by Alice-Ginevra Micheli, Contributing Writer
We all have that feeling. You know the one: you finish watching a movie and something about it hits you in just the right spot. Whether it was the theme, the story, or even the characters, there was a quality about it that almost makes you want to turn around and go back a second, third, or even fourth time!
Bar the reality of living in the movie theater for the rest of your days, you turn to the rest of pop culture and start to look for other avenues where you can find that same feeling.
Well I’m here to make this plight easier for all. Each month, I will take a piece of pop culture that was prevalent in the social consciousness — whether it is a movie, tv show, or something else — and then recommend other forms of media for those who want to stay in that world a little bit longer.
Welcome to your One Stop Pop, internet!
Well, to borrow an overused cliche, this show needs no introduction. But because that would be supremely boring, I’m going to write one anyway. Squid Game found its way onto our Netflix home screens at the beginning of October, and in what seems like a matter of days, the show catapulted from unknown foreign language series to one of the most successful television shows of all time.
If you’re one of the many that got obsessed, consumed, and positively haunted by the Korean dystopian thriller, and have been yearning for more since finishing its great but fleeting issue of episodes, then look no further! I have compiled some great options to hopefully keep you sated enough until the rumored second season swings around.
Movie: Train to Busan
Lets start with one that I’m sure many have recommended already. However, with it being one of my favorites of all time, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention it at all. Not only is Train to Busan suitable due to its dystopian nature, Korean origin, or equally nail-biting, tension-filled moments, but also because it shares a cast member with the prolific show itself. I’m speaking of course of Gong Yoo, who plays the Mysterious Salesman in Squid Game (a.k.a. the incredibly attractive salesman in Squid Game).
In Train to Busan, however, he plays Seok-woo, a father who must chaperone his daughter on her birthday to see her mother. However, while they’re on the titular train home, a zombie outbreak occurs, causing them to have to fight to survive to see the journey through.
Now this isn’t just your run of the mill zombie movie; trust me, I should know (for reference: my favorite movie is Zombieland). This is something more. Sure, it has the terrifying undead, emotional sacrifices, the big action scenes, and of course suspense that can be cut with a very blunt knife. However, what sets this movie apart is its human characters.
Unlike other zombie predictors, this movie doesn’t just immediately make all the alive people awful and deserving of their impending death. Instead, it develops a variety of different personages who all serve their own purpose throughout the movie. Some are for attachment, some are for badassery (it’s a word), and some are, yes, to be the villains of the piece. Honestly, the humans in it are the best part of the whole thing, and really help round out what could have been an unimaginative horror flick.
I could go on, but that’s more than you need to know really. If this has intrigued you, I highly recommend you head on over to Prime Video, and check it out tonight!
Video Game: Among Us
I mean what other game could it have been? Ultimately a major theme in Squid Game is the inherent mistrust amongst the players and staff that make up our cast of characters, and that makes sense. If I was thrown into a game where killing me was just part of the fun, there is no way I would sleep for that entire week, let alone trust people I’ve never met before with something as vital as my life!
So with that in mind, the best way for you to experience something like this for yourself is to play an equally viral hit, Among Us. A personified, digitized, and refined version of the original in-person game Mafia, Among Us is an online multiplayer game that blew up in our first round of COVID lockdowns. Able to be played virtually, it allowed people to interact with strangers, and/or kill their friends. I mean who wouldn’t want to do that?!
If you haven’t heard of it, between four and 15 players are dropped into a spaceship location with a series of tasks that must be completed to ensure the ship’s keeping afloat. However, all is not as it seems! One to two of the players on your ‘crew’ are in fact ‘impostors’ whose mission it is to kill everyone! Crew mates can win by completing all tasks, or discovering and voting the impostor off the ship, while the Impostor(s) can sabotage to cause chaos, making for easier kills and better alibis.
It truly is a hoot — there’s no other way to describe it. Whether playing in an online game with strangers all across the world, or with a group of your friends that you’ve arranged a session with, there is a lot of fun to be had. It gets your brain thinking, your argumentative side active, and your paranoia attuned for all sketchy behavior. To summariZe: it’s a roaring good time.
If you’d like to give it a go, it’s available for download pretty much anywhere, including PlayStation 4, Microsoft Windows, Android, Xbox Series X, and Series S, Xbox One, iOS, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5.
Book: Wolf by Wolf by Ryan Graudin
What better recommendation to give for a high concept dystopian thriller than another high concept dystopian thriller, with a twist!
Wolf By Wolf follows Yael, who lives in alternate history Germany after the Axis triumphed in World War II. To commemorate their Great Victory, the Axis powers host an annual motorcycle race across their conjoined continents. The prize? An audience with the highly reclusive Adolf Hitler at the Victor’s ball in Tokyo. A former death camp prisoner, Yael has one goal: win the race, and kill Hitler. A survivor of painful human experimentation, she has the power to skinshift, and must complete her mission by impersonating last year’s only female racer, Adele Wolfe. This deception becomes more difficult when Felix, Adele’s twin brother, and Luka, her former love interest, enter the race, and watch Yael’s every move.
Sounds intriguing, right? Well I can confirm that this book not only fulfills, but surpasses its elevator pitch into a category all its own. Combine the fascination of alternative historical fiction with the dynamic story elements of a dystopian motorcycle race for the Führer’s approval, and you have something completely of its own.
Packed with adventure, mystery, and twists at every turn (pun intended), this book is a great next pick for anyone that was sold on the unique premise of Squid Game, as well as its incontrovertible commentary on the downfall of modern capitalist society.
Taking it one step further by having it set in a past that may have been, this book is sure to have you staying up at night desperate to reach the end to see what happens. Does Yael succeed in her quest? Are the Axis ever toppled? Do Felix or Luka see through Yael’s disguise? Are people truly living lives with the Axis in power? All excellent questions that can only be answered one way: go to your nearest library or bookseller, and get your own copy today!
Anime: Death Parade
The other element that I’m sure enraptured audiences upon watching Squid Game is the brutal element of choice, with what is moral and what is ethical being made worlds apart, causing you to question whether it’s at all possible to call oneself a good person. Well, if that’s an abstract feeling you’d like to sit in for longer, then look no further than the anime Death Parade.
The show takes place in a reality where, after death, humans are either reincarnated or sent to the void. Before this happens, they arrive at the Quindecim, a bar attended by the mysterious white-haired, Decim. As humans arrive for judgment, Decim gives them the chance to play a game and reveal their true nature. Based on this, he then decides who gets another chance of life and who gets banished to the void.
Oh, and did I mention that the first set of characters we meet is a married couple who must battle it out for either fate?
I’m sure I have your attention now.
Dark, ominous, and vastly captivating, Death Parade, is a one season anime that was actually derived from a one-shot that was at first only created to help new animators train in their craft. However, due to its success, a full season was created to help flesh out the story, as it were.
Only 12 episodes total, this is a great pairing with the live action Korean thriller, if only for its absolutely senseless look at what it means to toy with morality. Questions that many want to ask, but seldom want to have to answer, it’s a further look into humans from both an emotional, and logical standpoint so, in a word, this anime rules.
Streaming now on Hulu or Funimation, I highly recommend you give this a go if you haven’t already.
There you are: four equally fascinating and intense alternative content options to fill your brains with following your binge (and possible re-binge) of the magnanimous Squid Game. Deplorable, tense, thrilling, emotional, and downright traumatic, there should be something above that can help at least re-skim the surface of the emotions you might have felt watching the Netflix series.
I’m now off to inject some much needed comedy into my veins. I’ll will return next month to give some suggestions based on November’s greatest hit — whatever that may be!
Until then, thank you for visiting SiftPop’s One Stop Pop. We hope to see you again soon!
You can follow Alice-Ginevra Micheli on Instagram and Letterboxd