‘Squid Game’ Star Reflects on Casting Criticism and Character’s Selfless Fate

[This story contains major spoilers from the final season of Squid Game.]

When Park Sung-hoon was cast in season two of the Netflix‘s Squid Game, there was a bit of an uproar. The South Korean actor was set to play Hyun-ju, who viewers would come to know as “Player 120” in the deadly Games that are the focus of creator Hwang Dong-hyuk‘s hit series. The backlash was because Hyun-ju was described as a trans female character who enters the Games in hopes of being able to afford her gender-affirming surgery, while Park is a cisgender man.

Hwang weighed in on the response, explaining how challenging it was to find an openly transgender actor in Korea to play the part. “I did anticipate such discussions to arise from the first moment I began creating the character Hyun-ju,” Hwang said at the time about the casting decision. “When we researched in Korea, there are close to no actors that are openly trans, let alone openly gay, because unfortunately in the Korean society currently the LGBTQ community is rather still marginalized and more neglected, which is heartbreaking.”

Park was also anticipating discussing the response to his casting when speaking to The Hollywood Reporter (via a translator) about the third and final season of Netflix’s most-streamed show. Since the season’s release on June 27, the series has set a new record for the streamer, with 106.3 million views watched during the first 10 days of release, per Netflix. Now that viewers have had a chance to see Hyun-ju’s two-season arc, the tide has turned around his casting. The character became a fan-favorite after season two and now, after season three, one of the show’s heroes, having died while trying to save her friends including Jun-hee (Jo Yu-ri), who birthed her baby during the deadly Hide and Seek game. In an unfortunate twist, Hyun-ju was fatally stabbed by the baby’s father, Lee Myung-gi (Yim Si-wan).

Below, Park addresses the casting concerns head on while reflecting on his two-season role on Netflix’s biggest series, and shares his hopes for how the spotlight on Hyun-ju can improve global representation for trans characters: “I had a thorough understanding of what I was getting into.”

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Director Hwang anticipated that there would be a loud response to your casting initially, explaining how challenging it was to authentically cast this role in South Korea. What hesitations did you have when you first signed on?

When I first heard that I was going to play a trans woman in Squid Game, I thought it was a very good challenge for me as an actor to take up. But at the same time, I questioned myself. Would it be acceptable for me as a cisgender actor to play a trans woman character? So I had my worries. I had my concerns. But I was determined to make her into a character who is not a caricature. I did not want to reduce her to stereotypes. I really wanted to focus on the inner qualities that she has, the traits that are so redeeming. I just wanted to create a very authentic portrayal of this very layered character.

How in your preparation did you then begin to connect to the character — what drew you to playing her and was there any research that helped you portray someone in the trans community?

I really wanted to play Hyun-ju because if you look at existing transgender characters in Korean cinema or on Korean TV shows, they tend to be caricatures and they tend to be pretty flat. But Hyun-ju was such a cool character. She has a good heart. She’s selfless. She cares about others. She’s a good leader; she’s charismatic and brave. She has all of these great qualities, and she’s very layered. So I really wanted to portray this character, and I knew that required a deep understanding of trans women and Hyun-ju in particular. I interviewed a lot of transgender individuals, got some advice from them, and I also did loads and loads of research so that I could study more about this community and the individuals. I really made sure that I had a thorough understanding of what I was getting into.

Once people saw you in this role, the response flipped and she became a fan favorite. We know she has this military background and enters the Games hoping to win so she can afford gender-affirming surgery. What else did you fill in about her life before the Games to help you play her?

I didn’t try to fill in anything extra to her backstory because I really wanted to stay true to the script. I thought that, just like any other Korean transgender individual, Hyun-ju would have fought against a lot of prejudice and bias all her life. As we see, she wants to complete her gender-affirmation surgery and she wants to move to Thailand and buy a small house there and make a lot of friends who share similar experiences to what she’s been through. So those were the things that I thought about when I was giving a reason for why she joined the Squid Games.

I understand you each received the full arc of your characters when you went into filming seasons two and three back to back, so you knew her fate. How did knowing her ending help how you played her along the way, and how did you feel when you read in the script how she died?

Hyun-ju tries to protect Jun-hee and the baby and makes a sacrifice, which is her life. And while I pitied her as the actor playing her, she doesn’t know that she’s going to get killed, so it didn’t really affect me that I knew her ending when I was playing her.

Not many characters in Squid Game are selfless, yet she died trying to protect her friends and this baby. How did you interpret her ending and what do you hope people take away from that?

Just like you said, she dies trying to protect her friends, Jun-hee and the newborn baby. I think that shows that her heart is really made of gold. She is such a warm-hearted and selfless person. When I was playing her, I thought that Hyun-ju maybe knew that she might die when going back and looking for the exit for her friends alone, but she would have done the same, even if she knew that she could die. So this is something that we should all really look up to. We should be like her in any way, if that’s possible.

What was it like to film her final scene and to wrap on this show? How emotional was that day?

I remember that day on set. Director Hwang came to me and just off the bat, he said, “What if you shed one drop of a tear just before you fall to the ground after being stabbed?” And I got it done in the first take, so I was very proud of that. But I was very emotional going into that scene. So even after I heard the sound of “cut,” I cried. I needed time to kind of cry and let the emotions go.

What are your hopes for the doors this could open for transgender characters globally on television? And how has Squid Game opened doors for you and what you want to do next?

For the first part of the question, as I said before, we had a lot of flat, one-dimensional stereotypical transgender characters in Korean cinema and on Korean TV shows. So I’m so excited that we have this character. I think Hyun-ju is going to open up doors for more multi-dimensional LGBTQ+ characters going forward. And for the second part of the question, I have recently played lots of villains, so Korean viewers know me for playing villains. And because of Hyun-ju, I got to show a new side of myself — the good side of myself. Thanks to Hyun-ju, right now, I’m in production for another show [Efficient Dating for Singles], and I’m a good guy this time.

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The final season of Squid Game is now streaming on Netflix. Read THR’s take on the finale’s A-list cameo and how it could set up a spinoff, and our two-part interview with Hwang Dong-hyuk on the final season and final scene.