19x19 board = grand epic, a multi-decade war 13x13 board = single battle between two opposing armies, like a game of chess 9x9 board = knife fight in a telephone booth

Since Go doesn't have set starting sides on a board like some other boardgames I don't know whether it matters but from a visual storytelling perspective I find it relevant that she sits beside Harlan, not opposite him. She's playing with him, not against him.

Him knocking over the go game rather than lose is also what he does with his death. The important difference though is that he’s willing to nuke a nonserious game to not let Marta win, but willing to nuke a serious situation and his own life to protect Marta and let her “win.”

I love Marta and Harlan's friendship. Despite the gap in age, in power, they treat each other as equals and you can tell they're important to each other and I love it so, so dearly.

I’m sure someone else has said this, but the fact that Marta’s second move is to go “behind enemy lines” is also an incredible parallel to her actions later in the film; working to keep her family safe while working WITH Blanc (even though he essentially functions as a potential “enemy”) instead of taking the safer move to stay out of the investigation as much as possible and stick to “her side.”

The Go motif is something that I don't think I've seen anyone else talk about in this movie, so I'm glad to see someone talk about it. The symbolism the reason for why Marta can win when the Thrombleys can't is a sort of foreshadowing for the qualities that Marta has that the rest lack. Go is a game about support and safety rather than pure aggression.

I just kind of had an epiphany while watching this and now I'm curious what you may think of this. Marta placed that black piece at the center of a round shape (well diamond, but it's go so a circle) with a hole in the center. You know, like a donut... It's a donut. She's the hole in the hole.

My absolutely favourite thing about this film is that Marta comes out on top *because she's a good person*. She genuinely wants to help others, while everyone else wants to help themselves. It's a trait I rarely see rewarded in film (outside of children's "power of friendship" cartoons) when so many "clever" characters are treated as clever because they're a conniving asshole who screwed over every other character. Marta is such a refreshing take from that - she's genuine and kind, and sticking to her values is what wins her the fortune. I see this reflected pretty nicely in the game of go. She sticks to her values of creating a beautiful pattern, rather than taking Harlan's aggressive bait. No matter how much the other family members try and threaten her, she still sticks to her values, because she has so much integrity. The above is the reason why I adore Knives Out's writing. It has so much nuance, and is easily one of the best written films from the last few years. Although I still really enjoyed Glass Onion, and it had all the cleverness and sleuthing of the first film, I did find that it somewhat lacked the moral core that made Knives Out one of my favourite films. Anyway, great video!!

Another thing I love about this scene is how we see Marta being completely at ease with Harlan. The rest of the movie, she’s nervous either being watched over by the press or people who see themselves as superior to her. But here she’s with someone she loves and is completely comfortable with. They laugh and smile and play argue. So beautiful. ❤

There's some more really clever ideas in the game I spotted too! Harlan's long chain of stones is called a "Dragon" in go terms. He's got a single huge white dragon without roots. This shape has a lot of what's called, "Influence" in go strategy - it makes its presence felt all over the board, influencing every other stone. It's possible he's what's known as a "fighting" player - someone who looks to kill enemy stones and win with sheer numbers. The movie also ends on the shot of the mug "my house, my rules" which is all about "taking territory" (the game Go is about taking territory). Marta is a territorial player that focuses on shape. Shape isn't just aesthetics in go, it's one of the three prime strategic dimensions (Territory, Influence, Shape). Shape in go represents not just beauty but efficiency and strength. Good shape has capacity to form eyes, which make stones immortal. There's a saying in go rich with metaphor for a murder mystery: "Two Eyes = Life, One Eye = Death"

I didn't even NOTICE they played Go in the movie

The final move Marta makes is also filling the hole that was created by this situation. As Benoît Blanc later mentions, the whole case is a doughnut as the center is missing, and even when you think you've explained it, the mystery still remains. But Marta is the key to the mystery, her playing according to her own rules and following her moral values is what allows the truth to finally come out. I see it as a foreshadowing that she is the central, and missing piece of the mystery/doughnut.

There's a big difference between the mentality of people who play Chess vs people who play Go. Chess is about sacrificing your "lesser" pieces to achieve a tactical advantage over their opponent, whereas Go is about pieces coming together to surround your opponent. There are no greater or lesser pieces in Go, no pieces that are more valuable than others, but their power comes in how they're positioned. It leads to two very different mentalities. It's very telling that Marta and Harlan play Go, while I'm almost positive the rest of the family plays chess.

to the point of Knives Out being endlessly rewatchable even once you know the ending- I actually never got to experience this movie blind to the killer. It got spoiled to me months in advance to my first watch through a reposted tumblr meme, so I watched the entire film trying to figure out _how_ the ending would come about rather than the _who_ of it all. It still, instantly, became one of my favourite movies

"For everyone else who can't follow directions and clearly doesn't care about spoilers, let's dive in." Hello, thank you for having me

I also noticed that they weren't holding the Go stones "correctly" during the scene. However, I thought this was primarily an oversight. Thinking about it, it might be that Harlan knows how to do it, but since it's only a game between friends and he didn't want to offend Marta or try to be stuffy about it he wasn't going to enforce the formalism of it. It could also be used to illustrate that Marta comes from a working class background and is therefore not as well versed in the superficial "ceremony" of the game but is still an excellent opponent despite that for a game that, like chess, does have an association with the upper reaches of society and those accompanying mannerisms.

MASSIVE additional point: it's traditional for the stronger player to use white. This might suggest that Harland still thinks he's a stronger player than Marta. Or more likely they don't play with others much. Either way, the first move advantage is worth at least 5 points even on a 9x9 board (depending on the players), so he's giving up a lot!

My favorite part of this is that the movie doesn’t exonerate Harlan, even though he is nice to Marta. The fact that he too is condemned as in some way responsible for the family’s dysfunction is so cool

My favorite way to describe Go is that there's one objective, get territory, and one rule, fully surrounded pieces get captured, and anything beyond that is clarifying that rule. The rest of the game follows. It really is beautiful.

As you were just going about how Marta wasn't actually playing go, I was just trying to shut my head saying "n-no, is actually a very valid move and a good one" because I knew it had to go somewhere, it had to. And it did! Glad to see it described as a very elegant move. ❤

His desperate need for tactical control, versus Marta's compassionate strategic thinking, is also why he ends up dead. If he had just done what she said, he'd have lived. She "wins" because she's better at Harlan's life than Harlan is. He doesn't even think through the results of his death correctly. Of course there was going to be a tox report, and that would have ruined his whole plan. Too busy not thinking, just "controlling" even at that point. So she lives, she takes the house, the fortune, and even considers helping his family. She's him, but smarter and better.

honestly, knowing the relationship between harlan and marta, and the context of the situation, it makes sense that the pieces are played out of order. they're good friends who play go together often, presumably every time they meet (since it's an important tradition to harlan). the decision to play in a nine by nine grid is decided by marta, who initially tries to leave because she's had a drink and she wants to go home after the party, so it's a purposefully faster game. the fact that they're not using the typical hand position also illustrates the casualness of the game, since they don't care if they jostle the pieces around. they've also played together so much that the game goes by super quickly, an effect achieved with all the time skips. while the skipped pieces could be a mistake of the filming or the edit, it can also reflect their relationship and how casual they are that, at this point, they can play games out of order, because they know each other that well. another thing it might reflect is the fact that harlan overthinks. maybe he's passing because he's taking up too much time thinking of how to beat her, while she's just following her instinct and knowledge. similarly, he becomes so consumed with the idea of the suicide plan to protect marta that he doesn't stop to note whether or not he's experiencing any symptoms. she lists out how long it'll take for symptoms to appear, and if they had waited those five, ten, fifteen minutes it would've taken for the overdose to start, even if they didn't call 911, they would've realized that it wasn't happening. the fact that he overthinks so much in order to try and win that he passes up opportunities to do so is reflective of the fact that he is willing to end his own life and give up everything he could do with what remains of it (he's only 85, and he's relatively healthy and very well off, so he has a decent chance of making it to 100) in order to complete a plot that came to his head, fully formed.

I’m sure this was a coincidence, but in Korea, the empty space that you capture with your stones is called a “house.” With how many times the motif as the Thrombey house comes up as the symbolic object of Harlan’s wealth, Harlan’s comment that Marta is better at Go than Ransom is kept feeling like a nod to the fact that Marta will be getting the house over Ransom.

Your descent into a Blanc monologue was excellently done.

I saw him saying 'it's basically over' as a last ditch effort to try to lower her defenses into thinking she's got nothing to worry about, even though he knew she would probably still be smart enough to put that black piece there anyways. His tone was playful, but even at that point he came across as pretty cutthroat and that seemed exactly the kind of things someone like him would do.

Also I think where Ransom comes into this is that he, like Harlan is very skilled at the game of control. The rest of the family lack foresight and act impulsively while Ransom is very collected and comes up with a clever and sound plan to defeat Harlan. He was the only one clever enough to fight back and he was evenly matched with Harlan. Ultimately the person who defeats him is Marta for the same reason she constantly beat Harlan.

Today I learned that Cathedral, the one board game I grew up playing, was Go with buildings. Ironically, I used to drive my older siblings nuts by playing to build a "nice city" rather than to win. (My family was pretty toxic and, as both the youngest and the only girl, I wasn't supposed to be able to beat anyone else. I did not like the nasty consequences of winning, so I found other goals. I guess that's part of why I love Knives Out.)

Re: the reasons they're fighting (27:30) Most of the family is fighting because they're realizing that what they have to lose is something that was never really theirs in the first place. They're fighting to keep a lifestyle they were lucky to be born into, that they were given for no good reason. And they're VERY upset at the idea that it could be taken away just as easily. Marta is fighting just to keep what she has. She doesn't even want the inheritance, she just wants to be left alone.

Also I don’t believe Harlan even allows her to finish the game properly, he intercepts based on his diagnosis an leaps of logic of the games trajectory; a wonderful depiction of his short comings and Marta’s strengths. While both are pragmatic and sensible people, Harlan often makes baseless assumptions, approaching each event with the intention to capture as much territory as possible that he assumes the idea he has already claimed “territory” and so he loses sight of what’s directly in front of him (his lack of overdose symptoms, Ransom’s rage, that his family would thank him), meanwhile Marta approaches each moved with the choices already laid before her. She does not act beyond her existing options, and always chooses the most sure footed route, the most honest route. Instead of spiralling into the potential consequences of Harlan’s dying on her watch, instead of self preserving, she moves to protect her territory, instead of thinking about how it looks like she killed Fran she stays to help her. Because the board wasn’t a territory, and Harlan’s pieces weren’t her enemy - they were weavings into her larger pattern. She essentially included his moves in her own. She worked with the choices presented to her. This also comments on her working class status vs his wealthy one.

20:30 I want to point out that stones can not be diagonally connected and the spaces diagonally adjacent to the stones dont count as liberty,so that group was in "atari"(atari means its about to be captured-it had only 1 liberty)so Marta basically saved the group before it got captured.That move makes sense because if she wants to capture the white group ,she has to save her own group first

I lost it when you dropped that Blanc line "it makes no dame sense! It compels me though." lol great video!

Marta's final move was just filling in the hole of the donut.

6:33 The territory in the right of the board is "mutual death". who controls this space depends on who's turn it is. If it's black's turn, they capture the bottom 3 white stones. If it's white's turn, they capture the big group. A real game would probably not finish like this or the automatic scoring on an online thing might arbitrarily decide one group is dead.

Nice video. I know it's fairly standard to think of the competing territories in Go as empires, but I regard them more as communities. There is no entrenched hierarchy as there is in say, chess, and each stone has equal value in the bowl. It is how they connect and support each other on the board that makes them strong. Additionally, Go will punish a player for being too greedy or aggressively expansionist, rather than being satisfied with a smaller victory.

I just love Marta as a character, a protagonist, and an underdog so much. I wish more media celebrated humble and intelligent characters like her and put them in the spotlight.

The Go metaphor of "winning because she's trying to make a beautiful pattern" has long been my favorite part of the whole movie!

Very interesting video! I hadn't noticed just how much of an allegory their match was to how they lived their lives. Also, I'm a little perturbed that I was taught Gomoku as Go. I spent four years playing the game under the wrong name and had no idea! So thanks for correcting that old error in my life 😂

another part for her ending play is that in the same way Harlon doesn't see it coming, Ransom didn't think Marta would stays to try and save Fran even if it could put herself in danger

Harlan: I don't know how you beat me at this every time. Marta: I'm not trying to beat you. I'm creating a beautiful pattern. She wins by being herself. Even when she doesn’t realize it or isn’t trying to… that’s how Marta will win. She leaves too much a presence on the right side of the scale

You channeled detective Blanc very well in your Gomoku monologue.

Another symbolic point to note is that Marta fills in the donut hole on the go board. Just how she fills in the missing narrative that blanc is trying to figure out. Foreshadowing as well as showing the difference in character

Always loved that board game scene and immediately noticed how much it explored Martha and Harlan’s styles both in the game and in life. But i never understood go so couldn’t really confirm.

First time I've laughed at a spoiler gate lol You also managed to put a red herring in the explanation of a board game from a mystery movie?

At 6:26 when you show an example board, neither the black or white groups in the lower right are actually alive. They are both in atari (meaning with only one liberty left and able to be captured) with a single eye and the next player to play could kill their opponent's group and win the entire bottom right area and the game.

Putting a black piece in the center of a ring of black pieces is also kind of like putting a donut hole in a donut, so maybe that means something 🤔

12:07, Marta holding the stones could show how she’s not one for the flashy forms that traditionally come with learning how to properly play this game. She plays how she wants with her own comfort.

also, the japanese rules for scoring don’t count the pieces you have on the board (only the enclosed empty spaces), while the chinese rules do count the stones as points

I just realised at 22 seconds when shows the scene when Beniot Blanc and Marta first meet and Blanc looks down, he sees the blood on her shoes. Later at the end when Marta asks him since when did he know she was part of the death, he says from the first time I met you. I think that kind of little attention to detail is so awesome.

Martha needs to play on F8, and she does, because her three stones only have one liberty less. Remember that strings aren't connected diagonal. She isn't playing Pente or Alea Evangelii. That would've been an awful move in either of those two games but it's a vital move in Go.

That moment when you had worked out that alternate theory about what game they're playing, and went cherry-picking through the film to support it, only to realize it was all in your head and had to let it go, I think that was the best KZfaq video moment I've seen all year. The internet community needs more people demonstrating that, instead of dying on the hill of half-baked fan theories.

Hey ! I came here from the go community. Didn't see the movie beforehand, so I did exactly as you said, I paused the video, watched the movie tonight, then finished the video. The movie was really cool, and your video is very nice. Thank you very much for the time and attention that you put into it, and seeing Ryan Li featured was so great, this guy is a jewel with such a great energy. ps : loved the gomoku part even if the move in question makes absolute total sense ^^

Marta's move in between her own stones is a classic move. I played go for years, and it is just a defense of the 3 L shaped stones that he could have captured. It is possible there are different versions of go, but the way I learned was that a stone can be placed surrounded if it captures immediately that turn.

I love this niche series you have going on at your channel. Explaining game scenes from movies. The video essay on film genre has become pretty popular on youtube over the past few years, but you have still managed to keep your's unique and distinct from the crowd.

The play by black at F8 is extremely logical in Go. When white played at G6 the black stones at E6,F6, and F7 are basically under attack - that group only has one liberty - at F8. By playing at F8 it connects that group to the stones at E8,F9, and G8 bringing the total group to 3 liberties. If Black had not played at F8, white could have played there next capturing the three stones and rejoining his two sides.

My favorite minor detail in the movie was the fact that none of the family members could get Marta's country of origin right. They all said different countries each time

Wow, this video taught me that the game I used to know as "Go" is actually "Gomoku" (for some reason thats how my chess buddies who taught me to play it long time ago called it). So I was strongly confused by the movie, the same way you pointed that Harlan could win the game at 22:20. Also, the rules of "Go" as you described them are the same for what we call "Dots" (though we shamefully disrespect the game as a casual pastime during boring lectures, we just draw dots on a grid of notebook papers)

I thoroughly enjoyed every second of this video especially the gomoku section and the conclusion.

This is cool. Just a few days ago, I was wondering what had happened to the Animorphs guy who had explained the Pirates game

24:30 You had me until this moment. All the while, I was utterly confused because I was thinking "Isn't she just defending her 3 pieces or am I dumb"

This video hit my nerd nerve like nothing else I've watched in a while. Probably like a lot of people I thought Go was the same as Othello, and I had no idea about the other games using the same board. Shout out to Ryan too!

6 frames, 20 seconds in the whole movie and you can pull out a new side to the story? Madly Respect to you, Sir!

14:22 this might be a mistake, but I thought that that stone was on f3, not g3, since the stone that was placed was 1 intersection away from the string.

As a Go player, when you went on your gomoku rant I started fuming. You raised and lowered my blood pressure in a matter of seconds, thanks.

This really made my Christmas. I love for in-depth analysis like this, and I sincerely empathize with making an assumption and running with it the way you did when you thought they were playing Gomoku. I was on board the whole time.

I'm glad to see that someone spoke on this. I play Go, myself, however I am still quite a beginner at the game. I've been wanting to talk about this scene in "Knives Out" since I saw it, but never quite knew how. I'm glad that someone like you was able to make this video. I find it's quite a good video and a good explanation of what is going on both in the game and throughout the movie.

This really had me worked up. He goes on and on about how her move doesn't make sense and it's a terrible move unless she's playing a completely different game and I'm just screaming, "it's literally her only move." Why gaslight us for a joke?

The Sonic the Hedgehog underwater panic sound when the size of the Go board starts to be appreciated was an amazing Easter egg and a fitting tribute to the movie's ability to do the same. Nice!

dude it was super sick that you ascertained the truth of this matter

One thing I liked is how they got what looks like a traditional Japanese set of stones for the game. You can get plastic and glass stones a bunch of places, but the clamshell(white) and slate(black) stones in the movie are quite nice and depending on the origin of the clamshell can be quite rare. It seems like the kind of set a successful author would pick up. Though the little bags he's got them in are a bit lame.

I loved the slow burn/transition into the 'Blanc Style' Commentary, this whole video a pleasant stroll to the terminus of gravity's rainbow if i do say so myself.

Go reminds me a lot of the Art of War in that it’s less about destruction/capture and more about controlling territory but also the opponent. It’s a very different mindset to other games. It’s fascinating how such a “simple” game actually requires very good strategic thinking and long term planning.

As a side note, I like how the game they played shows each of their perspectives on what a family means, as well. Harlan is "playing family" to "win", as is the rest of the Thrombey family. Marta just wants to protect her family because that is the whole point. Edit: Actually, that makes Ransoms comment more interesting as well, since he's basically saying: "Huh, I thought I was the only one who could defeat him at the game of "Family".

holy shit! when i first started watching this video, i saw the go board and immediately tried to recall the game me and my friends used to play on the graphed blackboard in high school. it wasn't go, because the rules were different, but i couldn't remember any specifics. and then you said "gomoku" and i just shot up. where i'm from it's called omok (오목) and it's a super common game. anyway as someone who's interested in both game design and storytelling, this was a wonderful video.

Always a pleasure to see you, sir. A wonderful Christmas present!

I have not finished the video yet so ignore me if this has been addressed, but the penultimate move (G6) threatens her entire position because he could take a way three stones (at E6 F6 F7) and play where black plays it's last move (F8). If that was to happen, white would be able to win the game again. If I was in that position I would have had to play into my own territory as well. 22:56 so this looks like GO to me alright.

Another great one. I always love seeing another entry in this series!

This is one of my favorite movie video essays that Ive ever seen. Really well-thought out, and features a better explanation of playing Go than other tutorials Ive read/watched. On top of that, the presentation was gripping. I really wanted to see where you were going with this and was not disappointed. Great video!

I have a 19x19 Go board that I got in high school and rarely find people to play with, but I love it. I don’t think I’ve ever won a single game of chess, but I can hold my own against other amateur Go players pretty well, and I think it has a lot to do with the artistry of it. It’s more intuitive to me in a way chess never was.

The first video I saw of yours was explaining to die seen in pirates of the caribbean. Even your old content is very watchable. Here's a new subscription for you.

Hell yeah, brother, this was a great essay! The "first watch" ending basically ended up in my head like you put it here, but you framed it differently, and I think it's really good. Thanks for putting the effort into making this video/thought in your head into reality.

It's always nice to see go pop up -- same for your videos. Thanks for this one, I enjoyed it.

At 15:21 you say it's impossible unless Harlan passed on a turn. So he did. He lets her win, just like he lets Random win. It's his little game he plays with them both to say they are his favorite. Ransom is like he was, and he wanted Ransom to be his successor. But after being with Marta, he realized the things he should have done to have been a better father, and none of that is who he is. In other words, who Ransom is. He plays Go with Marta because he plans to give it all to who he is striving to be. The game is how he communicates.

Fuck this was incredible content. I didn't think discussion of 20 second scene in a movie I haven't seen in years would engage me this much, but you're a captivating speaker with a lot of excellent points made. Thank you for this treasure of a video!

This was a very well written explanation. Thank you for making it!

Man it's always a delight to see you've uploaded. Great as always

Great to see you back, fascinating as always.

This makes me wanna get my big ol' Go board out again. Such a cool game! Also, gods, time to watch this movie again, too. Maybe I can do both at once! 😋 Anyway- Wicked rad analysis!! You really had me hook-line-and-sinker with the claim that it's not really Go. 😂

Dang its genuinely cool how like, low vs high level Go acts as a kinda perfect synopsis of the movie itself

Regarding the discussion at 15:21 about the extra stone Marta plays, it is actually an impossible situation by the standard rules. There's no way any stones could have been captured at that point because there's no fully surrounded areas on the board.

I'm so glad for another one of your videos I absolutely love your vids especially the analyzing board games in movies there my favorite please keep up the good work

this is a beautiful analysis of a scene from my favorite movie. i can't tell you how much i appreciated every moment of this ❤ what a christmas present!!!!

Your videos are always a delight to see in my feed! Thank you for the awesome play-by-play!

I LOVED THIS MOVIE and i’m glad to see other people covering it

16:55 it is also possible that she just guessed his move and went ahead and put her piece on the board early since it’s a quick game. Kinda would speak to how close they are too

Great video, and it is very nice to see content from you again.

I love what you did with the chess scene in Sherlock Holmes. I found another scene in interview with the vampire, the series, episode 6. I'm not a chess player so it may not work out as the other one but I thought I'd mention it. Keep up the amazing work!

For the weebs among us, Hikaru no Go is a fun shounen anime about Go that'll pump anybody up for mankind's greatest game.

I'd like to point out that during the scene when they discover the morphine overdose, we see Harlan get a notebook and write something down as he's talking about how this would be an interesting method of murder. Earlier he had mentioned, regarding ransom, "there's so much of me in that kid". We presume he's doing as he said, but wouldn't it be curious if Harlan had figured out what was going on, as he is a great mystery writer after all, and wrote down ransom's name in the notebook. Ransom, on the other hand, may not be a great mystery writer but he is certainly familiar with ways to murder and potentially get away. Purely speculation, as it's never touched upon later in the film and I'm sure Rian Johnson would have been clever enough to do that if that had been his intention.

Hello I have just finished watching Knives Out per your request and am now back to watch this analysis :D

This was really great! Thank you very much. (It never occurred to me how to interpret that game - And I don't have to knowledge or connections to find the deep insight this video provides.) Really glad I stumbled across this (well-made) video.