Did Netflix Screw Up the Squid Game English Subtitles and Dubbing?

Can we get a do-over?

Lee Jung-jae from Squid Game (Elle Taiwan, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

I just finished Squid Game season one last week. I am behind compared to most people living in the Philippines, because even my daughter watched it before me.

While you are trying to decide if I am a terrible father for allowing my 9-year-old to watch such a violent show just know that I am unconventional, and I felt the watching of a great story by a great writer was more important than a little fake blood.

I knew I was right about it because the story totally drew my daughter in, to the point she was sobbing at the end of the marble games episode (no spoilers people!)

I actually saw the end before I saw the rest and it kind of ruined the twist for me, but I watched anyway after I heard the story of how Squid Game even became to be made.

According to The Mirror:

“…fans are lucky the show saw the light of day as creator Hwang Dong-hyuk says it took him a whopping 10 years just to get the thing made. Speaking to The Korea Times, Hwang revealed that he actually came up with the idea for the series in 2008.”

As a writer, I admire that kind of patience and stubbornness to see your story be made into something you knew would be a sensation.

I knew I needed to spend a few nights watching the first season from start to finish, and surprisingly it only took me one long night to finish it when I was supposed to be working.

The show is mesmerizing, from the very first episode, once you get past the disconnect that three different pieces of dialogue are taking place. I always watch with subtitles on, its a quirk of mine so I don’t miss any of the story as the writer had intended it.

But, on Squid Game, you have the Korean, the English dubbing, and the English subtitles. I knew something was off when the dubbing and subtitles never matched and the story on the screen seemed to indicate that something else entirely was going on.

Enter Youngmi Mayer

I noticed @ymmayer’s first viral video on Facebook, since the algorithm has been feeding me a steady diet of Squid Game content for some time now. I can’t…