The Queen's Gambit

This was something which I wanted to watch for a long time and now I regret having not watched it sooner. It was almost perfect in many ways, and never felt fantastical at all which is often the case with a film or series centered around a prodigy. Anya Taylor-Joy gives her best performance here, on par if not better than "Peaky Blinders" and "The Northman". She is one of those actresses that can beautifully portray serious roles on the screen with a hint of being hilarious at the same time. That makes up for some of the best protagonists in anything which is watchable. I really appreciate that equal amount of attention was given to the ways of the game and to her character, talking about her character, we dive deep in here. The first thing that comes to my mind when I talk about protagonists and their obsession is Miles Teller in "Whiplash". And this very much resembles that. The gradual growth of her character in here and her exposure to the game being progressively increased was beautifully done. This didn't follow any clichés and I really liked the fact that they did every character of the show justice towards the end of the series. The clichés I'm talking about is in a film when a person is naturally gifted, he/she keeps going on without any negative consequences. We see a very realistic version of that here that even though she is gifted, she keeps working hard. The thing that I might think of as a con is the ceiling thing. It feels surreal while watching but it's not literal. I might say that it was a good stylized way of showing how these players visualize and analyze their games, but it didn't work for me. Also, they didn't follow the common trope of giving her a sexually traumatic past because everywhere we see where there is a female protagonist, this is the most common trope they use for her character development but that didn't happen here and I was glad that the makers decided to let all the things in life come to her naturally in a normal way. The relationships they established and used were very nicely done. About the writing, it had its ups and no downs at all. It was fantastic. The sets, the period pieces and the cinematography was surreal. And about the music, it was perfect. This might have the best soundtrack I've ever experienced in a series. I don't know if I'd come to this for a rewatch, because I think this is something which would appeal to me on the first watch only. But given it's time, I definitely enjoyed it and I don't regret a second of mine that went into watching this. Definitely worth your time.