WIG REVIEW: THE QUEENâS GAMBIT
Yes itâs true - the only things Iâve been watching lately are prestige TV shows starring women with bad red wigs. Iâll get back to movies someday!! In the meantime, I finally watched all of this miniseries that has Netflix and the world aflame with love - and I am aflame too....WITH HATRED OF ALL OF THESE WIGS!!! I have so much to discuss with this show, yâall. A friend of mine (who hasnât watched this show yet) probably said it best when he told me he thought the wigs in this show were supposed to be wigs WITHIN the narrative of the show (and therefore allowed to be bad):Â âwait I thought this was about a chess spy - thatâs supposed to be her real hair? NOâ INDEED!!! Letâs take it episode by episode (SPOILERS ABOUND) and DISCUSS.
Episode 1 - Openings
We begin in Paris, 1967. Beth Harmon, chess champion (?) awakens in a bath of ice (?) in the dark of her hotel room, clearly hung over or maybe still drunk. Her red â60s flip wig looks like HELL as does she, so...ok I guess this bad wig wurqs...for now. She sits herself down to play CHESS!! This whole show is about chess, obviously, and everyone is just mad about chess now! I am mad, too, because the show does not make chess seem interesting or sexy and I still hate it.Â
Anyway, we rewind about 10 (?) years to a young Beth Harmon, who is suddenly orphaned after her mom definitely commits suicide via car accident. Her mom has super short bangs and cries a lot. We see some even further flashbacks to an even younger Beth IN THE MOST OUTRAGEOUS BABY WIG (MORE ON THAT LATER). We learn that her mom is very unhinged, but also probably brilliant, as Beth herself will become later. LETâS HOPE SHE NEVER GETS HER DRIVERâS LICENCE (note: she never does?)
Apparently the mid to late â50s were all about very VERY short bangs, and on this non-wigged little girl I guess that is fine.
BUT THEN! She is brought to an orphanage where they burn her old clothes (YES REALLY!) and cut her hair into a bob (the kidâs actual hair so again - ok!) and also give her and all the other girls constant drugs! The 1950s were really wild, amiright? If I have learned anything from movies set at orphanages in the 50s, drug abuse was the main issue (the only movie Iâm referring to is obviously The Cider House Rules and the only thing I remember about that movie is that Michael Caine had an ether addiction). Anyway, the sedative drugs make her immediately put her hand on a hot radiator (safety first, orphanage!)Â
She also makes friends with an older girl named Jolene (I LOVE THE NAME) who teachers her to save the sedative drugs for nighttime when they can help her sleep. Great advice, Jolene! Also: there is absolutely no way that African American Jolene would be in an integrated orphanage in mid-50s KENTUCKY but this is just the beginning of issues I have with this series......
Moving on! In avoiding the orphanageâs weird insistence on Jesusy choir practice, she discovers the basement realm of janitor Bill Camp, who never actually does any janitorial work (that I could see?) but definitely plays a lot of chess. And thus, her chess obsession begins! This is also helped by those sedatives she takes every night which give her really absurd chess hallucinations on the ceiling. This orphanage has it all!
Essentially, this miniseries is Valley of the Dolls if those characters got addicted to both pills and chess at the age of 9. Beth gets very VERY good at chess and some rando chess guy from the local high school comes and gives Beth a doll (BETH HATES THE DOLL BUT LOVES DOLLS DO YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE). And she goes to the high school and plays a bunch of terrible high school boys at chess simultaneously and beats them all. Also: the orphanage suddenly gets in trouble for giving sedatives to small children for years and Beth is PISSED. She goes through withdrawal and years for the big olâ jar oâ pills!!!
AND THEN! During a kind of Jesusy film presentation, Beth sneaks away to the orphanage pharmacy and just goes hog wild on the pills! TRULY: Valley of the Dolls has nothing on this sequence.Â
Obviously, Beth is caught pill-handed and she also spills all the pills, breaks a giant glass jar, and then falls onto both of them. SHE IS 9. I THINK I LOVE THIS SHOW.
Episode 2: Exchanges
So after Bethâs completely insane pill odyssey, she is punished by being forbidden to play chess! Fast forward an indeterminate number of years, and we meet a slightly older Beth (now played by the bewigged Anya Taylor-Joy). AND THIS WIG, YâALL. WOOF. Completely dried out and bent, it really makes you appreciate the fact that they just cut the younger Bethâs hair. I realize that Anya is going to go through many 50s and 60s hairstyles to come but I really wish they had just done the same and used her real hair because we are about to take a bad wig odyssey that will last throughout this series. Also! I love that Jolene is played by the same actress! How old is too old to be in an orphanage?
Speaking of age! Beth is apparently now 15 but when a super weird couple expresses interest in adopting her, the orphanage director lady lies and says Beth is 13 and everyone just goes with it....FOR THE REST OF THE SERIES. Seriously, this age difference is never ever visited again or challenged. Beth is basically 15-17 for at least 5 years and no one gives a shit. OK? Anyway, Beth is adopted by Marielle friggin Heller (aka director of Can You Ever Forgive Me? and A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood) who has a very Mamie Eisenhower wig which is just fine compared to the bent and dry-ass mess on Anyaâs head.
It is later revealed that Marielle adopted Beth because her husband is mainly away on business and she needs an older gal pal around to fetch her....sedatives from the magazine store! I wonder if Beth will totally get addicted to them again! Iâm no chess player but you can absolutely predict plot devices in this series about two pawns away (is that a chess term? I still donât know or care!)Â
So yes: as predicted Beth absolutely gets addicted to sedatives again (also the specific sedatives she gets addicted to are the exact same ones she was addicted to at the orphanage - WHAT A COINCIDENCE! - and also they are made up sedatives for the purposes of this show only in case we all want to get the same magical chess sedatives and see chess on the ceiling too). ALSO! Beth is still mainly addicted to chess despite the fact that she was permitted from playing it for the last 5-7 years (depending on what version of her age youâre going on?) but still is good at it? Most upsetting: she rips apart her lovely bed canopy in order to see her ceiling chess hallucinations! THE NERVE OF THIS KID!
Also nervy: bitch totally stole chess magazines from the pharmacy when she was also stealing sedatives from her adoptive mom! Kleptomania is Bethâs #3 addiction after chess and pills also comes into play when it is revealed that her new adoptive mom is kinda poor since her husband is away all the time and doesnât give her enough money so Beth canât enter those chess tournaments she read about in the magazines she stole. SO she writes to janitor Bill Camp and asks for $5 to enter the chess thing and if she wins sheâll send him $10. THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT PLOT POINT WHICH WILL COME INTO PLAY LATER. So Beth goes to the chess tournament where she meets some not handsome twin dudes and a very handsome other dude named Townes.
Basically all the chess dudes at this tourney suck in the same way? To be fair: if I saw Beth walking up in her ugly orphanage clothes and orphanage cut wig, I would think she sucked at chess too? Oh also - all the girls at her new high school also think her style sucks. I WONDER IF IN COMING EPISODES SHE WILL GAIN MORE STYLE AND CHESS FAME THAN ALL THESE GARBAGE PEOPLE. Spoiler: she does and also beats this dude named Harry and becomes the Kentucky chess champion. Also! Bethâs adoptive dad totally abandons her and Marielle Heller! I still hate chess but will continue to watch this show because of its haunting wigs and lowgrade feminist vibe.
Episode 3: Doubled Pawns
This episode begins with a flashback to Bethâs shitty birth mother and her shitty banged wig and remember that time I said I was going to talk about the wig on the littlest girl who plays her? WELL HERE WE ARE. Baby Beth has the absolute WORST WIG ON THIS SHOW and given how terrible all the wigs are, that is saying a lot. This wig looks like it was ripped off an American Girl doll which had been mistreated for years and thrown of a jungle gym or something. IT IS THE ABSOLUTE WORST (as is her mom, who makes this poor kid believe she had drowned!!!)Â
ANYWAY. We get a new wig in this episode!!! Beth manages to grow out her orphanage bangs and allow her hair to have a 50s wave bob. Do not be fooled by the higher quality of this cut, however - the quality of the WIG continues to very much suck! WHAT IS THIS HAIR PART! No hair underneath! And everything is still a dried out, bent mess! ALSO HER ROOTS ARE A NIGHTMARE. This is also the episode wherein Marielle Heller basically becomes Mama Rose to Beth and really gets into Beth supporting both of them via chess winnings and becomes her chess manager (ACTUAL JOB TITLE). Also Beth gets nicer clothing. Hilariously, Marielle tells Bethâs high school that Beth is just constantly sick so she can skip school to go to chess tournaments even though Beth is straight up on the cover of Life magazine?! I wonder if this will at all come to the attention of the high school - IT DOESNâT! PLOT HOLES BE DAMNED THIS SHOW IS ABOUT CHESS! She does go to high school long enough for the snobby girls who once made fun of her to invite her to the dumbest party ever where they just sit around and ask Beth dumb questions about Chess fame and then all have a sing-along to a song Beth doesnât know because she has no idea what pop culture is: ONLY CHESS CULTURE. I watched this show with my mom and asked if â60s parties were like this and she laughed her head off and said NO. ALSO! Bethâs kleptomania comes into play at this party where she steals a bottle of gin and leaves without saying goodbye to anyone. WHAT A BITCH.
Speaking of bitches, Beth meets a new chess diva in the form of Love Actuallyâs resident child drum prodigy! He has a character name but whatever: Love Actually is his name and he has longish shaggy (non wigged) hair and dresses like Crocodile Dundee and is loved and feared in the chess community for being such a non-nerd (?) chess player. I asked my mom if anyone dressed like this in the â60s and she said âNO! But I guess I didnât know everyoneâ WHICH IS A GREAT ANSWER BECAUSE MY MOM DIDNâT RUN IN WEIRD CHESS CIRCLES IN THE â60s. We are lead to believe the â60s chess community of weirdos consists of the same 5 rotating dudes who are all at the same chess tournaments always and also possible love interests for Beth and sheâs better at chess than all of them.
The only weirdo chess dude that Beth cares about is Townes, who you may recall from the last episode in which he was the only attractive chess dude at that first chess tournament Beth went to with borrowed Bill Camp money. Anyway, she runs into him at some chess tournament (LIKE I REMEMBER WHICH ONE PLEASE) in Las Vegas where he is now a chess reporter (ACTUAL 1960s JOB, YâALL). He invites Beth back to his hotel boudoir where he takes some non-boudoir pictures of her playing chess and Beth is all aflutter with chess love but SUCK IT BETH, TOWNES IS GAY!!! I have to say that the only believable part of this show is that the only attractive chess dude would be homosexual. It still does not forgive any of the other plot nonsense.
SO! Itâs still the big Vegas chess tournament which is super duper important-chess wise (though this show also makes it seem like every chess game IS THE MOST IMPORTANT so who is to say?) Anyway, Beth and her 50s wave wig (even though it is the 60s?) play Love Actually and....they both win? I didnât know this was a chess pastability but ok? Beth is pissed that she didnât beat Love Actually, I hope I never have to see him again (SPOILER HEâS IN MANY MORE EPISODES AND HAD I KNOWN THAT MAYBE I WOULD HAVE STOPPED WATCHING NOW BUT I DIDNâT!)Â
Episode 4: Middle Game
We are still stuck with this weird â50s bob in this episode. IT STILL LOOKS BAD. New developments are: Beth is taking night classes at the local college (even though she is technically still in high school?) in order to learn Russian to better understand people who are more obsessed with chess than she is: Russians. Anyway, he ends up going to the most wild and stereotypical hippie party with a college dude after class and yep - loses her virginity to him. Ok? At least it wasnât to a chess weirdo? She also stays behind and parties and drinks alone in the hippie apartment because of all her substance addiction and kleptomania. Also! She graduates from high school despite being 2 years too old for high school (a plot point never explained) and missing all that high school for chess tourneys (another plot point never explained!) OH WELL: CHESS!Â
Beth and Marielle go to Mexico City for some chess tournament (AGAIN I COULDNâT TELL YOU WHICH ONE). Marielle is excited because she is pen pals (OMG THE 60s YâALL) with some Mexican weirdo who I definitely feared would steal all the chess winnings but then ultimately just sucks in the same way the adoptive dad did. Beth also runs into those chess twin weirdos because the chess community is comprised of only 5 dudes as I said. Their hair looks bad but not as bad as her wig.Â
Beth doesnât see much of Mexico City - nor do we unless you count a truly outrageous sequence in which Beth and Marielle go out on their hotel balcony and look into a green screen rendering of Mexico City that would have felt at home in CGI ghostmare, Bohemian Rhapsody. Anyway, Beth and her olde timey 1950s wig which is spending way too much time in the 60s even though sheâs supposed to be stylish now, take a lot of chess baths while Marielle drinks a lot because that Mexican pen pal/boyfriend sucks so bad.
So Beth wins enough chess to play Borgov, who we are led to believe is the Russian white whale/Bond villain of the chess community and LOSES! She is pretty pissed about it but not as pissed as...
....coming back to the hotel room to discover Marielle Heller and her luscious Mamie Eisenhower wig DEAD. TWICE AN ORPHAN, YâALL. Mexican coroners tell Beth that her mom died of hepatitis (!!!) and Beth somehow implicates low quality tequila in this hepatitis death. I LEGITIMATELY GOOGLEDÂ âDOES TEQUILA GIVE YOU HEPATITISâ IMMEDIATELY. I DONâT THINK IT DOES?!?!?! THIS SHOW IS ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS AND YES I WILL CONTINUE WATCHING IT DESPITE THE TERRIBLE WIGS AND MY HATRED OF CHESS.
Episode 5: Fork
Beth returns to Kentucky IN THE RAIN BECAUSE TV AND MOVIE DEATHS ARE ALWAYS ACCOMPANIED BY RAIN. She is about to be super lonely in the house she know owns (according to a super sketchy international phone call with her adoptive father which will definitely not hold up in court) and then...she gets a call from Harry! WHO THE EFF IS HARRY! Again, luckily, there are only 5 chess guys who need to remember and he is one of them (he is the one she beat for the Kentucky chess whatever in episode 2). She invites him over because sheâs lonely!
Harry is definitely the saddest of the weirdo chess dudes because apparently heâs been harboring a secret love of Beth (who at the time of their first meeting was like 13-15 depending on what timeline youâre going on and he was...20? OK GROSS BUT OK). BITCH EVEN GOT HIS WEIRD TEETH FIXED SO HE COULD BE LOVED BY BETH AND HER BENT ASS WIG AND SERIOUSLY NO THANK YOU HARRY. Regardless, Beth lets Harry have sex with her a few times and live rent-free in her house and ultimately Harry gets enough self confidence to leave this effed up living situation since he will never be one of Bethâs obsessions (which are still: chess, pills/alcohol, stealing shit).Â
So Beth goes to Ohio for some other chess tournament and reunites with UGH Love Actually. At this point in the show, Beth starts wearing long scarves as headbands and her wig has never looked better because most of it is covered by the scarf. THANK GOD. So Love Actually totally chess hustles Beth for a lot of coin playing speed chess (DEAR GOD WHY HAVE I BEEN FORCED TO LEARN WHAT SPEED CHESS IS) but in the end, she still beats him for the chess title. EFF YOU, Love Actually! May I never see you again! OH SHIT HE JUST INVITED HER TOÂ NEW YORK TO TRAIN HER FOR THE PARIS CHESS THING DEAR GOD WHY IS THERE SO MUCH LOVE ACTUALLY IN THIS SHOW OK FINE IâLL STILL WATCH IT.
Episode 6 - Adjournment
Ok so Beth and her ok wig that is mainly covered by a scarf go to Love Actuallyâs apartment in NYC which IS AN UNDERGROUND BUNKER AND SHE HAS TO SLEEP ON A BLOW UP MATTRESS. Again and for the millionth time: Love Actually is the worst! Especially the worst because he introduces her to all these rando bohemians he knows, including some French bitch who will definitely eff everything up when Beth is already teetering on her pill/alcohol obsession and should probably not meet any other enablers. Somehow, he does get her to quit the pills/alcohol long enough to have sex with him (UGH).
And so we are in Paris, 1967. Where we started the show with Bethâs awful 60s flip! AND WE MEET ANOTHER PLOTHOLE. Only a week before this, Beth was in NYC with hair about 3âł shorter and still wearing scarves in her hair. WHAT IN THE VERY HELL, SHOW! I realize that this show has a very vague sense of time or how old Beth is or whatever but truly: NOPE.Â
Anyway, itâs the night before the big match against Borgov and Beth is on her very best behavior when who should ring her up but that French bitch Love Actually introduced her to! She is downstairs at the hotel bar and just come down and have one drink and donât ruin your entire chess career, mmmkay? THIS ENABLING BITCH!!!! NEVER TRUST ANYONE WITH THIS CRYING GAME WIG UNLESS YOU WANT YOUR LIFE TO BE A CRYING GAME. Of course, Beth goes downstairs, drinks every drink in the bar, has sex with some rando French dude and...wakes up in the icebath we see at the beginning of the show and sweatily plays Borgov in her wig that has never looked frizzier, loses, and is shamed from the entire chess community. Also Love Actually wants Beth to come back to NYC but NO THANK YOU TO YOU AND YOUR BUNKER OF ENABLERS.
Back in Kentucky, Beth....is shown learning how to flip her hair. WAIT WHAT SHE ALREADY HAD A FLIP HAIRSTYLE THE ENTIRE TIME IN PARIS WHAT KIND OF WIG GASLIGHTING ARE YOU PLAYING, SHOW?!?!?!??!?!?!!
UGH anyway, with THE EXACT SAME FLIP WIG AS WEâVE SEEN HER IN, Beth tries to be a responsible young person of indeterminate age who owns a house in Kentucky and not drink or take pills or steal shit. EXCEPT remember that time her adoptive dad said she could just have the house if she paid the mortgage? WELL BITCH SHOWS UP AND JâACCUSES HER OF STEALING THE HOUSE FROM HIM. Which is hilarious because of all the things she stolen in this show, the house wasnât one of them. In any case, she buys the house! And takes herself out to dinner! And has a drink! AND UH OH.
At this point the show just goes completely off the rails in addictive nonsense. Beth just goes around the house in her terrible flip wig applying makeup and barfing in to chess trophies. Itâs every stereotypical drug/alcohol scene from every biopic ever except this chick doesnât really exist and this show is wearing on my nerves and Beth has to stop making so many terrible live decisions and this wig has BETTER GET BETTER.
And then magically - Jolene shows up in the most fabulous afro wig!! WHAT! OK I WILL WATCH THE BITTER CONCLUSION OF THIS SERIES BECAUSE I LOVE JOLENE.
Episode 7: End Game
Jolene...Jolene....Jolene. Jolene. I love Jolene. I donât love that this show uses her by making her be the âmagical negroâ trope who helps Beth get her life back together. Predictable nonsense! So yes, Jolene looks around Bethâs ramshackle drug den and tells her to get her life back together. AND THEN BETH DOES. No AA or rehab required! WHAT! I really appreciate that Jolene also compares her to Susan Hayward (star of Valley of the Dolls!) which is the sick burn/comparison I needed.Â
The other reason Jolene showed up was to bring Beth to janitor Bill Campâs funeral. At the funeral, which is very poorly attended, Beth reveals THAT SHE NEVER PAID BILL CAMP THAT $5 HE LENT HER (AND $10 SHE PROMISED HIM) AT THE BEGINNING OF HER CHESS CAREER. WHAT A PIECE OF SHIT. It is at this point that I fully decided that I wanted Beth to fail at everything because she is a garbage person who never gave propers to Bill Camp for changing her life for the better. THIS BITCH!! She even goes back to the orphanage where she discovers Bill Campâs CHESS SHRINE DEVOTED TO HER! SHE FEELS LIKE SHIT AS WELL SHE SHOULD! I FULLY HATE HER!!!!
Jolene is much more forgiving of Beth than me and also introduces Beth to a new obsession: squash! Ok? It does allow Beth to wear a headband which is great wig-wise (in that it hides all the seamwork). Beth also turns down these Jesusy people who want to fund her chess trip to Russia and so Jolene GIVES HER $3,000 TO GO TO RUSSIA. IF THERE IS ANYTHING IâVE LEARNED IN THE LAST 5 MINUTES OF THIS SHOW IT IS THAT BETH WILL NOT PAY THAT MONEY BACK AND JOLENE PLEASE DO NOT!!!!
Jolene does. Beth goes to Russia which is straight out of every Bond movie and gets her shit together and wins a lot of damn chess.Â
Though her midweight coat game rivals that of Nicole Kidman in The Undoing, her wig game ALSO RIVALS THAT OF NICOLE KIDMAN IN THE UNDOING IN THAT IT IS ALSO A RED NIGHTMARE WIG. This show spent so much goddamned money on clothes, sets, and CGI greenscreens of Mexico City AND YET NO MONEY FOR WIGS. BOO.
I did enjoy this one chess opponentâs walrus hair but otherwise, Bethâs flip wig has absolutely overstayed its welcome and is a compete and utter bent nightmare. Also! Remember that one hot chess dude? He shows up and helps Beth with Chess!! HUH?
Also every single weirdo in the chess community somehow form a chess calming circle in Love Actuallyâs bunker apartment and call Beth internationally to help her win against Borgov at chess! WHAT IN THE DAMN HELL? It is sweet I guess, but also makes ABSOLUTELY NO FUCKING SENSE AS BETH WAS A TOTAL ASSHOLE TO ALL THESE PEOPLE AND DOES NOT DESERVE TO BE A PART OF THEIR WEIRD CHESS GANG.
Ultimately, Beth beats Borgov and wears THIS FUCKING HAT. I think weâre supposed to believe that she is now the white queen chess piece (I HATE THAT I NOW KNOW CHESS PIECES).
She is actually dressed in head to toe white and somehow convinces her American handler that she will just walk...to the airport? And despite being invited to the Johnson White House (girl go there!) would rather just wander the streets of Russia without any purse or luggage or way of getting home. THIS BITCH. She finds a new chess community of old men who play chess outside at folding tables and decides to join them WITHOUT GOING HOME TO PAY JOLENE ALL HER MONEY BACK WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY WHAT SHE SHOULD BE THINKING ABOUT AND ALSO MAYBE SETTING UP A BILL CAMP CHESS FOUNDATION BECAUSE YOU NEVER PAID HIM BACK YOU PIECE OF SHIT. No, she is no longer addicted to pills, alcohol, or stealing but is absolutely addicted to chess on a level that is probably lethal. I spent the last moments of the show demanding that the Russian chess hobos murder her and her immaculate white outfit because BETH IS A SELFISH ASSHOLE AND ALL HER WIGS ARE GARBAGE LIKE HER!!!!
VERDICT: DOESNâT WURQ
