Chess Club Live Blog

 I watched The Queen's Gambit on Netflix as soon as it was released. I may have been in the first half million people in the world to have watched it as I watched pretty much sitting motionless for 7 hours but for comfort breaks. Afterwards, I tried to find out what Netflix had done on social media for the show. I went onto Facebook, nothing, Twitter, nothing, Instagram nothing but some weird stan account with tens of thousands of fans but didn't even seem like they were legit or even pretending to be. In a panic, I even went to TikTok and of course nothing. Okay so I went back to Twitter, they had posted some low key promotion on Netflix and Netflix Queue but still, no dedicated social media account anywhere. I was astounded. Well, this just was not going to be good enough for me (and I suspected a few million chess fans and randoms). I started writing DMs to Netflix Executives and eventually found the actual Social Media Manager. I told her exactly what I thought about the am...

 The Queen's Gambit has made it cool to obsess over chess. You see everyone going nuts for Chess, even if they don't know anything about the game, especially if they don't know anything about the game. It has been fantastic for chess content creators as we have been posting about one thing since October 2020 and getting props for it. What will we do when the hysteria ebbs away and we are left with the reality that Chess is boring. Is Chess boring? Yes, it is really boring. Don't get me wrong I love the game and have spent large proportions of my time watching chess events in the flesh and online but the game is pretty dull. The actual miracle here is the actress, Anya Taylor-Joy directed by Scott Frank following an adaptation co-created by Allan Scott and Scott Frank of a novel by the greatest sports novelist of all time, Walter Tevis captured the zeitgeist and propelled Chess, warts and all into the limelight. How long will it take those new fans of Chess to realize th...

  The Queen's Gambit a book by Walter Tevis and a huge Netflix Limited Series is the greatest story ever told about chess. Beth Harmon, the lead character in the story is also probably the single most famous chess personality fictional or otherwise. The interest in Chess has been resurgent and seems to know no bounds as chess set sales skyrocket and everybody seems to have either discovered chess can be cool or has rediscovered the game they left years before and proudly state that they used to play. Anya Taylor-Joy, the Golden Globe winning actress who played Beth Harmon did an incredible job with the character. I have watched and rewatched the show several times and when I see her move the pieces I am convinced she knows how to play chess and is genuinely the chess-playing prodigy she claims to be. Beth's nonchalant attitude and indefatigable determination to succeed was irresistible to watch and seems to have energised and powered the enthusiasm we see for all things Chess n...