As Squid Game itself was once considered a capitalist spin on Battle Royale ’s totalitarian premise, Squid Game ’s outsize success now means that any series with a vaguely related setup — hundreds of competitors, cash prize, competition to the death — risks being labeled a “ Squid Game knockoff.” Especially if that series is marketed with a distinct focus on those overlapping elements, as Last Samurai Standing is. In the six-episode first season, which debuted on Netflix November 13, a group of samurai are tasked with traveling from Kyoto to Tokyo and killing each other along the way to win a bounty that would change their lives, and the series’ trailer really amps up the bloodshed and backstabbing to lean into the Squid Game comparison. That’s understandable, given how suc

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