courtesy of Netflix

The Korean TV series “Physical 100” is a competition where the 100 most fit men and women of Korea compete in a series of challenges to determine who has the “perfect physique.” The competitions are made to challenge the guest and push them toward their limit. At the end of each challenge, contestants are eliminated and have to smash their own mold of their torso made of plaster to “finalize” the process of elimination.

Physical 100 season two ends with a bang, leaving fans shocked at the results. There were a total of five quests in these nine episodes and the last contestant standing walks away with 300 million won, which equals to about 220,000 U.S. dollars.

The first episode started with the introduction of each contestant. Some of the main contestants who caught the audience’s attention was retired MMA fighter, Dong Hyun Kim (22-4-1), returning member from Physical 100 season one, Hong Beom-seok, American Olympian Andre Jin and cross fitter Kim “Amotti” Jae-hong.

The first quest or “pre-quest mission” started off just like season one where the game host had to rank the contestants for the first official quest. Last year on season one, they had to hang on a bar to see who lasted the longest. After the first season’s success, the audience craved for a second season as the show gave a lot of what the fans were looking for, like many of the interesting contenders and many of the interesting challenges. This year, contestants focused on cardio. The room was filled with 100 treadmills and contestants for the first round had to run for ten minutes, their distance was logged each round and the lowest were eliminated.

The first quest is called “one-on-one deathmatch.” The top 50 and bottom 50 of the first prequest get together and pair to go against each other in a one-on-one fight. This was the first official start of the highly anticipated show and it was delivered. Fans enjoyed many of the pair ups as there were many surprises with who the contestants picked and how the matches each played out. Many were really close and had the audience worried for who would win. 

The second quest is a five-on-five team match that has two parts; quest 2 and quest 2.5. The first part of it is a team based maze. This part of the show had fans anxious on who the team captains would pick. Some were confused on why they picked some contenders and some were shocked. Fans really wanted their favorite team to win, because if their favored team lost, everyone on the team would be eliminated. Two teams are paired up, needing to work their way around a maze to find the center to find various weights of sandbags. In the maze, there are three giant scales and the teams needed the most weight in at least two of the three scales to win. 

Once those five teams were selected, the other five got another chance at a redemption round. This show truly delivers on the unique and different ways they allow competitors to play and how they let them rejoin the competition. It was very interesting how the show let the other eliminated contestants join back for a second chance. After a brutal four rounds, only one person is allowed to survive. That one person then has to make their own team of five from the people they compete against. 

The show does a really good job at cutting off the episode at the right time leaving us on a cliffhanger for the next episode releasing. On the maze challenge, it was a really close tie and it ended the episode right at the end of the challenge leaving us waiting until the next episode released.

The third quest, mine transportation match, required the teams to try and secure enough points during a mine cart relay challenge and push a bag across monkey bars in mid-air. This challenge overall, was a bit confusing to the audience as it over-explained the task, but once the competitors actually competed, it was much more understandable. 

The fourth challenge, called roller race, was a challenge where contestants have to move heavy barrels across a field twice and run back to their original starting place, concluding the challenge. Interestingly enough, this challenge was a curveball to the audience and the players themselves, as they had to go up against each other, meaning there would only be one winner in their whole group. At the conclusion of this challenge, the final four contestants remained; Amotti, Andre Jin, Justin Harvey and Hong Beom-seok.

The final quest was divided into three rounds, after a long battle, Justin Harvey was eliminated and placed fourth. A few nail-biting rounds later, Andre Jin was eliminated; placing third. The final quest was best two out of three, Beom-seok winning the first round and Amotti winning the second. For the winning round, Beom-seok, the crowd favorite, unfortunately lost his balance and lost the final round almost immediately leaving Amotti as the final contestant with the “perfect physique” and walking away with $220,000.

“Physical 100” is a climactic and entertaining show, providing watchers a perspective of what it’s like to compete in the game show. The show, in almost every episode, will have audiences at the edge of their seat and deserves a 9 out of 10.