#k horror

[bitchy-peachy]

Rewatched Phone (2002) South Korean, has English subtitles.

Since sharing is caring! Here's a link.

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[ink-pocket]

Do know what's really scary? You want to forget something. Totally wipe it off your mind. But you never can. It can't go away, you see.

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[pigeonfrog]

WIP I will finish tomorrow

[murderofdraculas]

A Tale of Two Sisters '2003

DP: Lee Mo-gae

Dir: Kim Jee-woon

[agentnico]

Squid Game - Season 3 (2025) review

Anyone recall that rumour of Hollywood A-lister Leonardo DiCaprio being cast as one of the VIPs in the final season of Squid Game? Look, this just reiterates to not believe everything you see on the internet, but I was at least hoping that based on the criticism of the original season that they’d cast more apt actors as the VIPs this time around. Well they are indeed back, but nope, they are as awkward as ever! Hey, at least you can’t blame this show for lack of consistency, for better or worse.

Plot: The last time Squid Game saw Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), he was at his lowest — physically and emotionally. The Korean drama’s protagonist ends the Season 2 finale lying on the ground, grieving the sudden death of his closest friend, Jung-bae (Lee Seo-hwan), and the failure of his attempted rebellion. Now it’s time for Gi-hun to stand up again. Squid Game Season 3 reveals the final chapters of Player 456’s story.

Creator Hwang Dong-hyuk seems to have run out of things to say about income inequality and the monstrousness of the ultra-rich, as dramatised in the nasty, violent, winner-take-all series of exaggerated children’s games that its economically threatened contestants played. It was the decision to split what was clearly designed as a one-season story into two that utterly wrecked the relentless momentum and suspense that had made Season One so exciting, despite the bleakness of its subject matter. Games that once would have begun and ended in a single episode were sometimes spread over two, or episodes didn’t feature any games at all. And that season (2) devoted, so, so, so, so much time to the survivors voting after each game on whether they should continue playing or split the current prize money equally. 

With Season 3, even though there are even less episodes, there is somehow even more voting. There’s a vote in the first episode. In the third. In the fifth. At one point, the players stop to conduct a vote in the middle of a game. It’s staggering how much time is devoted to these things, especially since we know the game can’t end early or there’s no rest of the season. During one of the votes, we cut to the posh viewing room where the evil billionaire VIPs gamble on the winner, and one of them really says, “Watching the voting this year? So fun!” And another of them really says, “Oh, it was more exciting than the actual games!” It’s hard to tell if Hwang actually believes this, or if he put in that exchange as a sarcastic message about compromises he might have had to make on behalf of Netflix’s desire for more episodes spaced out over a longer period of time. Regardless, each vote sucks all the energy out of the show, and it never fully comes back later. 

At least in Season 2 we had contestants and characters with some level of moral decency that you could root for. Yet in Season 3 any likeable character is quickly disposed of by the first half, leaving you with all the leftover despicable bastards to deal with, as such getting rid of any level of suspense or care by the end since you don’t actually mind if any of the final contestants snuff it. Oh, and watch out for some very cheap and uninspired uses of CGI for a dog and more notably a baby, with the latter playing a fairly big part this season, yet the special effects on it were almost disastrous. Again, we are supposed to care for this baby, but I’d say it’s up there on Twilight: Breaking Dawn level of bad. The only two characters/performances worth mentioning are Lee Jung-Jae as our hero Gi-Hun and the villainous Front Man played by Korean acting legend Lee Byung-Hun. The latter I am endlessly impressed with no matter what I see him in, as he can keep such a straight face, yet showcase so much with his gaze and slight facial twitches. And as for Lee Jung-Jae, he’s terrific, balancing the guilt and trauma he holds following the ending of Season 2, to the level of rage and anger and determination of wanting to do the right thing. His character arc has been absolutely great to follow from start to end, even though I think where his character is left in the finale is slightly anticlimactic and airless. A final choice that he makes loses the visceral impact due to the surrounding other characters we don’t give a crap about. But again, nothing but applause for Lee Jung-Jae’s performance.

Season One of Squid Game still stands strong and proud above everything else this show has offered since, and Season 3 leaves us on a very unsatisfying note, especially due to a puzzling and on-the-nose A-lister cameo in the concluding scene, that acts as an obvious cash-grabbing set up from Netflix for a unnecessary Squid Game: LA spin-off.

Overall score: 5/10

[ohwolfling]

This Terrifying K-Horror Featuring 'Squid Game' Stars Pushes the Limits of Found Footage

Nobody tell Mr. Beast about this place.

I wrote about Gonjiam Haunted Asylum and I almost didn't share it because graphics dept made the header image the part that scared me so bad I almost cried...

[giantkillerjack]

Western movies about demons: annoying, repetitive, preachy, always ends up glorifying Christianity (usually Catholicism specifically) as the One True Religion 🤢🤮🥶😰👎👎👎☠🤬👿👿👿

Asian movies about demons: let's get fucking Wild with some fucking folklore!! Or even - gasp! - some actual original ideas about evil spirits and possession??! At no point will Catholic priests be called upon to solve the problem because Catholic priests are OBVIOUSLY not the people you call when you need to have less evil in the room Japanese and Korean societies are not completely saturated with Christian fundamentalism! Have fun!!

[backcovergirl]

Ad for The Host in Rue Morgue Issue 64 (January/February 2007)