When you first came to me, you said my job here would be helping those who feel hopeless by putting them out of their misery. I trusted you. That's what I came here to do. You're the one who has changed.Kang No-eul confronting the Masked Officer about the organ harvesting conspiracy.
Kang No-eul on multiple occasions, impeding the organ harvesters by enforcing the rules of Squid Game.I was just doing my job.
Kang No-eul, also known as Number 011, is a major antagonist in Season 2 of Netflix's 2021 South Korean survival thriller series Squid Game. She is a North Korean defector and former soldier who fled to South Korea after killing her superior officer, leaving her newborn daughter behind in the process.
Initially working as a costumed performer at a theme park while sleeping in her car, No-eul later accepts a more lucrative position as one of the Masked Soldiers in the Squid Game, looking to reunite with her child.
She is portrayed by Park Gyu-young.
Biography
Background
No-eul was born in North Korea on June 25, 1994, serving as a soldier in the Korean People's Army and becoming a mother by 2023. She made the decision to defect to South Korea by killing her commanding officer and subsequent pursuit team at the border. In the process, she had been forced to leave her infant child behind.
Now in South Korea, No-eul began working as a costumed entertainer at an amusement park while living in her vehicle, saving money with hopes of eventually finding and reuniting with her child, whom she believes is still alive. She was recruited by the Masked Officer, who saw her in the hospital after escaping the Korean demarcation line, seven years prior to the events of Season 2, though she would not be employed until later.
2024
She first appears in "Halloween Party," where she is seen sleeping in her car at night in the parking lot of the amusement park where she works, as she has to work early the next morning. She is surrounded by pills, bottles of alcohol, and a picture of her daughter. A security guard knocks on her window and tells her that she is not allowed to be there, and that there will not be a "next time" or he'll have to report her. No-eul apologizes and agrees not to do it again.
The next day, she is working her job as a costumed performer in a pink bunny outfit, handing out lollipops to children. She encounters Park Na-yeon, the young daughter of Park Gyeong-seok, an artist who works at the park, giving her a lollipop and finding her endearing. Afterwards, she enters the break room to cool off, but Na-yeon follows her in. No-eul quickly puts her costume back on and receives a drawing from Na-yeon that shows the two of them holding hands. Na-yeon naively asks if No-eul's self-harm scars on her wrists hurt, after which No-eul quickly covers them up. When Na-yeon witnesses one of the employees cursing and without his costume on, she becomes upset, and her father comes in to apologize and take her out. The same employee mentions that Na-yeon has blood cancer and will need a bone marrow transplant, silently upsetting No-eul.
Unknowingly passing by Seong Gi-hun, the series' main protagonist, No-eul meets with a broker whom she hired to help find her daughter. She tells him that everyone insists her daughter is dead but pushes him to look one last time for her and gives him a stack of cash, noting that he previously said she could still be alive. The broker grows frustrated, clarifies his statement about her livelihood as being merely a possibility, and tells her it is best for her to give up on her quest to find her daughter.
No-eul is then seen at night crying in her car, holding the picture of her child and numbing herself with drugs and alcohol. A man suddenly knocks on her window, and while she initially assumes it is the officer from the previous night, the man instead calls her by name and hands her the Squid Game business card before leaving without another word. No-eul contemplates and looks at the card.
During what would've been her next shift, another co-worker wearing her old costume passes by and ignores young Na-yeon at the park. Na-yeon, however, mistakes the performer for her and believes she has been ignored. No-eul is then seen handing her manager a resignation letter, vaguely insisting that it is for "personal reasons" and politely declining the offer to have one last dinner with the team. Her now-former manager and co-worker note how she had always been "cold" and closed-off.
Afterwards, while leaving and walking through the park, she witnesses Na-yeon being put in an emergency vehicle while her father rushes to the scene. As the vehicle departs, No-eul notices the strawberry-themed hat the child was wearing, walks towards it, and picks it up. Later, she visits the hospital and enters Na-yeon's room, where she is on her medical bed. She holds her hand and leaves the hat before exiting. Father Kyung-seok takes notice of the hat when he returns to his daughter.
At night, No-eul sits by her car and a fireplace while calling the number on the Squid Game card. She agrees to participate in the games and burns both the business card and Na-yeon's drawing in the fire.
Later, she drives to the location given on the phone and enters a shipping truck, where it is revealed she is being hired as Number 011 among the masked guards as opposed to a player. As the truck departs, No-eul puts on her costume in her designated locker.
36th Squid Game
In "001," No-eul is seen again working as a sniper during the Red Light, Green Light game, the first competition of the 36th Squid Game, and is notified each time a player is detected by the motion sensor. The first player she kills is Player 066, who attempts to freeze during the "Red Light" but is too shaken up and therefore eliminated by her as part of the rules. She then kills Player 188 and is alerted about Player 244, but is surprised when she recognizes Player 246 as Kyung-seok, the father of Na-yeon, the girl at the amusement park. She proceeds to kill Player 237, and other players are seen being eliminated in a montage: it is not made clear which kills are No-eul's and which are done by other soldiers.
When Player 444 is caught moving, he is shot non-fatally in the leg by another soldier, which is later revealed to be to keep him alive for organ harvesting. Even though Gi-hun and Cho Hyun-ju end up helping Player 444 cross the finish line in time, No-eul shoots him in the head anyway to impede the soldier's plan, shocking Gi-hun and Hyun-ju. The soldier who shot him in the leg questions No-eul over radio, but she claims she was simply doing her job. No-eul then again notes Kyung-seok's presence in the game before being shown locking away her weapons, equipping her triangle mask, and exiting her locker. The Masked Officer suspiciously views her through a surveillance camera.
In "Six Legs," No-eul is back in her locker and washing her face while remembering Kyung-seok and the moment he rushed toward his sick daughter at the park. The organ harvesting conspirators angrily note how the contestants whom they tried to keep alive for more viable organ harvesting were instead shot dead, suspecting No-eul, whom they know as Number 011. The soldier who shot Player 444 in the leg informs the Masked Officer over radio, and later, one of the Masked Managers wakes No-eul up and instructs her to follow them to meet with the officer.
She enters the officer's room and takes off her mask as instructed, and the officer (now unmasked) criticizes her for ensuring the death of the contestants and interfering with the conspiracy. No-eul claims she was only doing her job. The Masked Officer remembers how he met her seven years ago in the hospital after she eliminated her pursuit team and made her way to the South all on her own, saying he felt bad and wanted to give her a second chance through employment, and also implies that he had given her the opportunity to find her missing child. No-eul expresses that she feels grateful but then notes how she was initially told her job would be helping hopeless people be put out of their misery, trusting in this and claiming that the officer is the only one who has had a change of heart. She excuses herself and leaves despite the officer attempting to justify the conspiracy through utilitarianism.
During the Six-Legged Pentathlon game, No-eul instructs the Masked Workers to open the marked coffin of Player 198, whom she subsequently kills after he is shown to still be alive.
Later, in "One More Game," No-eul stores away her guns and enters her room, but two male soldiers (one of which being the soldier who shot Player 444) involved in the conspiracy push her and enter her room before closing the door. A manager witnesses this through surveillance but switches his feed to another room. They unmask her, call her "pretty," and claim that she should've steered clear if she wasn't going to play along. When No-eul argues that she will report them, they reveal their faces and claim that the officer will not protect her for much longer. She punches them both and starts fighting them, but they ultimately pin her to the ground. One soldier pulls out a knife and puts a small cut on both her face and fingers, threatening to injure both. Their final warning to her before exiting the room is that if she continues to interfere, they will cut her fingers off and rape her. Afterward, No-eul breathes heavily in distress.
In "Friend or Foe," the soldier who shot Player 444 informs the officer that the operation is running smoothly and that No-eul is now "behaving." The officer still instructs him to watch her carefully. No-eul is seen dejected in her room before the soldiers are instructed to move out. Later, when Gi-hun's plan to kill the enforcers and retrieve their guns for rebellion starts moving, the Masked Officer instructs all soldiers to move out, which Kang No-eul complies with.
Player 246, whom No-eul knows is Kyung-seok, is eventually shot by a soldier wearing a triangle mask during the resistance while pleading for mercy. It is left ambiguous as to whether this soldier was No-eul or not.
Personality
[No-eul] has no other purpose in life than to reunite with her child. (...) [She’s] harboring the kind of indescribable agony that cannot be expressed in words. (...) No-eul begins working at the game with the mission of letting hopeless people pass on peacefully without pain. She’s someone who can’t go on living but must do so. (...) She joins the game with the idea of lifting others’ pain and giving peace to those suffering just like her.Park Gyu-young on Kang No-eul's mindset.
Despite working as a masked soldier in the Squid Game, No-eul seems to perform her duties with the most humility. Unlike some of her colleagues, who deliberately avoid killing eliminated and shot players to mark their coffins with blood crosses for their own advantage, planning to use them for organ harvesting, she chooses instead to end the suffering of hopeless participants quickly and peacefully. She later speaks out against the conspiracy to the Masked Officer, finding that it contradicts the promise made during recruitment that she would be helping people. Her actions stem from her own inescapable grief over losing her daughter and her difficult life circumstances, exemplified by her sleeping in her car and having scars of self-harm on her wrists.
While she appears outwardly stoic, cold, and withdrawn (noted by one of her previous co-workers and her manager at the amusement park), No-eul has a very protective and loving nature, especially towards children, rooted in the loss of her own daughter, with whom she is wholly concerned and refuses to give up on. This is demonstrated when she meets the young daughter of Kyung-seok (who later becomes a Squid Game contestant, shocking and saddening Kang No-eul). The child's sweet personality reminds No-eul of her own daughter, leading her to develop a bond with the girl and keep a drawing from her. Upon learning of the child's chronic illness, No-eul even makes a visit to the hospital to see her and return her hat. However, when contacting the number on her Squid Game business card, she throws the child's drawing into a fire, likely symbolizing the forgoing of her humanity before entering the games as a sniper.
Gallery
Images
Videos
External Links
- Kang No-eul on the Squid Game Wiki
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