*Spoiler alert

The Queen’s Gambit, written and directed by Scott Frank and Allan Scott, gradually shows the life of Beth Harmon, an orphan who grows into being a chess prodigy.

After her mother committed suicide when she was nine, Harmon is sent to the Methuen home for orphans and from then on meets the building’s custodian who goes by the name of Mr. Shaibel, who teaches her the endless curiosities of chess.

Led by the very own orphanage that raised her, Harmon struggles with drug addiction and copious amounts of drinking throughout the whole show. The orphanage gives Harmon, a child at the time, green and red barbiturates daily.  The orphanage uses them to keep children calm and balanced, but soon they are forced to discontinue the practice.

Despite Methuen’s attempt to no longer give tranquilizers to children as they contained harmful substances, this soon interfered with Harmon’s strengths and weaknesses in chess.

The same green pills that helped Harmon visualize chess with her mind also made her relive built-up tension from her daily worries.

At age 15, Harmon is adopted by a dysfunctional couple, Allston and Alma Wheatley. The couple had originally adopted Harmon to fill the void of the mother’s loss of her child. Soon after Harmon signs herself up for the 1963 Kentucky state championships, and from there meets her first opponent, Annette Packer, who lost in a matter of minutes.

“I definitely loved it. Overall it was a very interesting show, and I liked being able to watch her own perspective of during her mind during her important games,” Ne’ema Wambugu stated, who also added that she didn’t understand or know anything pertaining to chess before watching the drama miniseries.

While the show mainly took place in the 1960s, gender division in games including chess had occurred. Harmon is quick with her moves in chess, ultimately wiping out every one of her opponents as they sit in subtle defeat after realizing her plot all along. Unfortunately, her recognition from multiple news sources wasn’t specifically on how well she played chess, but because she played well- for a girl.

“I liked the show because it was mostly big about girl empowerment,” says Sophia Martinez. Martinez is currently a senior at George Ranch and hopes to influence others about the promotion of gender equity in games.

Sadly the limited series has been canceled by Netflix as the show was conceived as a “contained” story.