Squid Game Meets Jumanji In Netflix's 3-Part Sci-Fi Series

Image courtesy of MovieStillsDb Published Sep 6, 2026, 2:01 PM EDT Cathal Gunning has been writing about movies, television, culture, and politics online and in print since 2017. He worked as a Senior Editor in Adbusters Media Foundation from 2018-2019 and wrote for WhatCulture in early 2020. He has been a Senior Features Writer for ScreenRant since 2020. Sign in to your ScreenRant account While a mix of Jumanji and Squid Game might sound fun, this combination proved lethal for many of the doomed characters of Netflix’s ruthless, unmissable hit from 2020. Netflix’s Squid Game is one of the streaming service’s biggest hits ever, and it is not hard to discern why. A razor-sharp critique of capitalism, the satirical thriller follows a desperate man whose financial hardship leads him to a shadowy underground game circuit. Like a blend of The Hunger Games and Battle Royale, the titular game pits a series of poverty-stricken victims against each other in lethal variations of common playground games. The contestants compete for a massive cash prize at the end, but must sacrifice their dignity, their sanity, and, in all but one case, their lives to win. Unpredictable and brutal, Squid Game is a harrowing hit that mixes paranoid conspiracy thriller plotting with R-rated action sequences for maximum impact. As great as Squid Game was, however, it is tricky to imagine a sci-fi fantasy spin on the same story. While some fantasy satire shows like Good Omens used the genre’s more outlandish plot elements to comment on contemporary culture and society, it is hard to see how a sci-fi or fantasy version of Squid Game could retain the original show’s brutality while focusing on a more explicitly magical game, like the Jumanji franchise’s title game. That said, 2020’s underrated Alice in Borderland somehow managed to pull off this tricky blend. Alice in Borderland Makes Jumanji’s Supernatural Board Game Lethal While the opening scenes of Alice in Borderland are set in Tokyo, the Netflix series soon whisks its lead character, Kento Yamazaki’s Ryōhei Arisu, into a dystopian post-apocalyptic version of the Japanese city where nothing is as it seems and no one is safe. A video game-obsessed loner, Ryōhei is able to use his experience as a gamer to navigate this treacherous territory as the eerie, seemingly dead city is playing host to a lethal “Game” of sorts. Like a deadly version of Jumanji, this game forces Ryōhei and the two acquaintances who were transported with him to collaborate on tasks to ensure their survival. Each game presents them with tasks to “Extend their visa,” and the players soon find out that the alternative to extending one’s visa is instant execution via laser. Thus begins a dark fantasy masterpiece that mixes the ultra-violent action of Game of Thrones or Squid Game with an Alice in Wonderland-inspired game. Trippier than the straightforward political satire of Squid Game, Alice in Borderland gradually reveals that its characters are ersatz versions of the main characters from Lewis Carroll’s famous novel. However, the villains who are controlling the game remain unseen and unexplained for much of the show’s run, and this serves to make the series all the more unsettling, as well as thrilling. Alice in Boderland Is A Paranormal Version of Squid Game From the outset, Squid Game always made it clear that the series would eventually explain who was behind the games and how they got away with operating such a monstrous event, and the show’s final season provided many of the answers viewers had been waiting on since 2021’s first season. In stark contrast, like the book it is loosely based on, Alice in Borderland simply gets stranger and stranger with each new season. The show unapologetically deepened its story with each outing, killing off fan-favourite characters with little fanfare while obstinately refusing to explain the games and how the heroes might ultimately escape them. Owing as much to obtuse cult classics like Twin Peaks and The Prisoner as more mainstream fare like Jumanji or Squid Game, Alice in Borderland was an entirely unique beast that remains underrated even now. Release Date 2020 - 2025-00-00 Network Netflix Directors Shinsuke Sato Cast Kento Yamazaki Ryohei Arisu Tao Tsuchiya Yuzuha Usagi Writers Yasuko Kuramitsu Creator(s) Haro Aso