Squid Game Reality Show Producer Says Anti-Capitalism Was Only a Minor Theme of the Series

I… hm. Huh. Hmm. I.. what? What. Huh. I’m sorry. What?

Netflix’s Squid Game reality show The Challenge—a competitive adaptation of Hwang Dong-hyuk’s dystopic, anti-capitalist thriller—has seemed like a terrible idea, even for Netflix, since it was announced. Whoever came away from the show’s gripping tale of desperate people forced to confront their humanity at the childish behest of wealthy elites and thought “well, that was good, but what if it was just the game bits?”

Squid Game: The Challenge executive producer Tim Harcourt, apparently. “For us the anti-capitalist allegory is only one very small part of Squid Game,” Harcourt recently told TV Guide. “I often say to people, Star Wars is about swashbuckling rebels overtaking an empire, but people don’t necessarily just focus on that as being about freedom or being about anti-imperialism.”

Reader, if I let any part of these two sentences sink further into my brain than they already have, much in the way a hammer would enact blunt force trauma, I will come away with permanent damage. So let’s just put aside the utterly unhinged Star Wars commentary for a moment, and wonder: what does Mr. Harcourt think Squid Game was primarily about?

“It was about how people come together when they’re required to beat the game,” Harcourt continued. “It was also about how we’re ingrained from childhood to be competitive. These games are all childhood games, and they’re super-sized and it brings out this childhood competitive spirit in everyone.”

Ah. I see. That’s how you get from Squid Game to a facile, hollow reality TV show rendition. Got it!

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