[UncleOxidant]

I think the issue with the square would be that the capacitance would be much, much smaller since the wires are separated by a large distance (square law). The capacitance of the original setup is already quite small, but at least it's noticeable on a decent scope. But I doubt you'd see that effect in the square setup.

The other issue with the Veritasium "setup" was that he specified that the wires had no resistance. That being the case the RC time constant would be 0 and thus you wouldn't see that initial charging of the capacitance (and associated current flow) because it would happen instantaneously under those assumptions.