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How Beth Harmon changed chess
Chess has been taking over slowly of all streaming platforms that are popular nowadays, first, Twitch, and now Netflix too. The amazing history of Beth Harmon is a tale that has impressed the world, to the point that it became important.
There have even been several changes in chess just because of the series, the truth is that it has shaken the world. A particular interest in chess has appeared in people who watched the series.
The reason is simple; the queen’s gambit is a Netflix mini-series that tells the story of Beth Harmon, a chess prodigy. Beth will not stop until she defeats the strongest chess players of the time.
She intends to destroy masculine dominance over the chess elite, proving that women are also great chess players. The series played with various important aspects of the chess top-level competition.
Also, Beth Harmon is an incredible character, with a simply amazing back story, her personality and determination can’t be compared. The series has done a great job portraying great players of chess history, do you want to know all of the details?
Keep reading and find out!
Who is Beth Harmon?
Let’s explain a little about this incredible character and her amazing ways in chess for those who don't know. Beth is a girl that has developed a great talent to be a chess champion, she learned chess since she was little, and now she’s hooked.
The problem is that she is also dependent on the medicine and the drugs she is given. She reaches the point in which she needs a dose to play chess very well.
The series is based on a novel that has was released several years ago, the author confessed to having been in a state of dependency on medicines. This is surely the factor that gives the series some spice for the spectators, and of course, the drama o that all Netflix series have.
The nature of Beth Harmon remembers several chess players at the same time because it remembers some of them. For example, Bobby Fischer can be compared to Beth, regarding his behavior and personality.
The reality is queen’s gambit has an amazing plot, which is finely related to the nature of the chess world. Not in the usage of drugs though, but in the way they portray chess competitions and characters.
How has chess changed because of Queen’s gambit?
We have seen that different sites like chess.com have implemented some features thanks to the series. You can play Beth Harmon’s bot on chess.com if you like to.
But definitely, the series has given more popularity to chess worldwide, encouraging people to play. Of course, half of the people who start to play chess just because of the series will surely get bored quickly.
However, people’s interest has risen, and the series have given a vision to their spectators about chess pretty fun. Now there is a question among the public, is chess actually how we see it on the Netflix series?
Well, of course not, however, not everything is the pure drama of the series, there are some good aspects that one only knows when you play the game. And these are the parts in which the queen’s gambit gets a great result portraying, showing the public how beautiful can this game be.
It also shows in a great way, the intensity of the strive for the top-level chess players to be at that level. For example, the enthusiasm and determination of the series remember to legendary chess battles, like Kasparov vs Karpov.
Chess players similar to Beth Harmon
Her personality and nature strongly remember Bobby Fischer, Anatoly Karpov, and Boris Spassky’s. How can we reach all of these conclusions?
First of all, Fischer was an incredibly egocentric player. Although he was never diagnosed with mental illness, it was obvious he was greatly disturbed for his childhood.
Fischer was a kid who grew in a dysfunctional family, his mom abandoned with when he was 14 years old. He left middle school to follow his dream and become the chess world champion.
The American ex-champion had a kind of similar objective to the strong Beth Harmon in chess, he wanted to stop Russia’s dominance over world-class chess.
We could say it was pretty similar to Beth but without the drugs and alcohol part. Of course, this is just the way to add drama to the series.
All of this is finely combined with Spassky’s and Karpov’s efforts to always be the number one, and their competitive and reckless nature. However, all of these players knew perfectly how to canalize their emotions and energy into brilliant movements.
This is the reason for their success, the same happens with Beth Harmon, who uses drugs and alcohol to function and play chess correctly. Playing chess for Beth is a way to keep herself busy, and also to try to justify her drug addiction with something good, wow!
Why the series gave popularity to chess?
It’s incredible how the series almost put chess on trending of all kinds, creating great interest in the game. The registrations on chess websites increased dramatically, and several chess streamers and influencers were talking about it.
For sure, the chess community has become bigger after the great Beth Harmon’s madness, which gave some more public to chess competitions.
However, if there are people who have developed an interest in the game thanks to the series that’s ok. But, like most of what is trending, it passes away, and everything goes back to normal.
The same will happen, not to say it already happened, with the queen’s gambit series. But now more people know about the complex and interesting nature of the game thanks to the series.
This is good for the YouTubers and influencers on different platforms getting views about Beth Harmon-relative content.
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