The bishops, the complete guide

I have seen many articles and books that talk about the bishop pair. We all know the basic rules "knights are better in closed games, and bishops are better in open games", but why are bishops generally preffered? First, it is easier to open a position that it is to completely blockade it. Even in semi-closed positions, bishops can do well.

In this series of articles I will try to explain the following topics

1. Bad bishops and why sometimes they are not bad: I will show you why they are necessary and why they are better in their starting position. This is speciallly true for black's light square bishop. Sometimes we develop this bishop instead of leaving it "doing nothing", but why do grandmasters leave this bishop undeveloped? Is it really a "bad" bishop?

2. bishop vs knight: I will show examples about this legendary fight. Although there are many articles about this, I will try to add depth to this subject.

3. Bishop pair: Why the bishop pair is good and how to use it.

4. Opposite color bishop endings: What you didn't know about this endings. Most of the time we just assume they are a draw and we forget about the strategy behind all this endgame.

In this first intruduction I will start with a game maybe most of you know, the famous Carlsen vs Topalov game: