SPOILER ALERT: This article contains major spoilers from the “Squid Game” series finale, now streaming on Netflix.
In the final moments of the series finale of “Squid Game,” after all is said and done for Gi-hun/Player 456 (Lee Jung-jae), a new character is introduced to viewers just before the credits roll: a recruiter in a Los Angeles-based version of the titular deadly games, played by Oscar winner Cate Blanchett.
The unnamed character is set up as the U.S. counterpart to the original South Korean games’ Recruiter (Gong Yoo) featured at the start of “Squid Game” Season 1 in 2021. He was the man Gi-hun played the slap-filled game of dajiki against, and who offered him the invitation to join the Squid Game. After a devastated Gi-hun made it through the games to become the victor at the expense of hundreds of other lives, he spent the next few years searching for the Recruiter in an attempt to get back in the games in Season 2.
His efforts eventually proved successful and, following a nail-biting game of Russian roulette that the Recruiter lost, Gi-hun re-entered the games and worked hard to take them down from the inside. And by the end of Season 3, Gi-hun did succeed — in a way.
The arena and surrounding island housing the South Korean version of the Squid Game competition is destroyed by The Front Man/In-ho (Lee Byung-hun), and he and the guards escape before the authorities can get to it. In-ho leaves behind all the players’ dead bodies to burn up inside (including Gi-hun’s), but saves Player 222’s baby, who became the de facto winner when Gi-hun killed himself to make sure the baby would be the one to survive.
Several months later, In-ho has seemingly chosen not to rebuild the games, and leaves for Los Angeles. It is then, after dropping off Gi-hun’s original winnings from his first Squid Game with his daughter, that In-ho is in a town car in downtown Los Angeles when he spots Blanchett’s Recruiter character.
He sees her, dressed in a suit, playing the familiar game of djaiki with a homeless man. He makes eye contact with her and they silently acknowledge each other before he appears to puzzle over something, but ultimately roll up the car window and move on.
And that’s how the series ends: hinting at the idea that, though the original South Korean games are over, the Squid Game has already spread to other countries, and there is room for Netflix to tell more stories within the universe.
Though it has not been confirmed by Netflix, and “Squid Game” series creator and director Hwang Dong-hyuk has stated he is done with the franchise from here on out, there are rumors that an English-language series has been pitched by David Fincher (with whom Blanchett previously worked on “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”).
Sources tell Variety that the streamer has no plans to announce a “Squid Game” spinoff at this time — but based on A-list addition of Blanchett to the franchise at the very end, and the immense success the main series has seen over its three-season run, Netflix is considering next steps for the IP.
Currently, the streamer has a popular mobile game based on the series, as well as 2023’s “Squid Game: The Challenge,” an unscripted competition program, which won a BAFTA for best reality series. “Squid Game” is also a featured component in Netflix’s soon-to-open permanent entertainment venues in Philadelphia and Dallas.
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