At the time of me writing this discussion, season 3 hasn't been released yet. Here are some themes and ideas of season 1 and 2 of the series Squid Game.
Squid game brings to light ideas around capitalism, democracy, and social systems in a similar way that other movies and shows have done, for example, The Hunger Games. You could easily write many essays and isolate many different themes from squid game, but I'm going to focus here on two things in particular. The first is the idea of "success" and secondly, how the series communicates ideas through the main protagonist Gi-Hun.
The system of capitalism can be judged as fair or unfair, depending on how you look at it. At it's core, capitalism contains the assumption that work, choices or inputs lead to rewards and that there are winners and losers based on peoples work, choices and inputs. This series constantly asks the question, what makes a person a winner or a loser.
This brings forward the concept of "success". What makes a winner a winner, and a loser a loser, especially in capitalistic and democratic types of societies.
The idea of "recipes for success" comes to mind. Which factors and parameters can possibly lead to success, and these ideas are repeatedly presented in this series.
What makes this series unique however is that it is, in particular, presented around the experiences of the main character. At least, this is true for season 1 and 2.
Another recurring theme is the use of wrongly sized representations of things, especially things related to environment. Environmental simulacra are often used according to a certain pattern.
When it is in the environment of controllers or VIPs it is undersized. For example the mini-glass bridge, the jazz scene or even just watching the players as little people on a big screen.
However, the environment is grotesquely enlarged for the players and even the workers in the game. Thus even the environment makes these people small and insignificant as pawns to the rich and those in power. An example is the big dolls as well as the intermediate complex spaces which creates the effect that the players are inside a big dollhouse.
And off course, the game itself is essentially a smaller model of capitalism and a democratic society with similar elements of layers and hierarchical levels, selective authority, winners and losers, rewards, resource distribution and so forth.
Yet, among all the different themes and ideas presented in this series, the concept I found the most interesting is the idea of "success" and the many ideas related to it.
Even from the first episode, the viewer is presented with people who lost, and is losing heavily, in life. Later in the series the idea is presented that the game creators and or the rich and powerful believe that some people are inherently losers. As though people can be sorted into a "trash"/"useless" category OR a "winner"/"useful" person category.
In particular the salesman and the frontman seems to support such ideas and they seem to view the players in the squid game as inherently losers/useless people and this is also WHY they end up as players in the squid game. Then the creators of the game must believe that either a person is alchemically transformed into a no-trash person by winning the game, or it is believed that the game functions like is a "sorting mechanism", weeding out the useless people.
Other ideas are also presented in the series. Could it be luck or good karma that plays a role? Or perhaps a combination of factors. What are the components or recipe for success?
It could be luck, karma, the inherent characteristics of a person, a personality, skills, knowledge, talent, work, choices made by a person and so forth.
Gi-Hun in particular is presented as a very lucky person. At first you might think he is a looser according to how the game creators view people, but throughout the series Gi-Hun actually has extraordinary good luck. In fact many times throughout the first two seasons you could say, wow how lucky! Perhaps Gi-Hun is simply benefiting from very strong plot armour, but his luck seems to be an integral part of his story. You might say his faith in morality and good ethics rewards him with good karma.
Often his good luck is emphasised as being just that - extraordinary good luck. For example, when he uses his daughter's birthdate to pick winning horses he actually wins a fair amount of money.
Later he often makes choices simply directed by ideas of morality and ethics and it is often as though he is rewarded with good karma for his choices. With this being such a strong theme, it is not surprising that supernatural elements like the preacher in season 1 and the shaman in season 2 is present. There might also be an additional element to Gi-Hun's perspective and choices, but I'll talk about that after season 3 is released.
However, you could also say that he was unlucky enough to find himself in the games three times already by the end of season 2. However, if he survives being in the game three or more times, that could be seen as extraordinary luck.
During season 1 the contrast in personalities and characteristics of Gi-Hun and his friend, Sang-Woo is shown. This also puts emphasis on the idea of what sort of a "game approach" or "game tactic" can used to win the game.
Gi-Hun manages to win the games AND do it in a relatively ethical way. In contrast, Sang-Woo made at least three very morally grey or even outright unethical choices which directly lead to the deaths of other players. Gi-Hun is morally outraged at the lengths his friend Sang-Woo would go to win the game.
The worst morally questionable action that Gi-Hun takes in season 1 is to cheat on the game of marbles by exploiting Il-Nam's apparent dementia. Even here he is lucky again that even his morally questionable choice does not lead to him being responsible for another player's death. Ironically, after season 1, Gi-Hun is incredibly traumatised and suffers from extreme survivor guilt.
There is an additional aspect which adds even more texture to Gi-Hun's story. If you take into account this character's most probable personality type, his actions and choices become even more interesting.
According to the principles of the 16 personality types (also known as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or MBTI), I would guess that Gi-Hun most probably has an ENFP personality type. People with such a personality type can be known as "campaigners" who are enthusiastic, creative and sociable, free spirits. The problem is just that he is an extremely traumatised person with extreme survivor guilt and this casts a shadow on his normally upbeat personality.
According to this personality theory, and if my guess is correct, Gi-Hun is a strong "F" which means that he places emphasis on emotion related parameters which manifest as attention to his self and other's emotional well-being and a focus on relationships. In contrast, his friend Sang-Woo rather focuses on logic, rationality and puzzle solving.
This is important because these personality traits have a strong influence on their approach and focus, both in the game and in life itself. Gi-Hun's focus on relationships and people's well being is read as him having "faith in people". Sang-Woo's focus on rational thought and puzzle solving manifests as him being an intellectual person who advances through being clever and smart, both in the game as in life. However, Sang-Woo trusts his cleverness so much that when his logic fails due to logical blind spots (as seen in the marbles game as well as his career), he cleverly cheats to "win".
Gi-Hun's focus on people, combined with his strong inner sense of ethics and morality, are clear a guiding principles for him. According to Gi-Hun's way of looking at the world, people should help each other to improve things for everyone, however, according to the salesman, the frontman and Il-Nam, it's useless to have faith in people. The game controllers seemingly believe that social systems and the world is simply brutal and people can be sorted according to winners and losers.
According to these social structures people need to be ruthless to survive and be winners. Social systems are simply a different form of "jungle" where the tough and ruthless survive. When the VIPs find themselves in predatory animal masks in a jungle themed lounge, it signifies their commitment to these brutal principles of social systems.
This concept or survival of those who are ruthless, ties in with the moment the viewer is introduced to Il-Nam. During the red light, green light game of season 1, Il-Nam is seen running very confidently and even happily towards the finishing line.
When you know that he is playing the game out of desire (another strong theme of the series) to relive some previous feeling, it gives some hints about Il-Nam's thoughts and motivations. Perhaps as a youth, he learned early how to win while being ruthless, like ignoring death and destruction around you while being focused on a goal. Perhaps it is him revisiting this feeling of accomplishment and application of this simple principle. Be ruthless to survive and win.
Yet, he is a layered character and not merely only ruthless. Instead of him simply applying this principle of ruthlessness, he has within him deeper insights about companionship and community. I believe by the time he offered Gi-Hun the oath of "gganbu" at the start of the marble game, he already decided to use his "special player privilege" so that Gi-Hun will survive that level. That was his way of sharing in that moment.
Another fact that is often overlooked, and even missed by Gi-Hun, is Il-Nam actually secretly acknowledges that Gi-Hun is correct in having faith in people by sneakily loosing the bet he made with Gi-Hun. Even before the deadline, Il-Nam gives his answers to the bet thus implying that he lost the bet without outright saying it.
This would indicate I believe that Il-Nam himself understands the subtle layers of "winning" in the sense that ruthlessness is needed, but also a reliance on people and relationships. However, he knows this as a type of a secret and would not say it outright.
The idea of desire is also a significant theme of season 1 and is also a part of Il-Nam's story. A book by Jaques Lacan about desire can be seen on In-Ho's desk. Lacanianism is about desire and the idea that desire is never really gratified but rather continues to re-manifest as new desires. You could believe that this is one of the driving forces behind the Squid Game. That the very rich have to create a ruthless and brutal game to gratify them since they have already gratified all other desires. Il-Nam even mentions this idea on his deathbed.
I would say the frontman and the salesman are unaware of the subtleties of human relationships which is also why they do not understand how Gi-Hun could have been the one to win the game. I would say indeed his focus on people combined with good luck won him the game, but this does not suit the frontman and the salesman's way of looking at life and the game. It is not surprising that the salesman and frontman are fascinated by Gi-Hun's choices and way of doing things and also as to why it works and manifests as good karma.