The Netflix Squid Game watermelon energy drink, a 250ml can bought in Belgium, is the European edition of a tie-in that exists in several different versions around the world. Netflix licensed Squid Game energy drinks separately by region to promote the second season, which arrived in December 2024, three years after the first season became the most watched series the platform had ever aired.
The can is built around Young-hee, the giant animatronic doll from the Red Light, Green Light game in the opening episode. She appears as a cartoon illustration against a saturated pink body, in the same orange dress, white collar and dark pigtails she wears on screen. It is a far more playful treatment than the scene she comes from deserves, and that contrast is exactly why the character became the single most recognisable image from the whole series. The Netflix wordmark sits alongside her, which is still an odd thing to see on a drink.
Young-hee is not an invention of the show. The name and the look come from a character in South Korean primary school textbooks used from the 1950s onwards, familiar to generations of Korean children in the way Janet and John once were in Britain. That reference lands very differently in Seoul than it does in a Belgian shop.
The European release is a genuinely separate product from the Korean one, and this can proves it. The back is printed in French, German, Spanish and Portuguese with no English and no Korean, and it carries Hot Shots Europa as distributor. The Korean domestic version, sold through GS25 convenience stores, uses a completely different recipe built on ginseng, guarana, green tea extract and L-carnitine. Same licence, same character, different drink.
Inside is a carbonated watermelon energy drink carrying 80mg of caffeine per can at 32mg per 100ml, taurine at 0.40%, and added niacin, pantothenic acid, vitamin B6 and vitamin B12. It is coloured with black carrot juice concentrate, a natural pigment, and sweetened with sugar alongside acesulfame K and sucralose. It is pasteurised and carries the standard high caffeine warning against consumption by children or by women who are pregnant or breastfeeding.