Yes, I’m so conditioned to expect darkness in modern shows, it’s nice to not have another show like that.
The dialog is certainly stilted. Did Diablo Cody write these episodes? 
I was expecting Jolene to be a bully, given how she was calling everyone a “cocksucker”. But she only acted like that with the adults. She was an angel with her fellow inmates.
Speaking of which, I really liked how she corrected Beth on the “guardian angel” thing.
Wasn’t until I checked IMDB that I recalled AT-J from Emma.
Like most here, I loved it and appreciated that none of the themes were too heavy handed. I saw the getting drunk before the match as the catalyst to realize that it wasn’t drugs that helped her play, but ultimately the acceptance of the help of others (she gets on phone with Benny, et al.). In the end, I see the chess game in the park as a statement that she wouldn’t be a “pawn” in the games of others (Us-Soviet relations) but that she would play the game on her own terms - for fun, and to spend time with others, rather than to crush your opponent.
Soooo many fun ways to read in to the title as well. Of course there’s the feminist angle, but also, like the theory behind the opening, giving up something relatively unimportant now, to achieve greater freedom of movement in the future.
Question: when Beth was playing the young Russian kid (“You can see movies in your car?”), why was she walking away from the board after every move and distracting him? Was she playing head games? Did the kid annoy her?
I wasn’t clear on what she was doing.
Yes, so much - it had its moments of dark, but I like to end my narratives with a feeling of being uplifted, not beat down. I don’t need “and they all lived happily ever after” - but I do want “and they overcame this.”
Yeah, I found that over the first couple episodes, I had to reset my Horribleness Expectation Quotient to a less modern level.
“Ooh, the janitor gave her a look. And now she’s going down into the basement? This is gonna be really bad!”
[janitor becomes beloved gruff mentor]
“Huh.”
“Now she’s being adopted? And the dad just gave her a look in the rear view mirror! She is totally screwed!”
[Foster dad turns out to be a garden variety asshole who quickly exits the picture]
“Huh.”
I thought for sure her adoptive mother was going to exploit her for all her winnings. So I was surprised when she turned out to be a loving person.
I saw that as a nice book end to how she started. A return to enjoyment of playing a game with a wise grandfatherly figure.
I was also relieved that the writers chose not to tug at our emotions by making her live through some sort of traumatic abuse.
The actress does say she intended it to be a psych-out, but while watching it I didn’t attach any significance to it, other than that she didn’t feel seriously challenged.
Players get up and walk around during matches - it’s unremarkable. In tournaments if a player’s opponent is taking several minutes between moves, then the player will often stroll to different tables to see how the other games are progressing. It might help the player decide if he can settle for a draw, or if he needs to take some risks and go for a win.
I read into it a couple of things:
-
He’s a young boy. She’s a good-looking young woman. So she decided to distract him in a way no prior competitor of his could.
-
Earlier, one of the chess people (Benny? Bently?) mentioned her needing to rely more on intuition. So this was part of that - she would make her move, immediately leave, and only come back when the boy started her clock. She would then glance at the new position, quickly make her move, starting his clock before walking away again.
I still remember as a teenager (over 50 years ago 
) being distracted by a glamourous blonde female chess player wearing a leather miniskirt. 
Sadly chess players don’t rely on intuition (except in speed chess or a simultaneous display.)
Beth was probably analysing the position in her head as she walked around. 
Not going to argue the habits of actual chess professionals, but from a narrative standpoint, her actions could be derived as a reaction to the ‘use intuition’ advice given earlier. And, hell, it may have been her mom’s advice.
Well to be fair, chess players using their previous experience do look as if they are using ‘intuition’.
Sleeping in the tub? I thought she got out of a tub full of water while dressed. I interpreted those scenes to imply that yes she slept with the French model, and she soaked herself in the tub to help her sober/wake up.
What exactly happened to the adoptive father. He stayed in Denver? Why Denver? He was a traveling salesman? What did he sell? Didn’t give the impression he earned enough to support 2 households. At first I wondered if he was leading a double life - maybe had another family, but I concluded he just stayed on the road to be away from Alma.
I thought it a little inconsistent that he at first just paid for them to stay in the house. Then when Alma died, he said Beth could stay there if she made the payments. Those made it seem like he didn’t need the money. Then he wanted his interest repaid, which made his seem penurious.
Spoilers are okay right?
I lvoed the show until the last forty minutes or so, at which point all of a sudden everything went perfectly. Beth suddenly kicked booze and pills, all the guys she’d been mean to rallied behind her, and she wiped out the competition. I struggled to buy who easy and rapid her sudden redemption/recovery was, or why absolutely everyone loved her; I can understand why guys are like puppydogs around her because she looks like Anya Taylor-Joy, but a few self-respecting men would have been nice to see, and the deus ex machina of a Magical Negro Supporting Character seemed really hack.
I give it an 8/10 still, but it’d have been 10/10 with a much, much better conclusion. The set and costume design was out of this world.
I think there were parts to the Rally around bit that are more subtle than you’re giving credit for.
- They still liked her
- Benny is kind of an asshole but knows he’s kind of an asshole. Kind of like a David Spade character.
- I suspect the local guy still loved her.
- Here’s the big one though, these Chess Players rallied behind their best chance of an American beating the Russians. It is very much like fans of most baseball teams joining together to root against the Yankees when the Yanks are going good. This is why Bobby Fischer was such a big deal. Or the US Hockey Team winning in 1980 as another example.
The quick (repeated) kicks off benzos did sort of drive me nuts - benzo addiction being among the hardest things to kick - and physical withdrawal being a thing. Those girls in the orphanage should have been jonesin a lot harder than they were. But I got the feeling that all those guys had been rooting for her all along (once they determined they weren’t in her league) and so the rally wasn’t surprising. I also didn’t think she was mean to any of them. A little - not socially adept - but they didn’t seem the top of the charisma charts themselves. (Now, the blanket acceptance she got from them - that struck me as wrong, but its a fiction, not a documentary on women in a man’s world.)