Warning: Spoiler alerts below
"Squid Game: The Challenge" has been intriguing viewers since it debuted just ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday. But according to some of the show's Chicago-area contestants, things weren't quite as they appeared on screen.
The competition recreates certain elements of the hit Netflix show “Squid Game" — minus the lethal consequences — from “Red Light, Green Light” to challenges like Dalgona and more.
The show was filmed in the United Kingdom with 456 players vying for the chance to win $4.56 million. Contestants came from around the world, though all had to speak English.
NBC Chicago spoke to two contests — Kevin Byrne from Chicago and Jinwoo Oak from Wheeling, Ill. — who both spoke candidly about their experiences on the controversial reality show.
They said what they experienced on set doesn't quite come across in what audiences are seeing on-screen.
That is particularly emphasized in the first challenge -- Red Light, Green Light.
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"The first challenge on the show was ridiculously hard," said Byrne. "I've run seven marathons and I think this was every bit as hard as a marathon. The edit in the final show looks like it was five minutes."
Oak similarly said "the five minutes definitely does not do justice to what we had to go through."
"Being an athlete, I ... felt really good about anything that required athleticism, speed, but Red Light, Green Light, was the toughest thing I've ever done in my life mentally. Probably physically too given the conditions."
According to Oak and Byrne, the challenge actually lasted up to nine hours and was done in below-freezing temperatures.
"The show definitely downplays that," Oak said. "Doesn't even mention the temperature, but towards the end, when people cross the finish line, you'll notice that people's noses are red, like people have runny noses."
The length of time was arguably even harder, Byrne said.
"They show a woman who, she ended up in a squatting position and couldn't hold it and went out and in the edit it looks like she couldn't hold a squat for 20 seconds, but in actuality, she was probably holding that squat for 15 minutes," he said. "So it's like a totally different story."
But the cold temperatures, long hours and challenging asks weren't the only issues that made the competition harder than expected.
Inside the dormitory was another beast.
"So going into the game, I really didn't know what to expect," Oak said. "And with it being a reality show, I thought, 'Ok, there may be some drama,' but I think the drama portion definitely caught me off guard."
Between dorm eliminations and alliances, Oak said the dynamic inside the dorms transformed.
"It was like socially, physically, emotionally, mentally, just trying to be prepared and as zen as possible about having no idea what was gonna come next," Byrne said.
Byrne noted that paranoia eventually set in as players grappled with the unknowns of the show.
"You don't get a sense of the paranoia and conspiracy theories when we were there in that dorm," he said. "High stakes, no information and all you really had to do was talk to one another. There were so many conspiracy theories thinking that certain people were plants or like they have information, they know something."
The show also had a list of banned products that players couldn't bring with them, including lip balm, leaving players with extremely chapped lips in the cold conditions.
Oak said he snuck in chapstick despite the risk of being eliminated if it was discovered, noting it was something he didn't realize would be quite so needed.
"[Other players] were like, 'How do your lips look so great?'" Oak said. "And I would have to downplay it and act like I didn't have chapstick because you know, that's like my advantage and I didn't really want to share chapstick. So I was like, 'Oh, like, naturally I just don't get chapped lips. But, yeah, now I can say I snuck in chapstick, at the risk of being eliminated, but I was glad I did because people were getting desperate."
That desperation led players seeking relief to resort to some unusual means.
"[People] were using oil from the bottom of our like the egg portion of our food to use that as chapstick. Other people were using the condom lubricant as chapstick," Oak said. "So it was ... it was gross."
When it came to the food, there were also some complaints.
"People complained about the food, but I guess I learned that I have really low standards because while it was not enough, like we all lost weight, the food was not that bad," Byrne said. "Like sticky oatmeal and like bad rice with an egg on top."
After days of being inside with no connection to the outside world, Oak said he needed to get creative to find a way to pass the time.
Using underwear and socks available in a vending machine, and cutting pieces of fabric using provided shaving razors, he managed to craft a ball that could be used for soccer and, at one point, a massive volleyball game that didn't make the show's final cut.
"There was one moment there that a lot of other players were sad that it didn't make the show because the second night, we played volleyball," Oak said. "So, I made the underwear ball. I said, 'OK, like, we had a juggling game with six to seven people. That was great. What can we do to include more people? And the answer is volleyball. So what we did was we took these track jackets, everyone took them off that were playing and we tied it from one end of the dorm to the other to make a net and it was like 40 v. 40 at that time in the middle. So about 80 people were playing, a bunch of people were at the sides sitting at the top just watching. So it was almost like a sports arena - people looking down and like cheering.
"We played for about maybe like five minutes and the production chimed in through the intercoms. They said, 'OK, a heads up guys, if you guys sweat, that's on you, we're not going to provide additional tracksuits. So do as you please.' And after hearing that I like had the ball in my hand, I was like, 'OK,' and then we just kept playing and everyone else kind of went with it and we were having fun and then like three minutes later, production chimed in again and said, 'Please stop playing.' So I think it was clear they didn't want us to play and like the first attempt, they probably expected us to stop after knowing that we're not getting additional tracksuits, but that was a really cool moment in there."
While Oak said making friendships was critical during the challenges, he wishes he had opened up more to other players.
"I would probably share my story with more people that I connected with from there," Oak said, noting that the challenge came at a "very dark time in my life."
Oak, who left his 3-week-old baby to take part in the games, also left his terminally ill mother, who had just months to live after battling cancer for nine years.
With no way of keeping in touch with family during the games, he would later learn his mother's condition had worsened as he was competing, but she asked family members not to contact him.
"When I got out of the game, since it was fully immersive, I found out that ... almost the entirety of the time I was there my mom was admitted to the ICU with dangerously low levels of her blood count and my sister took medical leave, urgent leave, dropped everything and came to Chicago to be with my mom. And she was gonna reach out to this game welfare team multiple times to just tell me to come home, but my mom didn't let her until the end. She said, 'OK, like doctors still say we have a few weeks left. I don't want you to call him.' So because of what my mom said, my sister didn't call me. When I got out and I connected with them, I FaceTimed and it was really just heartbreaking to see how much weight my mom lost in the short time I was there."
The day he arrived home, Oak's mother passed away.
While Oak said he's ultimately glad he left the game when he did, he feels sharing his journey could have helped him go further on the show in the end.
Despite the grueling conditions and unexpected hardships, both Oak and Byrne said they managed to form lasting friendships inside the competition, including multiple connections to the Chicago area.
"I think the most unexpected part would be coming out with all the friendships that I did," Byrne said. "They, the casting team, did an amazing job casting people, 456 people from all over the world and everyone, like, without fail was interesting. Some people weren't really my like, cup of tea in terms of like, there were a lot of big personalities there, but everyone was interesting. So just so much downtime you really had a chance to talk with the other competitors, get to know them and I was exposed to people that I wouldn't have otherwise, you know, just different, all sorts of different walks of life."
For its part, Netflix noted that the show would have "surprising new additions" from the original series, and that players' "strategies, alliances, and character will be put to the test while competitors are eliminated around them."
The show's final episode is set for release on Dec. 6.
