This is the series to watch on television this week. Rematch returns in just 6 episodes to the duel between chess champion Garry Kasparov and the IBM computer Deep Blue…
Rematcha mini-series in 6 episodes, which was scheduled on Arte from October 17, 2024, is a fascinating psychological thriller, recounting the battle between world chess champion Garry Kasparov and the IBM supercomputer Deep Blue. Already confronted in 1996, the two adversaries will face each other again in 1997, during a second match which will mark history and which gave its name to the Franco-Hungarian production, with the Canadian Yan England (The Red Band Society) at the controls.
Imagined “long before The Queen’s Game “do not make chess a fashionable sport”, according to its charismatic producer Bruno Nahon, Rematch takes the viewer back to the end of the 1990s, a backdrop rich in upheavals, starting with the arrival of the internet, American platforms like Google and Amazon in homes and powerful computers in universities. “At that time, the World Chess Championship was a major media event, like the Tour de France, or Roland Garros and the World Cup,” Nahon also recalled while presenting his project.
But this chess match was unique, because it was the first between two of the greatest world powers of the time, the greatest human power in terms of intelligence and the most powerful computer, all with political and ideological questions at stake. The series Rematch also resonates today since it deals with the beginnings of artificial intelligence, in 1997. “It was a period when technology could not be questioned because it was considered the embodiment of progress,” adds Bruno Nahon again.
Kasparov or Deep Blue, who won the match?
Beyond the context and these more topical issues than ever, the war between Garry Kasparov (played by Christian Cooke, seen notably in That Dirty Black Bag), an extraordinary character with a rare intellectual and political stature, and Deep Blue, staged with suspense, is also a key element of the series. Warning: for those who missed or forgot the outcome of this major confrontation, the rest contains spoilers!
The first match between Garry Kasparov and Deep Blue took place in Philadelphia, in February 1996, and was won by the Russian with a score of 4 points to 2, Deep Blue snatching the first game from the outset and putting Karsparov in difficulty by the rest, before the latter won three victories. The scenario of Rematch then explains how Helen Brock, from IBM’s research and development department, seeing her position threatened, wanted at all costs to convince Kasparov to accept a return match. It will offer the creator of Deep Blue, a solitary engineer nicknamed “PC”, the means to design a much more powerful computer. Paul Nelson, a former American champion known for snatching a draw from Kasparov, will also be recruited…
The second match took place in New York, in May 1997, with a computer renamed “Deeper Blue” for the occasion. And it is indeed the machine which will win this time on the score of 3.5 points to 2.5, but outside the conditions required during the World Championships and with a controversy, when Kasparov will imply that A “great human master” was behind the computer. IBM will not provide all of Deep Blue’s logs (the list of calculations and actions performed by the machine with timestamps) as requested and the computer will be hastily dismantled after the match.
In the casting of Rematchin addition to a stunning Christian Cooke, we find some familiar faces from the successful series of recent years, like Sarah Bolger (The Tudors), Trine Dyrholm (The Legacy), Aidan Quinn (Elementary), Tom Austen (The Royals), Luke Pasqualino (Skins) and Orion Lee (First Cow).