Why can’t Hollywood just leave foreign projects alone?
Writer Andy Crump on Hollywood's tendency to remake international titles—and not always for the better
Cate Blanchett as the American recruiter in the final episode of Netflix's "Squid Game."
Courtesy of Netflix
Words by Andy Crump
Hulu’s 2020 revival of Animaniacs, that Millennial childhood mainstay, kicked off with a droll musical number about, of all things, reboots. Mocking Hollywood’s custom of cannibalizing art by cannibalizing art is the kind of gutsy move only the Warner siblings would attempt—not the Warner siblings, Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack, mind you, but the other ones, Yakko, Wakko, and Dot.
“Reboot It” reads like the writers’ room’s apologia for their blatant hypocrisy. Frankly, no “sorry” is necessary. The song’s critiques of remake-reboot-reimagining culture are spot-on, building to a sucker punch against a truly botched instance of American studio remodeling: Spike Lee’s 2013 adaptation of Park Chan-wook’s 2003 masterpiece, Oldboy. “Take something foreign, then translate it, shamelessly appropriate it, even if the old fans hate it!” trills Dot (Tress MacNeille), cavorting by a wooden fence with a paintbrush, leaving chaotic white streaks across each plank until the fence stops at a brick wall emblazoned with a character portrait of Josh Brolin—Lee’s star and original lead Choi Min-sik’s dollar store substitute. (Josh: you’re great. You’re just no Choi.)
The broader thesis of “Reboot It” correctly argues that the American entertainment industry recycles itself constantly. But Animaniacs is nothing if not thorough, so the jab at Oldboy (2013) is necessary, because American producers have a long history of snapping up rights to foreign titles, whether films or TV shows, and transforming them to suit the tastes and aesthetics of an American audience. Maybe that’s the subtext Hwang Dong-hyuk intended to bake into the conclusion of Squid Game, his 2021 dystopian sociopolitical thriller, whose success and popularity among U.S. viewers threw everyone off guard, including its streaming service, Netflix; maybe the big reveal in “Humans Are…,” the series finale, that the games are also held in the land of the free is Hwang’s way of nodding at the United States’ foreign remake dynamic.
But Squid Game is ultimately a show about power, class, and capital, and not about the sort of vulturous practice Yakko, Wakko, and Dot highlight in “Reboot It.” Even in the interest of fairness, it seems a far cry that Hwang would bother smuggling a swipe at the way Americans churn out copycat versions of superior overseas media into his show’s last scene. It’s a twist. Of course it’s a twist. Oh: you thought Gi-hun’s (Lee Jung-jae) noble self-sacrifice was the punctuation mark ending the games’ endurance? Hoo, boy, that’s embarrassing for you. Just before Hwang ties up the story’s loose ends in a bow, the camera cuts to In-ho (Lee Byung-hun), Squid Game’s overarching antagonist, now stateside, watching a recruiter playing ddakji in an alleyway with a scruffy homeless man. Game over; the games begin. Again.
Questions abound over the sequence: Why is the recruiter for the games’ American counterpart playing ddakji? Did In-ho know the games exist in the United States? If so, does he intend to stop them, inspired as he is by Gi-hun’s decision to spare Jun-hee’s (Jo Yu-ri) baby by taking his own life? Or does the discovery of his American counterpart crush his spirit? These are David Fincher problems, assuming his Squid Game isn’t just a rehash of Hwang’s, and instead a continuation. (Details being slim at the moment, the project sounds like it’s leaning in the latter direction.) Questions and cliffhangers are all but de rigueur in thriller plots, so it’s expected that Squid Games leaves its audience wanting more. But “more” in this particular case amounts to “too much.”
“Americans making their own version of Squid Game is not a big surprise,” user @lethkook posted on X a few days after the series’ third season went live on Netflix. “They always do this, see something from abroad succeed, and instead of appreciating it as it is, they copy it. They just can’t stand foreign success without putting their stamp on it.” They’re absolutely correct. Erik Skjoldbjærg’s paranoiac detective movie Insomnia (Norway) begot Christopher Nolan’s remake; Cameron Crowe responded to Alejandro Amenábar’s Abre los Ojos (Spain) with his doltish reinterpretation, Vanilla Sky; Brad Silberling turned Wim Wenders’ magnificent metaphysical drama Wings of Desire (Germany) into treacle, and called it City of Angels.
Aiming the lens at Asian cinema, the United States has, over the years, reimagined such classics as Seven Samurai, Infernal Affairs, Pulse, The Ring, Shall We Dance?, and Godzilla. Some, like The Magnificent Seven and The Departed (corresponding to Seven Samurai and Infernal Affairs, respectively), justified themselves on their own merits, while the rest—put gently—didn’t. It’s fitting, in a way, that Squid Game should end with the reveal that, yes, here in the United States, one of the greediest countries in the world, we have our own game in motion. It makes sense that in a place where income inequality is a flashpoint issue, a cabal movement would tempt the desperate with unfathomable wealth against the risk of death. But for that ending to land, Squid Game has to either end, full stop, or pick up in a fourth season where the third leaves off—as the recruiter (played, bafflingly, by Cate Blanchett) slaps a man across the face while In-ho looks on.
Instead, Squid Game is developing into a franchise, many-limbed and with enough suckers to keep itself coiled around pop culture for as long as Netflix is making money. Maybe that’s the most Squid Game thing about the series’ finale of all: capitalism always wins, even when it loses.
Published on September 2, 2025
Words by Andy Crump
Bostonian culture journalist Andy Crump covers movies, beer, music, fatherhood, and way too many other subjects for way too many outlets, perhaps even yours: Paste Magazine, Inverse, The New York Times, Hop Culture, Polygon, and Men's Health, plus more. You can follow him on Bluesky and find his collected work at his personal blog. He’s composed of roughly 65 percent craft beer.