Last spring during quarantine, “The Circle”  saved many from boredom and gave them something to look forward to. Again this year, “The Circle”  season two came out and brought people that same joy and excitement. 

“The Circle” is considered one of the first social media competition shows, where the contestants never actually get to see each other face to face while competing. Many players will enter as themselves, but this style of competition allows for the contestants to create false profiles for themselves if they choose to. Participants have the ability to completely transform themselves into a completely different gender or age group. The suspension of contestants not knowing who is telling the truth and who is playing as a “catfish” creates entertaining content for the viewers, as they know who is actually behind each profile. It is also comical when a player accuses another player of catfishing  when it is clear to the audience that they are playing as themselves and vice versa. 

The second season is broken up into 13 episodes even though they were not all released at one time. Contrary to how many Netflix series are premiered, “The Circle” followed a schedule where about four episodes were released each Wednesday from April 14th to April 28th, and then the finale was released by itself on May 5th. This format created anticipation between the episodes and forced viewers to watch the show over a long period of time, rather than binging watching it all in one night. I enjoyed watching the show this way because if I fell behind on it, I only had a couple of episodes to catch up on rather than a whole season. However, I was also impatient to find out what would happen next in the show. 

The second season was fairly similar to the first season, but it did have some fundamental changes. The second season featured many different twists that the first season lacked. Some of these include bringing players back to play with a second chance and players being given secret advantages. I thought that these additions made the show more interesting and exciting. 

Overall, I would highly recommend watching season two of “The Circle” if you find yourself in the mood for a suspenseful and lighthearted TV show!