Chess in the Ads: Nike's Great Ad Has Less Than Great Chess

Nike is celebrating its 50th anniversary with an ad directed by and starring Spike Lee. Though there are various edits shown on TV, they are actually cuts from a 4:42 ad, available on YouTube.

The ad features Lee (as his Nike character Mars Blackmon) playing chess against "Zimmie" (played by actress Indigo Hubbard-Salk).

We join them in the endgame in this position (although I'm not entirely clear if white's king is on g2 or g1), with Zimmie to move, playing white.

It looks like this is going to be a short commercial. White has mate in 2 (Ng6+, Kg8, Rg7#). Any other move for white is really bad, but Zimmie plays Qd5, saying "check."

Except it's not check. It would make sense if black's king had been on g8, then moved to h8 after Qd5+, setting up what ultimately comes later.

Spike ignores the false check call, which means the king was, in fact, on h8. He can really turn the tables with Qe1+ (if white's king is on g1), but he blunders very badly with Rb5.

Except when we go to the video...

Spike moves the rook to b5, but somehow white's queen is back on d3.

Not that it matters a whole lot. Zimmie finally makes the right move, which is Ng6# (if the queen is on d5) or mate in 1 (if the queen is on d3).

All in all, it's a tribute to dozens of great sports moments, both old and new, but kind of a poke in the eye to chess, or at least film continuity.