seen in the show, the center’s staff also wore pink costumes, resembling the jumpsuits of the guards in the original series. The center’s website also mentioned that, like in Netflix’s series, players would win a prize if they won all the challenges. However, the amount of money and details surrounding the prize are unclear.
Seeing the survival show’s continued cultural impact and global reach is impressive, to say the least, and we are curious to see if Squid Game season 2 will be just as popular. So far, we don’t know much about the next instalment to the story. However, the series’ director, Hwang Dong-hyuk, has hinted that the police will be more involved in the next chapter.
While we wait on updates to Squid Game season 2, why not dive into some dystopian stories with our list of the best sci-fi series of all time.