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Squid Game has ended its run with a season 3 finale that served as a second half of season 2, more or less, the overly-large season covering a single game split in two.
While there were certainly good moments in the season, episode 2, for instance, was one of the best in all three seasons of Squid Game; once we made it to the end, it was just...not a good finale, and the entire thing very much felt like it was not supposed to exist, a product of Netflix trying to milk the popular series when it should have been a one-off.
What went wrong? (Spoilers follow)
The turning point was the birth of the baby. The CGI baby who was, admittedly, halfway decent CGI, but still, a CGI baby that then had to be carried through the games as another player because the idiot VIPs thought it would be funny. This totally changed Gi-hun's mission, which was already sort of neutered after his failed rebellion as he had given up his ultimate goal of taking down the Frontman and the games.
The end here was all over the place. In a bout of incredibly bad timing, Gi-hun opts to jump off the final tower to follow the rules of the game and save the baby, first A) assuming these insane game operators will actually do anything kind with the baby (who they were willing to let die thirty seconds earlier) and B) give it billions in prize money.
The timing is poor because just minutes later, the Coast Guard and the detective arrive to storm the place, meaning if this did not happen coincidentally that close together, Gi-hun probably could have escaped with the baby if the Frontman hit the button to let them down, which seems like something he would do at that point. But the show wanted to get that Gi-hun sacrifice in there despite it meaning practically nothing.
The Frontman ends up giving this completely random baby to his brother, along with the baby's cash because well, the baby had to go somewhere since the final four episodes were based around it. I am fundamentally okay with the Frontman surviving all this, but I can't believe we got through this entire series without a single one of those deeply annoying, horrifyingly cruel VIPs getting killed. We were waiting the entire series for that, and they just...disappear in the end. I guess maybe they got blown up? We have no idea.
The Cate Blanchett cameo was the cherry on top. I suppose the idea here was to cast a recognizable actor in that role as they did on the Korean side, but it certainly was a bizarre moment to see a hugely recognizable Western actress in the last moments of the show (the only other Western actors being the abominable VIPs). As of now, there is no confirmed American spin-off coming, but obviously, that seems like something Netflix would do. Who knows if they could rope Cate Blanchett into an entire series? But the point is, the games didn't end anyway, so all of this was pointless and just left open-ended for more seasons someday or spin-offs.
I thought season 3 started strong, but it was ultimately a thrown-together mess by the end where everything jumbled together and little made sense. It also negated the entire arc of Gi-hun within minutes, which was a terrible end to his character. What a nightmare.