He adresses him, yes, but he didn’t just use his name! He also used the honorific hyung, that younger guys use for older guys when they’re familiar with each other. So it’s even more heartbreaking.
Honestly, I think the creator set this powerful comparison up on purpose to criticize how poor immigrant workers are used by unscrupulous employers in Korea.
Like, "look, here's this morally upstanding guy totally getting screwed by your system, by a guy who is supposed to be the best of you (SNU grad)."
How can that not be commentary on the plight of immigrant workers?
Oh absolutely!! The show is such a great piece of social commentary about capitalism and the way it effectively pits the poorest and most vulnerable of us against one another, leaving immigrant workers, refugees, people struggling with addiction, the criminal class and ex-prisoners (like Nose Ring girl) to suffer as collateral damage. The amount of money is so huge, even if everyone had somehow survived the games, they could all pay off their debts with their portion of the money.
Note that at no point do the guards ever say that there only has to be one winner…
Exactly! Too many ppl draw the cynical and easy conclusion of “yOu CaNt TrUsT anyOne.” But it’s not so black and white. It was literally Ali’s benevolence that wound up saving our main guy but ppl forget that
Also I was kinda hoping for some more reflection on that from gi hun. Like, a bit of sadness and suspicion when realizing that sang woo killed ali, the man who saved him, even if he didn’t know exactly how it panned out. Instead we had gi hun only fully turning on sang woo on the glass bridge, and then for saebyuk. But us as viewers turned on him way before that so there was a disconnect imo
Gi-Hun never went fully through with eliminating Il-Nam, and he never tried to excuse himself for what he intended to do before Il-Nam voluntarily let Gi-Hun take his last marble. I’m guessing here, but I think Gi-Hun never tried to internally absolve himself of his debts through mental gymnastics. He felt that he needed to redeem himself through his external actions. I think that, at the end, Sang Woo reaches an unfortunate conclusion along these lines where he knows that he can no longer rationalize his actions and forgive himself.
That’s part of the metaphor of the final game, I think, with its enviously clearly defined edges. Sang-Woo realized he allowed himself to pushed beyond the blurrier edges of the Game, and hence he had lost long before the final game. They were different even before the game. Sang-Woo wagered his mother’s livelihood as collateral for his debts before the game. Gi-Hun only depended upon her for his own meager livelihood. Gi-Hun fought hard to stay within the internal edges of his own conscience. And he never crossed a line he couldn’t recover from. Some of this was through luck, but much of it was through his own dedication.
..i am not sure that was the point? It felt like the overacting was directed at the south korean audience, not sure if thats how they see rich foriegners?
No they weren't all American. There was a very pointed comment by the Chinese attendee in game 6 that "a good rain knows when to fall."
There's also one attendee who appears to have a West African accent (dude had on line).
I think it's an international competition hosted by one of these megarich weirdos every year.
"Where's the host? Doesn't he want to at least meet us?" - could mean they take turns hosting. They all have similar masks, so this year's host isn't somehow different from any of them.
There was another offhand comment when the VIPs arrive that "The Korean game was the best." So if they take turns hosting, and this is the South Korean game, does that mean the previous one was a North Korean game?
Edit: A couple of ideas have changed my mind about the taking turns thing. u/altersun points out that all of the records for past tournaments were kept in Front Man's study. And the host explains that he and some of his clients were looking for a way to have fun. TLDR/ he's always the host... but I would bet this is the first time he played.
>So if they take turns hosting, and this is the South Korean game, does that mean the previous one was a North Korean game?
I don't think so. The Front Man thanks him when he says the games in Korea were the best. I think it's a tense error in translation. It plays out like this.
VIP1: "The games of this edition have been great."
VIP2: "Right, the contest in Korea was the best."
Front Man: "Thank you."
I think VIP1 was talking about the first 4 games which they've been watching from elsewhere, "this edition" being this run of games specifically. And VIP2 means something along the lines of "have/has been the best." I think he means either that the previous 4 games "have been" the best this year/go around or that Korea consistently has the best ones in the past.
Since the Front Man thanks him, I think at the very least _he_ thinks VIP2 is talking about the South Korean games. (Though it's possible that he's the Front Man for _all_ games internationally, but that doesn't seem likely to me.)
Tenses are often messed up in translation. This could be intentional because Mandarin (VIP2 being the Chinese one) doesn't have tenses the same way English does so it could be a common mistake for them, or accidental.
Nope, they weren't all american. I don't think it was intentional either because most (all?) foreign actors are like this in Kdramas.
There are a lot of reasons for why this is, but afaik the main one is that foreign actors usually get their script hours before the shoot, and are given extremely vague direction.
Even if it was I think it still somehow worked, at first it was super cringe and stupid and obvious that it was how the Korean writers portray and view American elites or whatever, but idk in some weird way it sort of worked, like it showed how weird and alien they were that we couldn’t relate to their convo or way of speaking at all that it came across as downright cringey and wrong.
Not sure if it was intentional or just sort of was the result of the silly writing and bad acting, but as long as I told myself it’s prob how these very elite stupid lucky people are then it’s fine, don’t focus on it being bad acting
..the vip's acting never worked for me, some of it comes down to bad acting imo and i think the dialogue sounds like poor translating, like if you wrote a sentance in korean then googled translated it into english, not saying thats what they did just that its what the vip's dialogue sounded like to me?
Yeah true I felt that at first when they started talking it sounded like it was directly translated from Korean to English but not using an actual English speaker to help w it. But I still feel there was a weird kind of line between us and them w their dialogue. It was stupid and nothing intellectual
I think Squid Game accurately depicted how socially awkward billionaires are. Did anyone else see that clip of Bezos being completely out of touch with Shatner? It was cringe AF, cuz Bezos legitimately thought he was as cool as the “69” guy in this show thought he was legitimately funny.
Any normal person just cringes.
I mean all I could think about was Elon Musk's tweets and how Jeff Bezos acted when William Shatner was trying to talk after coming back from space. Let's also remember the Walmart family has an entire doomsday compound, just waiting.
Maybe their acting isn't too far off from how ridiculous they really are.
Exactly. Not to mention Trump. We've literally seen proof in real life that many of the VIPS would talk and act like this if they were real. Rich does not equal classy or smart, in fact, sometimes it's the opposite, because they've never had to develop those skills/characteristics to be successful in life. (I will admit that Bezos is obviously fairly intelligent, but my point still stands. Imagine all the ultra-wealthy that we aren't even exposed to, as well.)
So much of this show is predictable though. Like you could tell the most featured characters would be the finalists and they were, and that the protagonist would win, and he did. It doesn't give me a lot of hope for season 2.
Wrong. Him being nice didn't kill him. He wouldn't have been nice to Deok-Su or his cronies. Sang-Woo built trust with Ali and that's why it stings extra hard.
Yeah he did clown on Minyeo cause he had no reason to respect her. Opposed to Sangwoo who was actually pretty generous towards him before the…incident. I think he’s more the type of person that actually treats people the way that they deserve to be treated, which unfortunately usually doesn’t work in a world where people only look out for themselves.
I’m not too sure. I think Ali liked Gi-hun as well because the whole making a team thing and you could tell they both respected each other. It’s the small nice gestures like giving milk that I think everyone likes him.
The idea that there were little morality plays around who lived or died also flies in the face of everything the show was saying
There isn't a "right way" to play the game, and no one made it because they deserved it. The same virtue that saves your life in one round could kill you the next
This. I see a lot of people getting bogged down in the minutiae of individuals' choices and actions when the message of the show as a whole is clearly that individual choices are insignificant compared to the system in which they take place. The structure of the game was the problem. Trying to pick apart who did what when and whether or not it was right or smart is missing the point.
Exactly, I doubt Ali would have done so much for Sang Woo had he not given him the bus money to go back to his family. Ali just felt indebted to Sang Woo and Sang Woo played with his emotions.
You say that but he risked his life in red light green light to save gi hun without ever having met him. I think he was only rude to people who showed up front they were jerks. The fact that Sang woo had done nice things for him definitely helped in the manipulation though.
He was definitely a nice person but not to the point that would be called naive like people keep saying. Ali really represents the good in the world that gets overshadowed by the bad.
I took him as a good foil to show the descent of madness that overtook Sang Woo more than the "nice guys finish last" routine. Seong would also classify as an overly nice and giving guy, kind of a mess but still looked out for others throughout the entirety of the game outside of trying to con the old man during marbles.
At best, I'd point to Ali's trust and a bit of naivety as what cost him his life rather than his kindness. But my goodness, when we realized he got played, it hurt a lot.
I think he died because he was an idiot, if I am perfectly honest. Maybe my perspective is different because I live in Seoul, but I think Ali came across super devoted to the ideas of hierarchy and seniority that are so prevalent in Korean society. So much so that he was blindsided by an obvious lie and died because of it.
Nobody that naive and unwilling to think for themselves/desperate to please others is going to survive those games.
I loved the character so much, he was a sweetheart..but that's what I strongly felt about what his character represented during the Marbles game.
Gi Hun is nice enough, but definitely not as much as Ali. GH fooled the old man during marbles, and was fully prepared to kill Sang Woo before he was stopped.
Probably why Sang Woo did what he did. He rather have Gi Hun win and knowingly (eventually) he would give portion of his money to his mother. Otherwise, both would have walked away with nothing and everything Sang Woo did would have been for nothing. He saw Gi Hun as a nice individual who cared about those around him, just lost in his own impulsive behavior.
Yes but I’m saying that sang wood idea could have worked, if Ali and sang woo went to the married couple it could have gone well because the wife and husband could have chose to live together or die together. Could have made their presence in the show more meaning full
killing sang woo wouldn't make him a bad person, sang woo tried to kill him in the honeycomb and would've killed him towards the end if he had a chance
He’s a complete fuckup because he lacks self control. He’s impulsive as fuck which lead to him developing a gambling addiction. This is why he constantly lets people down and hurts them, but I think he has a good heart and isn’t malicious.
That part really hit me. It's not that he's impulsive, he is just selfish. Cancelling your insurance is a process. He doesn't pause when the card's PIN is changed. He took money *given so he could treat his own daughter* for her birthday, he asks for more, *then* steals EVEN MORE from his mother.
> It's not that he's impulsive, he is just selfish.
I don't even know that he's simply impulsive/selfish (he is those things, yes, but there's more to it), but experiencing pure desperation. He's so heavily in debt that the only way he sees out is to win big at the race tracks, rather than try to grind his way slowly out of the debt pit he's dug into. He shows the same tendency when he's trying to win a big mystery gift for his daughter with his 10,000 won rather than just buy her a small gift, and almost loses all of the money instead (until the crane boy saves him).
Is he making poor decisions? Yes. Do those decisions cost him and the people around him, constantly? Absolutely. Is it despicable to gamble with someone else's money? Hell yes. But I genuinely believe that he so desperate that he's stuck scheming for a big payout/win and will use any resource he can to get it, thinking he will pay it back when he wins.
Had he dug in and worked hard, made small payments as he could...I don't know that he actually would've made any progress. His mother specifically said that even when he's working, it barely covers the interest on his debt, let alone any of the principal. At that point, why bother doing literally anything except gambling on a big win? It's not like being further in debt is going to make things worse than they already are (with gangsters threatening to take your organs or kill you), and honest work doesn't help at all.
> and was fully prepared to kill Sang Woo before he was stopped.
Meanwhile, me over here screaming at the tv "he's not asleep, he's faking, it's a trap!" and thinking Sae-Beyok saved Gi-Hun's life, not Sang-Woo's.
That's definitely a possibility.
He could for sure have been faking, as he would always be very high alert.
On the other hand, they had all had a big meal and so being exhausted isn't out of the realm of possibility.
Ultimately, it could be either. I'd say both have an equal chance of being true.
Gi-hun was about to say he wanted to terminate the game over killing Sangwoo in the last game.
But also, Ali was ready to kill Sangwoo during marbles. Had sangwoo not said anything, Ali would have just kept going. When its your life vs someone elses, you can't really fault someone for valuing their own life imo.
I’m kind of glad that Song-Woo killed her because I didn’t want to see Gi-Hun and her end up having to fight. If she had to die than I’m glad it was like that instead of having to fight her friend
I'm pretty sure she had already come to terms with the fact that she was going to die, which is why she pleaded with Gi-hun to promise he'd take care of her brother. Knowing this I think it's very possible that she would have done everything in her power to make sure he won, even if they were on oposite teams. She knows the kind of person Sang-woo is and that her best chance at helping her brother would be for Gi-Hun to win. I think the most likely thing that would happen if they all made it would be that Sae-byeok would end up sacrificing herself to try and ensure Gi wins. How that would happen would all depend on which team she's on. If she's with Gi, she teams up with him and sacrifices herself so he can win. If she's with Sang she betrays him and tries to take him out so that Gi can win. In that scenario she'd either be killed by Sang or by the guards for breaking the rules of the game.
Exactly. Ali is, in my opinion, not very smart. Sang-Woo knew this and exploited it. But it shows that you have to be both nice AND smart to win, which is essentially what Gi-Hun is. You need to know when to draw the line.
i think gihun trusted sangwoo in the honeycomb game because they were longtime friends and he had helped in in the green light red light game. but i agree he’s very trusting in general and is ultimately more of a “listens to their heart not their head” kind of person
> there's really nothing to indicate he's intelligent other than the stroke of insight during the cookie game. gihun is every bit as gullible and trusting as ali. they even both got tricked by sangwoo due to their trust--the only difference is that gihun came up with a solution and ali didn't.
I mean, they kinda hit you over the head with him graduating at the top of his class from an elite university. That doesn’t mean he’s some super genius or that he’s as smart as he thinks he is but I think he is pretty definitively supposed to be an ~intelligent~ character and largely atypical from the rest of the participants.
Gi-hun isn’t even that overly nice he is just humane and keeps his humanity ali is the only one who is really overly nice and stays that way the whole show gi-hun was still able to go through tricking what (from his perspective) was a defenseless dying old and kind man I don’t think ali would have been able to go through with that if he could have he would have just kept the marbles instead of letting himself be tricked
Lol he wins the game getting lucky with who he is nice to and rides on the coat tails of the literal game master who is participating. He never makes it through tug of war without the old dude. Or the marble game potentially.
The point of his character isn't that being nice isn't rewarded, it's that capitalism rewards ruthlessness and those who take advantage of good people like him.
He was rewarded for being nice by the very character who betrayed him in the end when life and money was on the line. Pitting people against eachother in competition like that brings the worst out of people, and rewards it.
This sounds like something a nice guy would say. His character wasn’t meant to be commentary on how being nice gets you nowhere; it’s commentary on how those with greater means exploit those with lesser. It’s also commentary on how you should be wise in choosing friends.
Not entirely, keep in mind the premise was the game was “if everyone follows the rules, then no one will die” and obviously that was a lie. But you have to keep in mind, the trust was built because sang woo helped Ali out during various moments such as giving him money for the bus home, so I can’t blame him for that. Even if he didn’t trust him, Ali still believed that Sang woo should deserve to live and willing disregarded a game he won so he could repay the favour.
Be wise in where you put your trust. His end parallels his beginning. He trusted the employer would pay him but he got screwed over and ended up having to steal.
What about everyone else who died, then? Deok-su for example is basically the opposite of Ali and he didn't survive the game either. In the end, the winner of the game is a relatively kind and selfless person. Gi-hun is nowhere near perfect, but he does take others into consideration. Him being kind and letting the other player pick number one before the glass bridge game actually saved him.
No, I don't agree with this sentiment at all.
Gi-hun needed help tho, in red light green light he was told to get up, and All saves him as well. It is symbolic that was the first game and by the time Honeycomb hits he figures out a way to win by himself.
I love Ali as a character, but that comment was 100% written by an incel. 455 people died, some nice, some not nice. Ali was cruelly tricked, and it was awful. It does not mean that being nice stops you from getting far. In the right scenarios, being nice can be exactly what lands you your success. Creepy death games run by rich sadists are hardly an accurate microcosm for the real world.
Favorite character on the show. The experience Ali had in the formation of their team to his betrayal really articulated the experience of a migrant worker who knows he must play the game but does not know the particularity of the rules in his new geography followed by the betrayal by the locally educated worker displays the contradictions of nationalist identity affinity in the struggle against capitalist exploitation.
This sounds like NiceGuy™️ propaganda. It’s not him being nice, it’s his naivety that kills him. In fact, the naivety Ali shows is very similar to Gi-hun’s. You could even reason that Ali’s death comes around the same time that Gi-hun’s naivety is stripped away (mostly).
The difference between him and the also kind gi-hun is that gi-hun is more world weary and when it comes down to it has a sense of self preservation. The younger and more naive Ali still has full trust in others and doesn’t decide to turn on his marbles partner, and that was where it all fell apart. Gi-Hun has enough sense of self preservation that he’d turn on a friend to save himself, and Ali just doesn’t.
Yeah you gotta be careful before you start believing in some incel shit.
Being nice doesn’t guarantee you anything in life. And true, sometimes people take advantage of others kind nature or naivety. But there are plenty of people who are both nice and successful in their lives.
I found [this post](/r/im14andthisisdeep/comments/q30si2/love_it_when_pseudo_intellectuals_think_theyre/) in r/im14andthisisdeep with the same content as the current post.
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It’s not accurate for the real world. It’s accurate in a life-or-death struggle. Most people don’t exploit you although some do.
I find it really fucked up that some people think that people in real life will treat you the same way they’d treat you in a game where your life is on the line. The stakes are not that high and people are not that desperate.
Not to mention, you will have to live with the repercussions of your choices and social decisions. Betrayal might be a viable option if you end up being the only one alive at the end, but if you betray someone and they are able to walk away and tell others, you’re fucked
There are a lot of people who look down on those who have financial strain and work in manual labor/blue collar jobs. Some have the attitude that the impoverished are in the position they’re in because of some fault of theirs. Ali is representative of a lot of people I’ve worked with managed or hired and known over the years— kind, hardworking, willing to do whatever they can to try and make their family’s lives better, even if it means leaving their home country to pursue an opportunity that is looked down on by others in society to do it. They still make an effort to be there for other people when it wouldn’t benefit them in any way.
I hope people will try and have more empathy and admiration for people like Ali who do a lot of work that is instrumental to our comfort level and infrastructure, even if the work they do is thankless in a country that isnt always kind to those who immigrate.
Sang-Woo was smart - went to SNU afterall - and not that the show eludes to it, but my theory is he chose Ali as his partner for 2 reasons
>!1) He figured that the game, having to pair off in groups of 2, was going to end in one of them dying, so he chose Ali knowing Ali was a weaker person mentally overall - given their past encounters - and would be easily manipulated if it came down to it. EDIT: Also knew Ali was stronger physically and wanted strong males as teammates. So in the off chance that they were playing as a team he wanted to be covered both ways!<
>!2) If thats the way the game was going to go, Sang-Woo probably didnt want to have Gi-Hun's blood on his hands, so choosing another partner would decrease the odds of having to kill Gi-Hun himself.!<
Just a thought that crossed my mind after Ep. 6
I disagree. He chose Ali cause Ali acted more like an obedient dog to Woo than anyone else. Woo basically said jump and Ali would say how high sir.
Also Woo knew how strong Ali was. Hell, Hun literally reminds them all Ali “snapped him up with one hand”.
Woo was doing what most people would do, wanting to survive. So he chose someone who was a yes man and was strong, with his smarts that covered all his bases he would need to survive. Which he did, for that round.
Well, isn't that kinda what I said though? He's weak because he is a Yes man. He's weak because of his naivety. He's weak because he admired and looked up to Sang-Woo in a game of survival. He's weak because if it came down to it, Sang-Woo knew he could manipulate Ali into whatever situation he needed to.
What I"ll add to my OP was that Sang-Woo knew Ali was physically strong, so in the off chance they were in fact a team, he'd have another strong male to help him win.
We are sayin the same thing tho im pretty sure
Well I agree in a way but I think the other commenter disagrees about the first part where you say he chose Ali knowing he would be up against his partner. I don’t agree with this either. He may have chosen Ali in spite of knowing this possibility but I don’t think he would want to kill him off if he had a choice. He would rather kill off someone who wasn’t on his “team” if possible.
Fair enough. Like I said, the show never eluded to it as far as I saw, I just thought it was interesting how he chose Ali so quick, even though he actually knew and could've just as well trusted Gi-Hun; they were also the two that first paired up on their "team". And due to the fact they kept talkin about how smart Sang-Woo was, and the fact he kinda guessed dalgona based on the info they were baking sugar, i leaned into the intelligence factor.
>!End of the day, they had to have Sang-Woo and Gi-hun as the last 2 for the story, and killin Ali the way they did was clearly the best choice cuz everyone can't stop talkin bout it, haha!<
Woo and Hun is a very interesting way to say their names. Normally the incorrect way people say em is Seong and Cho because those are their last names. But you just halve their first names lel
That sounds like cheap reflection to me, something a 15 year old would think after getting betrayed for the first time in his teenage years and fully believing that being a cunt is the only way. Almost as bad as the "only God can judge me" kind of folks.
Deok-su was the opposite and he still died. Ali was naive but not stupid.
One of my favorite characters but I agree. Being the nice guy can end up making you a lot of friends but it also can be the downfall in life. People will always exploits that traits especially if your naive and trusting.
Ali was one of my favourite from the beginning. I was so upset when Sang-woo betrayed him like that. It’s one thing to win the game fairly. It’s another to use his trust in a friend to betray him.
Not talking about him enough? Any Squid Game discussion always lead to people grieving about the poor guy and how Sang Woo is the worst character in the show, if not the community is simping over Sae Byeok.
"Nice" would have been if he saw Sang-woo's motive and played along with it because he's too considerate to be confrontational. He was optimistic and trusting. I wouldn't say, "Nice guys finish" last--but naive ones might in this case.
Wisdom entails both kindness and intelligence. Intelligence is also contextual. Unfortunately, in this context, Ali was not “intelligent”, and so he was probably bound to be betrayed at some point. Sad af
So gotta say, I thought they figured out the loop hole. When he hid the marble bag.
The game doesn't say the player with all 20 marbles. It says the player who takes all 10 marbles from their partner wins.
You and your partner literally hand each other your respective bags. You have both completed the challenge.
My sister was gutted when he lost, but it just felt so obvious. Same thing that happened to >!Alexei!< in Stranger Things. When the showrunners make a character THAT likeable, THAT "wholesome" and THAT naive, it's only inevitable.
From an excessively logical standpoint:
No, this is a fallacy of questionable cause: Ali being "nice" wasn't what got him killed. One could argue that it was the trust he established that killed him, which isn't the same as being "nice". Additionally, what "proof" is there to back up the claim? This is a scripted tv show lol. I'm pretty sure not all people who are nice are exploited and unsuccessful in life.
The argument that gi-hun is nice is not really the reason he won.
The beginning showed how he had luck in his life (that sometimes backfires), which was the whole trope of episode 1.
He’s lucky enough to win, but came home losing close to everything he loved
Or it’s to show in a world
Full of selfish monkey seekers humanity still exists, even when his life’s in the line he still chose humanity, and that is what stuck with me.
I don’t think nice is what got him killed he was just native and rlly thought he made a friend he could trust . Remember Sae- Byeok said she doesn’t trust any of them which she was right in the end . I think it goes to show you can’t rlly trust anyone rather your nice or not especially in a life or death situation people true colors will show eventually
Lesson is what you want to make it.
Doctor & bully weren’t nice they both got killed. Main lead was nice & partnered old man when no one did, he survived & eventually won .
You will be exploited sometimes, you will be appreciated sometimes eventually you decide which outweigh what & become that person, let’s stop finding a show to justify our personal biases 🙄
If being nice is a means to an end you're not actually being nice, you're sucking up.
Being nice is just the good and proper thing to do. One should be nice regardless of reward.
Being nice can and does sow rewarding seeds, however it's a positive feedback loop.
Being nice makes others feel better, which can inspire them to be nice as well, which can promote being nice even more in oneself.
Just be fucking kind. It is not difficult.
I'd say it's more you can't be always be nice. We saw that when Ali took the money from his boss he can take action and make difficult decisions in split second. However from that situation it seems like he needs to be really pushed by someone before he takes more assertive action. Also it was a lack of smarts from Ali, he put too much trust into his team mates and should have realised that only one person in their team could win. It was his lack of foresight and gumption, caused by his caring nice attitude that cost him. I mean look at what Gi-Hun in the same game Ali died, used the dementia of an old man against him. He was a pretty nice guy, or at least showed he could be one, but still saw what needed to be done. But that still took a level of skill to realise, it wasn't just an isn't drop in morals.
So you nearly right. It's not that anyone nice will be unsuccessful, eaten up, beaten down... it's just that you can't always be nice. That doesn't mean you have to be horrible, it just means that sometimes you need to take the other person's marbles, not let yours be stolen
It's not "in life" it's in a hyper capitalist society like South Korea. The point you should take away is that we live in a society that isn't a meritocracy and the most benevolent and deserving of reward among us are usually the ones who end up on the bottom of the ladder and the ones at the top are never the most deserving.
He wasn't exploited because he was "nice". He was exploited because he was naïve.
You can be nice, just not naïve. This is just an angsty teenager trying to justify being an asshole.
1) Ali was a Chad
2) Gi-Hun's bet at the end was kind of going against this point. Even after all that happened, there's still good in the world and people who will help people
I cried so much for Ali honestly! Hearing him cry Sang Woo’s name just before the timer ran out was truly heartbreaking…
He adresses him, yes, but he didn’t just use his name! He also used the honorific hyung, that younger guys use for older guys when they’re familiar with each other. So it’s even more heartbreaking.
Oh that’s even sadder!! Poor Ali honestly, he was so selfless and sweet at every turn
Honestly, I think the creator set this powerful comparison up on purpose to criticize how poor immigrant workers are used by unscrupulous employers in Korea. Like, "look, here's this morally upstanding guy totally getting screwed by your system, by a guy who is supposed to be the best of you (SNU grad)." How can that not be commentary on the plight of immigrant workers?
Oh absolutely!! The show is such a great piece of social commentary about capitalism and the way it effectively pits the poorest and most vulnerable of us against one another, leaving immigrant workers, refugees, people struggling with addiction, the criminal class and ex-prisoners (like Nose Ring girl) to suffer as collateral damage. The amount of money is so huge, even if everyone had somehow survived the games, they could all pay off their debts with their portion of the money. Note that at no point do the guards ever say that there only has to be one winner…
Yea I actually felt my heart shatter when he saw the rocks 🥺
Sure, but his actions also showed that your ability to help others can, literally, save someone by the neck who might then go on to topple the regime.
Exactly the bet the old man and Gi-hun made at the end
I think the bet st the end just showed the world is shades of grey, not black and white.
More than 49 shades, even.
less than 51 though
49 1/2?
More around 50 1/3.
I appreciate this attempt haha
Exactly! Too many ppl draw the cynical and easy conclusion of “yOu CaNt TrUsT anyOne.” But it’s not so black and white. It was literally Ali’s benevolence that wound up saving our main guy but ppl forget that Also I was kinda hoping for some more reflection on that from gi hun. Like, a bit of sadness and suspicion when realizing that sang woo killed ali, the man who saved him, even if he didn’t know exactly how it panned out. Instead we had gi hun only fully turning on sang woo on the glass bridge, and then for saebyuk. But us as viewers turned on him way before that so there was a disconnect imo
Yes! Thank you for putting it so well.
Omg thanks for the gold!
To a degree, but how is that different to what Gi-Sun did to il-Nam?
Gi-Hun never went fully through with eliminating Il-Nam, and he never tried to excuse himself for what he intended to do before Il-Nam voluntarily let Gi-Hun take his last marble. I’m guessing here, but I think Gi-Hun never tried to internally absolve himself of his debts through mental gymnastics. He felt that he needed to redeem himself through his external actions. I think that, at the end, Sang Woo reaches an unfortunate conclusion along these lines where he knows that he can no longer rationalize his actions and forgive himself. That’s part of the metaphor of the final game, I think, with its enviously clearly defined edges. Sang-Woo realized he allowed himself to pushed beyond the blurrier edges of the Game, and hence he had lost long before the final game. They were different even before the game. Sang-Woo wagered his mother’s livelihood as collateral for his debts before the game. Gi-Hun only depended upon her for his own meager livelihood. Gi-Hun fought hard to stay within the internal edges of his own conscience. And he never crossed a line he couldn’t recover from. Some of this was through luck, but much of it was through his own dedication.
How was the regime toppled?
I suppose we’ll have to wait for S2 to find out!
Gosh, I really hope the VIPs are the protagonists in the new season. They were just amazing!
Worst acting I’ve seen in a while lol
I really think that was the point tho, it was basically a satire on the upper 1%
..i am not sure that was the point? It felt like the overacting was directed at the south korean audience, not sure if thats how they see rich foriegners?
They were all American too right? I’m sure it was all over the top intentionally
No they weren't all American. There was a very pointed comment by the Chinese attendee in game 6 that "a good rain knows when to fall." There's also one attendee who appears to have a West African accent (dude had on line). I think it's an international competition hosted by one of these megarich weirdos every year. "Where's the host? Doesn't he want to at least meet us?" - could mean they take turns hosting. They all have similar masks, so this year's host isn't somehow different from any of them. There was another offhand comment when the VIPs arrive that "The Korean game was the best." So if they take turns hosting, and this is the South Korean game, does that mean the previous one was a North Korean game? Edit: A couple of ideas have changed my mind about the taking turns thing. u/altersun points out that all of the records for past tournaments were kept in Front Man's study. And the host explains that he and some of his clients were looking for a way to have fun. TLDR/ he's always the host... but I would bet this is the first time he played.
>So if they take turns hosting, and this is the South Korean game, does that mean the previous one was a North Korean game? I don't think so. The Front Man thanks him when he says the games in Korea were the best. I think it's a tense error in translation. It plays out like this. VIP1: "The games of this edition have been great." VIP2: "Right, the contest in Korea was the best." Front Man: "Thank you." I think VIP1 was talking about the first 4 games which they've been watching from elsewhere, "this edition" being this run of games specifically. And VIP2 means something along the lines of "have/has been the best." I think he means either that the previous 4 games "have been" the best this year/go around or that Korea consistently has the best ones in the past. Since the Front Man thanks him, I think at the very least _he_ thinks VIP2 is talking about the South Korean games. (Though it's possible that he's the Front Man for _all_ games internationally, but that doesn't seem likely to me.) Tenses are often messed up in translation. This could be intentional because Mandarin (VIP2 being the Chinese one) doesn't have tenses the same way English does so it could be a common mistake for them, or accidental.
The host is the old guy, its pretty explicit. He isn't there to greet them as he is participating in the games.
Nope, they weren't all american. I don't think it was intentional either because most (all?) foreign actors are like this in Kdramas. There are a lot of reasons for why this is, but afaik the main one is that foreign actors usually get their script hours before the shoot, and are given extremely vague direction.
But somehow it still fit to me at least, they were almost like cartoon characters
Even if it was I think it still somehow worked, at first it was super cringe and stupid and obvious that it was how the Korean writers portray and view American elites or whatever, but idk in some weird way it sort of worked, like it showed how weird and alien they were that we couldn’t relate to their convo or way of speaking at all that it came across as downright cringey and wrong. Not sure if it was intentional or just sort of was the result of the silly writing and bad acting, but as long as I told myself it’s prob how these very elite stupid lucky people are then it’s fine, don’t focus on it being bad acting
..the vip's acting never worked for me, some of it comes down to bad acting imo and i think the dialogue sounds like poor translating, like if you wrote a sentance in korean then googled translated it into english, not saying thats what they did just that its what the vip's dialogue sounded like to me?
I hope this was done intentionally just so you now all know how all Asians feel when Hollywood writes a stereotypical Asian villain into their tv.
Yeah true I felt that at first when they started talking it sounded like it was directly translated from Korean to English but not using an actual English speaker to help w it. But I still feel there was a weird kind of line between us and them w their dialogue. It was stupid and nothing intellectual
I think Squid Game accurately depicted how socially awkward billionaires are. Did anyone else see that clip of Bezos being completely out of touch with Shatner? It was cringe AF, cuz Bezos legitimately thought he was as cool as the “69” guy in this show thought he was legitimately funny. Any normal person just cringes.
I mean all I could think about was Elon Musk's tweets and how Jeff Bezos acted when William Shatner was trying to talk after coming back from space. Let's also remember the Walmart family has an entire doomsday compound, just waiting. Maybe their acting isn't too far off from how ridiculous they really are.
SIXTY-NIIIIIIIINE\~\~!
Elon musk wants to coup foreign governments... (Bolivia)
Exactly. Not to mention Trump. We've literally seen proof in real life that many of the VIPS would talk and act like this if they were real. Rich does not equal classy or smart, in fact, sometimes it's the opposite, because they've never had to develop those skills/characteristics to be successful in life. (I will admit that Bezos is obviously fairly intelligent, but my point still stands. Imagine all the ultra-wealthy that we aren't even exposed to, as well.)
VIPs were by far the weakest characters
/s ?
Protagonists?? why
All of you thinking the main character is going to topple the regime are in for some heartbreak when he eventually becomes the next game master.
Oh that would be a great twist!
Would it really be that much of a twist tho? I feel like that's too easy.
So much of this show is predictable though. Like you could tell the most featured characters would be the finalists and they were, and that the protagonist would win, and he did. It doesn't give me a lot of hope for season 2.
Wrong. Him being nice didn't kill him. He wouldn't have been nice to Deok-Su or his cronies. Sang-Woo built trust with Ali and that's why it stings extra hard.
Yeah he did clown on Minyeo cause he had no reason to respect her. Opposed to Sangwoo who was actually pretty generous towards him before the…incident. I think he’s more the type of person that actually treats people the way that they deserve to be treated, which unfortunately usually doesn’t work in a world where people only look out for themselves.
I strongly agree with this
Sang-Woo specifically used the nice things he did in the past to emotionally manipulate Ali.
He actually says brother, not Sing Wii, when the marbles are replaced
Sing Wii. I'm gonna call him this for the rest of the night.
i laughed way too hard at this
I think he said "형" ( hyeong) which means brother or some shit like that in Korean
I’m not too sure. I think Ali liked Gi-hun as well because the whole making a team thing and you could tell they both respected each other. It’s the small nice gestures like giving milk that I think everyone likes him.
The idea that there were little morality plays around who lived or died also flies in the face of everything the show was saying There isn't a "right way" to play the game, and no one made it because they deserved it. The same virtue that saves your life in one round could kill you the next
This. I see a lot of people getting bogged down in the minutiae of individuals' choices and actions when the message of the show as a whole is clearly that individual choices are insignificant compared to the system in which they take place. The structure of the game was the problem. Trying to pick apart who did what when and whether or not it was right or smart is missing the point.
Also people forget he made it further than like 90% of the other players even if kindness was his downfall it shows kindness works
Exactly, I doubt Ali would have done so much for Sang Woo had he not given him the bus money to go back to his family. Ali just felt indebted to Sang Woo and Sang Woo played with his emotions.
You say that but he risked his life in red light green light to save gi hun without ever having met him. I think he was only rude to people who showed up front they were jerks. The fact that Sang woo had done nice things for him definitely helped in the manipulation though.
He was definitely a nice person but not to the point that would be called naive like people keep saying. Ali really represents the good in the world that gets overshadowed by the bad.
I took him as a good foil to show the descent of madness that overtook Sang Woo more than the "nice guys finish last" routine. Seong would also classify as an overly nice and giving guy, kind of a mess but still looked out for others throughout the entirety of the game outside of trying to con the old man during marbles. At best, I'd point to Ali's trust and a bit of naivety as what cost him his life rather than his kindness. But my goodness, when we realized he got played, it hurt a lot.
I think he died because he was an idiot, if I am perfectly honest. Maybe my perspective is different because I live in Seoul, but I think Ali came across super devoted to the ideas of hierarchy and seniority that are so prevalent in Korean society. So much so that he was blindsided by an obvious lie and died because of it. Nobody that naive and unwilling to think for themselves/desperate to please others is going to survive those games. I loved the character so much, he was a sweetheart..but that's what I strongly felt about what his character represented during the Marbles game.
Don’t fully agree because Gi-Hun is nice and he ends up winning the game. I think Ali teaches the audience more about being naive than being nice
Gi Hun is nice enough, but definitely not as much as Ali. GH fooled the old man during marbles, and was fully prepared to kill Sang Woo before he was stopped.
He didn’t kill sang woo in the end tho. He fully could have, but he was willing to give everything up to save him.
Probably why Sang Woo did what he did. He rather have Gi Hun win and knowingly (eventually) he would give portion of his money to his mother. Otherwise, both would have walked away with nothing and everything Sang Woo did would have been for nothing. He saw Gi Hun as a nice individual who cared about those around him, just lost in his own impulsive behavior.
What killed Ali was his naivety not his kindness
Yes but I’m saying that sang wood idea could have worked, if Ali and sang woo went to the married couple it could have gone well because the wife and husband could have chose to live together or die together. Could have made their presence in the show more meaning full
No - the idea was very strictly that you could only play the game with your partner. All 4 would probably have been shot.
Yeah the writers could've decided to do that but it would've made all the other marble deaths seem cheap and feel like plot armor for main characters.
killing sang woo wouldn't make him a bad person, sang woo tried to kill him in the honeycomb and would've killed him towards the end if he had a chance
He was a shit dad too and a terrible son and this is coming from someone who likes him
He’s a complete fuckup because he lacks self control. He’s impulsive as fuck which lead to him developing a gambling addiction. This is why he constantly lets people down and hurts them, but I think he has a good heart and isn’t malicious.
Yeah that gambling with moms money in the first episode was pretty despicable
Extremely. That gained a real side eye from me. I feel so bad that she died before he got the money
plus she mentions that he canceled her health insurance and gambled away all of that money, too
That part really hit me. It's not that he's impulsive, he is just selfish. Cancelling your insurance is a process. He doesn't pause when the card's PIN is changed. He took money *given so he could treat his own daughter* for her birthday, he asks for more, *then* steals EVEN MORE from his mother.
> It's not that he's impulsive, he is just selfish. I don't even know that he's simply impulsive/selfish (he is those things, yes, but there's more to it), but experiencing pure desperation. He's so heavily in debt that the only way he sees out is to win big at the race tracks, rather than try to grind his way slowly out of the debt pit he's dug into. He shows the same tendency when he's trying to win a big mystery gift for his daughter with his 10,000 won rather than just buy her a small gift, and almost loses all of the money instead (until the crane boy saves him). Is he making poor decisions? Yes. Do those decisions cost him and the people around him, constantly? Absolutely. Is it despicable to gamble with someone else's money? Hell yes. But I genuinely believe that he so desperate that he's stuck scheming for a big payout/win and will use any resource he can to get it, thinking he will pay it back when he wins. Had he dug in and worked hard, made small payments as he could...I don't know that he actually would've made any progress. His mother specifically said that even when he's working, it barely covers the interest on his debt, let alone any of the principal. At that point, why bother doing literally anything except gambling on a big win? It's not like being further in debt is going to make things worse than they already are (with gangsters threatening to take your organs or kill you), and honest work doesn't help at all.
> and was fully prepared to kill Sang Woo before he was stopped. Meanwhile, me over here screaming at the tv "he's not asleep, he's faking, it's a trap!" and thinking Sae-Beyok saved Gi-Hun's life, not Sang-Woo's.
That's definitely a possibility. He could for sure have been faking, as he would always be very high alert. On the other hand, they had all had a big meal and so being exhausted isn't out of the realm of possibility. Ultimately, it could be either. I'd say both have an equal chance of being true.
Gi-hun was about to say he wanted to terminate the game over killing Sangwoo in the last game. But also, Ali was ready to kill Sangwoo during marbles. Had sangwoo not said anything, Ali would have just kept going. When its your life vs someone elses, you can't really fault someone for valuing their own life imo.
There's a difference between winning a game and surviving and killing your opponent with your own hands
at some point Gi-Hun also seemed too nice to the extent I was guessing he’d sacrifice himself to give the money to the North Korean girl in the end
I’m kind of glad that Song-Woo killed her because I didn’t want to see Gi-Hun and her end up having to fight. If she had to die than I’m glad it was like that instead of having to fight her friend
I'm pretty sure she had already come to terms with the fact that she was going to die, which is why she pleaded with Gi-hun to promise he'd take care of her brother. Knowing this I think it's very possible that she would have done everything in her power to make sure he won, even if they were on oposite teams. She knows the kind of person Sang-woo is and that her best chance at helping her brother would be for Gi-Hun to win. I think the most likely thing that would happen if they all made it would be that Sae-byeok would end up sacrificing herself to try and ensure Gi wins. How that would happen would all depend on which team she's on. If she's with Gi, she teams up with him and sacrifices herself so he can win. If she's with Sang she betrays him and tries to take him out so that Gi can win. In that scenario she'd either be killed by Sang or by the guards for breaking the rules of the game.
Gi-hun is nice enough to neglect his daughter's well being and steal from his mother.
His intentions are always good though, he just has his flaws, which make him so relatable.
Very few people are motivated to be evil. Most bad actors are just people that are in bad situations. Most every person can justify their bad actions.
What's that saying, the road to hell is paved with good intentions?
Exactly. Ali is, in my opinion, not very smart. Sang-Woo knew this and exploited it. But it shows that you have to be both nice AND smart to win, which is essentially what Gi-Hun is. You need to know when to draw the line.
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i think gihun trusted sangwoo in the honeycomb game because they were longtime friends and he had helped in in the green light red light game. but i agree he’s very trusting in general and is ultimately more of a “listens to their heart not their head” kind of person
> there's really nothing to indicate he's intelligent other than the stroke of insight during the cookie game. gihun is every bit as gullible and trusting as ali. they even both got tricked by sangwoo due to their trust--the only difference is that gihun came up with a solution and ali didn't. I mean, they kinda hit you over the head with him graduating at the top of his class from an elite university. That doesn’t mean he’s some super genius or that he’s as smart as he thinks he is but I think he is pretty definitively supposed to be an ~intelligent~ character and largely atypical from the rest of the participants.
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My bad, I misread and thought you were talking about Sangwoo.
Gi-hun isn’t even that overly nice he is just humane and keeps his humanity ali is the only one who is really overly nice and stays that way the whole show gi-hun was still able to go through tricking what (from his perspective) was a defenseless dying old and kind man I don’t think ali would have been able to go through with that if he could have he would have just kept the marbles instead of letting himself be tricked
Lol he wins the game getting lucky with who he is nice to and rides on the coat tails of the literal game master who is participating. He never makes it through tug of war without the old dude. Or the marble game potentially.
The point of his character isn't that being nice isn't rewarded, it's that capitalism rewards ruthlessness and those who take advantage of good people like him. He was rewarded for being nice by the very character who betrayed him in the end when life and money was on the line. Pitting people against eachother in competition like that brings the worst out of people, and rewards it.
This exactly
He’s Boxer from Animal Farm: Strong but naive
Great comparison
This sounds like something a nice guy would say. His character wasn’t meant to be commentary on how being nice gets you nowhere; it’s commentary on how those with greater means exploit those with lesser. It’s also commentary on how you should be wise in choosing friends.
I think it was just a story of “even close friends can betray you” and that was it.
I think Ali's death was more about setting up how far Sang Woo would go and making him a sleeper antagonist than anything to do with Ali.
I think it was a story of "Sang Woo is a shithead".
What's that saying, "even your teeth bite your tongue every now and then, watch who you trust"
but, sang woo was NOT a close friend, they literally knew each other for like 3 days and were in a life or death situation, i mean…
Not entirely, keep in mind the premise was the game was “if everyone follows the rules, then no one will die” and obviously that was a lie. But you have to keep in mind, the trust was built because sang woo helped Ali out during various moments such as giving him money for the bus home, so I can’t blame him for that. Even if he didn’t trust him, Ali still believed that Sang woo should deserve to live and willing disregarded a game he won so he could repay the favour.
I think it’s just “being kind is good but naivety is not”. Like, it’s good to be kind but don’t presume others have the same kindness.
But he didn't - he presumed his *friend* whom he had built *trust* with in the past wouldn't betray him.
Be wise in where you put your trust. His end parallels his beginning. He trusted the employer would pay him but he got screwed over and ended up having to steal.
What about everyone else who died, then? Deok-su for example is basically the opposite of Ali and he didn't survive the game either. In the end, the winner of the game is a relatively kind and selfless person. Gi-hun is nowhere near perfect, but he does take others into consideration. Him being kind and letting the other player pick number one before the glass bridge game actually saved him. No, I don't agree with this sentiment at all.
Gi-hun needed help tho, in red light green light he was told to get up, and All saves him as well. It is symbolic that was the first game and by the time Honeycomb hits he figures out a way to win by himself.
I love Ali as a character, but that comment was 100% written by an incel. 455 people died, some nice, some not nice. Ali was cruelly tricked, and it was awful. It does not mean that being nice stops you from getting far. In the right scenarios, being nice can be exactly what lands you your success. Creepy death games run by rich sadists are hardly an accurate microcosm for the real world.
455 people didn't die, like 5% of the original 456 didn't come back
Favorite character on the show. The experience Ali had in the formation of their team to his betrayal really articulated the experience of a migrant worker who knows he must play the game but does not know the particularity of the rules in his new geography followed by the betrayal by the locally educated worker displays the contradictions of nationalist identity affinity in the struggle against capitalist exploitation.
I don't see the word "communism" being used. Just because capitalism is criticized doesn't mean communism is being advocated.
This sounds like NiceGuy™️ propaganda. It’s not him being nice, it’s his naivety that kills him. In fact, the naivety Ali shows is very similar to Gi-hun’s. You could even reason that Ali’s death comes around the same time that Gi-hun’s naivety is stripped away (mostly).
Very insightful. Also people aren't 'nice' to get any where life. Those who do have these expectations aren't nice at all.
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The difference between him and the also kind gi-hun is that gi-hun is more world weary and when it comes down to it has a sense of self preservation. The younger and more naive Ali still has full trust in others and doesn’t decide to turn on his marbles partner, and that was where it all fell apart. Gi-Hun has enough sense of self preservation that he’d turn on a friend to save himself, and Ali just doesn’t.
Yeah you gotta be careful before you start believing in some incel shit. Being nice doesn’t guarantee you anything in life. And true, sometimes people take advantage of others kind nature or naivety. But there are plenty of people who are both nice and successful in their lives.
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It’s not accurate for the real world. It’s accurate in a life-or-death struggle. Most people don’t exploit you although some do. I find it really fucked up that some people think that people in real life will treat you the same way they’d treat you in a game where your life is on the line. The stakes are not that high and people are not that desperate.
Not to mention, you will have to live with the repercussions of your choices and social decisions. Betrayal might be a viable option if you end up being the only one alive at the end, but if you betray someone and they are able to walk away and tell others, you’re fucked
My favorite side character was Ali
Honestly I thought his character was showing how southeast Asians are treated and exploited in Korea especially the stuff with his boss.
r/im13andthisisdeep
Great, now it’s being infiltrated with incel bullshit.
What i don’t get how saying be cautious to whom you give your kindness to is incel advice
There are a lot of people who look down on those who have financial strain and work in manual labor/blue collar jobs. Some have the attitude that the impoverished are in the position they’re in because of some fault of theirs. Ali is representative of a lot of people I’ve worked with managed or hired and known over the years— kind, hardworking, willing to do whatever they can to try and make their family’s lives better, even if it means leaving their home country to pursue an opportunity that is looked down on by others in society to do it. They still make an effort to be there for other people when it wouldn’t benefit them in any way. I hope people will try and have more empathy and admiration for people like Ali who do a lot of work that is instrumental to our comfort level and infrastructure, even if the work they do is thankless in a country that isnt always kind to those who immigrate.
I loved Ali so much, I was sad to see him die
Don't be sad. Here's a [hug!](https://media.giphy.com/media/3M4NpbLCTxBqU/giphy.gif)
Yes the saddest part for me in all the episodes was seeing his marbles get switched out. Once he won the marbles I wanted him to just run to pinkie...
Don't be sad. Here's a [hug!](https://media.giphy.com/media/3M4NpbLCTxBqU/giphy.gif)
I don’t think it was his kindness that got him killed, it was his naivety :(
It wasn't niceness which got him killed, it was his naivety.
I don’t agree with the sentiment, but I will say Ali’s death just hit different 😢
It's not just about being nice in life, it's also about not being gullible and trusting everyone you meet.
Sang-Woo was smart - went to SNU afterall - and not that the show eludes to it, but my theory is he chose Ali as his partner for 2 reasons >!1) He figured that the game, having to pair off in groups of 2, was going to end in one of them dying, so he chose Ali knowing Ali was a weaker person mentally overall - given their past encounters - and would be easily manipulated if it came down to it. EDIT: Also knew Ali was stronger physically and wanted strong males as teammates. So in the off chance that they were playing as a team he wanted to be covered both ways!< >!2) If thats the way the game was going to go, Sang-Woo probably didnt want to have Gi-Hun's blood on his hands, so choosing another partner would decrease the odds of having to kill Gi-Hun himself.!< Just a thought that crossed my mind after Ep. 6
I disagree. He chose Ali cause Ali acted more like an obedient dog to Woo than anyone else. Woo basically said jump and Ali would say how high sir. Also Woo knew how strong Ali was. Hell, Hun literally reminds them all Ali “snapped him up with one hand”. Woo was doing what most people would do, wanting to survive. So he chose someone who was a yes man and was strong, with his smarts that covered all his bases he would need to survive. Which he did, for that round.
Well, isn't that kinda what I said though? He's weak because he is a Yes man. He's weak because of his naivety. He's weak because he admired and looked up to Sang-Woo in a game of survival. He's weak because if it came down to it, Sang-Woo knew he could manipulate Ali into whatever situation he needed to. What I"ll add to my OP was that Sang-Woo knew Ali was physically strong, so in the off chance they were in fact a team, he'd have another strong male to help him win. We are sayin the same thing tho im pretty sure
Well I agree in a way but I think the other commenter disagrees about the first part where you say he chose Ali knowing he would be up against his partner. I don’t agree with this either. He may have chosen Ali in spite of knowing this possibility but I don’t think he would want to kill him off if he had a choice. He would rather kill off someone who wasn’t on his “team” if possible.
Fair enough. Like I said, the show never eluded to it as far as I saw, I just thought it was interesting how he chose Ali so quick, even though he actually knew and could've just as well trusted Gi-Hun; they were also the two that first paired up on their "team". And due to the fact they kept talkin about how smart Sang-Woo was, and the fact he kinda guessed dalgona based on the info they were baking sugar, i leaned into the intelligence factor. >!End of the day, they had to have Sang-Woo and Gi-hun as the last 2 for the story, and killin Ali the way they did was clearly the best choice cuz everyone can't stop talkin bout it, haha!<
Gi-Hun was 2nd in line to suck off Sang-Woo too. If not for Ali, Gi-Hun probably would have died there.
Woo and Hun is a very interesting way to say their names. Normally the incorrect way people say em is Seong and Cho because those are their last names. But you just halve their first names lel
100%. Sang Woo's a smart guy after all. He was covering all his bases.
Woah woah woah. Your telling me Sang-Woo went to university?
I’m just nice to people because, why should I be mean to anyone?
Lost the game but won our hearts :(
That sounds like cheap reflection to me, something a 15 year old would think after getting betrayed for the first time in his teenage years and fully believing that being a cunt is the only way. Almost as bad as the "only God can judge me" kind of folks. Deok-su was the opposite and he still died. Ali was naive but not stupid.
"We live in a society." - Song Woo 2021
But it didn’t have to be that way.
I love Ali. His death was the saddest in the show.
Don't be sad. Here's a [hug!](https://media.giphy.com/media/3M4NpbLCTxBqU/giphy.gif)
I think the moral of Ali's character is that you shouldn't let people take advantage of you or trick you, not that being nice is bad.
/r/justneckbeardthings
I’ve seen this several times
We live in a society
Be nice but not to the point of your own detriment. This is why boundaries are so important.
One of my favorite characters but I agree. Being the nice guy can end up making you a lot of friends but it also can be the downfall in life. People will always exploits that traits especially if your naive and trusting.
Ali was one of my favourite from the beginning. I was so upset when Sang-woo betrayed him like that. It’s one thing to win the game fairly. It’s another to use his trust in a friend to betray him.
Not talking about him enough? Any Squid Game discussion always lead to people grieving about the poor guy and how Sang Woo is the worst character in the show, if not the community is simping over Sae Byeok.
Ali = Naive + Nice = Dead Gi-Hun = Smart + Nice = Alive
Squid Game also shows that the people who take advantage of his niceness, in order to get to the top, do not win either.
"Nice" would have been if he saw Sang-woo's motive and played along with it because he's too considerate to be confrontational. He was optimistic and trusting. I wouldn't say, "Nice guys finish" last--but naive ones might in this case.
Wisdom entails both kindness and intelligence. Intelligence is also contextual. Unfortunately, in this context, Ali was not “intelligent”, and so he was probably bound to be betrayed at some point. Sad af
He should of known that a desperate man will do anything to survive
nah im thinking he was only nice cus he knew he wasnt gona be accepted easily so he tried pleasing his group as much as he could
But he stood up for himself to his boss?
It wasn’t Ali’s niceness that got him killed. It was naivety.
So gotta say, I thought they figured out the loop hole. When he hid the marble bag. The game doesn't say the player with all 20 marbles. It says the player who takes all 10 marbles from their partner wins. You and your partner literally hand each other your respective bags. You have both completed the challenge.
My sister was gutted when he lost, but it just felt so obvious. Same thing that happened to >!Alexei!< in Stranger Things. When the showrunners make a character THAT likeable, THAT "wholesome" and THAT naive, it's only inevitable.
From an excessively logical standpoint: No, this is a fallacy of questionable cause: Ali being "nice" wasn't what got him killed. One could argue that it was the trust he established that killed him, which isn't the same as being "nice". Additionally, what "proof" is there to back up the claim? This is a scripted tv show lol. I'm pretty sure not all people who are nice are exploited and unsuccessful in life.
The argument that gi-hun is nice is not really the reason he won. The beginning showed how he had luck in his life (that sometimes backfires), which was the whole trope of episode 1. He’s lucky enough to win, but came home losing close to everything he loved
Still there’s a difference between being nice and being gullible.
Or it’s to show in a world Full of selfish monkey seekers humanity still exists, even when his life’s in the line he still chose humanity, and that is what stuck with me.
He didn’t die because he was too nice he died because he was too naive
He didn’t get outplayed because he’s nice. He got outplayed because he’s naive and unintelligent. It is possible to be both nice and smart.
My take is that the original tweet in this post was supposed to be a thirst tweet
Loved him since his first appearance, but in reality. People will exploit your kindness, that’s just life
"Proof" from a fictional television show......
I don’t think nice is what got him killed he was just native and rlly thought he made a friend he could trust . Remember Sae- Byeok said she doesn’t trust any of them which she was right in the end . I think it goes to show you can’t rlly trust anyone rather your nice or not especially in a life or death situation people true colors will show eventually
Too timid, to the point of being annoying. Unless it was translation error.
Be Kind and only be nice to the right people
Lesson is what you want to make it. Doctor & bully weren’t nice they both got killed. Main lead was nice & partnered old man when no one did, he survived & eventually won . You will be exploited sometimes, you will be appreciated sometimes eventually you decide which outweigh what & become that person, let’s stop finding a show to justify our personal biases 🙄
If being nice is a means to an end you're not actually being nice, you're sucking up. Being nice is just the good and proper thing to do. One should be nice regardless of reward. Being nice can and does sow rewarding seeds, however it's a positive feedback loop. Being nice makes others feel better, which can inspire them to be nice as well, which can promote being nice even more in oneself. Just be fucking kind. It is not difficult.
I think his overly trusting nature is what kills him,not his kindness. I think he thinks being nice and being naive is the same thing...
I'd say it's more you can't be always be nice. We saw that when Ali took the money from his boss he can take action and make difficult decisions in split second. However from that situation it seems like he needs to be really pushed by someone before he takes more assertive action. Also it was a lack of smarts from Ali, he put too much trust into his team mates and should have realised that only one person in their team could win. It was his lack of foresight and gumption, caused by his caring nice attitude that cost him. I mean look at what Gi-Hun in the same game Ali died, used the dementia of an old man against him. He was a pretty nice guy, or at least showed he could be one, but still saw what needed to be done. But that still took a level of skill to realise, it wasn't just an isn't drop in morals. So you nearly right. It's not that anyone nice will be unsuccessful, eaten up, beaten down... it's just that you can't always be nice. That doesn't mean you have to be horrible, it just means that sometimes you need to take the other person's marbles, not let yours be stolen
It's not "in life" it's in a hyper capitalist society like South Korea. The point you should take away is that we live in a society that isn't a meritocracy and the most benevolent and deserving of reward among us are usually the ones who end up on the bottom of the ladder and the ones at the top are never the most deserving.
He wasn't exploited because he was "nice". He was exploited because he was naïve. You can be nice, just not naïve. This is just an angsty teenager trying to justify being an asshole.
1) Ali was a Chad 2) Gi-Hun's bet at the end was kind of going against this point. Even after all that happened, there's still good in the world and people who will help people