Tag Archives: The Running Man

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A very short review of “Squid Game” (2021)

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Capping off the Halloween watchlist this year was Hwang Dong-hyuk’s “Squid Game” (2021) which was (mostly) worth the hype.  Don’t be discouraged by its campy visuals or its familiar premise.  (Deathtrap game shows have been with us since at least the 1987 adaptation of Stephen King’s “The Running Man.”)  This miniseries is truly good enough to be bingeworthy.

After a bit a slow start, there are visceral, inventive action-horror sequences and surprisingly effective character development.  There’s some good acting too — most notably by Yeong-su Oh, as an ostensibly disadvantaged older contestant in the miniseries’ eponymous contest.

The “twists” and “layers” you might have heard about might be a bit overhyped.  I predicted most of the big reveals, and I am no goddam Copernicus.  (Ask anyone.)  I actually wasn’t happy with the final reveal — I thought the story was stronger without it.

But “Squid Game” shines nonetheless, because it expertly capitalizes on the heartrending human drama that its premise allows for.  It’s an unflinching (and occasionally touching) snapshot of its creators’ view of human nature — and that’s why it’s a superior horror thriller.

sg

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And here is the latest thing that makes me feel old.

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What’s with all the people in music videos looking so damn young these days?  Did they change the child labor laws?

There was a time when I was daily viewer of MTV (the sedate stuff on VH-1 was for old people), and I rocked hard, people.  It seemed to me that whenever I watched a video, I saw people who were my own age.

Now these videos are inhabited only by people who look young enough to be my kids. And that makes sense, because … they kinda are young enough.  (Yes, I realize the video below for The Calling’s “Wherever You Will Go” was made 18 years ago, but that’s beside the point.)  If the performers in a video today were in their very early 20’s, then they’d be about the right age, if I’d fathered kids when I was 26.

Furthermore, some astute commentators pointed out online Monday night that 2019 is the year in which the original “Blade Runner” (1982) was set.  The opening title card names “November, 2019” as the time when all things Fordesque turn angsty and existential and killer-androidy.  Am I … older than Harrison Ford’s character? I am six years older than Ford was when he made the film.

Now I just feel weird.  Why do I write these blog posts, anyway?

[Update: Today I am learning that “Akira” (1988) and “The Running Man” (1987) also set their stories in 2019?! That’s ironic, given that the future we’ve come closest to is that of 2006’s “Idiocracy.”

I wonder how people in our parents’ generation felt when 2001 arrived, if they’d happened to see “2001: A Space Odyssey” in theaters in 1968.]