This text comprises spoilers for Squid Recreation Season 2.
Park performs Kang No-eul, a North Korean defector who’s desperately looking for out extra details about her younger daughter left behind within the North. No-eul finally ends up getting into the video games — not as a participant, however as a masked soldier, cladded in a vibrant pink uniform and given the license to kill contributors who fail every spherical of the winner-takes-all video games.
This twist in her id was not one thing that Park was conscious of throughout the two rounds of auditions she went by way of for the second season of the trailblazing present.
“I went by way of two rounds of auditions, not understanding what position I might be enjoying,” Park tells Deadline. “I used to be simply given loads of traces to learn. The primary audition spherical, I despatched in an audition tape. The second spherical was in individual with the director and the creator. It was solely after that I used to be given the script and notified that I might truly be enjoying the position of the soldier.”
Park beforehand appeared in hit dramas like It’s Okay to Not Be Okay and Candy House.
Actor Lee Web optimization-hwan performs the position of Jung-bae, who’s lead character Gi-hun’s long-time buddy, additionally showing within the first two episodes of Squid Recreation Season 1. Within the first season, Jung-bae seems alongside Gi-hun betting on horse races collectively. Lee shares that he was shocked and pleased when he realized that he would have an expanded involvement within the follow-up season.
“Director Hwang gave me the script and simply mentioned that I needed to be in Season 2” says Lee. “I used to be fairly proud, as a result of he was not even asking however as a substitute nearly forcing me to be within the second season. I couldn’t be happier and I used to be over the moon holding on to that script. I truly needed to attempt to keep away from everybody as a result of I didn’t need to spoil something and I needed to immerse myself in my character.”
In just below three weeks, Squid Recreation Season 2 has already change into the third most-watched season of tv ever on Netflix, notching 152.5M complete views since its December 26 premiere, sitting behind solely Squid Recreation Season 1 and Wednesday when it comes to all-time viewership.
On the chance to develop his character of Jung-bae additional within the second season, Lee mentioned that he thought quite a bit about what it means to specific a “middle-aged” male friendship onscreen with Lee Jung-jae’s character.
“I bear in mind in Season 1, there’s a scene with the ATM machine, and we’re saying issues backwards and forwards at one another, and I needed to convey that very same vibe again in Season 2,” says Lee. “I feel it’s with all Korean middle-aged males, and I don’t know if it’s with middle-aged males all around the world, however they at all times prefer to grill and curse at one another. That’s our method of displaying affection to mates. It’s type of bizarre, however that’s what we do.
“In Season 1, I attempt to curse him with the worst attainable curse that may be aired, and I needed to convey that very same chemistry in Season 2. Nevertheless, Gi-hun is a distinct man in Season 2, however my character Jung-bae remains to be the identical foolish outdated man,” provides Lee.
Lee reunited with Lee Jung-jae in Squid Recreation, after beforehand showing collectively on 2020 motion movie Ship Us From Evil. He fondly picks the shoot for the pentathlon recreation in Squid Recreation Season 2 as certainly one of his greatest reminiscences on set.
“I bear in mind the scene within the Pentathlon when all people was cheering collectively,” says Lee. “It required loads of takes, however there was this one take the place I felt that we had been actually all on this frenzy collectively. We had been very excited and cheering for everybody and it nearly felt like we had been again in 2002 throughout the World Cup [held across Japan and Korea] and South Korea went to the semi finals. It was 23 years in the past, and the entire nation was in a frenzy. I felt that very same factor throughout that take. However the humorous factor was that after the director shouted ‘lower,’ all people grew to become shy people once more.”
Regardless of her character’s steely, cold-blooded exterior, Park emphasizes that No-eul is somebody who’s desperately looking for dignity and human connection.
“Relatively than specializing in the mercilessness or violent a part of the character, whereas killing somebody can not ever be justified, I feel that what No-eul is asking is: what does it imply to protect a minimal stage of human dignity? What does that imply to her, and the way is that expressed? I feel if viewers checked out it from that perspective, they’re going to be much more intrigued by the character, particularly into the third season,” says Park.
She added that she had a couple of conversations about her character with the director and the important thing query revolved round how the character ought to reside, having presumably misplaced somebody who’s an important individual to her.
“I bear in mind the director telling me that the character’s title actually means sundown in Korean, so it refers to a time when darkness begins to seep in and you’re feeling heavier,” says Park. “Going past simply the facial expressions and having a decrease voice, the director talked about the way it means greater than that, how I needed to carry a way of this very heavy, weighted emotion, particularly when getting into the video games because the soldier.”
On her subsequent venture, Park says that she want to be a part of a “slice-of-life human drama.”
“I want to painting a job in one thing like a slice-of-life human drama, whether or not it’s about falling in love or simply about folks’s every day lives,” says Park. “Though just lately I’ve been fortunate to have the ability to take part in tasks the place I portrayed characters who had been put in excessive conditions, if a possibility permits me to take action, I might love to simply painting on a regular basis life as a human being. In Korea, we name that style ‘human drama.’”