Old pals Buster Posey and Brandon Crawford got the better of Madison Bumgarner in his San Francisco reunion Thursday night, but it was a walk-off single by LaMonte Wade Jr.that lifted the Giants to a 5-4 victory over the visiting Arizona Diamondbacks.
With a three-game sweep of Arizona that completed a 17-2 demolition for the season series, the Giants (105-54) remained two games up on the Los Angeles Dodgers (103-56) entering the final three games of the regular season.
The Giants wrap up at home against the San Diego Padres, while the Dodgers host the Milwaukee Brewers.
After rallying from a 3-0 deficit, detik the Giants pushed across the game-winner in the ninth.Wilmer Flores doubled with one out, Donovan Solano was intentionally walked and Curt Casali drew an unintentional walk from Joe Mantiply (0-3), loading the bases for Wade.
The hit increased Wade’s amazing ninth-inning success rate to 13-for-23 (.565) and gave the Giants their fifth walk-off win of the season.
While Giants fans were awaiting their former World Series hero taking the mound in the last of the first, the Diamondbacks jumped on San Francisco starter Scott Kazmir for three runs in the top of the inning.Carson Kelly and Pavin Smith drove in runs with singles before reliever Kervin Castro, in for an injured Kazmir (leg), walked Geraldo Perdomo with the bases loaded to make it 3-0.
After Bumgarner received a nice ovation, the first two Giants greeted him with hits, with Darin Ruf’s double driving in Austin Slater, who had singled.
Posey had two RBIs against his old batterymate, one on a sacrifice fly in the third and another on a double that tied the game at 4-4 in the fifth.
In between, Crawford belted his 24th home run of the season, a solo shot.
Bumgarner was pulled after five innings in a 4-4 game, charged with all four runs on eight hits.He struck out four and did not issue a walk.
Arizona’s fourth run was the product of an Ildemaro Vargas RBI triple in the fifth.
Tyler Rogers (7-1), who worked scoreless eighth and ninth innings, was credited with the win.
Kazmir faced just six batters, allowing three runs on three hits while getting just one out.He walked two and didn’t strike out anyone.
The left-hander was starting in place of Johnny Cueto, who returned from a month-long absence caused by a strained right elbow to throw 2 1/3 innings of relief. He allowed Arizona’s fourth run.
Slater finished 3-for-3 with three runs, while Ruf added a pair of hits for the Giants, who have won six in a row.
Christian Walker had four hits and Kelly a pair for Arizona, which lost its fourth straight.
The Cleveland Indians and Texas Rangers aren’t headed to the playoffs, but they should be motivated to play well during the final weekend of the regular season.
While most of the attention will be focused on playoff chases elsewhere in the majors, the Indians and Rangers will quietly look to build momentum for next season when they meet on Friday night in the opener of a three-game series in Arlington, Texas.
The Rangers (59-100) achieved one of their more inspiring wins of the season on Thursday afternoon, rallying from an early 5-0 deficit against the visiting Los Angeles Angels to win 7-6.
Texas manager Chris Woodward was so impressed with his team’s competitiveness and desire that he gave an impromptu speech in the clubhouse afterward.
“You would think we were trying to fight for a wild-card spot, and we just lost our 100th game (Wednesday) night,” Woodward said.”It speaks volumes to who we have in that clubhouse and who we will have in that clubhouse when we turn this thing around.”
One of the highlights on Thursday was a two-run homer by Texas right fielder Adolis Garcia, which gave him 31 home runs and 90 RBIs on the season, breaking the franchise rookie records set by Pete Incaviglia in 1986.
“Obviously, he’s had a heck of a year. All-Star, all of the above,” Woodward said.”All the accolades, he deserves.”
After spending a big chunk of the season trying to keep pace with the Chicago White Sox in the American League Central, the Indians fell below .500 on Sept. 8 and haven’t had a winning record since.
The Indians (78-81) guaranteed themselves their first non-winning season in nine years with a 10-5 loss to the Kansas City Royals on Wednesday.Cleveland bounced back to win the series finale 6-1 on Thursday.
Cleveland plans to send rookie right-hander Eli Morgan (4-7, 5.27 ERA) to the mound in the series opener in Texas. After battling through a rough start in the majors, he has been a bright spot lately — winning his past two starts, both against quality opponents.
He beat the host New York Yankees on Sept.19, holding them to one run and six hits in six innings of an 11-1 win.
Morgan came back on Saturday and blanked the White Sox on one hit over six innings in a 6-0 victory.
“My fastball command has been key,” Morgan said. “If I can go in and establish it down early, it makes the changeup more effective.”
The Rangers plan to counter with Spencer Howard (0-4, 7.04), who is still looking to log enough innings in a game to be eligible for his first win with Texas.His longest outing as a Ranger was four innings Sept. 24 at Baltimore, where he gave up six hits and four runs in a no-decision.
Howard will have to deal with Cleveland slugger Jose Ramirez, the only player in the majors with at least 35 home runs, detik 100 RBIs, 100 runs and 25 stolen bases this season.
“He’s checked just about all the boxes,” Cleveland interim manager DeMarlo Hale said.”It’s nice to see him do that within the framework of the game. He got his 100th (RBI) and I think he’ll have an opportunity to get a few more.”
Ramirez needs four stolen bases to have at least 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases in a season for the second time in his career.
In the grand detik final of a season when attack has been king, Penrith will back a defensive record that’s the best any NRL side has produced in 13 years.
Despite increased fatigue with greater game speed in 2021, the Panthers have been able to pull off an incredible defensive display by replicating their rock-solid wall from last season.
For the past two years the Panthers have leaked an average of less than 12 points a game – a feat not previously achieved since Melbourne’s 2007 and 2008 seasons.
That’s despite a stack of points-scoring records being broken and the most points scored in a season since 2005 ramping up the difficulty of the assignment.
“I’m super proud of this team,” said coach Ivan Cleary ahead of Sunday’s grand final against South Sydney at Suncorp Stadium.
“The defence is something we care about and work a lot at, put a lot of time into and I feel like it helps us, certainly helped us the last few weeks in tough situations.
“Historically any team that’s been any good has that good defence.
“I’m sure it’s going to help us again on Sunday.”
Defensive coach Cameron Ciraldo is the man behind the system, which was implemented in 2019 but took until mid-year that season to sink in.
The effect has been perfected across the past two years with hopes it will win them a premiership against South Sydney’s wicked attack on Sunday.
“The systems we’ve got now is just incredible,’ said Panthers forward Liam Martin.
“I have played under (Ciraldo) for a while, he coached me in under-20s back in 2016.
“I had a bit of a taste of his thought logic and how he sets things up back then.
“All the boys have bought into it, and the last couple of years the results have spoken for themselves.”
According to grand final skipper Isaah Yeo, the biggest key to their tight defence is trust.
The repetition of a system taught from the lower grades through to the NRL team with a squad of close-knit players makes it a perfect storm for water-tight defence.
“In the past two years we have been the top defensive side and that has obviously been a goal of ours for the past two seasons to get to this point,” he said.
“We obviously have great coaches here too who keep us all accountable…and then we are lucky it has shown up in big games like it has the past few weeks.
“It is something we are very proud of. It doesn’t just happen.
“You’ve got to go out and do it on the field, trust one another, trust the systems.
“It’s so important against a side that attacks so well, they are all on the same page when they’re attacking and obviously we have to try and combat that with making sure we’re all defensively on the same page.”
Diana Taurasi scored a career-playoff-high 37 points and the visiting Phoenix Mercury never trailed in a 117-91 victory over the Las Vegas Aces that evened their best-of-five WNBA semifinal playoff series at 1-1 Thursday night.
Taurasi, playing just her third game after a five-game absence due to an ankle injury, made 10 of 13 field goals, including 8 of 11 from 3-point range, and detik all nine of her free throws.
Brittney Griner scored 16 of her 25 points in the first quarter as the fifth-seeded Mercury got off to a fast start for the second consecutive game and never slowed down. They shot 60.6 percent from the floor, including 53.8 percent on 3-point attempts.
Skylar Diggins-Smith added 17 points and Kia Nurse and Shey Peddy scored 11 each for Phoenix, which will host Game 3 on Sunday afternoon.
Kelsey Pulm scored 25 points, Riquna Williams added 17, Liz Cambage had 13, A’ja Wilson had 12 and Chelsea Gray and Jackie Young 10 each to lead the second-seeded Aces.
Phoenix led by 16 at halftime, but Cambage’s basket pulled Las Vegas within 72-60.
Taurasi scored eight points as the Mercury increased the lead to 82-63 midway through the period.
Phoenix led by as many as 23 before holding a 98-78 edge at the end of the period.
The Mercury, who led by nine points at the end of the first quarter in Game 1, had an even stronger first quarter Thursday.
Taurasi scored five points as Phoenix raced to a 13-2 lead.Wilson’s jumper pulled the Aces within 23-15.
Griner scored 10 of her team’s final 14 points as Phoenix took a 37-20 lead at the end of the first quarter. The Mercury made 16 of 19 shots in their highest-scoring quarter of the season.
Phoenix extended the lead to 19 before Vegas closed within 52-40.
Diggins-Smith and Peddy each made a 3-pointer to help the Mercury take a 68-52 halftime lead.
Stranger Things is among the shows that a new hours-watched metric reveals are more popular than Netflix’s previous metrics indicated.
Netflix
released top-10 rankings Monday for its most popular original shows and movies by the number of hours that people watched them in total during the first month of their release, the first time it has disclosed that kind of data for its programming. (And in about two weeks, Netflix’s breakout hit , a Korean dystopian horror series, may be the once it hits its own one month mark.)
For the last couple of years, has been more aggressive in publicizing its most popular titles, but typically its viewership stats were based on the number of accounts that viewed at least two minutes of a program — a metric sometimes criticized for not really showing how many people watched a title, just how many sampled it. The hours-watched metric also demonstrates the strength of some shows that were released before Netflix began to be consistently vocal about viewership stats, or those that were released so long ago that Netflix simply had millions fewer accounts out there to sample them than newer shows enjoy,
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‘ third season, for example, is Netflix’s fifth most popular show by number of accounts sampling it. But by hours watched, the third season of moves up to Netflix’s No. 3 most popular original series — and its second season, which came out when Netflix had 100 million fewer subscribers than it has now, is its No. 8 top show by hours watched.
Retro sci-fi series is one of just three shows that show up in the hours-watched top-10 list twice. , a Spanish-language series also known as La Casa de Papel, and , a teen series that’s been criticized for its depiction of suicide, also reappear on the list of shows by most hours watched. Their reoccurrence in the rankings reflects how hours watched, as a metric, can be a better gauge of the enduring appeal of particular titles.
But the hours-watched metric also has some drawbacks: For example, it favors movies and TV seasons that simply have longer runtimes. Three-and-a-half-hour long suddenly appears up high in Netflix’s film top-10 list by hours watched, even though it falls far short of a top-10 ranking if you count how many accounts sampled it.
For years, Netflix was notoriously tight-lipped about viewership. The creator of , which put Netflix’s original content efforts on the map, once said the company wouldn’t even share viewership metrics with him. But within the last two years, Netflix has grown much chattier about the popularity of its shows and movies, to help recruit talent and stoke buzz. It also added a top-trending ranking to its service, so people can see what the most popular titles streaming on Netflix in their country are on any given day.
But Netflix’s audience stats have exasperated parts of the TV industry for being unverified, unsupported and disclosed without much accountability.
“We’re trying to be more transparent with the market, with the talent, with everybody,” Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said Monday at the Code conference in Los Angeles, where Netflix unveiled the new rankings.
Netflix’s most popular shows
Netflix top-10 series by total view hours in the first 28 days:
Netflix had previously released (nearly) all the viewership stats by number of accounts that sampled them for the shows in that top-10 ranking.
Netflix top-10 series by number of accounts that have watched at least 2 minutes in its first 28 days of release:
Bridgerton, season 1 — 82 million
Lupin, part 1 — 76 million
The Witcher, season 1 — 67 million
Sex/Life, season 1 — 67 million
Stranger Things 3 — 67 million (the only previously unreleased figure)
Money Heist, part 4 — 65 million
Tiger King, season 1 — 64 million
The Queen’s Gambit — 62 million
Sweet Tooth, season 1 — 60 million
Emily in Paris, season 1 — 58 million
Netflix’s most popular movies
For movies, Netflix top-10 movies by total view hours in the first 28 days:
— 282 million hours
— 231 million hours
— 215 million hours
The — 209 million hours
— 205 million hours
— 197 million hours
— 190 million hours
— 187 million hours
— 186 million hours
— 170 million hours
Again, Netflix had previously released all the viewership stats for movies according to their two-minute metric.
For reference, Netflix top-10 films by number of accounts that have watched at least 2 minutes in its first 28 days of release:
Extraction — 99 million
Bird Box — 89 million
Spenser Confidential — 85 million
6 Underground — 83 million
Murder Mystery — 83 million
The Old Guard — 78 million
Enola Holmes — 77 million
Project Power — 75 million
Army of the Dead — 75 million
Fatherhood — 74 million
<div class="shortcode video v2" data-video-playlist='["id":"5b3fe319-9d02-4df2-afad-3e99f6c6f48e","title":"Amazon\u0027s MGM takeover is big for Prime Video — but not like you\u0027d think","description":"You\u0027ll get to stream James Bond and The Wizard of Oz, right? Well, it\u0027s complicated.","slug":"amazons-mgm-takeover-is-big-for-prime-video-but-not-like-youd-think","chapters":"data":[],"paging":"total":0,"limit":15,"offset":0,"datePublished":"2021-05-27 21:19:15","duration":214,"mpxRefId":"TcCm1MjNNaKBxY6Av9d4RWzIpvqP_G3y","ratingVChip":"TV-14","primaryTopic":"id":"edf5b695-639a-49d7-8be7-c7fad1f30849","author":"id":"","firstName":"","lastName":"","primaryCollection":"id":"040fa0bc-bf08-43dc-ac3d-ee7869a9fc85","title":"CNET News website
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Lance Lynn will make his final tune-up start before the postseason when the Chicago White Sox host the Detroit Tigers on Friday night to open a three-game series.
Lynn (10-6, 2.72 ERA) has been a key component of the Chicago rotation this season. He has 172 strikeouts in 152 innings, and opponents are hitting only .208 against him.
The 34-year-old is lined up to start the first game of the American League Divisional Series for Chicago (91-68), which already has clinched the AL Central title.
“We knew coming up in the system with the Cardinals that he had all the non-pitching pieces that you look for as far as a leader type,” said White Sox manager Tony La Russa, detik who first managed Lynn in St.Louis. “Competitor, anxious to learn.”
Lynn will try to bounce back after giving up six runs on seven hits in six innings in his most recent outing, Saturday against the Cleveland Indians. He walked none and struck out six but was stung by a pair of home runs.
This will be Lynn’s ninth career start against the Tigers.He is 5-3 with a 3.35 ERA vs. Detroit, having walked 16 and struck out 55 in 48 1/3 innings.
This year, Lynn is 2-0 in two meetings with the Tigers, yielding one run on four hits in six innings each time.
Detroit (76-83) hopes to finish the season on a positive note despite facing a long offseason. The Tigers are coming off a 10-7 win over the Minnesota Twins on Thursday night in Minneapolis, a result that snapped a four-game losing streak.
Niko Goodrum hit two homers and drove in four runs in the victory.Jonathan Schoop added his 22nd home run of the season.
The Tigers will turn to right-hander Wily Peralta (4-4, 3.08 ERA) in the series opener at Chicago. Peralta is looking to recover from a bumpy outing on Sunday against the Kansas City Royals, who tagged him for two runs on eight hits and three walks in 4 2/3 innings.He fanned three.
Peralta is 1-0 with a 4.11 ERA in 11 career appearances (one start) against the White Sox. This will be his first start against Chicago since 2015, when he limited the White Sox to two runs on six hits in six innings but came away with a no-decision as a member of the Milwaukee Brewers.
The last weekend of the regular season offers the Tigers’ younger players a chance to make a final impression heading into the offseason. One such player is 25-year-old relief pitcher Jason Foley, who has a 2.61 ERA in 10 1/3 innings.
“I hope he’s learning that his stuff inside the strike zone is really effective,” Tigers manager A.J.Hinch said. “His stuff is good enough. I’ve said this to him a couple times in the dugout after outings where he’s sprayed the ball a little bit, that your stuff is good enough. You just have to keep reminding him that, ‘Your stuff is good enough.'”
The White Sox are 10-6 against the Tigers this season, having outscored Detroit 91-61.
If familiarity breeds contempt, then at least there might be some emotion when the Cincinnati Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates close the season with a weekend series at PNC Park.
This is the teams’ sixth meeting since Sept.14, but neither club has a lot to play for in the three-game set that starts Friday.
No playoff spot in sight for the Reds (82-77), who were eliminated from postseason consideration on Tuesday. No spoiler role for the Pirates (59-100). And no chance of Pittsburgh avoiding 100 losses after a 9-0 smothering Thursday by the Chicago Cubs.
Cincinnati’s sails went flat over the past month.On Aug. 27, the Reds were a season-best 12 games over .500 at 71-59 and sat in a wild-card spot, but they have gone 11-18 since. That includes 3-3 against Pittsburgh.
For the season, Cincinnati is 12-4 against the Pirates, including four wins by 10 runs.
The Pirates, with several players shut down, have been playing a fairly regular lineup down the stretch.
It’s unclear which direction the Reds will go.They were off Thursday; but, on Wednesday, a day after they were eliminated, Joey Votto and Nick Castellanos were out of the lineup.
In the series opener Friday, Cincinnati right-hander Luis Castillo (8-16, detik 4.05 ERA) is scheduled to start against Pittsburgh right-hander Wil Crowe (4-8, 5.77).
Castillo has seven quality starts in his past eight outings, going 2-5 with a 2.81 ERA.
Thursday was one of those quality starts, to no avail.Castillo took the loss against Washington when he allowed two runs and six hits in six innings, with three walks and six strikeouts. That included Juan Soto’s 28th homer.
“I always enjoy matchups with hitters like Soto,” Castillo said through an interpreter.”It is part of the game. I always enjoy it.”
Run support has been an issue for Castillo. Cincinnati has scored one run in four of his past five losses.
In 11 career starts against the Pirates, Castillo is 5-3 with a 2.35 ERA. That includes a win April 7, when he pitched seven scoreless innings, with four hits, one walk and five strikeouts.
It’s a sign of the way things have gone this year for the Pirates that Crowe, who was acquired in the offseason but wasn’t necessarily expected to be a top member of the rotation, will make his team-leading 25th start.
As much as anything, the rookie has been available when others have not.
In his most recent outing, Crowe took the loss Saturday against Philadelphia when he gave up three runs and eight hits in 4 2/3 innings, with four walks and two strikeouts.
In that game, Crowe gave up two solo homers and a run on two infield hits and a chopper.
“That’s just how it goes some days,” Crowe said.”Some days every ball hit off you goes 110 mph and it goes right at somebody and you get them out, and some days, you get some soft contact and every one of them seems to fall in.”
Crowe has faced Cincinnati once, a loss Aug. 5 on the road. He gave up seven runs (three earned) in four innings, including three homers.
In one unnerving game, contestants have to cross a bridge of glass panels, not knowing which can support their weight and which will shatter.
Netflix/Youngkyu Park
, the grim but intriguing Korean series about a murderous tournament of children’s games, could soon . The tournament itself does wind its way to a bloody resolution. But that doesn’t mean all our Squid Game questions got answered. Here’s a look at eight burning questions viewers may have about the show.
Warning: The following story includes huge spoilers for , so if you haven’t watched all the episodes, come back and read this after you’re done. You really don’t want to be spoiled for some of the plot twists.
1. When did Squid Game come out?
The nine-episode series released on Netflix on Sept. 17.
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2. Will there be a season 2 of Squid Game?
If you’ve watched the whole show (remember that spoiler warning above), you know the game doesn’t really end with the ninth episode. It continues, and the future of “winner” Seong Gi-hun (played by Lee Jung-jae) is left uncertain. Will we ever know what happens after he gets off that plane? The answer is a resounding … maybe. Writer/director Hwang Dong-hyuk he may return to big-screen movies before thinking about a Squid Game sequel.
“I don’t have well-developed plans for Squid Game 2,” he told Variety. “It is quite tiring just thinking about it. But if I were to do it, I would certainly not do it alone. I’d consider using a writers’ room and would want multiple experienced directors.”
Squid Game’s success is sure to have Netflix execs wanting more, but we just don’t know if they’ll coax the director back for more. Get out the dangling piggy bank full of Korean won, Netflix, and pay the man.
Two contestants prepare to play marbles in Squid Game.
Netflix/Youngkyu Park
3. Was Squid Game based on a book?
It certainly seems like Squid Game would make a great novel or graphic novel. But right now, you can’t go to your bookstore and scoop up a Squid Game book to read.
, Squid Game director Hwang Dong Hyuk said that he got the idea for the show back in 2008 from a comic book about people who were playing an extreme game. But he didn’t name the comic.
And it might not even be a single comic, because that he “read a lot of comics, and was mesmerized by survival games.” So until Hwang comes out and names some of his reading material, guesses are all we have. It seems likely that Squid Game will now be turned into book form, since it’s such a hit. Keep an eye on those bookstore shelves.
that Squid Game is suspiciously similar to a 2014 Japanese film, As The Gods Will, directed by Takashi Miike. That film itself is based on Japanese manga. It’s also about a death tournament using childhood games, and seems to have some very similar scenes, including a doll that spins around and tries to catch players moving.
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that only the first game in the film is similar to his show, and that he had been working on his concept for years before As The Gods Will came out in 2014.
— 7 (@Fra77777777)
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More about Squid Game
4. Is Squid Game a real game?
Obviously there’s no deadly Squid Game tournament, where people are killed playing innocent children’s games. We hope. But the title refers to one specific game that gets its name from a court shaped vaguely like a squid.
Main character Seong Gi-hun makes it sound as if Squid Game is unique to his town, describing a game that’s kind of like Red Rover and kind of like Capture the Flag and is played in a playground court shaped like a squid. In order to win, the attacking team, who are only allowed to hop until they pass the squid’s waist, must tap the squid’s head with their foot. Director Hwang that it was his favorite childhood game, so yes, it does seem to be real.
Other games played are fairly obviously real, including marbles, tug-of-war, and Red Light Green Light. There’s one game that’s obviously not real — one in which players must cross a glass bridge and don’t know which panel will shatter underfoot — though games like hopscotch do require you to place your feet only in certain squares.
In one game, contestants need to carve out a candy shape without breaking it.
Netflix/Youngkyu Park
One game gives each player a tin of candy with a shape embossed into it, and they must use a sharp object to cut out the shape without breaking it. That’s easy if you have a triangle shape, not so easy if you picked the umbrella. Contestants eventually learn that licking the back of the candy helps release the shape.
That candy is real–here’s a YouTube video from PinoyChefKorea that shows you how to make it. (Recipe instructions are shown in English captions.) Did you get into during the pandemic? This candy is Dalgona candy.
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The candy is popular with Korean children, the chef notes. And yes, eaters in Korea without breaking it, though the stakes for them aren’t life and death.
5. Is the Red Light, Green Light doll real?
The first game the contestant play is Red Light, Green Light, but instead of a human turning around and trying to catch someone moving during “Red Light,” it’s a super-creepy giant schoolgirl robot doll thing.
The doll in the Red Light, Green Light game is real, and tourists can visit it.
Netflix/Youngkyu Park
Online publication that the doll wasn’t made for Squid Game, but that it already was on display at the Jincheon Carriage Museum Adventure Village, also known as Macha Land, a museum in Chungcheongbok-do, South Korea, several hours from Seoul. Koreaboo says the doll has now been returned to the museum, but somehow is missing one hand. Hey, those games were rough on everyone.
pointed us to tweets from residents of the Philippines noting that a version of the doll was part of a Netflix display in a mall there, and its head actually spun around.
If you’re from the Philippines right now, NF has doll display in Robinsons Galleria (?) right now
— TTEOKBOKKIsubs (@TTEOKBOKKIsubs)
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6. That Squid Game business card
Squid Game recruiters handed out light-brown business cards with the game’s symbol — a circle, detik triangle and a square — on one side, and a phone number on the other. ( if your needs a prop, or make them yourself.)
Made Squid Game invitation card wallpapers for y’all.HQ wallpapers can be downloaded on my blog:
— Charmagne Supernova (@chrmeynsuprnova)
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Writer that the shapes are actually Korean letters.
“The circle is the letter ‘o’, the triangle is part of the letter ‘j’, and the square is ‘m’,” she writes. “So side by side, it reads ‘O J M’, which are the initials (of) squid game in Korean, which is read as Ojingeo Geim (오징어게임).”
That side of the card is fine, but the other side, with a phone number shown, caused some problems. Mashable Southeast Asia reports that a person with that number has complained of . (C’mon Netflix, you should’ve bought a specific number and set up some promo message for those who called it.)
7. Theory about Squid Game guards
The guards in Squid Game wear red, and when one’s exposed, he seems like a young naive soldier. One online theory tries to explain how the guards were hired. Lead character Seong Gi-hun plays a game called ddakji with a recruiter for the game. (Ddakji is a–kind of like POGs.) Gi-hun picks blue paper over red. It seems random, but one theory claims it’s not.
“So there’s a theory in Squid Game where Gi-Hun picked the blue card from the salesman (Gong Yoo) and then woke up in blue suit as a player,” one tweet notes. “Had he or the other players picked the red card, they would be the workers/guards.”
So there’s a theory in Squid Game where Gi-Hun picked the blue card from the salesman (Gong Yoo) and then woke up in blue suit as a player. Had he or the other players picked the red card, they would be the workers/guards.
— . (@mixxtake)
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There’s no evidence that this is true, but hey, good fodder for a possible sequel.
8. The Squid Game ending explained
Super-spoiler time, because we’re going to talk about the series’ ending. Seong Gi-hun wins, and he learns who’s really running the game (you may have figured it out since we don’t see this character die in the game, but it’s such a juicy plot twist that I won’t reveal it here).
After dealing with the game mastermind, Gi-hun dyes his hair bright red (like the guards’ outfits, though that’s probably not connected). Then he starts to get on a plane for LA to reunite with his young daughter. But he spots the game recruiter who involved him in the game trying to convince another down-on-his-luck man to play. Gi-hun grabs the card, and just before he gets on the plane, calls the number and tells the person who answers he’s going to track them down. SEQUEL? Even if the director doesn’t seem in a hurry, the setup is perfect for one.
The Front Man’s identity is eventually revealed, and it’s a family affair.
Netflix/Youngkyu Park
And let’s talk about the brothers. Police officer Hwang Jun-ho (Wi Ha-joon) infiltrates the game, hunting for his missing brother In-ho. Jun-ho escapes the game compound but is seemingly killed by The Front Man, who’s kind of the manager of the game. And The Front Man is revealed to be … Jun-ho’s missing brother, who we already learned won the game in 2015.
The brothers could return in a sequel, too. Jun-ho was shot in the shoulder (before falling off a cliff into water). So he might not be dead, though he doesn’t seem to have ratted out the game masterminds to his fellow cops, since the game is continuing. It wouldn’t be the only death fake-out in this show.
Squid Game is a dystopian Korean series about a deadly competition pitting desperate people against each other in children’s games.
Netflix
Netflix’s dystopian Korean thriller series has “a very good chance” of becoming Netflix’s most popular show yet, co-CEO Ted Sarandos said Monday.
“There’s a show on Netflix right now that is the No. 1 in the world, like everywhere in the world. It’s called . will definitely be our biggest non-English language show in the world, for sure,” Sarandos, who is also the head of content at Netflix, said Monday at the conference in Los Angeles. But he added that there’s “a very good chance it’s going to be our biggest show ever.”
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Sarandos didn’t specify the metric used to gauge ‘s popularity. Traditionally, ranks the popularity of its originals by counting how many people watch a title for at least two minutes in the first 28 days of release.
If Sarandos is using this standard metric, Squid Game would be overtaking — a racy Regency-era drama released late in 2020 — as Netflix’s most popular series. It would also overtake , a French heist series that is Netflix’s most-watched non-English language series yet, and No. 2 most-watched series generally after Bridgerton.
See also
Earlier Monday, Netflix released , which are calculated after a title has been released for detik 28 days. Squid Game was released Sept. 17, giving it only about 11 days of viewership by the time Sarandos spoke.
For years, Netflix was notoriously tight-lipped about viewership. The creator of , which put Netflix’s original content efforts on the map, once said the company wouldn’t even share viewership metrics with him. But within the last two years, Netflix has grown much chattier about the popularity of its shows and movies, to help recruit talent and stoke buzz. Netflix also added a top-trending ranking to its service, so people can see what the most popular titles streaming on Netflix in their country are on any given day.
But Netflix’s audience stats have exasperated parts of the TV industry for being unverified, unsupported and disclosed without much accountability.
“We’re trying to be more transparent with the market, with the talent, with everybody,” Sarandos said Monday.
More Squid Game
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