The “Queens Gambit” is the best thing on Netflix right now

brighteyes wrote:

It is excellent. There are only seven episodes and I split them up over four days so I could savor the viewing.

You (times about a million people) are why the movies may never come back.....

Zhukov wrote:

I loved it too.

One thing. I'll try to be vague to not give too much away.

Are we supposed to take her American competitor Benny Watts seriously? He's supposed to have edge how he dresses and acts, but he looks like a kind of scrawny crocodile dundee wanabee. Really difficult for me to buy into his character.

He was pretty Chad IMO -- but in a chess player way.. I think it worked.

I"m so watching it just cause of that reason!! How can the albin be defeated!!!

grandmasterchess wrote:

Has everything you need in a series. Amazing acting, story, drama, and cringeworthy moments that you can’t look away from. Highly recommend everyone watch the pilot in the least.

10/10 and deserves a thread on LRC

Excellent indeed.

For those interested in chess don't forget to check out the interviews covering who they based the characters on, where the games where taken from (and modified or improved), GM coaching of the actors for natural play, even the memorization of the games is fascinating. Keep in mind the majority of the actors didn't know how players holds pieces when moving, or taking other pieces

Zhukov wrote:

I loved it too.

One thing. I'll try to be vague to not give too much away.

Are we supposed to take her American competitor Benny Watts seriously? He's supposed to have edge how he dresses and acts, but he looks like a kind of scrawny crocodile dundee wanabee. Really difficult for me to buy into his character.

Yeah that was pretty bad.. and the mustache looked bigger than his very large head. They should have just given him a Johnny Depp look. That character didn't fit well. The ending was a bit lame but I was glued to most of the series, very well done.

Trollminator wrote:The ending was a bit lame ....

Ah no, you have no soul! I loved the ending. ?

Quite a predictable storyline and ending.

Hard to believe a chess player with drug and alcohol problems for most of the show could dominate the chess competition in a short space of time.

Even Fischer had to train and practice for years to beat Spaskky in 1972.

It seemed like most of the tournaments portrayed in the show was knockout except for the US Championship. Most major tournaments back then were a round robin format.

Phenomenal series. I play chess, my wife doesn’t. We both loved it.

Great series. Best thing I've seen on television since Breaking Bad. I played chess from age 10-14, then the uncle who taught me to play and who I was pretty evenly matched with was ditched by my aunt and he moved away. Missed him terribly because no one else I knew in my small town played chess or was interested in learning..... My wife never played chess, doesn't know the first thing about which pieces can move where, and she loved QG too. Wish they made more series like this, with a definite ending, great story, great characters and acting, and great sets. They really got this one right.

11/10 ( "this one goes to 11").

KCgeezer wrote:

brighteyes wrote:

It is excellent. There are only seven episodes and I split them up over four days so I could savor the viewing.

You (times about a million people) are why the movies may never come back.....

https://www.primetimer.com/barnhart/queens-gambit

I'm glad Hollywood did not attempt to make this a 2-3 hour movie. Hopefully there are more treatments like this one. I saw Let Him Go in the theatre last week and A Rainy Day in Paris and several other movies in the last month. I'll see Ammonite and Hillbilly Elegy (although I think it should probably have been treated like Queen's Gambit over a longer run time) this week. Having said all that, the catastrophic overreaction to Covid with a viable stay at home option for movie watching probably will cripple the theater business just as it will alter many other business models. My wife, a corporate lawyer, has not been to her office since March and they and now talking about not going to the office all of 2021.

Trollminator wrote:

Zhukov wrote:

I loved it too.

One thing. I'll try to be vague to not give too much away.

Are we supposed to take her American competitor Benny Watts seriously? He's supposed to have edge how he dresses and acts, but he looks like a kind of scrawny crocodile dundee wanabee. Really difficult for me to buy into his character.

Yeah that was pretty bad.. and the mustache looked bigger than his very large head. They should have just given him a Johnny Depp look. That character didn't fit well. The ending was a bit lame but I was glued to most of the series, very well done.

I thought he was supposed to be a nerdy former child prodigy who is trying to be cool. I thought the juxtaposition of his wimpyness and his attempted image was intentional.

Everyone told me how great this series was so I waded in. I'm through four episodes and I'm still "meh" about it.

I was really into chess as a kid but I retired after winning our school's tournament in 6th grade.

NameStolenAgain wrote:

Keep in mind the majority of the actors didn't know how players holds pieces when moving, or taking other pieces

So, I'm actually a chess National Master (top 200 or so in the US) and this was my only critique of the show. I really enjoyed it overall including the realism with actual game play that made some sense and historical chess references.

But the piece moving still got me a bit because it was really clear they were actors. Some of the movements were kinda unnatural and not what you would see out of someone experienced with tournament experience. Still a very minor critique and not likely something non-chess players would notice.

A couple random thoughts about chess and the movie. (I used to play quite a bit many years ago, some of it serious chess.)

I don't remember people staring at their opponent as they did in the movie, although we certainly did quick glance to see reactions.

Actually many players were more obnoxious than portrayed in the movie. (Some were very cool too though )

Replaying games (after tournament) in your head at night in bed was true for me.

Losing a tournament chess game is psychologically more difficult than losing in any other sport I have done (I haven't done wrestling or boxing, they might be tougher)

Tournament chess is much more cognitively, physically and emotionally difficult than competitive running.

It seems like as I got older it was harder to play top chess than to keep running at a higher level. (That is probably very subjective but it was just a feeling I had.)

On a pick up game, the person who arranges their pieces on the board the quickest usually wins (assuming its not intentional).

I guess as in any sport, motivation, confidence and unwillingness to lose are everything in this sport.

Playing with a friend, competitive chess, and having both of you getting pushed to your limits, is an amazing experience. Win or lose, its an experience you wouldn't have had without your partner. Great to go over games afterwards with them to see what they were thinking.

I've got to point out that the reigning Women's World Chess Champion, Ju Wenjun, is ranked only number 404 in the world overall.

The show is wildly unrealistic.

Benny Watts' look is cross between a poor man's Crocodile Dundee, Johnny Depp and the white trash version of David Spade!

historically inaccurate wrote:

I've got to point out that the reigning Women's World Chess Champion, Ju Wenjun, is ranked only number 404 in the world overall.

The show is wildly unrealistic.

You're not wrong, but the best woman (Yifan Hou) doesn't play woman-only events. She is a top 100 player.

The best woman ever was Judith Polgar who became a grandmaster at 15 and peaked at 8th in the world. The Polgar sisters are a very interesting study for the whole nature vs nature debate as they were raised explicitly to become great chess players and they all succeeded to an extent.

You're right, the staring isn't realistic either. Neither is the blitzing of moves so quickly in games where there are 2 hours per side.

I rarely ever see issues with obnoxious players at my level, but I've definitely seen it from players way, way worse who greatly overestimate themselves. There is a massive gulf from a casual player to a tournament player and then an even larger gulf from regular tournament player to chess master.

They explained the Swiss system early in the show - how most are run these days and back then. I think they just highlighted the "top board" a lot - with the display board and commentators. So it seemed like no one else was playing later in the tournaments.

Von Trips wrote:

Quite a predictable storyline and ending.

Hard to believe a chess player with drug and alcohol problems for most of the show could dominate the chess competition in a short space of time.

Even Fischer had to train and practice for years to beat Spaskky in 1972.

It seemed like most of the tournaments portrayed in the show was knockout except for the US Championship. Most major tournaments back then were a round robin format.