{"id":11732,"date":"2021-12-12T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-12-12T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.koktailmagazine.com\/?p=11732"},"modified":"2021-12-12T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2021-12-12T00:00:00","slug":"game-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.koktailmagazine.com\/th\/2021\/12\/12\/game-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Game On: Recognising The ‘Battle Royale’ Film Genre"},"content":{"rendered":"

Some accuse Squid Game for being unoriginal, but it’s all about perspective<\/h3>\n
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[This story first appeared in Koktail Magazine Issue 1.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Squid Game<\/em> on Netflix is all the rage right now and will probably be still by the time this magazine is in print. While the Korean series has captivated audiences globally through the help of a little streaming platform called Netflix, I couldn’t help but notice that the premise is a very familiar one, and I know I’m not alone on this. Almost immediately after its release, netizens and critics drew similarities with a Japanese Netflix series from a year earlier, Alice in Borderland<\/em>. However, my mind actually went towards an even older Japanese production, 2000’s Battle Royale<\/em>, AKA Quentin Tarantino’s “favourite movie of all time” and the movie that probably did some short-term brain damage on me as a youngster.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The memory of Battle Royale <\/em>then took me to the franchise that made Jennifer Lawrence a Hollywood A-lister, The Hunger Games<\/em>, and from there I embarrassingly hitchhiked my way to Nerve<\/em>, a B-grade film starring Emma Roberts and Dave Franco that I never intended on watching.<\/p>\n

I am definitely not on the boat of accusing Squid Game<\/em>’s Hwang Dong-hyuk of being unoriginal or ripping off those who came before, the same way I don’t go around dismissing any new zombie or apocalyptic film of “having been done before”. The only difference between Squid Game <\/em>and a zombie film is that the latter is welcomed into the open arms of a recognised sub-genre.<\/p>\n

According to Wikipedia, the closest thing to a sub-genre for films like Battle Royale, The Hunger Games, Alice in Borderland<\/em> and Squid Game<\/em> would be “battle royale”, go figure. But little else is defined and designated for this unofficial category of storytelling. I say that battle royale deserves placement as a sub-genre of horror, same as slasher, splatter and zombie. It does have a lot of survivalist overlap, but not all survivalist films, like The Revenant<\/em>, are battle royale.<\/p>\n

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Characteristically, battle royale centres around a brutal game, an oxymoron, wherein a winner typically triumphs at the expense of the other participants’ lives. Brutality can range from needing to kill all your opponents as the sole objective of the game to becoming the last one standing by avoiding harm. The game at play is often created or facilitated by a privileged entity that is sadistic in nature, one that takes pleasure in manipulating and watching the little people suffer. (In The Hunger Games<\/em>, this is the Capitol and in Squid Game<\/em>, this is the Front Man and the VIPs). While many battle royale films have notably fictional, futuristic or surrealist settings, remember that their concept is rooted in real human history—think gladiators.<\/p>\n

If battle royale were to gain prominence as a genre, we would stop wasting time comparing and criticising Squid Game<\/em> and perhaps instead, demand that more films of the like be made. Until then, the aforementioned titles (minus Nerve<\/em>) are stand-up archetypes to discover or rewatch. Saw (<\/em>2004), As The Gods Will<\/em> (2014) and Ready or Not<\/em> (2019) also fit the description aptly in case you’re looking to host a battle royale watch-athon. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some accuse Squid Game for being unoriginal, but it’s all about perspective [This story first appeared in Koktail Magazine Issue 1.] Squid Game on Netflix is all the rage right now and will probably be still by the time this magazine is in print. While the Korean series has captivated audiences globally through the help […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":4365,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11732","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-films","category-the-arts"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nGame On: Recognising The 'Battle Royale' Film Genre<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Some accuse Squid Game for being unoriginal, but it's all about perspective Squid Game on Netflix is all the rage right now and will probably be still by\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.koktailmagazine.com\/th\/2021\/12\/12\/game-on\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" 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