8 contestants—trapped in an 8-story building—are given the chance to earn an unbelievable amount of money for every minute of their stay. The catch is that they will be provided food and water, but will only be able buy everything else at 100x more than its usual price.
Separated by floors, the 8 players—who are all in desperate need of money—earn passively but are hindered by a timer. Hence, they all must find a way to extend their stay to earn as much as possible (millions and billions)… while making sure that no one dies, or else the game ends.
Here are 5 reasons why “The 8 Show” might just be right for you:
1.) If you’re waiting for #SquidGame2.
“The 8 Show” is another survival game genre that you can consider adding to your list. The series, however, has a more mature premise but is actually less brutal—it’s not centered around children’s games and its main focus is for the players to avoid deaths to keep the game going. However, it’s only less brutal… until they start running out of time.
2.) If you don’t want to get too attached to character to focus on the game and strategies.
The characters are not as fleshed out as how it was in #SquidGame. Viewers only get glimpses of their lives before entering the game, and they’ll mostly be referred to as their floor numbers all throughout the series (for a reason).
— Chun Woo Hee as the insane and extravagant 8th Floor
— Park Jeong Min as the “brain of the group” 7th Floor
— Park Hae Joon as the aggressive 6th Floor
— Moon Jeong Hee as the mother-like 5th Floor
— Lee Yul Eum as the submissive 4th Floor
— Ryu Jun Yeol as the “rather normal one” 3rd Floor
— Lee Joo Young as the tough (but actually kindhearted) 2nd Floor
— Bae Sung Woo as the struggling 1st Floor
And they pretty much remained as their stereotypes until the end—a nod to the drama’s ending message and also let the viewers focus on the “show.”
3.) A change of (game) rules to create something new.
As mentioned, the goal is to stay alive. Although “The 8 Show” is similar to its predecessors of similar genres, buy it’s also flipped and different in many ways. This, somehow, gives the series a fresh take to the usual death-survival game.
4.) It’s brutal, but not much of a bloodbath until the final episodes. And the pacing really starts to speed up from there.
5.) It’s feels like you’re part of a writing workshop, but through a drama series. It also questions what should be deemed as entertaining and when to draw the line to keep things humane. Hence, whatever seems “lacking” in the show—deep character relationships and a complicated sense of entertainment—might have been done on purpose to make such a statement
All in all, “The 8 Show” is a dark comedy that’s simply eccentric and whimsical. It also seems like the show is trying to make a statement to make viewers think alongside the players on what can be defined as entertaining without losing one’s humane side. In conclusion, it’s truly a series that will make you question whether “the show must go on,” and, alongside the players, decide when is the right time to stop.
“The 8 Show” is now streaming via Netflix.
Gia Allana 