Raucously entertaining chess romp. Scott Frank deserves props for making this unexpectedly sexy. Whole cast is great, but Anya is amazing here (as she was in Emma as well) and Jacob Fortune-Lloyd looks like a rising star. (Could see him as Superman in a couple years.)
Loses points for being predictable, poorly paced in its final two episodes, and treating the outcomes of each match as a given rather than a tense affair. I never felt Harmon would ever lose, and that’s a discredit to the story’s tension and its depiction of self-destructive recklessness meeting obsessive ambition.
Lovely colour grading throughout. Occasionally unnecessary camera shake.