On Boxing Day 2024, two momentous comebacks played out on Netflix. After three years, the second season of Squid Game – the streaming platform’s record-breaking original series – was finally released. It brought with it a cast of new characters, including Thanos, a purple-haired rapper who lost his money in a cryptocurrency scam and has a penchant for drugs and making up cringeworthy rhymes.
The intentionally cartoonish figure provided some light relief from the desperation and death of the rest of the show but also marked the first activity in seven years for the actor who plays him. Since 2017, Choi Seung-hyun – aka T.O.P, the former lead rapper of K-pop kings BIGBANG – had been persona non grata in the Korean entertainment scene, forced into the margins after being charged with smoking marijuana in his home. He was sentenced to 10 months in prison, suspended for two years, and had his every move scrutinised and captured by paparazzi camera flashes – including being wheeled through hospital when he regained consciousness following a suspected overdose.
In 2020, he – understandably – announced to fans on an Instagram livestream that he would not return to the entertainment industry. As he joins NME on Zoom from Seoul for a belated press day to discuss his big comeback, he reflects on that declaration. “In my twenties, I received so much love [that] maybe I was undeserving of it – that’s how intense and grand that love was,” T.O.P says. Throughout our chat, he is stoic and solemn, occasionally adjusting his deep brown suit jacket, a slight nervousness to his actions. “Then I ended up disappointing so many people and, at that time, I had to go through an intense darkness – so dark that it’s hard to imagine. There were some moments back then when I felt such intense and heavy shame that I just wanted to quit everything.”
“I had to go through an intense darkness – so dark that it’s hard to imagine”
He retreated to his home and studio, making music for himself, with the hopes of one day being able to share it with his fans. When he got the call from Squid Game director Hwang Dong-hyuk to play Thanos, he faced a tough decision. “I did think that getting to portray a role like this character might end up leading to me being pigeonholed, especially because Squid Game is such a global series,” T.O.P explains. “This was a concern, not just personally but from people around me as well. But I also thought that, in a way, it almost felt like destiny that I met this character, which is what led me to gather my courage.”
That feeling of fate, he says, manifested itself through the faith Hwang placed in him at a time when no one else seemed interested in working with him. “For many, many years, I was focusing on only creating and writing my music, and no one reached out [to me] acting-wise,” he says. “But director Hwang placed such a huge amount of trust in me, I think that his gestures are what led me to gain or summon up that courage [to take on the role of Thanos].”
The returning star has described playing Thanos as “daunting” and today points to the worldwide success of Squid Game as one of the contributing factors to that. But some of the parallels between the character and his own experiences also made the role an intimidating one. “There’s a lot of connection with him and parts of my past and my past mistakes,” he says, referring to the on-screen failed idol rapper’s reliance on pills to get through the deadly games – and his own issues with drugs. “I had to really sit down and think about if I was going to go through with it. I felt the only way to repay the trust that director Hwang had placed in me was for me to really do a good job in portraying Thanos.”
Before his period in the entertainment industry hinterland, T.O.P was a seasoned actor, last appearing in the 2017 action-thriller Out Of Control and previously taking roles in South Korean films like Tazza: The Hidden Card and Commitment. Being back in front of the camera after so long took some getting used to.
“There was a lot of pressure, especially [because] initially in Squid Game, there are so many actors on set and so many members of the crew,” he explains. “When I first arrived, everything felt very surreal. To be a part of the 456 players of Squid Game and being there, having so many sets of eyes on me, I think that’s when it just really hit me that, ‘Oh, I am really a part of Squid Game.’”
“I will be sharing my music for the first time in almost a decade”
Despite returning to our screens as part of such a huge show, T.O.P currently has no “concrete ideas” for the acting side of his career. “What I am currently hoping to do is share with the world T.O.P – me as a musician – because I will be sharing my music [for the first time] in almost a decade,” he says. “The musician T.O.P would be the character that I want to play [now].”
As well as being a member of the huge boy band BIGBANG – who helped put Korean music on a global stage with songs like ‘Bang Bang Bang’ and ‘Fantastic Baby’ – before his ostracisation from the industry, T.O.P also released a handful of solo and collaborative releases. In 2010, he scored a Number Two hit in South Korea with ‘Turn It Up’, a piece of bumping hip-hop with a robotic edge. Three years later, the jagged single ‘Doom Dada’ dripped in ominous swagger as he declared himself “a Basquiat of rap”.
It’s music that got him through the tough times he’s faced. “In order to quite literally live, I turned to creating music,” he says of the relief being in the studio over the last eight years brought him. “That’s when I learned that, only when I was in my music [or] standing in front of the mic, I was able to breathe.”
He says “part of my responsibility as a musician” is to share what he’s been working on – and gives NME some insight into what to expect. “Over the years, I spent a lot of time really thinking about and regretting what I have done, and I spent a lot of time on self-reflection as well,” he explains carefully. “I think those years have allowed for my musical universe to change greatly. I feel that my music has become richer and expanded in size as well, so I’m quite confident that my fans will feel that I have matured musically.” His expression remains sombre but his words are tinged with the faintest optimism that suggests, if all goes to plan, Thanos is far from the last we’ll see of T.O.P.
*This interview was conducted through a translator