‘Squid Game’ Star Lee Byung-Hun Talks Favorite Season Two Scene & ‘Unbelievable Moment’ Promoting A Korean Project In Hollywood

deadline.com:

This article contains spoilers for Squid Game Season 2. What started as a small but enigmatic role for veteran actor Lee Byung-hun in the first season of Squid Game as Front Man/In-ho has bloomed into a pivotal and much larger part in the sequel.

Removing the mask of his Front Man persona, Lee’s character soon enters the ruthless, winner-takes-all games as Player 001, allying himself alongside former game-winner Gi-hun (played by Lee Jung-jae). “After it was decided that I would be in Season 2, Director Hwang [Dong-hyuk] paid a visit to where I was filming a different project,” Lee tells Deadline. “I asked him, ‘Do you have any idea how Season 2 is going to go?’ At that time, Director Hwang didn’t have a concrete idea.

I had a vague idea that it would probably be about In-ho’s past, but when I read the completed script later, I was quite shocked to see that it was completely different from what I had expected.” After breakout roles in Korean films like Joint Security Area, A Bittersweet Life and The Good, the Bad, the Weird, Lee ventured into Hollywood, taking on the role of Storm Shadow in G.I.

Joe: The Rise of Cobra in 2009. He also appeared in G.I. Joe: Retaliation and RED 2. However, it was only at the Squid Game Season 2 premiere in Los Angeles in mid-December 2024 — more than 15 years after his Hollywood debut — that Lee realized it was his first time walking the red carpet with a Korean project and surrounded by his Korean peers. “It was a really unbelievable moment because having experienced Hollywood — not just Hollywood films and the production experience, but also being in parties, events and gatherings — it was very different to be there on the red carpet with the cast members, with my colleagues, with