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The Queen's Gambit (Netflix miniseries)
Nov. 6th, 2020 12:50 pmWhen Bird Guy and I sat down to finish watching Haikyuu!!, and the trailer for The Queen's Gambit flashed on the screen, I felt like I was getting absolutely sucker-punched by The Algorithm. It's a hot nerd chick? and she's kicking ass in chess? in Kentucky??? Did Netflix make this shit in a lab to appeal to me specifically?
"Do you want to watch this instead?" Bird Guy asked.
"I think we have to," I said, with gleeful resignation.
And gosh, what a satisfying watch. It's ultimately a feel-good story, a wish-fulfillment story, a straightforward narrative where Our Hero Obviously Wins, but it's got just enough teeth to be interesting, and very strong acting which makes the whole thing relentlessly compelling. Small wonder it's been such a success; my brother and both my parents (all people with very different tastes!) have called me in the past week to say "hey, I'm watching this thing on Netflix, I'm really liking it and I think you would too..."
I enjoyed the whole thing (though I'll note the first episode was my least favorite; it moves more slowly than the rest), but let me babble about Mrs. Wheatley, since that was definitely the most compelling arc—
( spoilers for Mrs. Wheatley in The Queen's Gambit )
I'm a sucker for arcs where both people become better people precisely because of their love for each other—not better in the sense of, becoming Good People TM, but better because they're paying attention to someone else, and someone's paying attention to them, and done rightly that's all you need.
<3 mrs wheatley <3
"Do you want to watch this instead?" Bird Guy asked.
"I think we have to," I said, with gleeful resignation.
And gosh, what a satisfying watch. It's ultimately a feel-good story, a wish-fulfillment story, a straightforward narrative where Our Hero Obviously Wins, but it's got just enough teeth to be interesting, and very strong acting which makes the whole thing relentlessly compelling. Small wonder it's been such a success; my brother and both my parents (all people with very different tastes!) have called me in the past week to say "hey, I'm watching this thing on Netflix, I'm really liking it and I think you would too..."
I enjoyed the whole thing (though I'll note the first episode was my least favorite; it moves more slowly than the rest), but let me babble about Mrs. Wheatley, since that was definitely the most compelling arc—
( spoilers for Mrs. Wheatley in The Queen's Gambit )
I'm a sucker for arcs where both people become better people precisely because of their love for each other—not better in the sense of, becoming Good People TM, but better because they're paying attention to someone else, and someone's paying attention to them, and done rightly that's all you need.
<3 mrs wheatley <3
