• "Squid Game" is finally back, three years after its first season.
• Season two features some familiar faces, but also plenty of new characters.
• Here's a guide to the major characters in season two, and who plays them.

After a three year-long wait, "Squid Game" is finally back.

The Korean-language Netflix series takes place mostly within the confines of a killing game, in which the economically disadvantaged play children's games for money. To participate, they wager their lives.

The show is one of Netflix's biggest hits, prompting the streamer to invest not only in a second and third season from creator Hwang Dong-hyuk, but also in in-person experiences, a reality series, and a video game.

"Squid Game" season two stars Lee Jung-jae as Seong Gi-hun, the winner of the games on season one. Unfortunately, the nature of the show means that most characters from season one like Sae-byeok (Jung Ho-yeon) and Sang-woo (Park Hae-soo) aren't back in season two. While there are a few familiar faces, the majority of the cast are new.

Here's a guide to the major characters in "Squid Game" season two, and who plays them.

Warning: This post contains light spoilers for "Squid Game" season two.

Seong Gi-hun

Gi-hun is a veteran player of the games, and returns as player 456. In the three years since he emerged as the sole survivor of his cycle, he's used his fortune to search for the man who recruited him so he can find a way to shut the games down.

Seong Gi-hun is played by Lee Jung-jae.

Hwang In-ho / The Front Man

Toward the end of season one, Jun-ho discovered that his other brother, In-ho, was the Front Man in charge of the games. Initially, Jun-ho believed that In-ho may have been a player.

Lee Byung-hun plays In-ho.

The Recruiter

The recruiter is a tall, handsome man who recruits people into the games by challenging them to a game of ddakji.

Gong Yoo plays the recruiter.

Kang No-eul

No-eul is a young woman working at a theme park. Originally from North Korea, she hopes to locate her child and bring her to South Korea. Later, she's recruited into the games — not as a player, but as a soldier.

No-eul is played by Park Gyu-young.

Park Jung-bae

Jung-bae (Player 390) is Gi-hun's friend from outside the game — the same one with whom he gambled on horse races in the season one premiere. Unfortunately, this time they meeting inside the game.

Park Jung-bae is played by Lee Seo-hwan.

Hwang Jun-ho

Jun-ho is the detective who followed Gi-hun to the games in season one, infiltrating them by posing as a guard. He's the younger brother of Hwang In-ho, the Front Man. In-ho shot Jun-ho toward the end of season one, but he survived — and at the beginning of season two, he's working as a traffic cop.

Wi Ha-jun plays Hwang Jun-ho.

Mr. Kim

Mr. Kim, referred to as Kim Dae-pyo in the credits, is Gi-hun's former creditor. After winning the game, Gi-hun paid him back, and retained his services to help him find the recruiter.

Mr. Kim is played by Kim Pub-lae.

Woo-seok

Woo-seok is close to Mr. Kim. Now, both Mr. Kim and Woo-seok work for Gi-hun as part of his search for the recruiter.

Woo-seok is played by Jeon Seok-ho.

Dae-ho

Dae-ho (Player 388) is a young man who Gi-hun and Jung-bae befriend in the game. Like Jung-bae, he's also an ex-Marine.

Dae-ho is played by Kang Ha-neul.

Lee Myung-gi

Myung-gi (Player 333) previously worked as a cryptocurrency influencer. However, a poor recommendation led to him, and other players, losing a significant amount of money.

Myung-gi is played by Yim Si-wan.

Kim Jun-hee

Jun-hee (Player 222) is a young woman who entered the games to repay her debt, as a result of losing money on Myung-gi's recommendation. He's also her ex-boyfriend.

Jun-hee is played by Jo Yu-ri, who is a singer and former member of the K-pop group IZ*ONE.

Thanos

Thanos (Player 230) is a rapper who lost money after bying cryptocurrency on Myung-gi's recommendation. In the game, some people recognize him as a celebrity.

Thanos is played by Choi Seung-hyun, a musician also known by his stage name T.O.P.

Nam-gyu

Nam-gyu (Player 124) is one of Thanos' groupies in the games. Previously, he worked at a nightclub, where he first met Thanos.

He's played by Roh Jae-won.

Min-su

Min-su (Player 125) is one of the younger players in the game, and aligns with Thanos. He also befriends Se-mi, a cool young woman.

Min-su is played by Lee David, who described the character in a cast featurette as an "ordinary guy" who is "super timid."

Se-mi

Se-mi (Player 380) is a young woman who befriends Min-su in the games.

Se-mi is played by Won Ji-an, who described the character as "bold and determined."

Park Yong-sik

Yong-sik (Player 007) is a young man who joined the game to pay off his debt. Unfortunately, he also encounters his mother there.

Yong-sik is played by Yang Dong-geun.

Jang Geum-ja

Geum-ja (Player 149) is Yong-sik's mother. She joined the game to help her son pay off his debt.

Geum-ja is played by Kang Ae-sim.

Hyun-ju

Hyun-ju (Player 120) initially faces discrimination in the games because she is a trans woman. She's a former special forces soldier.

Hyun-ju is played by Park Sung-hoon.

Young-mi

Young-mi (Player 095) befriends Hyun-ju in the games, and refers to her as unnie — a term that younger women use to refer to older women they are close to.

Young-mi is played by Kim Si-eun.

Seon-nyeo

Seon-nyeo (Player 044) is a shaman who often behaves melodramatically and unpredictably in the games.

Seon-neyo is played by Chae Kook-hee.

Gyeong-seok

Gyeong-seok's (Player 256) daughter Na-yeon has cancer, and he joins the games to fund her expensive treatment.

Gyeong-seok is played by Lee Jin-uk.

• "Squid Game" season two has two major twists that reframe the story's direction.
• Season three will arrive in 2025, so there won't be as long a wait between seasons.
• Here's what happened in the explosive finale and how it will impact season three.

Warning: major spoilers ahead for "Squid Game" season two.

"Squid Game" season one ended with hope, but the second concluded with death and misery after an electrifying finale.

The global sensation returned for a second season after the first became Netflix's biggest surprise success.

Season two returns to the gritty world where a secret organization runs a gameshow where contestants can win a fortune playing a series of children's games.

If they lose, they are killed, and the prize pot increases with each death.

In season one, Seong Gi-hun is the only survivor of the games, wracked by guilt and grief after watching his friends die one by one for him to win. He decides to take down the organization, but the plan goes awry in season two, landing him back in the competition.

This time, the game makers add a new feature where contestants can vote to leave after every game. But most are so desperate for the prize money that they continue.

Gi-hun leads a revolution that is foiled by a saboteur.

In season two, Gi-hun forms a new crew, including Player 001 — Hwang In-ho, the leader of the games who enters in disguise.

They work together to survive the games and eventually agree that they must end before everyone dies. But other players still want to continue, leading to a tied vote in episode six.

In the finale, the players who want the game to keep going attack and kill other players so they will have the majority in the next vote.

Gi-hun and his allies hide during this massacre, and when the guards come to break it up, the group attacks the guards, steals their weapons, and starts a rebellion.

The rebellion fails, though, due to In-ho's betrayal.

Since his reveal in episode three as a player, it's been clear that In-ho has infiltrated the games to sabotage Gi-hun's plan to stop them. But he doesn't play saboteur fully until the rebellion.

Gi-hun and Park Jung-bae (Player 390), Gi-hun's friend from outside the games, head to the command center, but In-ho stops the rest of the group from following, keeping them divided and easier to defeat.

He splits the group further, sending two on a mission to get ammo, from which neither returns.

He takes two more players to help Gi-hun, but shoots them both in the back. He then sends a radio message pretending to die himself.

The guards overwhelm and kill the remaining rebels, apart from Gi-hun, Jung-bae, and the two players who returned for ammo.

In-ho switches outfits to the signature mask and a black jacket of the games leader and confronts the now-captured Gi-hun and Jung-bae. They don't realize that In-ho has betrayed them because he has changed his voice and appearance.

In-ho then shoots and kills Jung-Bae right in front of Gi-hun.

It's a tragic ending to the season, putting Gi-hun in a difficult position. He is now captured, his rebellion has been crushed, and he has caused the death of his close friend.

This leaves Gi-hun with two possible paths for season three: give up on his plan to destroy the games or be fueled by his loss and rebound with an even better plan. It's likely Gi-hun will also learn that In-ho is the leader of the games in season three.

A second group of characters is also betrayed

Outside the games, Gi-hun recruited a group of people to help him stop the games, including Hwang Jun-ho, In-ho's brother, and Woo-seok, a member of the criminal underworld.

They plant a tracker on Gi-hun, but when that plan fails, they search multiple islands nearby to find the game center. They use a boat run by Captain Park, a fisherman who saved Jun-ho after his brother shot him to protect the games in season one.

In the finale, Captain Park is revealed to be another saboteur working for the organization that runs the games. He kills one of the crewmembers working with Jun-ho and sabotages the team's drone.

The rest of the crew does not know yet, leaving another exciting mystery to be uncovered in season three. Will Gi-hun's allies find out Captain Park's identity and find the game island before he kills them all one by one?

Season three debuts in 2025, so hopefully, fans will soon find out what happens next.

• "Squid Game" season two has an emotional finale followed by a scene interrupting the credits.
• It is the first time the series has tried something like that.
• Here's what it teases for the third season.

Warning: major spoilers ahead for "Squid Game" season two.

The highly anticipated second season of "Squid Game" is out, and it ends with a chaotic and tragic finale.

Season one was a surprise hit for Netflix when in 2021, becoming a global sensation through word-of-mouth and social media trends. Netflix hopes for the same success with the second season, which debuts in the middle of the holiday season.

In season one, a group of people struggling with debt signed up for a competition where they played children's games to win a fortune.

What they realize too late is that the losers of the games are killed, leaving only one survivor, Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-Jae), Player 456.

At the end of season one, Gi-hun vows to stop the deadly competition, but his plan is foiled in season two, and he finds himself competing again.

Gi-hun leads a revolution against the guards in the final episode

He tries to unite the contestants against the game, but they mostly insist on playing, enticed by the prize money.

In the finale, this boils over into a massacre when the players who want to continue the games attack those who want to leave.

Gi-hun and his allies use that chaos to overwhelm the guards and start an uprising against the game makers. But the rebels are eventually cornered and defeated. Gi-hun survives, but his best friend, Park Jung-bae (Lee Seo-hwan), Player 390, is killed in front of him by the antagonist, Hwang In-ho (Lee Byung-hun), Player 001.

Gi-hun will likely seek revenge in season three, though his spirit may be broken by his failure and the loss of his close friend.

The post-credit scene teases one of the next games

After Jung-bae's death, the credits for the director and cast appear on-screen.

Then, a small scene shows a group of players walking into a new game room. This room includes a train signal stand, a hanging doll resembling the Young-hee doll from "Red Light, Green Light," and a boy doll facing the first.

The boy doll is likely Cheol-su. In June 2022, Hwang Dong-hyuk said in a statement teasing season two that the show will introduce "Young-hee's boyfriend, Cheol-su."

Young-hee and Cheol-su are characters from old South Korean textbooks and are well-known as best friends.

Cheol-su is not assigned to a specific game, but the other signs in the scene may indicate that the game is somehow related to trains.

• The first season of "Squid Game" was extraordinarily good TV, and season two is no exception.
• In the three years since season one aired, "Squid Game" has also become a cultural sensation.
• "Squid Game" season two follows similar patterns as the first — but it works to great effect.

Before "Squid Game" was a cultural phenomenon, it was an astoundingly great television show — and luckily, season two of the Korean-language drama reminds us exactly why.

The South Korean series about a death game for the economically downtrodden exploded after hitting Netflix in September 2021. Not only was it the most significant non-English hit in Netflix history, it quickly became one of Netflix's biggest shows ever.

That popularity spilled from the small screen to myriad even smaller screens, becoming an internet phenomenon whose biggest symbols — the pink-clad guards, green jumpsuits, and even star Lee Jung-jae's beaming face — became inescapable memes eventually divorced from their original meaning.

That's part of why the return to creator Hwang Dong-hyuk's blistering fever dream is so gripping. "Squid Game" season two brings the cultural phenomenon back to Earth and executes the nigh-impossible, continuing what could have been a complete story in a way that's just as cutting as its predecessor.

Back to the game

In its first season, "Squid Game" struck viewers with sheer novelty: its sharp class satire, grounded in childlike aesthetics, was dissonant in a way that was both disturbing and wildly compelling. While there's no way to recreate that shock factor in season two, the series doesn't need to reinvent the wheel to be excellent. In fact, its iterative nature is a thematic strength.

Season two is functionally a torture cycle for Seong Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae), the victor of the games. Burdened with a 45.6 million fortune won through the deaths of his companions, Gi-hun puts it to use attempting to shut the games down. This time, he's the one with power, funding a citywide manhunt for the games' ddakji-playing recruiter (a once-again show-stealing Gong Yoo) and incentivizing his employees with a substantial reward. Unfortunately, Gi-hun's crusade puts him back where he started in the games, with his life on the line.

This time, however, he knows exactly who his enemy is: the Front Man, also known as Hwang Jun-ho's (Wi Ha-jun) elder brother, In-ho. This season, the gamesmaster has a much more involved role — one that actor Lee Byung-hun, finally unmasked, handles with grim, enthralling aplomb. He is equal parts Gi-hun's foil and torture master, slowly working to dismantle his still-idealistic worldview by repeatedly exposing him to the horror of human nature.

That makes season two's repetition of familiar games, like "Red Light, Green Light," or character beats, like Gi-hun encountering an old friend in the games, incredibly effective. Even though he's been dealt the same cards — frankly, better ones, given that he's no longer bound by his debts — Gi-hun must struggle against human hubris and avarice.

There are, of course, new challenges. Season two introduces several new games that are just as superlatively designed as their predecessors. This cycle's new mechanic, a chest badge to indicate which players vote to leave or stay in the games, establishes a rote but still compelling division between the players.

New players make an impression

Wisely, Gi-hun takes a backseat for much of season two to make room for the show's captivating cast of new characters.

Choi Seung-hyun (a rapper known by the stage name T.O.P) is an easy standout and sure-to-be fan-favorite as Thanos, a braggadocious rapper burned by a failed crypto investment. Kang Ae-sim is easy to emotionally invest in as Geum-ja, a woman who joined the games to pay off her son's debts, only to discover he agreed to play as well. Former soldier Hyun-ju (Park Sung-hoon) is the most compelling of the bunch: a transgender woman, she faced discrimination after transitioning, leaving her in debt after she was fired from her job while pursuing gender-affirming surgeries.

Lee shows up once again to work this season, deftly handling the nuances of Gi-hun's plight and changed character. Most striking are the moments where he falls back into Gi-hun's childlike innocence from season one, most frequently due to the actions of his former gambling buddy Jung-bae, played by a painfully endearing Lee Seo-hwan. Still, Lee pulls off the determined, beleaguered savior well.

For the most part, Hwang (who still mostly wrote season two himself, this time with a few assistants) juggles the series' myriad character arcs and plot lines well, though some threads don't hold up as well as others. The weakest of the bunch is Jun-ho's quest outside the games to locate the island where they're held and also, presumably, Gi-hun and his brother. While his arc posing as a guard in season one provided valuable insight into the process of the games, this time, his search is mostly a distraction with little payoff in the confines of the season.

Ultimately, though, "Squid Game" manages to live up not only to its preceding season but the myth of the franchise itself. Success can bring crushing pressure, and with it, an impulse to iterate. In this case, though, the iteration works in service of the show's point: there is no escape: not for the game's players, and certainly not for Gi-hun.

"Squid Game" seasons one and two are now streaming on Netflix.

• KKR and Bain Capital bid over $5 billion for Seven & i's non-core assets.
• Seven & i's non-core assets include superstores, baby stores, and Denny's Japan operations.
• Seven & i also received a $47 billion offer from Alimentation Couche-Tard.

Some of the world's biggest private equity companies have joined the race to own pieces of 7-Eleven's parent company.

Japanese-owned Seven & i Holdings has a sprawling set of businesses, including 85,000 7-Elevens globally and a host of supermarkets. The $39.5 billion company, whose stock is up 30% this year, has been the target of numerous takeover bids in recent months — for all of the business or parts of it.

On Wednesday, Reuters reported that US private equity firms KKR and Bain Capital each offered over $5 billion in first-round bids for some assets of the company. Local private equity firm Japan Industrial Partners offered about $4.8 billion, per Reuters.

The firms are reportedly looking to buy York Holdings — Seven and i's non-core businesses, including superstores, baby goods chain Akachan Honpo, and the company that runs Denny's diner chain in Japan. All three firms were successful in the first round of bidding for these assets, according to Reuters, which cited people familiar with the matter.

Private equity firms typically buy companies or subsidiaries they see as struggling and work to make them profitable before selling them as a whole or in parts after a couple of years.

Representatives of KKR, Bain Capital, Japan Industrial Partners, and Seven & i did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Reuters reported on Wednesday that Seven & i aims to select the winning bid as early as February, and the decision could be finalized by spring.

Rival convenience store

Besides the three buyout firms, the 7-Eleven parent also received a $47 billion takeover offer from Canadian multinational convenience store chain Alimentation Couche-Tard. Couche-Tard, which has almost 17,000 stores around the world, bid for Seven & i this summer.

Unlike the private equity firms, Couche-Tard appears to want to buy the whole company, including the 7-Eleven stores.

The deal would amount to the largest-ever foreign takeover of a Japanese company and would give the 7-Eleven chain North American ownership again.

The chain partnered with Ito-Yokado, a Japanese supermarket chain founded in 1973, to build franchised locations in Japan. In the 1990s, Ito-Yokado acquired a majority stake in the company and completed a full acquisition in November 2005. That year, Ito-Yokado reorganized, becoming Seven & i Holdings. 7-Eleven had about 25,000 stores globally before the takeover in 2005, per a trade magazine.

Couche-Tard did not respond to a request for comment.

Seven & i family

The company is also contending with a management takeover to fend off the Canadian offer by going private. In November, Seven & I said it received an acquisition proposal from current vice president Junro Ito, his private company, Ito-Kogyo, and the son of founder Masatoshi Ito.

Ito-Kogyo owned 8.2% of Seven & i as of August, making it the second-largest shareholder, according to the company. Master Trust Bank of Japan is the largest shareholder, with a 14.7% stake.

The privatization offer could be worth around $58 billion, Bloomberg reported in November.

Seven & I said in November that it had formed a board of directors committee to consider Ito and Couche-Tard's offers.

Beyoncé performed a medley of hits from her record-breaking "Cowboy Carter" album during Netflix's first-ever NFL Christmas Gameday halftime show on Wednesday.

The big picture: Guests at the show in Houston, Texas, during the break at the Houston Texans-Baltimore Raven game included Post Malone, Shaboozey, Reyna Roberts, Tanner Adell, Brittney Spencer, and Tiera Kennedy, and Beyoncé's elder daughter, Blue Ivy Carter.

Go deeper: Beyoncé makes history again with "Cowboy Carter"

President Biden on Wednesday denounced Russia's large-scale Christmas Day attacks on Ukraine that damaged critical energy infrastructure and vowed to continue a U.S. surge in weapons deliveries" to Kyiv.

The big picture: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on X called the attacks "inhumane," while Russia's Defense Ministry said the "long-range precision weapons and strike drones on critical energy infrastructure facilities" in Ukraine had achieved the goal of Putin's forces.

• At least one person in the eastern Dnipropetrovsk region died and six others in Kharkiv were injured during the attacks, according to local officials.

What they're saying: "The purpose of this outrageous attack was to cut off the Ukrainian people's access to heat and electricity during winter and to jeopardize the safety of its grid," Biden said in a statement.

• "In recent months, the United States has provided Ukraine with hundreds of air defense missiles, and more are on the way," added Biden, who will be succeeded by President-elect Trump next month.
• "I have directed the Department of Defense to continue its surge of weapons deliveries to Ukraine, and the United States will continue to work tirelessly to strengthen Ukraine's position in its defense against Russian forces."

Trump's pick for special envoy for Ukraine and Russia also criticized the assault.

• "Christmas should be a time of peace, yet Ukraine was brutally attacked on Christmas Day," Retired Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg said on X.
• "Launching large-scale missile and drone attacks on the day of the Lord's birth is wrong. The world is closely watching actions on both sides. The U.S. is more resolved than ever to bring peace to the region."

Go deeper: Russia says it's using bitcoin to evade sanctions

• Moving abroad with kids can be challenging.
• BI spoke to parents about how they helped their kids navigate the move.
• Parents suggested telling kids about the move early and involving them in decision-making.

Moving abroad is never straightforward, and with kids in tow, it becomes even more complicated.

Additional factors come into play, from finding the right school and dealing with negative reactions to explaining cultural differences.

"The truth is that as meaningful and life-changing as moving abroad can be, it can be hard, no matter how experienced you feel," Stacy Ennis, who moved her family to Thailand and Portugal, previously wrote for Business Insider.

"When kids are involved, the chances of hardship are even higher," she added.

BI spoke to parents and relocation consultants who uprooted their lives in the US to move to different parts of the world.

Here are their best pieces of advice:

1. Start the conversation early

Genie Doi knew she wanted to leave the US with her family after a shooting near her son's school in Los Angeles. He was 5 years old at the time, and when she told him about the move, he was upset, she said. He worried about leaving his grandparents, friends, and toys behind.

"We tried to prepare him for a year just by talking about how exciting this change is going to be," said Doi, who moved in 2022. Before moving, they also visited his new school in Japan so he could familiarise himself with the environment and try to make some friends.

"It was a really smooth transition for him," said Doi.

2. Plan ahead for school

In 2016, Jackie Baxa relocated from Wyoming to Seville, Spain, with her husband and two sons, who were 9 and 13 at the time. Now, she is a relocation coach for families looking to do the same.

Baxa said that education is a factor that weighs heavily on parents' minds. Things to consider include the language in which classes are being taught and whether their kids have the capacity to pick up a second language.

"Do what you can to foster language development in a way that doesn't feel like you're adding more school to the child," said Baxa, whose sons chose to stay in Europe for college and are now fluent in Spanish.

3. Find a piece of home abroad

Besides packing sentimental items from home, Baxa suggested finding bridging activities to help your kids adapt abroad.

Knowing that her kids were big soccer fans, Baxa and her husband brought them to watch professional games. "We knew that that would be really special for them, and it was special for all of us," she said.

She added that capitalizing on what kids identify with and expanding them into new interests can also create psychological comfort.

"It could open up pathways to friendships and things that will make them feel better about what they've left behind," she said.

4. Involve your kids in the decision-making process

Anna Sosdian, an international relocation consultant at StartAbroad, suggested that parents involve their kids in decision-making.

"Make them feel like they have some control over some of the details," she said, whether that's letting them decide what to do on their first day or choosing which room they will have in the new home.

When Jennifer Kusch told her teenage sons that they were relocating to Dubai for her work, they told her she was "ruining" their lives, she told BI.

But they eventually warmed up to the idea. Kusch moved to Dubai six weeks early to settle into their new home. On trips to Ikea, she video-called her kids so they could choose their bedding and furniture.

"I tried to keep them as involved as possible," she said.

5. Your mood affects your kids

Celia Robbins, who moved to Berlin with her husband and four kids, said she tried to stay positive for her kids. "If you're not happy, it's hard for them to be happy," she said.

To help them better integrate, she and her husband networked and joined communities on Facebook.

They also sent their kids to German language classes and enrolled them in a German American school.

"We are trying hard to be ourselves while also appreciating the community and the culture that we're a part of," she said.

6. Encourage them to ask questions

Despite the stress of moving and potential resistance from their kids, these parents agreed on one thing: Go for it.

Learning to say goodbye to friends and being the new kid is hard, said Katie Miller, who moved from Texas to Dubai with her husband and three young kids earlier this year.

"But I'm watching each of them thrive because they've been stretched in new ways," she said.

She said parents should invite their kids to be curious about the moving process.

"We told the kids there are no silly questions. We are all learning together."

• Netflix streamed NFL games for the first time on Christmas Day.
• Technical problems marred a high-profile boxing match last month, but Netflix learned lessons.
• Many social media users praised Netflix for a smooth broadcast after it beefed up capacity.

After fumbling a high-profile boxing match featuring Mike Tyson and Jake Paul last month that was marred by technical problems, many social media users praised Netflix for a smooth broadcast of its first-ever NFL games on Christmas Day.

Netflix, with more than 280 million subscribers worldwide, is the home of hit shows like "Squid Games" and "Stranger Things," which have different technical requirements than massive live events.

Christmas marked the first time it has streamed America's most popular sport, with the Kansas City Chiefs beating the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Baltimore Ravens and Houston Texans followed, featuring a halftime performance by Beyoncé.

More than 60 million users tuned into last month's boxing match, exceeding Netflix and internet service providers' capacity.

Netflix's stream of the event was beset by buffering, poor image quality, and audio problems after Netflix executives greatly underestimated the size of the audience and failed to beef up capacity, The Wall Street Journal reported.

"We were stressing our own technology, we were pushing every ISP in the world right to the limits of their own capacity, we were stressing the limits of the internet itself," Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos explained at a conference this month.

It was an embarrassing misstep for Netflix, which is set to broadcast Christmas NFL games through 2026 and recently signed a contract to stream the FIFA Women's World Cup in 2027 and 2031.

For the Christmas NFL event, executives worked ahead of time with internet service providers like Charter's Spectrum, Comcast's Xfinity, and Verizon's FiOS to increase capacity, the Journal reported.

The investment seems to have paid off.

However, not everyone was pleased. Some social media users complained about glitches, and others disliked being forced to subscribe to yet another streaming service to watch football.