Mumbai, 13 November 2026: Dopamine Media & Entertainment today released the official trailer for CANDIDATES, a six-episode series about a generation of Indian chess prodigies: D Gukesh, R Praggnanandhaa, R Vaishali, Arjun Erigaisi and Vidit Gujrathi. Filmed between June 2022 and December 2024, the series follows them from a heartbreaking blunder at the 2022 Chess Olympiad in Chennai to the moment Gukesh, at 18, became the youngest-ever undisputed World Chess Champion.
Directed by Prashant Raj and Abhineet Chute, CANDIDATES premieres on Dopamine Media’s YouTube channel on Sunday, 22 November, the day the 2026 World Championship opening ceremony kicks off in Geneva, where Gukesh defends his title. The series runs alongside the match and concludes with a two-episode finale on 9 December, two days before Game 14.
The Story
In 2013, a seven-year-old boy sat in the stands in Chennai and watched Viswanathan Anand lose the world title. He vowed to win it back. CANDIDATES follows him and four other prodigies who set out to bring the crown home: Gukesh, the king of comebacks; Praggnanandhaa, the people’s hero; his sister Vaishali, the shadow fighter; Arjun, the mad man; and Vidit, the resurgent.
Along the way come losing streaks and comebacks, friendships tested across the board, near-misses that hurt for years, and families who rearrange their lives around a chessboard.
Most sports documentaries look back at how champions were made. CANDIDATES was filmed as it happened. Shot vérité-style across eight countries and territories and 14 cities, its crew was there for Gukesh’s Olympiad blunder, for his unfiltered reaction to becoming World Champion, and inside the players’ homes in between. Nothing is staged, scripted or recreated.
What they said
“Chess looks like the quietest sport in the world. Spend time with these players and you realise how loud it is inside their heads. Every loss is personal. You don’t need to know the rules to feel this one,” said Biswa Kalyan Rath, co-creator and producer on the series.
“We started filming in 2022 without knowing how this story would end. We only knew these players were special and that someone needed to be in the room. We are releasing CANDIDATES on YouTube because that is where India’s new chess audience grew up, and it should be free for all of them,” said Prashant Raj, co-creator and director of CANDIDATES.
“We all saw the crown. And it was the Candidates team that was there for the blunder, the losing streaks and the long nights before the wins. Every champion was once a candidate, and that is the universally heart-tugging story we wanted to tell,” said Anu Singh, producer.
Release schedule
All episodes premiere on the Dopamine Media YouTube channel at 7PM IST:
● Episode 1: Sunday, 22 November
● Episode 2: Friday, 27 November
● Episode 3: Tuesday, 1 December
● Episode 4: Saturday, 5 December
● Episodes 5 & 6 (finale): Wednesday, 9 December, back to back, one hour apart
The Team
CANDIDATES is created by Biswa Kalyan Rath and Prashant Raj, directed by Prashant Raj and produced by Anu Singh, Prashant Raj and Biswa Kalyan Rath for Dopamine Media & Entertainment, in association with Chessbase India and with archival support from the International Chess Federation (FIDE). Cinematography and episode direction are by Abhineet Chute, with Ajay Mehta as associate director. The series is edited by Khushboo Raj Agarwal (series editor) and Aniruddh Ramjiwal (episode editor). The background score is by Daniel B. George and Harsh Upadhyay, sound design is by Manik Batra and graphics by Mihir Lele.
CANDIDATES is independently produced and released and will be distributed across multiple platforms across the world apart from YouTube post the World Championship match.
