(Credits: Netflix)

There you are, counting hours until Squid Game season three drops a bombshell on Netflix. But while you’re at it, the streaming giant is sending ripples down the fandom with the first six minutes of what’s about to come. With fans connecting dots of their deadly theories, the Squid Game think tank was already brimming full with speculation. But as the creators take out the needles to stitch up the loose ends in the finale season, these first six minutes prove detrimental.

Surprises in Squid Game never really ended well for the players. But before season three’s drop, Netflix just brought fans the thing they didn’t even realise they needed: the first six minutes of Squid Game season three premiere. Knowing that the viewers will waste no second in brainstorming the cryptic clues, Tudum stepped in to unbox the sneak peek. And Best of Netflix sends a fair warning: brace yourselves.

In the six-minute preview of Squid Game season three, the remaining players receive a gift unlike any other: Seong Gi-hun wrapped in a gift box coffin. Fans are aware of the failed uprising Gi-hun led in the previous season. So, the apprehension everyone feels glancing at the gift-box coffin, originally meant for eliminated players, makes complete sense. However, they can take a sigh of relief like the survivors because Netflix doesn’t play coy with player 456, who is indeed alive.

But in case you find that cathartic, you’re mistaken. Lee Jung-jae, who plays Gi-hun in the Squid Game series, confirmed the roadblocks ahead of him are too many to count. In fact, returning to the competition almost felt like Jung-jae was “being sucked into a different universe.” “When the coffin is opened, Gi-hun is reborn,” he explains. And this means one thing: Gi-hun has to undergo the challenging process again, serving as a deadly paradox.

Creator Hwang Dong-hyuk doubled down that The Front Man is on a mission to make survival harder for Gi-hun in Squid Game season three. The games will be more difficult and way darker. The stakes are increasingly high. And since Gi-hun must find a way to end the game, the decisions he has to make this season wouldn’t be easier than the last. Basically, expect more chaos, think on your toes, and always remember, like survival, death is also just a game away.

Fans shouldn’t mistake Gi-hun’s living status as The Front Man’s gesture of kindness. It’s the opposite. “He wants Gi-hun to really feel and understand the heavy price of his own mistakes,” Dong-hyuk tells Tudum. What the Front Man actually wants is for Gi-hun to give up on humanity. So, bringing him back in the game, letting him live, and making the games far more brutal than what the viewers have seen so far, serves the Front Man’s plan.

Gi-hun and the Front Man are both former Squid Game champions. For the Front Man, whether Gi-hun survives or dies is not relevant. In fact, they have completely different ideologies. As a result, “Front Man wants to dismantle the noble belief that Gi-hun holds on to,” Lee Byung-hun explained. What the Front Man primarily wants is for his former teammate to let go of his perspective and own his own. And the question that the first six minutes leave is who wins the psychological Squid Game in season three.