Squid Game season 3


The third and final season of the South Korean dystopian survival thriller television series Squid Game, marketed as Squid Game 3 and created by writer and director Hwang Dong-hyuk, was released on Netflix on June 27, 2025.
The season stars Lee Jung-jae, Lee Byung-hun, Wi Ha-joon, Yim Si-wan, Kang Ha-neul, Park Gyu-young, Park Sung-hoon, Yang Dong-geun, Kang Ae-shim, Jo Yu-ri, Lee David, and Roh Jae-won. In the season, Seong Gi-hun and the players fight for survival in ever-deadlier games. In-ho welcomes the VIPs while his brother Jun-ho continues the search for the island, unaware of a traitor in their midst. The season received positive reviews from critics.

Episodes

Cast and characters

Numbers in parentheses denote the character's assigned player number in the Squid Game universe.

Main

  • Lee Jung-jae as Seong Gi-hun
  • Lee Byung-hun as Hwang In-ho / the Front Man
  • Yim Si-wan as Lee Myung-gi / "MG Coin"
  • Kang Ha-neul as Kang Dae-ho
  • Wi Ha-joon as Hwang Jun-ho
  • Park Gyu-young as Kang No-eul
  • Lee Jin-wook as Park Gyeong-seok
  • Park Sung-hoon as Cho Hyun-ju
  • Yang Dong-geun as Park Yong-sik
  • Kang Ae-shim as Jang Geum-ja
  • Jo Yu-ri as Kim Jun-hee

    Special guest stars

  • Park Hee-soon as the Masked Officer
  • Jung Ho-yeon as Kang Sae-byeok
  • Cate Blanchett as the American Recruiter

    Recurring

  • Song Young-chang as Im Jeong-dae
  • as Seon-nyeo
  • Lee David as Park Min-su
  • Roh Jae-won as Nam-gyu
  • Choi Gwi-hwa as Kim Gi-min
  • Lee Gyu-hoe as Kim Yun-tae
  • Park Jin-woo as Lee Seung-won
  • Woo Jung-kook as Player 039
  • Oh Dal-su as Sea Captain Park Yeong-gil
  • Jeon Seok-ho as Choi Woo-seok
  • Sung Do-hyun as Kim, the mercenary leader
  • as Kim Yeong-sam
  • David Sayers as VIP #1
  • Jane Wong as VIP #2
  • Bryan Bucco as VIP #3
  • Jordan Lambertoni as VIP #4
  • Kevin Yorn as VIP #5

    Guest cast

  • Choi Seung-hyun as Choi Su-bong / "Thanos"
  • Won Ji-an as Se-mi
  • Lee Seo-hwan as Park Jung-bae
  • Lee Suk as Player 096
  • as Park Mi-hwa
  • Kim Geum-sun as Player 349
  • Cho Ah-in as Seong Ga-yeong, Gi-hun's daughter
  • Park Hye-jin as Sang-woo's mother and Kang Cheol's adoptive mother
  • Park Si-wan as Kang Cheol, the younger brother of Kang Sae-byeok
  • Choi Jae-sup as Park Man-cheol, a broker involved with Sae-byeok and No-eul
Additionally, creator Hwang Dong-hyuk makes a cameo appearance.

Production

Development

Hwang stated in December 2021 that he was discussing a third season of Squid Game with Netflix. The third season was confirmed after season two aired. When Hwang was thinking about the idea for the ending of season three, he thought of season three as the finale. He believed that with that story, he was able to tell everything that he wanted to tell through the story of Squid Game and also in the perspective of Seong Gi-hun as a character, and that he doesn't need any further stories from here.

Writing

Hwang originally envisioned the second and third seasons as one, but split them up after feeling there were too many episodes for one season. According to Hwang, at the beginning of the third season, Gi-hun will once again be a changed man compared to the previous two seasons and "at a very critical crossroads". The season will also reveal how Hwang In-ho became the Front Man. Cheol-su, Young-hee's giant robot doll "boyfriend", was introduced in the post-credits scene of the second season's final episode and will appear in season three alongside a new game. Speaking about the season, Hwang talks about how the emphasis this season places "on how have to preserve their humanity amidst this intense competition" but introduces games "that could really show the lowest bottom of human beings" wanting "very intense games to bring out the bottom parts of human nature." He also talked about how the changes Gi-hun and Myung-gi go through are "dramatic" and how Jun-hee's baby will be very relevant "not just for Jun-hee, but for the fate of everyone inside."
Hwang had originally written the season to end with Gi-hun being able to escape the games, winning or not, along with others, and going to see his daughter, but felt this ending "didn't line up for me" given the situation in the contemporary world. He altered the story to include Jun-hee and her baby as to allow Gi-hun to sacrifice himself for the baby's future, which Hwang saw as a symbol of the next generation.

Casting

and Lee Byung-hun reprise their roles as Gi-hun and the Front Man. As the games of the second season continue, Wi Ha-joon, Kang Ha-neul, Park Sung-hoon, Yim Si-wan, Yang Dong-geun, Park Gyu-young, Jo Yu-ri, Kang Ae-shim, Lee David, and Roh Jae-won reprise their roles.
Cate Blanchett makes a cameo appearance at the end of the final episode, she takes the role of a recruiter for an American version of the games. Hwang said that "having a woman as a recruiter would be more dramatic and intriguing", and with Blanchett, "We needed someone who could dominate the screen with just one or two words, which is exactly what she did If Gong Yoo is the Korean Recruiter, I thought she would be the perfect fit as the American Recruiter, bringing a short but gripping and impactful ending to the story." Lee considered the scene to reflect on the nature of the Squid Games, that "despite all of the noble efforts of so many people, the world still continues as it was before". Though some media outlets like Variety and The Hollywood Reporter believed that this final scene may help to set up the planned America production of Squid Game that David Fincher has been slated to direct, Hwang said that he did not plan this scene to make any such connection, having heard no official word about the Fincher version.

Filming

Filming for the third season started in July 2023 and ended in June 2024, as it was filmed back-to-back along with the second season.

Post-production

The editing portion for season three was "nearly done" by November 2024.

Music

The soundtrack for the third season was composed by Jung Jae-il, who returned from the previous two seasons. The score was released digitally on June 27, 2025, alongside the series premiere. It features a darker, more orchestral variation of the "Way Back then" theme, reflecting the finality of the season.

Release

The season was released on Netflix on June 27, 2025. In its first three days, it became the biggest-ever television launch for Netflix, getting more than 60.1 million views and more than 368.4 million hours viewed. According to information from Netflix, Netflix Tudum and Flixpatrol, the season ranked at No. 1 in 93 countries, making history as the first Netflix series to debut No. 1 in every available country, and remained at that top spot for a whole week. In less than two weeks, the season reached more than 100 million views and became the third most-watched non-English Netflix show, right beside Squid Game season 1 and season 2.
At the end of its run, based on total views in the first 91 days of release, Squid Game season 3 reached 145.8 million views, notably by remaining 9 consecutive weeks in the top 10 most popular non-English seasons. The season thus became the fourth Netflix's most-watched series of all time, behind Squid Game season 1, Wednesday season 1 and Squid Game season 2, and surpassing the show Adolescence, released the same year.

Marketing

To promote the final season, Netflix launched a global campaign titled "The Final Game". In June 2025, replica "recruitment" stations were set up in major cities including New York City, Paris, Tokyo, and Seoul, where fans could play non-lethal versions of the games featured in the show. The final trailer was released on June 12, 2025, and accumulated over 40 million views in its first 24 hours.

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 79% of 78 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "The games reach a grim crescendo in this climactic third season, repeating familiar beats but with a ruthlessness that drives creator Hwang Dong-hyuk's themes home." Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned a score of 67 out of 100, based on 26 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.
Time also gave a positive review of the series, commenting that the series was back to its "brutal best" that "cuts to the bone" with its emotional depth and character arcs, as well as the themes touched on by Hwang in the series.
Although professional critical reviews remained mostly positive; it has been noted that audience ratings and reactions toward the season were mixed, with particular criticism being aimed at the series ending and the timing of certain character deaths.