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Something I can't stop thinking about though -

When in-ho is eavesdropping on gi-hun and jung-bae's conversation he hears jung-bae say "when we get out if here we should get soju like the old days" and then later when they're getting ready to rebel, in-ho makes a point of telling gi-hun "you can buy me soju when we get out of here" SO he heard these two best friends reminiscing about the time they used to spend together and took the next opportunity to insert HIMSELF into that scenario with gi-hun instead.

He was jealous af listening to that conversation and he is down bad for gi-hun and no one can tell me otherwise

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best addition to season 2 is the new layers of class divide that we see by giving the pink soldiers more dimension as characters. we see that they’re not financially stable—the recruiter had to work his way up the ladder from the bottom, noeul lives in her car—they’re not the rich. they’re symbolic (and literal, in the case of the game) class traitors who serve the elites. they may seem like they have power since they have guns and masks, but really the only difference between them and the players is the weapon in their hand, and who gave it to them.

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Although I’m not sure if this was the director’s actual intent, I like how the games of both seasons of Squid Game reflect the theme of the story (excluding Red Light, Green Light since that’s more of a basic, early elimination game). S1 was about how unfair capitalism is as a system. We saw that reflected in:

1) Dalgona: people are randomly handicapped by the images they select since they’re not told what the images mean. So it’s the same game, but some people have it easier than the others while other people are doomed from the start.

2) Tug-of-War: it’s unfair since the contestants aren’t told what they’re playing and some people are at a natural disadvantage due to their physical strength

3) Marbles: the goal is to defeat your opponent by any means necessary

4) Glass Steps: literally, just a leap of faith. If you’re lucky, you live. If you’re unlucky, you die.

5) Squid Game: same as marbles.

Meanwhile, S2 was more about human nature and how even though the system of capitalism is destructive and unfair, people are willing to play ball with it. When given the choice of doing things for the greater good or your own self-interest, people will choose their own interests. We saw that reflected in:

1) Six-legged pentathlon: the game reinforces the idea that if you die, it’s because you were dragged down by the people around you. Also, since there are mixed teams, the people who wanted to live are dragged down by the people who chose their own interests over other people’s survival.

2) Mingle: people will backstab each other in order to survive. We saw that in full display when Min-su threw Se-mi under the bus, despite her having his back in the earlier episodes. Also, people will tear other groups apart if it means their own interests are protected. We saw that in display when two strangers dragged Yong-sik away from his mom, knowing full well that she could’ve died.

TL;DR Squid Game S1’s games were about capitalism as a system since they’re inherently unfair and are centered on competition. S2’s games were about human nature and people being inherently selfish since they encourage backstabbing and the idea that people will drag each other down.

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the indisputable fact that inho's only blind spot is his brother. he could have (and would have) killed any other intruder. if anyone else would have infiltrated the games instead of his younger brother—the younger brother who idolizes him, admires him, whose entire world within the narrative frame of the show revolves around him—inho would have killed them. he would have not done it personally, he had enough guards with him to assure that. but then, it turns out that the person who has crawled into this pit of darkness he has vanished to, year after year, is junho. junho, who loves him enough to bring him back. who has ventured into this hell on earth to bring inho back. who could not stand a week of his brother's disappearance, that little vanishing act, who is perhaps just alike enough to come as far as he did. who else could have made it that far? junho has a singular advantage compared to anyone else who might have ever wondered, or tried. he knows his brother. he is the only living person who knows inho better than anyone else.

but, see, of course junho had to survive. he could have never died after the first season, because the person who shot him is inho, and not the guards. the mirror image of himself (which is a motive repeated when inho sees junho while he is extracting the bullet out of his matching gun shot wound—it could literally not be any more obvious), his achilles heel. inho never intended to kill junho. instead, he sent the boat that would save junho's life and bring him back to the shore. despite the increased risk of keeping an intruder alive, inho does not care and does so anyway. junho is his brother, and because that is all that inho has left in the world, his brother cannot die. because inho could watch hundreds, thousands of people die with the resolute detachment of a business man, but he could not watch junho fall into the ocean without inspiring a haunting. he could not stand the fact that his brother would die, that he could have killed him. inho is not even the first to pull the trigger—that is junho. junho shoots first, draws blood, and inho watches him, stunned into silence.

do they know each other? better than anyone. maybe this violence should not come as a surprise then, but it does, to the both of them. inho does not expect junho to harm him, he thinks, genuinely, that junho will come with him. and, for a brief moment, he believes that junho will. junho, who has followed him into the police force and onto that wretched island. why would he not follow him further?

but junho has also been changed, and this is the one place he cannot follow his brother to. his own desire is, once again, a mirror image of his older brother: he wants inho to follow him back home. this is the main motivation for junho's entire character arc, which has followed him into season two; it has remained unchanged, instead only increased in fervor. junho, honestly, could not care less about these games; actually, gihun cares much more about the games and the sacrifices than junho does.

because junho cares about inho.

and inho cares about junho, enough to keep him far away from him. which goes directly against junho's need to bring inho back, of course. now, the question is—what will happen when those two forces will finally push against each other? and that is very much the central question of the show.

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gihun collecting deranged homicidal freaks like infinity stones

bonus:

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“maybe in another universe we get our happy ending”

the other universe:

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Some sketches with my fem!zukaangs

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★ 【R・A】 「 呪関連絵まとめ 」 ☆ ✔ republished w/permission ⊳ ⊳ follow me on twitter

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Yuji Itadori X Sukuna

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omg i found a really sweet sukuita fic recently that i think others should read: https://archiveofourown.org/works/61331620/chapters/156762136

its 50k words of good food !!! and makes the power system actually seem interesting ?? can you believe it???

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i like sukuita fics where at first glance it looks like yuuji is losing and sukuna is winning, but if you take a deeper look, sukuna is losing too. and he's losing because of the consequences of his own actions, his own selfishness

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dude....

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Bout to reread Sasaki to Miyano and have realized how bADLY I want Shima and Mistumi to display similar levels of attraction. I know they like each other!!! I know they want to be together !! I also want to see them feeling magnetic desire 😩

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Bout to reread Sasaki to Miyano and have realized how bADLY I want Shima and Mistumi to display similar levels of attraction. I know they like each other!!! I know they want to be together !! I also want to see them feeling magnetic desire 😩

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TW: rape, sexual assault, child abuse

Archived version here, in case you hit the pay wall:

https://archive.is/HJtxW