Squid Game creator Hwang Dong-hyuk’s films: from the melodrama of My Father to the public outrage caused by Silenced

Hwang Dong-hyuk shows a flair for the dramatic in his films, starting with his 2007 debut, the schmaltzy, uneven My Father. His later work has a cynical strain

Gong Yoo stars in Silenced as a teacher at a school for the hearing-impaired who uncovers horrific physical and sexual abuse, a film that outraged South Koreans

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Squid Game creator and director, Hwang Dong-hyuk (left), and its star Lee Jung-jae on the set of the Netflix smash hit series. Photo: Netflix

Published: 7:15am, 2 Nov 2021Updated: 10:05am, 2 Nov 2021

Netflix’s Korean original series Squid Game captured the global cultural zeitgeist this autumn in a way that we’ve seldom seen before. The show’s popularity also prompted an explosion of opinion pieces and memes, and some of these took liberties with the facts.

One of the major misconceptions surrounding the series was that its success was a rags-to-riches story for its creator, director Hwang Dong-hyuk.

While it is true that Hwang initially wrote a film script for Squid Game over a decade ago and struggled to get it made, until it eventually landed at Netflix, Hwang was already one of the most established and successful directors working in South Korea, long before his current hit.

Looking at Hwang’s earlier work, it’s hard to imagine something quite like Squid Game coming along, but the seeds can be seen. Throughout his career, he has shown a skill for melodrama, while all his films are also marked by an undercurrent of cynicism, two tendencies which merge to thrilling ends in his TV drama series debut.

Despite his success as a commercial storyteller, the most surprising thing about Hwang is that he largely avoids happy endings.