Triple Click - Beanscast: Squid Game & Battle(s) Royale

Episode Date: July 28, 2022

The Triple Click triad takes on Battle Royale - which means they’re spilling the beans on the notorious 2000 film, as well as The Hunger Games, Danganronpa, and Netflix’s recent series Squid Game.CW: More murder than usual, brief discussion of suicide.Note: This bonus episode originally ran in early December 2021.An interesting Inverse feature on some of the film’s stars 20 years later: https://www.inverse.com/entertainment/battle-royale-20-year-anniversaryJoin the Triple Click Discord: http://discord.gg/tripleclickpodTriple Click Ethics Policy: https://maximumfun.org/triple-click-ethics-policy/*It will be Maddy. Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointripleclick 🚀  SUPPORT TRIPLE CLICK:Join Maximum Fun | Buy TC Merch💬 JOIN THE TRIPLE CLICK DISCORD🎮 Triple Click Ethics Policy📱 SOCIALS | @tripleclickpodInstagram | YouTube | TikTok | Twitch

Hello, lovely triple-click listeners. It's Kirk Hamilton here. And as we mentioned last week, we are taking this week off from making the show. So instead of a new episode, we are sharing the following episode with you. So as you know, because we say to the start of every episode, we are members of the Maximum Fun podcast network. And if you become a subscriber to Maximum Fun, you can get monthly bonus episodes that we record. And the following is one of those bonus episodes. It's an episode we recorded last fall for the Maximum Fun. bonus feed and it's all about Battles Royale. So that meant really that Jason Maddie and I watched Battle Royale, the movie and we also talked about Squid Game, which at the time had just been a global phenomenon. We talked about

the Hunger Games, we talked about Dangan Romp, but we talked about anything with a kind of killing game battle royale theme. We talked about that storytelling method, how it works, the kinds of character stories that it allows for. It was a really fun conversation. And it's just a taste of the kinds of bonus episodes you get. If you become a

member. So we really hope that you will consider becoming a member if you aren't already one yet. You can go to Maximumfund.org slash join to become a member. And yeah, thanks so much to everybody who is already a member. We really appreciate you too. Okay, we'll be back next week with a new episode. Until then, here's our conversation from last fall about battles royale. I'm Maddie Myers. I'm Jason Shrier. And I'm Kirk Hamilton, and I have some bad news for both of you. What? Only one of us is going to walk out of this podcast recording session alive. I'm a rude. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know what I expected. Oh, no. Who's it going to be? Who do you think would make it out in a battle royale between? Maddie. I'm sorry.

Maddie's vicious. It's me. Maddie's a fight. I've been plotting both of your deaths for years and the time has finally come. I don't think we would stand a chance. Also, no jury would convict. Maddie, I feel like as an editor

at a website, I feel like you are just inherently like plotting the deaths of all of your writers. Oh, deeply manipulative job. Honestly, like people don't understand. Like when we did the Triforce thing and people were like, who'd be Gannadorf? And I was like, it's me. I don't understand why people don't.

It's Gannadorf. I'm Gannadier. Maddie is secretly mon. Manukuma. Maddie is the showrunner. That would be fun cosplay, honestly. That would be fun. There's a lot of cosplays of Monakuma and who, of course, is the greatest character.

It's true. Hey, speaking of which, speaking of Battle of Royal, big thank you to all of the thousands or tens of thousands, whatever it is, all of the people out there who are supporting us and entering into a death match to see who will be the, the final triple-click supporter. No, no, no, no, no.

They are the audience. They are watching this heinous display. That's true. They are the paying members chanting for each of us to kill one another. It really makes you think, you know. I know, it makes you think. You're the listener. Think about what you're supporting here.

What does it say about you? Like in the street game where they pulled those like English speakers off the street to be to pretend to be actors. To like wear the like diamond encrusted masks? That is what Max Follinger. Donors will be receiving in the mail as a diamond-engresseded big mask that you will wear to a covert location and then you will watch the three of us fight to the death. Or just record a podcast. That may or may not be max fun at least year.

So thank you all for being members. This is a bonus episode about Battles Royale. We're talking about a lot of different things, the movie Battle Royale, which we all just watched or re-watched, The Hunger Games, Dangan Romp. We're talking about a lot of stuff. So what we're going to do is I am going to come in, Future Kirk is going to come in right now and just say all the things we've spoiled. just going to spoil everything. This is a beans cast. We're spilling up. Well, Maddie already spoiled, dang. You can cut that out. You can, you can bleep it. That was bleep it, yeah. That was bleeped. But in the, after this, they're going to all be, the beans are going to be spilled. Though you knew that coming in. This is a beans cast, people.

Yeah, the beans are out. Spillin beans. So here comes Future Kirk to tell us what we are going to spoil. Bing! Future Kirk here to tell you as promise what we spoiled. And it's pretty much what you would expect. We spoiled. Battle Royale, the movie, the Hunger Games. and primarily the first Hunger Games film and book. We spoil Dangan Rompah, the first Dangan Rompah only, and we spoil Squid Game as well in its entirety. So pretty much what you may be signed up for. Also, just a content warning this episode does include more discussion of murder than usual, and also some discussion of suicide. Okay, back to the show.

Bing! Okay, that was great. Thanks, feature Kirk. It would be funny if we had spoiled, like, the Wizard of Oz. It's just like a crazy lady. And the listener is like, what? Like, how did that come up? And we're like, this is the ending of Bill and Ted where whatever we do now will dictate

what I do in the future. It comes in and it's just a total free association. Right. The following things will be spoiled. Like, the latest Super Bowl commercials, like the new season of succession. The Farmer's Almanac for 2023. It's interesting. The winning lottery numbers.

Yeah. Anyway. Okay. So this is going to be fun because it's surprising how Battle Royale has kind of taken over everything, like how this one premise has become one of the dominant paradigms in fiction and also game design over the last couple of decades. So we're going to start with Battle Royale, the 2000 Japanese film, because that is kind of just a good starting point. We all just recently watched or rewatched it. I hadn't seen it in 10 years.

or so and didn't really remember it. And I think both of you hadn't seen it. So we all just watched it for the first time. Yeah, I hadn't seen it. Yeah. Is this, I should ask, Kirk, you have got to know this. Is this the first example we've ever seen in media of like this concept of like dropping a bunch of people in one place and having all kill each other until one survives? No, I mean, there's previous things.

There's various versions of this. Like obviously any gladiator movie, there's death rate. Sure. There's the running man. But yeah, in this premise, and especially with it being young people. Again, and the callers. It's the world. you never say that anything was the first of anything because it wasn't.

And I'm sure this wasn't either. But this was certainly a sensational example of it. It had a huge cultural impact. And a huge controversy. It was banned for years. And people thought it would provoke teen violence and school shootings. And it was a lot of United States people, I know, couldn't watch it for a long time. And it had to be like pirated.

And it was like cool and culty to watch Battle Royale. And that was how it was for a long time. So a little background on Battle Royale. This was directed by Kenji Fukusaku, who's a very famous Japanese film director. One of Quentin Tarantino's favorite directors. So you can kind of see a lot of references to this film and his other films in Kill Bill, which is like basically Tarantino's love letter to Asian cinema. This was his last film.

It's based on a book by Koshun Takami, which he also wrote into a manga. The book is from 1999. The premise, of course, as you probably know, is that a bunch of teens are sent to an island. they have to kill each other and only one gets out alive. It's basically in response to rising teen violence in Japan, and it's a very Japanese-specific story in a lot of ways. This was like after the great economic recession of the 90s, there was all this fear about teen violence in Japan.

This story is kind of about that. And also, it's a very barbed, I think, criticism of parents and teachers and the people who aren't doing the work of taking care of children, and then they put them into this ridiculous scenario. Also, it's just like a really wild movie. It's really violent. And yeah, this came out right after the Columbine Massacre in America, which is why there was this huge reaction against it.

And everyone was in America. It was like, that is, that shit isn't coming here. Which is ironic because the movie is very much not about what the Columbine Massacre was. And I mean, I understand like the weird connection in your brain and in a person's brain between like, oh, teens having to kill each other on an island at the behest of adults. and teens killing one another in real life for unrelated reasons. It's just, this movie is so different from that.

But of course, media bands aren't always logical and I don't. Yeah, it really is that thing where there is like a specific lack of logic to this kind of reaction where, like, someone looks at this show and they see a scene where a guy like uses an Uzi to like mow down some high school kids. And they're immediately like, no, we can't show this even though like you said, actually like this is about, you know, it's like a. really thoughtful movie in a lot of ways. And it's about violence. Yeah. And it's about, as you said, the adults' failure and they're just oversimplification. I mean, actually, that's interesting. Do you think the movie is condemning Catano, the adults in the movie?

Because I really couldn't tell at first what this movie's stance was on that. And that's part of what's interesting about it, I think. Yeah. I mean, I read an interview. I read an interview with the director. I love this movie, by the way. I just watched this for the first time last night, and I thought it was incredible. So good call. I enjoyed it a lot.

I read an interview of the director. I'm totally misquoting and paraphrasing here, but Kenji Fukusaku, said essentially that like this movie stemmed from his inherent mistrust of adults as a kid and like how he felt like adults were always like irresponsible and mistreating kids. And like that's what the movie came from. So yes, 100%. It feels like it's a movie. The stance of this movie is that like the adults have all completely failed these kids. In terms of Katano, I think he's a more complicated character in a very ambassioned. one, partly because you see some just little glimmers of him toward the end, and his decision at the end is very interesting. But throughout the movie, absolutely, your sympathies are with the children, and you're meant to feel horrified. I think in a way that I've never felt horrified by another one of these story, but certainly not by The Hunger Games, that then Squid Game also made me feel horrified, but even Squid Game has that difference in that they're adults. But we'll get to Squid Game in a little bit.

But in this, I think that the way that this film lingers on the names of the children, It really introduces you to all of them. It assigns them all a number, which is this way of dehumanizing them, but in a way that also shows their name. So, like, you're kind of simultaneously presented with their dehumanization, but their actual identity. The way it uses flashbacks, the way that it, you know, every single showdown or murder that happens between the kids references their past life and their regular innocent childhood together. Like, all of that is really meant to make you feel sympathetic for the kids. and then the adults are just like either there's Catano

and then there's just these army dudes who are all just total assholes like they're just like worthless jerks I'm the first teacher I guess but he dies pretty quickly and he seemed like a nice guy and he's of course instantly killed but he was also presented I mean this is what's interesting about it

is that that first teacher is sort of condemned by Catano and the army guys is having slacked off like you sort of see him on the bus with the kids like playing paddy cake with them and like he's not instilling any discipline, of course. He's just allowing the teens to run wild, run amok. And like, that is, I mean, I will say, I thought the first 10 minutes of this movie were unintentionally funny. And then I ended up really liking it. But the setup is very odd. Like, the moment that you called

out in our G-chat, Jason, where you were like, why does Nobu stab Kitano in the first place? Like, yeah, I was so confused about that. It's so absurd that scene where, like, basically it's just Kitano as a teacher at the beginning of the movie. before the later events where he becomes a mastermind behind The Hunger Games. He's just a regular teacher who can't control his classroom and he's grown resentful. And Nobu is one of the students just stabs him in the leg for no reason other than that he's an out-of-control kid who's just fucking around. And then he runs down the hallway, like gleefully almost. And that's kind of the inciting incident, but also not.

This comes, Maddie, the important context there is that this comes after a couple of like text sclerons that are like the society is colloquially. Like things are out of control. So presumably it's related to like this all just being some sort of post-apocalyptic setting, although that's not really exploring. But I think the issue though, okay, so there's a couple problems with the setup of this movie. So the 1999 novel, I haven't read it, but I read the full Wikipedia page. So I'm basically an expert. The 1999 novel is set in post-World War II, Japan, but it's an alternate universe where Japan won. And so it's a totalitarian like sort of Nazi-influenced parable.

and the government creates the death games, hunger games style. And everybody in the society knows about the death games and that the kids are competing basically to just destroy humanity's morale in the country and keep this regime in charge. It's very similar to the hunger games in that way. But in this movie, they kind of want to have their cake and eat it too with that because they open with like employment rates are at 15%. Like the recession, there's a huge global recession and like Japan has hit really hard

and society is crumbling. And teens are out of it. of control as part of this. And like, they don't respect their elders anymore. And so that's why Japan has created this Battle Royale act. And it opens with a newscaster covering the Battle Royale, which makes it seem like everyone knows about the Battle Royale. But then later, none of the kids know what it is or understand why they've been brought there. And also the Battle Royale appears to be the work of Catano and his own grudge, his own acts to grind, Monakuma style, which is a more interpersonal parable about like teens and the experience of high school and bullying like more dangan rompa

as opposed to the hunger games and i just yeah it's not really clear that that was interesting but it was kind of both i agree that that's interesting and i was thinking about the same thing because when he tells the kids do you know about the battle royal act and he puts the BR act up on the board and they're all like no and he's like all 42 of them don't know right which like if this shit was happening you would know about it especially if you were a ninth grader and it was potentially like you had the potential to be in it that undercuts the entire premise of this sort of thing as a sort of act of government terrorism where in the hunger game style or in the style of the book, if you're using this to keep people in line and scare them,

then that makes sense. But they need to know about it for them to be scared about it. Yeah. Otherwise, they won't be scared at all. The flip side of that is that you wind up with, right, this much more personal feeling story that totally works for me. Yeah. Even though it doesn't make sense in that logical way because- It makes as much sense as Dangan Rompah does, where it's like this one teacher like kind of broke bad in a way. And like it is, it's sort of not explicable as to how he has all these government resources unless it's a governmental terrorism thing. But according to Dangan Ramborals, it's like, oh, just this person is finally getting back at all these fucking kids who didn't respect him. That's the thing is it's like the fantasy of the teacher who can finally just like smack these kids around.

And that's what that opening scene is really sort of enacting is he finally walks back into his into the room. But this time he's got soldiers. And this time he just kills the one girl, like right off. Yes. And then kills Nobu. Kills Nobu. That whole sequence. And I agree that it's got, this movie has such a weird energy.

The way even that people move, the way they choreograph the movements, it almost looks like dancing, especially in this early sequence. Maddie, you link this, we can link in the show notes this great article about the creation of this and how they spent just weeks on that classroom scene. And you can see it when he like, he cuts Nobu and Nobu falls and rollo. on the ground, and it's very, like, almost dance-like, like the children are kind of jumping around and flying around, and their emotions are so big that it takes you a minute, especially, I think, as a, like, American viewer who is just sort of adjusting to a lot of things, especially watching it with the Japanese language track, to just be like, okay, like, what frequency is this movie on?

Like, what exactly the fuck is going on? It took me a while to get there. Like, I think it's part of why I found it comedic at first, because I was like, am I just too desensitized to battle royals now? Like, if I just, like, I don't care anymore. But I think it's actually just that the movie's really fucking weird. And, like, it took me a little while to get on its wavelength. And then I think it also just becomes so much stronger once all the kids enter the game.

Yeah. Just the rest of the movie from that point is wild. Well, then you have the structure and you have the number ticking down, which really is the tension of, like, who's going to survive. Although I found it so disconcerting. I mean, maybe that's the point, but I found it so disconcerting how quickly some of the kids just starting killing each other. Yes. Well, yeah.

I mean, I think it just kind of, they brought in ringers, and that's part of what got it started. Like the one kid, the, but only one of the ringers was actually killing people. But he killed like 20 kids or something. Sure, but totally separately. Like, other people were just straight up killing each other. Well, the first kid who kills that girl, it was kind of an accident. Like, he's not even, you know.

I think also, Jason, like, they've just seen their classmates be murdered in front of them. Like, multiple of them, right? Like, like a foot away from them. They watch a girl get stabbed and then they watch like a kid's head explode because he's, they're all wearing these, these collars around their necks. And they're told, we can explode your collars and blow your heads off at any time. Like, if you aren't doing. Yeah, they blow over their necks.

They don't even. It's not like running. It's like just they blow a hole in your neck and you bleed out. It's really gross. And like it's projectile blood all over every kid. And it's so. And I feel like Jason, that's why it was more believable to me that the kids in just a traumatized panic. would be like, I have to survive this.

And like, some kids react by just running and some react by just immediately resorting to murder. And it's like, well, what would a person do in the situation? And I felt like they presented such a diverse array of reactions from each of the 42 kids that I was like, I do think this is at least believable within the world of this movie, which is already insane. So like I don't even know what I'm trying to make.

You get very few. Really, it's like Mitsuko is the one. girl who is like just a stone killer other than the one kid who kills everybody there's a lot of kids who are like either mistakenly killing one another or like not wanting to do anything but then sort of turning on each other in self-defense or whatever and then a lot of kids obviously who are just trying not to kill one another at all and a lot of suicides like this movie depicts a lot of suicides that's a Japanese culture thing for sure because suicide was in was has been a major epidemic in japan i mean i feel like it doesn't if this movie was America. I feel like it's still realistic that a lot of people in this situation would commit suicide. Like what if you know you can't kill anybody? A really heartbreaking scene early on is

the girl and the boy who are just like fuck this and they just jump off the cliff. Just hang themselves. Oh, well there's the two kids that hang themselves. Oh, and then later and the girl. And then later the boy and girl who jump off the clip. There's like multiple characters who are just like, I don't have it in me to kill other kids. So I'm going to kill myself. The little girl who leads to the kind of comedic massacre at the lighthouse, but then really tragically kills herself. Yeah. This is a very sad movie. It's so, okay. but zooming out a little bit because we're talking about battles Royale in general. I did it.

Take a drink. Jason, you mentioned that this movie really locks into focus and really gets moving once the game is underway, which I think is true and tends to be true of any of these things. It's always at its most... The setup is... Yeah. It's always at its least interesting when they're talking about why this is happening or they're kind of rationalizing it.

And like there is an excitement to the very first moments like in The Hunger Games, this is certainly something the Hunger Games does very well, where there's all this like pageantry, and then they finally like launch you up in these tubes, and then you're there, and there's a countdown timer, and then boom, you have to go. Like, there's always like an excitement to the start, but once it's underway, that's when the whole thing locks into place. And that's, I think, where the sort of game design part of a Battle Royale really shines, and like where that, it's like narrative game design, basically.

and you're seeing it play out in this film, in The Hunger Games, in Squid Game, it's like, you know, it's always a game, and the rules of the game are very clear to you, and it's the same reason that a video game story pulls you in, and that a video game feels like playing through this, you know, this thing that you really want to see what happens next. It's because it's designed and scaffolded in a video game or a game-like way. Yeah, I don't, I think part of it is also just classic storytelling, which is that there's this inherent tension in figuring, and the underlying question is like who's going to survive,

who's going to be the last person standing? And that is just, I think that's one of the reasons that this method of this genre, so to speak, or method of storytelling has become so popular, is because that question is always interesting, no matter what. If you have a group of people getting together

and like one of them is the winner, and only one of them can be the winner and the rest of them we're going to die, that is always a fact. just not even be chosen. I mean, it's like why people watch The Bachelor. Like, it's like, just having a huge group of people and they're going to be eliminated, you, you always want to call it at the beginning. And yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, so I think having that in any sort of story is always going to lead people to keep watching. And I think that's fundamentally what you're

looking for with any, with any sort of medium. Yeah, but I also think, though, that the game design part of Battle Royale, the movie is so apparent just from the get-go in a way that I don't know that it is in like a gladiator movie. Like the fact that every student gets a random weapon is very Fortnite. Like it's very like which which thing did you happen to find and like who do you happen to kill and can you take

their weapon? And the the main character gets a pot lid and like that's his weapon. And like that feels very fortnight to me. It's so funny. It's like and his girlfriend gets binoculars. Yeah. She gets binoculars. And like other characters get everything

from like an AK-47 to like a knife or like the the sickle that Mitsuku has. And it's it's like all manner of weapons that each of them has. And that just feels it's like yeah, life isn't fair. And also one of the kids is like a trained assassin seemingly. So like one of them is like a hardcore like e-sports pro equivalent but in real life where he's going to freaking kill like, you know, 30 of the kids. And then you don't have a chance. It's like yeah, you jump into a fortnight. You jump into a fortnight tournament and like ninja is there. Yeah, like ninjas there. But also it's real life and these are actual murders. So it's significantly less fun. Something that stood out to me, okay, I want

to compare this to Deng and Rapa for a second. This is going to be a little spoilery, but that's what we're doing here. So Shuya and Noriko, so kind of from the beginning, you see that like they're this, this quote unquote couple where like Shuya, she clearly cares for him. He clearly cares for her. There's clearly something going on there and that they're going to be partners and like stick up like like stick together throughout this this death game and have each other and stand by each other because like this sort of thing if I were in that sort of thing having a partner by my side would certainly make it more easier to get through and so it makes total sense then you play danganropa and you start off the game and you're playing as this guy this kid makoto and he runs into this girl named sayaka who like he knew from from before this and

they recognize each other from childhood and she's adorable and she's like this this bubbly personality who's like, oh my God, Makoto, I'm so glad to hear. Can I rely on you? Like, I want to, I want you to help me. Very similar to Noriko, like, in so many ways. She's, like, famous, right? She's, yeah, she's the ultimate teen. She's the ultimate idol. Yeah, very much like Nariko. Yeah, very much the same character type. And then she immediately dies in the first chapter. Unlike Mariko. And then on top of that, it turns out that she dies because she was planning on framing you and killing someone else and framing you for it. So it's the ultimate subversion, and we were talking about this on our Dangan Rampa episode, about how this series is so good at subverting things.

And that to me, seeing like kind of the origins of this, of that relationship, and knowing how Dangan Rump was subverted it, I thought it was pretty cool to watch in the original version. Yeah, it feels more like a direct commentary on this movie in Dangan Rompah now. I think it almost has to be. Yeah, it definitely is. Which is fun, because I didn't know that. That might be the best twist in all of Dangan Rompah,

and it happens at the very beginning of the first game, but it really might be the best twist. Because they really like, they're like, hey, it's free time. Why don't you go hang out with that cute idol girl who seems so nice, who you used to know as a kid? And then she totally just gets murdered. Yeah. Yeah.

I think that that sort of subversion works better for me. Like, it works better for me that Dangan Rampa is doing something with the narrative framework and playing with it in a way that I think Squid Game does as well, where when you look at the Hunger game, Like the Hunger Games doesn't really bring anything new to the table. There's always this question of, you know, what are you going to do when you're in there with your friend? When you're like Katness is in there with PETA. They're both in there.

Oh, how cruel. But then in the Hunger Games, maybe it's that the Hunger Games is American, but the Hunger Games is the one where the person is able to break the game through like their sheer force of will and like escape. But so is Battle Royale though. They do break the game at the end, which I will admit. I did not expect them to be able to do that. I thought that just one person was going to survive. But I wasn't expecting, like, sort of magical level computer hacking to play a role and also for a different character to have somehow been behind the hacking in a turn of events.

I was not so that I could explain. Well, yeah, it was. So it was Kowada, right, who did the virus. Yeah, somehow. Yeah, it was kind of, like, waving a hand and just like, forget about this. They're gone now. He figured out how to turn off the neck guard. of his two new buddies while tricking Catano and company, and they all got away, except

Kauwada tragically died. Let's think this through then, because I think there's something interesting here. So let's look at those three stories, Squid Game and Battle Royale and the Hunger Games. I've never seen The Hunger Games, by the way, or Reddit or anything. Oh, do you not know the ending? Because I can summarize it. I don't know anything about the Hunger Games. Oh, wow, really?

Okay. Well, it's very twilight. It's actually a love triangle. I believe the other guy's name is Gail. I'm remembering it right. It's like Gail or Dale or something. And so he's the one who's back at home waiting for Katniss and he's like the brunette hottie and Pita is the blonde hottie who's loved Katniss her whole life but she's like so

embarrassed because he knows how poor she is. This is all very important. So anyway, she knows on some level that PETA loves her but she doesn't actually like him. Okay, Maddie. No, this is part of the plot, Jason. And she pretends for the cameras that she and PETA are in love. And PETA believes her. And that's why they save both of them at the end is because the two of them together in the climactic moments are like,

we're both going to have to die. So I guess we'll just both commit suicide because we love each other too much to do anything. And they stop the games and save two winners because of that, except that Katness was faking it. She didn't actually love PETA and PETA was not faking it. And that sets up the Love Triangle Tension for books two and three, which I could give a shit about. But that's how they win is by fucking with the cameras of it all. And the audience and the reality show game betting, all of that aspect of it, they fuck with that to break out, which is very different from how the characters in battle royale break out. Right.

So, and I think that the first Hunger Games, particularly the first Hunger Games book, kicks ass. Like, I think it's a dope book. When I first read it, I read it in like an afternoon because it's just like a... And it's still worth it, Jason. It's a fun read. Oh, yeah. It's really good. And that, but I do think that it's interesting that Katness is very clever and, like, comes up with this way on her own in the heat of the moment to get through it.

Because there's always this question of like, well, only one of us can get through this thing. And we're in it together and we're friends. So like at some point, I'm going to have to betray you or you're going to have to betray me. And throughout the Hunger Games, there is like routinely, it's kind of convenient. She becomes friends with Rue. Rue gets killed. And like, so, oh, she didn't have to make that decision. even though Catniss is really kind of a killer and maybe would.

So at the very end, she comes up with this way to kind of get out of it intact or at least alive. Where in Battle Royale, they don't come up with anything. Like the two protagonists, Shia and Noriko. Shia and Noriko are just the most passive characters. They just wander through the movie. They're kind of passive characters. And there's like a hint that like Noriko's innate goodness, like the fact that the teacher really liked her is like part of why he was. at least rooting for her, but he doesn't even manipulate the game for her to win or anything.

Yeah, he does show up randomly. He gives her an umbrella. He gives her an umbrella. I watched that scene multiple times because I was like, why is he here? And it's not, I mean, I guess the answer is just he's sort of fascinated by this daughter figure. Well, he's imagined her. Yeah, because his daughter hates him. He hates him, yeah.

He wants this. Right. And then you see at the end that she had a relationship with him and, like, she actually treated him like a father. So you can see why he liked her. Yeah. By the way, I should say that, like, like one of the other parallels that I immediately thought about with with dangan rampa and battle royale is that

Kitano just like monocuma is like the most captivating villain that like every time he's on stage you're just fascinated by him like everything about him his facial tics and his personality and his voice is similar in the sense that he is he is getting revenge I mean he's not a fellow teen as monocuma turns out to be but he does he is getting revenge in a very personal way and like the stakes are personal for him in a weird way. Well, I wouldn't say Dangerumpa's about getting revenge, though, because she's like, I feel as though I've been... She's like the ultimate, no, she's the ultimate despair. Her whole story is that she's like this, this, this psychopath. She's also like a model who's been judged. I mean, yes, I know she's a psychopath as well, but she's like, I, you know, been judged my whole life and like that's what she's

projecting. I don't know. That's how I read her character. Maybe I should replay Dangerumpa. I don't think I'm the only one who sees her that. No, her story. Her story is that she's the leader of this group called The Ultimate Despair. That is like their entire personas are dedicated to like bringing despair. Yeah, but there's her story and there's how you can interpret her character. Like you can interpret her character a lot of different ways. Sure, but you see her, I mean, her character doesn't exist.

Like the supermodel character does it. Like she's like a split personality. There's a lot to it. It's worth replaying the game. Once there's a split personality, it's kind of hard to evaluate a character at all. Yeah, she has like, well, she, it's this, there's this crazy scene. at the end of Dengarampa that that I had forgotten about until I replayed her recently, but she's like,

she puts on all these different personalities and voices, and she's nuts. She's amazing. She's a great villain. But anyway, so yeah, so Kitano, I think, is just like, and he's played by Beat Takeshi, who's this actual TV host in Japan, who's, like, super famous and well-known. I think he had that show, Castle,

something, Takeshi's Castle or something like that. He was a game show host, like, in real life, which is, like, adding to the unreality of Battle Royale in a fun way for viewers in Japan. panic. And he has such a great voice that like he uses, like when he does the announcements, it's so good. Everything about him is so captivated. Yeah, it would be like if like

Trebek hosted the Hunger Games or something. Like it would be like the equivalent of that for us at the time. I was trying to think of like other game show hosts that would be like very weird to see them be a villain. Because that was what people reacting to as well was that he was not seen as like a bad guy in the media. He was like well liked as a game show host. So now he's evil.

That's fun. I like how his left eye kind of twitches and closes. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, so I'm going to complete the zoom out now. We've got, so we've got heroes take it upon themselves through their creativity, survive the games. That's Hunger Games.

Then we've got heroes are actually kind of passive. They're helped out by Kowada who is actually kind of the protagonist of the story who gets them through it. And then they also get through it because Catano sort of lets them go. Like he knows they

survived and then he sets it up so that they'll kill him so they can escape because he's like over his life and wants to die anyways and they kill him and then he takes a phone call and then he dies that scene is incredible where he just gets up and it's like I was like what the fuck like because you're thinking like were they blanks like were those are those like squibs on him or is that blood and he's like so weird also he like has a water gun like he didn't even have a real gun yeah because he wasn't actually threatening well because he wasn't going to shoot nariko because he really saw nariko well I know it's just like that reveal was also amazing to me. Okay, so we've got those two. So now Squid Game is, I would say,

I guess, the most cynical of the three of these then, right? Like Squid Game ends with the whole game is intact. He actually just wins according to the rules of the game. Like nobody cheats. You're thinking the whole time like, oh, maybe, you know. So it's like, Sebyak, is that her name is going to, she's going to like be so industrious and like crawl up into the ceiling. And then no, and then she like dies in a really sad. way. And really, it's just, it comes down to the characters and he just gets through it. And then there's kind of this twist at the end, which, have I mentioned this on the show that I like, don't like the ending of Squid Game only because I wish it had just ended? I kind of wanted it

to just end. Yeah. No, I'm with you. I was, I thought it was going to end. Wait, which twist? Are you talking about the old man twist or the airplane twist? Yeah, the old man twist. So at the end of Squid game, uh, Gihun goes back to his apartment and of course his mother's dead and like, what's the point of anything and he just like lies on the ground and cries and I was like credits like that's it like just end it right there like I was waiting for that I have a slightly different take well go ahead there's like some dangan rompa-esque twists on twist where it's like he goes and finds out that the old man that he befriended in the game is still alive and also is the katano-esque jinkoesque mastermind behind it all who is still dying of brain cancer but fundamentally

believes people are evil, makes a weird bet with Kuhn about a homeless guy on the street. There's a ticking clock. It's all of that like additional like are people truly good or bad? I was like, this is this is weird. Like I didn't need all this. You know what I'm saying? Let me share my take. My take's a little bit different because I would have been happy. What I didn't like is that it's set up another season and that there was like this stuff afterward where he gets off the plane and is like going to go and there's a new hair cut. Yeah. That stuff I was like, I don't need. that I would have actually been fine. I liked the scene with him

where the old guy reveals that he was actually in charge of everything and that's like the twist is that this guy really like just wanted to do the whole thing and it kind of puts things into this fresh context. It also changes the impact of my favorite episode which is the Marbles episode the most heartbreaking shit I've ever seen.

But now it's not. But now it's not. It's destroyed me. Right. And it makes it like undercuts the most impactful thing about the whole show emotionally, which I sort of enjoyed. But I liked the bet, the scene where the guy is drunk on the street

because there was an unspoken thing to it, because the whole time I'm staying there thinking, you can just go down and help him. Like, you could be, there's nothing in the bet that says you can't just go help him. But it was like so fundamental to Jehoun's character that he was like just powerless and like

beaten down and unable to like take control of his own life. And he just sits there and like watches and he treats the bet as though he can't do it. if that guy had died and then right as he dies, like someone comes and helps him, and then it's just the end of the story, it would, like, as a self-contained thing, it would have been, like, flawless. And instead, having the cop and, like, the brother and that whole thing and, like, these carrying on stuff where, obviously they're going to get another season because it was so popular. I, like, I wish it had just been one self-contained season because it would have been nearly flawless. Yeah.

I haven't thought about that. That's a good point, Kirk, about his powerlessness. although I can't imagine that the that Guyune, that the old man would have tolerated him. I think he would have. I think he totally would have. Like, I think that was part of the test. I mean, what can he do?

He's bedridden. You can't stop anyone from going and helping the guy. But I mean, I also get that that scene, I mean, I like the overall commentary of like people are good because I think that's true personally. So I liked that the show that had been so cynical about human nature generally was also still realistic

about what people do when they're under stress and was also like yeah sometimes there are people who actually help somebody else out but that paired with just the ridiculousness of the old man's monologue I don't know I just I struggled with it in that moment

that's understandable yeah weird and like a little too much but not not like it ruined the show for me it wasn't on that level at all and I'm sure I'll watch season two and see what they do but I I was like, this is a lot. I'm a whirl with all these twists, and I don't think I needed them to be here.

Yeah, I think that it's remarkable. I think, I mean, I thought it was a really remarkable show. And that just given that it took the paradigm that had been established and then built upon that felt so familiar at this point, and by actually like really leaning into how disempowered everybody in it was, how they're all, I mean, they're all there by their own choice because the actual existing world that we live in is so shitty. to actual people, like it really is right now, that some people would believably choose to do this,

which I buy. And like, that's like bleak, man. It's like really bleak. And it's about our actual world. That, I think, is a really interesting, like, new wrinkle to the battle royale formula or to the formula of this kind of death game story where, like, really, they really drilled down and got real about it. Rather than, you know, whatever, getting more fantastical or building new rules or, like, you know, going in some more. more just sort of fun or creative direction, they actually just got way darker and it worked. I guess it's the era we live in that that would be the most successful version.

Yeah. I feel like it also works because it's still somewhat about interpersonal relationships. Like, I don't know if you meant like the cop storyline was something you didn't like, but I actually thought that was really cool. I liked it. I liked it, but I didn't like how it led to an eventual reveal about bigger world-building stuff. but I thought it was an essential part of the show. But I liked that the host character turned out to have been related, to have been the brother who won the game.

Like that whole turn of like you never really escaped this cycle, I thought was both a good societal commentary and also just interpersonal thing to share about these characters. I thought that worked really well. And those smaller moments were part of what made it so good. Also, Squid Game, amazing stealth video game. Like those, the cops sneaking around pretending to be the other guys. Like, my co-worker Mike Maharty compared it to Hitman.

And that has just stayed in my head. It's such a hitman level. Weeks. Like, it would be the coolest hitman level. And it just feels like a video game. There are hitman levels that are almost that like so many where you're like, there are different similar costumes that allow you access to different areas. Like that's just such a.

Or like a secret society with masks. Right. Like it's evil and you need to break into it and disrupt it in some way. And you would totally go and kill the guy, yes. I almost feel like there might have been a level that was like forcing people to kill each other or something. But yeah, and that actually I think is interesting too, that they introduce a new kind of game design to this formula that was already very game designy. And that it gives you the same thing that a stealth game gives you, which is the opportunity to observe a system at work, which is why I think the cop is an important part of Squid game is that through him, you see how this all works. it would just be a contestant's eye view,

which would be probably effective, but pretty growing and scary, if it was just them. And more like Battle Royale or Dangan Rompah, where you never really get to see it outside of what's happening until the end. I guess like Dangan Rompah, because Battle Royale, you do see the command post. You do see how it's structured,

where Dangan Rampa, you're just in it in a first-person perspective, which does make a pretty big difference in how it feels. I've been thinking about how all of these battles Royale are designed to cause the place. Players despair of some sort. And that's most blatantly spelled out in Danga Rumpa. But I actually think Squid Game, the one where nobody's actually killing each other or asked to kill each other, might be the most effective at causing despair because so much

of it is like about intention and unintentional like behavior. So for example, I mean, first of all, the concept that the conceit that they all are choosing to be there is really interesting. And that's an interesting wrinkle to that particular show. you could argue that because of their financial situations and like the crushing crushing debt and capitalism in general that they don't really have a choice but they are sensibly choosing to be there. So they are it's as like that's unlike any of the others.

Well, sort of. But yeah, sort of. No one in Fortnite is choosing to be there. That's what Jason's saying. It's societal factors that are controlling. The other thing that I think is really interesting is that the most heartbreaking deaths are like unintentional. It's people picking their partners or what they think, who they think they're going to team in the Marvel's game, only to discover that they're actually competing against each other

and they're going to be responsible for the deaths of whoever they picked. And that is like even more despair-inducing than like, I think I've never been in the situation, but it seems a lot more like crushing than even just asking people to directly kill each other because if you're given, if you're told to go directly kill people, like you have the choice of not participating. killing yourself like people did in battle royale or just not doing it and trying to survive. But here it's like you unintentionally chose to be partners with this person and therefore they are going to die or one of you is going to die and it's going to be your fault and you have no control over that. That is like even more crushing than like active. Active murder. That was the episode where

I was like, oh, I guess this is where I would die because like if Dina and I were in the game together, I would be like, all right, I'm just going to get shot because at least that's a quick way to go. Like they just do, it's, it's relatively humane, if that's the right word in Squid Game. Like, it's just headshot, boom, you're dead. It's like some of the Battle Royale deaths are really gruesome ways to go in like Hunger Games. It's like children who don't know what they're doing. Yeah, dangarrapa. Definitely. But Squid Game, it's, it's very cold and calculating, which is why I thought it was interesting that people described it is so violent because I was like, compared to some other media I've seen, it's more emotionally violent. It's the actual violence of

Squid game is it's a lot of headshots, but what gets to you about it is the circumstance and the fact that it's as Jason says despair inducing because you're like, oh my God, these people are treated as less than human by society and now they're entering this death game

because they have no other choice. Yeah, I think the reason for that is because the whole purpose of the game within that universe is not the death. Like the death is just incidental. Like the people who are watching when we see them and they're fantastic. Fantastic acting.

When we see them watching, they don't seem to care about the deaths. Like, the deaths are just like, like, people falling off a bridge and landing in a pile on the floor. Like, that doesn't matter. They're more interested in who the winner will be. And I think that's an interesting wrinkle as well. Whereas if you're playing Dengaropa, part of the kind of lurid thrill is seeing the different executions. Like, how is this person going to be murdered? And it's just an interesting framing.

And also solving the murders is a key part of it because you need to collect everything in that room. But, yeah, but I mean in terms of like the impact of the death itself, I feel like it's more, more of an impact in Battle Royale and Dangerumpah as opposed to Squid Game where it's kind of beside the point. Yeah, to the violence in Squid Game, I do think, because there's almost a slaughterhouse energy to the first couple of episodes. It's so clinical and they're just murdering people. Well, they have to narrow down. They started at 4.68. It depends what you find most haunting, I guess, is if that aspect of it is what truly unnerves you, then Squatry. game is actually the most horrifying of them all because it's about a system grinding you down.

Right. And like the way that they're systemically slaughtered in that opening sequence is pretty tough. If you just, you know, from a pure violence on screen standpoint, I mean, it's just watching a mass murder of unarmed people, which is like, you know, brutal. So I can see why people would have that reaction, even though I agree that it wasn't until the Marbles episode, that it really like, it was, that was actually where the show locked in for me also of like, oh my God, this show is amazing. Like this isn't just a really, you know, kind of, I don't know, nasty, weird, you know, propulsive thing.

Like it was just, it was fun to watch because I was like, damn, this is like dark and messed up and really slick and well done. And I'm, I definitely want to know what happens next. But I wasn't like, you know, you don't love it until they break your heart. And then you start to really feel for the characters and see what's happening. For me, it was, it was Sabiak and the other girl. So that whole conversation where this other girl just has nothing to live for when she keeps forgetting and being like, oh, after we get out of here, like we can go to the movies together. I was, I tell you what, I haven't been as emotionally destroyed by an episode of TV as I was by that episode.

I was alone. Have I did I talk about this on the main show? Oh my God. No, I don't think so. You watched it alone? Wow. Not alone. Well, Emily couldn't hang.

She was like not into the show. It's too violent. So she was out at work. And I'm at home. And I'm like, oh, Dina loves stuff like this. She'll watch more violent content than me. Like, she was like, checking with me. She was like, are you sure you want to keep watching this?

I was like, I got it. I want to know what happens. I got to know who wins. Yeah, just watching that episode. Like, oh, I'll put on another episode of that funky show. I've been watching it. I was just like, oh, like halfway through it by the end. And it was wild because I knew what was going to happen.

Every single pairing. I was like, well, he's going to kill him. The old guy's going to let him win. She's going to kill her. Like, it was like, all of the main characters are going to survive this. That wasn't what was devastating. It was the actual just minute to minute reality of it and that they just let you sit with it for the whole episode

when you knew how it was going to end. Oh my God. That's like one of the greatest episodes of TV. I didn't expect the husband and wife thing. Like I didn't necessarily because I sort of was like, oh, well, clearly like it's a husband and wife. They're probably both going to kill themselves. But instead he allows his wife to die and then is so haunted by it that he kills himself.

And you just sort of watch this side character deteriorate in the background of the proceedings that are unfolding with the main characters. And that was really brutal to watch because I was just like, well, I guess that's how that would have gone for that guy. No wonder, no wonder we all love, no wonder humans love battle royals so much. Yeah. So twisted. So why do we find, is it just because it's such a good metaphor machine? Like, is that the thing that makes these work?

Like the thing that Squid Game does that is on another level from either of, you know, anything that came before it. is that it's like such a potent metaphor for capitalism, for our current society, really just for that. And like it works on small levels and macro levels. It's about relationships. It's about adults. Like it's about the world that we as adults inhabit where by being about high school, Dangan Rumpa, Battle Royale, even the Hunger Games is about teens. Like it's like those are all kind of about these more teen-flavored emotions where Squid Game is like much more fully fleshed out and real. and it feels like it's more about the real world.

But fundamentally, they all work. And is it because they're all just like, it's just such a potent metaphor because we just live our lives according to this, or at least are told that we should live our lives according to this thing of like compete with everybody. And one of you can win, like be the best. And it's life or death.

And even if it's not literally life or death, it feels like it's life or death. So what if it was? Right. Yeah. Right. Like what if we just shrunk it down and put it into this tiny thing

and like made the rules very clear? And then you just got to watch. And maybe that is the case. I mean, that's like why Survivor was a big, was as big as it was. It is. So many reality shows have that exact same structure. And also, again, so many video games do. And it's why these Battle Royale video games are so satisfying.

Like even like the goofiest one, like fall guys. Like it's still like really cool to watch and just be like, oh, let's see who wins. I'm going to stick around and see who wins. Like it's just there's something about the elimination process and the best person. at the end or the most deserving person at the end that satisfies some core thing in us, I guess. I don't know. I hate to even say that because it sucks. Like, I don't want that to be something that satisfies a core thing in me. That sucks ass. I don't like that. Your core violence urges. I don't like it. I think it creates, it creates the fantasy of meritocracy,

which I think is really appealing to people. The last man standing, best man wins or best women wins. I think, Kirk, to your point, I think that clear rules are really the most important part of this whole genre and concept. And in all of these games, just having a clear rule so that is always followed and that the creators, even the people who are like the authoritarian who are in charge, who are controlling everything, they cannot break the rules no matter what. I think that really makes it work. And that's the most important thing about it is that like, you're going into this. You know exactly what the stakes are, what the rules are. Like, it would not, you would feel cheated as the audience of this story or as the audience

of these games if, like, at the end of it, instead of winning, like, when there are two people left, like, suddenly Monakuma comes out and decides, oh, you know what, I'm just going to end it for us all. And I'm going to decide that neither of you can win. I'm going to kill you both or whatever. Because whoever's in control already has so much power and authority that it would just feel, like, nonsensical if they then decided, like, actually, we're going to. to kill everybody. So I think that Squid

Game has the most clear-cut commitment to that principle because in the Hunger Games they're constantly like cheating because there's this whole thing where like they you know there's this political part of that whole story where they need Catanus to do this or that or they're going to try to kill her and they're constantly

like mixing things up and throwing things into the fight that aren't fair. In Fortnite or PubG it's also not fair right because there's RNG like you find and same in Battle Royale it's not And there's the random danger zones. I'm just talking about following the rules that you have set.

Right, but like it works in the, in terms of the commentary, but it's not actually fair that in Battle Real you're all like you just said, Maddie, you're all given different weapons or they move people around and the rules are by nature unfair and those are the rules. As long as they're following the rules, right? Like that's not if someone opened a box and they got nothing and the rules were that you have to get something, then that would feel unsatisfying. That's my point. And it's why when somebody like has.

acts and cheats in Fortnite, it's so frustrating. I mean, that's part of why it was also surprising to me that that was a plot point in Battle Royale because I was like, oh, we're like outside the rules now. Like, we can just hack stuff? Like, why do we have this capability? Like, I expected some emotional hacking, like Katniss style where they, like, found some way to trick the system in that way. But instead, it's like a very literal, like, no, we're going to cheat by turning off

the little neck braces. Like, that's the only way for multiple people to survive this, which is, it's fun to watch that and the Catnus version because you like seeing the underdogs get one over on the authority figures. But you're right, Jason, if the authority figures were the characters who were suddenly like, also, I'm going to suddenly kill six of you at random. Like, that would be weird and bad and, like, stupid. Yeah, that's why the later Hunger Games books get less and less interesting, especially when they're no longer doing the Hunger Games. It's most interesting when you have a framework you understand. And that's also why I just read the synopsis of Battle Royale 2, which there was a sequel film that was directed by Fugasaku's son

because he died before he could make it. And it sounds like a mess. Apparently it got very bad reviews, but it's totally like, you know, the two of them are on the run. And then there's a new battle royale, but the kids like get sent after them to hunt them down. And so Shuya and like his freedom fighters have to fight against these other kids. And then it just sounds like a total mess.

And it's very similar where it's like, wait, what? Is this even battle real anymore? Which is also true of the third hunger games. In the Hunger Games, where it's like Katness and her freedom fighters have to fight against random people. There's an amazing thing. I don't either. The third book's a mess. I never even saw the final movie.

There's an amazing sequence where they're like attacking the Capitol in their army. And then she's like, and then she realized the way that the battlefield was arranged, it was another Hunger Games. And you're like, you don't have to justify calling the third book. the Hunger Games by actually trying to pretend that the war that's happening is somehow the Hunger Games, because it's just not anymore. It's just a war. And the Hunger Games was the metaphor thing.

Right. You're doing the literal version of the metaphor. Right. Yeah. Oh, well. So yeah, breaking out of the game always kind of loses thing. And that's actually kind of why I'm worried about Squid Game season two. It's the same thing. Like, these stories work when they're hemetically sealed within a story. It's why Dangan Rompel loses me

when they start talking about the despair people. It's why the sequel loses. me in ways that I won't get into for your sake, Maddie. But like, anytime they go outside of the game, you lose a lot of that potency. So I guess the strength of the Battle Royale is just that closed system, how well it works as a metaphor for just about everything or anything you want it to be, and how clear the rules are, how we understand how it all works. And there's actually kind of an infinite number of possibilities.

I think as Squid Game kind of showed, like, whoa, there's a whole lot more you can do with this framework then has been done. Yeah. Yeah, well, it's brilliant. I mean, you don't, Squid Game really shows us that it doesn't have to be them all killing each other. It can be done in other ways. But yeah, I mean, the concept of like, like, it's a reality show, right? Like, it's essentially you're watching a reality show and that concept has always been just so appealing and just has so much inherent conflict that it's always just going to make for a good story. Yeah, and since people don't die on reality shows, I feel like that's part of why the actual video game versions of this are fun because, of course, you don't actually die. In real life,

when you die in the game, for some reason, I don't know why not, because everybody's been saying for years that that happens, but they haven't, they haven't figured that out yet. So that's part of why, like, watching a really good match of PubG feels as much fun as watching, like, a thrilling survivor finale, because it's like, oh, it's that, it's tapping into that same sense of, like, there's characters on the battlefield. But I don't actually know if that sensation is the same, as I feel watching Squid Game. Like, I don't even put those things in the same category. No. No.

Like, it's not about that. It's not like, well, like Battle Royale, the movie was controversial and was, you know, parents were freaking out about it because of the content of the film where Fortnite was controversial because like all the kids wouldn't stop playing it. Like it's just a very different kind of thing. They were playing Fortnite at recess and so on and that was probably also too irritating. They were flossing all the time. They were flossing.

There was so much flossing. I was like, okay, so I went to my old high school a couple weeks ago to like give a little talk to their newspaper class. And I asked them, I asked them if any of them played video games. And they're like, no. And I said, you guys don't play. Like, what are kids playing these days? Like, are you guys playing Fortnite? And they all laugh.

They're like, Fortnite. So apparently, Fortnite is not longer cool at high school. That panic has gone away. I wonder what games the kids play these days. If you know, write us and let us know. So do you think... Well, so Roblox is big among younger kids. Oh, yeah. Sure.

They have some Battle Royals, I'm sure, in there. But not high school. And they have Squid Game games in Roblox as well. That's true. That's true. So we're winding down here, but I want to... Do you think on the video game tip, is this now the, like, maybe the dominant type of competitive multiplayer game, like the Battle Royale game?

Like, was it the case that for so long, deathmatch was the thing, and it was like, whatever, 16-de-6? 8V8. And then there were kind of bigger games. Do you remember was it called Gun, the Sony, the PlayStation game? They had like 100 people. And then Battlefield, you know, a lot of people. Oh, it can be so big.

Bing! The game I was talking about is actually called Mag. It was a 2010 PlayStation 3 game that could support up to 256 players, which was quite a lot of players then. And actually is kind of quite a lot of players now. So anyways, it's not called Gun. It was called Mag. Bing!

Was it just that there wasn't the bandwidth to create this thing of like, okay, there's 60 people? they're all on an island. The island's really big. Sometimes they're not going to fight, but eventually they're going to have to, and only one person is going to win. It just seems like a way better setup for a multiplayer game, but it's funny to think about what a PVP game was for so long when we were all playing video games, like in the

2000s. It was always Call of Duty, like, you know, six versus six match. And it could only be a few people. It could only be like 12 players or 10 players or whatever because that was all that games were capable of doing that. And so having it not lag and like be. coherent. Yeah, I mean, I am only going to say no because I feel like something else will happen that we should never predict. Until the next thing, I guess, is more what I mean. Not forever.

Nothing is forever. I cannot imagine what it will be. But yes, for now, it is the thing. And I feel like I've almost talked myself out of my take going into this, which was that Battle Royale, the movie and The Hunger Games, etc., influenced PubGy, which like it did clearly influence PubGy. but PubG feels like The Bachelor. Like it's so different to have a video game where no one is actually dying

and like that's just an inherently different construct than these stories or even Dangan Rompah which is also a video game about a death match. But it's a narrative video game. It is a narrative video game

that is about the feeling of being in a death match where Fortnite is never about that. Like at no point are you like the shocking betrayals which like honestly why not? Like that would be own if that was somehow

also part of it. Like, that is actually what's going to happen next, is that it will be a video game. But, like, Dangan Rompah-esque, where you have to get away with murder in the game and trick everybody. And it's such a, like, detailed physics engine. Well, that's among us, right?

Now you're talking about Among Us. It's really among us. That game's good. Yeah. Among Us is... I invented among us by accident. That's the next thing. Let's make this a game. Let's get rich.

I think people don't like it. I think it should be on phones. Yeah. It sounds great. So I think... So I think the real appeal of the battle royale game is the endorphin rush that you get and like that that looming sense of tension that builds as you get further and further along, right? Because you're so committed. You've been playing for 20 minutes.

You're in the top five or whatever. It's like if you die, it hurts even more than if you died 10 minutes ago. But if you win, the rush is just incredible. And I felt that before while playing trials of Osiris and destiny where like you're committed to this thing. You're trying to go flawless. You put all this time into it. so the highs are even higher and the lows are even lower. Also felt this way while gambling.

It is all very similar and very much appealing to like that human just like desire for like these stakes and tensions and so on. So I think if a game mode were to come along that were to capture that same feeling of like, oh man, like tension is so high. But if I win like I really made it above all these people and like the rush is going to be so great. I think that's very possible and I'm sure there are designers out there working on the new big thing in that front as we speak.

Yeah, it's really that there is a narrative to a Battle Royale video game because there's actually pacing. You know, there's downtime, there's exploration, there's arming up, there's little skirmishes, it's all building toward a kind of final showdown. That narrative just doesn't exist. If you just tune into a stream of Call of Duty,

it's just like whatever. Like it's just a bunch of people getting shot. it just doesn't make sense. Where if you tune into a stream of Fortnite, I've watched Fortnite streams. I've watched our friends play. They'll just stream it on Discord. And it's pretty fun because I know,

like I'm like, oh, well, I know where we are in the story. We're at the early part where you're all trying to find stuff. And, you know, maybe you see somebody, but they don't see you and they keep going. And it's kind of this build and it has a narrative to it, which is also why all these films we just talked about, or TV shows to talk about work. Like they all have that narrative framework.

And that, I guess, if something is going to replace this style of video game, it's got to be something, with that kind of a narrative, because the narrative part of it, even though it's not, obviously, like, characters and stuff, but, like, the narrative of the game is really, you know, is really sticky. It's really compulsive. Yeah, it's the best part. And it's long, and it's like a long narrative. Like, you're committed for a long time. It needs a little time, because there has, you need time to have pacing, right? Like, you can't do pacing. Well, also, you have to feel like, like, oh, man, like the tension builds. We've talked about this before when it comes to, like,

save points in JRP's, like, the tension builds, the more. It's, the more. It's, you have to feel time you spend on something and then all that time just disappears if you die whereas if you win then it's like oh man I put in 40 minutes of my life in this sort of like call of duty death matches are sort of like playing blackjack where it's like okay one got a card got a hit like got won this round lost this round it's all just happening very quickly whereas like a battle royale playing pub g is like uh I don't know putting like uh you put $10 on your favorite team to win the Super Bowl and watch them right early course of the season.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. If they win, you win $1,000 and you're like, oh, man, I got this amazing rush. Like, this is the best high I'll ever feel like, never going to, never going to recreate this. I came in number one and got the chicken dinner. Except you're also playing in the Super Bowl yourself. And you have some way, and you're illegally betting on your own performance. Yes, exactly.

You have some way of actually determining the outcome. I mean, unless you're watching PubG. But if you're playing it, then you, in theory, have a way of determining the outcome. Your victory is all the more exciting because it wasn't just a good pick. You did it. You won the game. That's why, yeah, playing games is better than gambling. In conclusion, don't gamble, kids.

Play video games. And I think that was the moral of squid game, actually, is that playing games is better than gambling. And that's why you stopped gambling and started playing squid game. And then he got rich and he was happy. And he lived happily ever after. It's great to be a gamer, folks. And that's what the moral is. Gamers win in the end.

Nice. All right. Well, this has been fun talking about battles, with you all. I think we solved it. We figured out the moral of squid game and of video games in general. I also think we managed to successfully hack the game such that all three of us can survive after all in a stunning twist that no one expected. I know. We're not going to have to kill one another. It's because we had such a great conversation that the audience would just be so disappointed if only one of us. If only Maddie made it out alive. Let's be good. I know.

So we did it. Congratulations. Our max fun overlords have decided that all three of us should continue to host triple click after all. Thank God. I was really sweating bullets for a minute. The rules were broken. I hope this was still satisfying. Yeah. We'll have season two and it'll be kind of a letdown.

Season two coming next year. All right, well, this was fun. Thank you all so much for being members and for listening. And I will see the two of you next week for more Triple Click. See you guys next week. Bye. Triple Click is produced by Jason Schreier, Maddie Myers, and me, Kirk Hamilton. I edit and mix the show and also wrote our theme music

Our show art is by Tom DJ. Some of the games and products we talked about on this episode may have been sent to us for free for review consideration. You can find a link to our ethics policy in the show notes. Triple Click is a proud member of the Maximum Fun podcast network. And if you're listening to this bonus episode, it means you're already a member. So thank you. We really appreciate your support. Find us on Twitter at Triple ClickPod.

Send email the triple click at Maximumfund.org and find a link to our Discord in the show notes. Thanks for listening. See you next time. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and Culture. Artist-owned. Audience-supported.