To the scriptwriter who has probably never played the game, the equation is simple, "chess = hard: Character who plays chess = smart".
That's why Moriarty plays chess with Sherlock Holmes in Book of Shadows, and Professor X plays Magneto throughout X-Men. From Russia With Love begins with a match between a Czech grandmaster (who we later find out is Spectre's chief planner) and his Canadian opponent. The game is there to cement the cleverness of his upcoming evil plan.
In The Thomas Crowne Affair, chess gives us an early heads up that the suave art thief is a tactical brainiac. We first see how smart the computer Hal is in 2001: A Space Odyssey when he calmly destroys astronaut Frank Poole at chess. It's the same with chief replicant Roy Batty in Blade Runner.
You don't see this phenomenon with other board games. Serial killer masterminds never play Hungry Hungry Hippos, Guess Who or The Game of Life. You don't see a Netflix mini-series based around a young woman with an alcohol problem showing the boys who's boss at Connect Four.
But despite the hype, chess is a simple and fun game that anyone can play. To enjoy it, you don't have to know anything about the King's Indian Defence, the Albin Counter Gambit or The Ruy Lopez. All you need to know is the basics, like the horsey worsey goes two squares vertically, one square horizontally. No one at the kitchen table needs to see 25 moves ahead or even two. You're allowed just to play.
It's been two weeks of intense daily chess with my son, and while I'm still smashing him, we are both having a great time. Well, I am anyway.
Last week I caught him watching "How to Beat Your Dad at Chess" on YouTube. It hasn't helped - yet. I run a straightforward approach. Do everything to control the middle of the board, get out the big guns early and show no mercy — attack, attack, attack. Yesterday I beat my boy in 10 moves. It was a quick and glorious death.
Speaking of which, I played chess with Black Caps coach Mike Hesson as a child. He beat me in two moves using Fools Mate. It's a tactic best described by English author Francis Beale in a 1656 translation of an earlier Gioachino Greco text.
"Black Kings Biſhops pawne one houſe. White Kings pawne one houſe. Black kings knights pawne two houſes. White Queen gives Mate at the contrary kings Rookes fourth houſe."
I'm pretty sure 9-year-old Hesson didn't have Francis Beale in his head on that fateful Sunday morning in North Dunedin. We were just playing chess for fun, and he got lucky with a couple of stupid pawn moves from me. Although, it would make a great scene in the movie of his life. In a first-act demonstration of the tactical genius that would later manifest in international cricket success, young Hesson humiliates a kid at chess.
In conclusion, we need to stop treating chess with reverence. You don't have to be Magnus Carlsen, Moriarty or Magneto to play. Chess is the greatest board game ever, not only for its complexity but because it's really fun.
*Interestingly, the convention of white going first didn't cement itself until the late 19th century.*
