I watched it because Netflix kept pushing it in the front line. It's a well made fairy tale set in a modern world: Against all odds a girl coming from bad environment and with hardly any formal training manages to beat chess players with years of practice - The universal girl story, told with chess.

Why Netflix is pushing that onto me is beyond my understanding, a middle aged single man is obviously not the target group for this. Don't get me wrong, it's a well told story and the actors are amazing. My favorite is the stepmother, her arc from frustrated divorcee to smart businesswomen is greatly perfomed by Marielle Heller. And the makeup department had a hard time to "bore down" Anya Taylor-Joy's beauty to make her believeable as the wallflower. Her performance does sell it though. The rest of the cast is equally excellent.

It's also nice the filmmakers treated chess with respect by hiring no other than world champion Garry Kasparov as a consultant. As such the games are great, but due to the fast cuts you need to pause to really comprehend them.

Sadly the story is filled with kitschy stereotypes and comes across quite cringy at times. Every chess player she's facing is an overly condescending scumbag, yet she beats them handily and in the course wins over their hearts turning them into charming love interests. The competition between the players feels greatly overdramatized and a little too crude for my taste. The first episode was comically horrific, almost reminding me to Zack Snyders "Sucker Punch". It's a fairy tale in the style of "Amélie" - not as magical, a little more gritty, but a fairy tale nonetheless.