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The "strong female character" BS was off-putting. I came to 3 Body not having read the books. I'd seen the Chinese show's trailers but never watched it because subs are too fast and I tend to watch these shows while I work on a different PC. The bar scene where they rattle off their exploits to the nice guy is not the sole instance of the "strong female" trope. There is another on-the-nose scene where one woman says "I was at the doctor's office" (or something) and the other woman says "What did he say?" and the first woman says "Not he... she". I rolled my eyes hard. The gender swapping was much more obvious once I listened to reviews of the Chinese one then it made sense why the male characters in the western version were dumb, designed to be unlikeable or weak and the women were constantly being praised with "she is the smartest person i have ever met", "she is the only one who can do this", "we have 100's of the best engineers and physicist but we need her". I was just like... sigh... really? Even the prime anti-hero, wenjie... she doomed earth because of her feelings but in the western version u can see she gets the "women can't do wrong" treatment. A male character dooming earth to ruin would have been portrayed less favourably... probably getting the littlefinger exit.
The scientist suicides in the book weren't about the experimental results not matching theories, it was about them not being consistent. Doing the experiment over and over gave completely random results every time. It made it look like causality isn't real. It made the very idea of science seem wrong.
@@hexPixelStarshipsNot to get all argumentative, but science fiction is SUPPOSED to be based on science, science FANTASY (Star Wars) doesn't care. There's a reason why there's a hard line between Hard Sci Fi, and Sci Fi, hard sci fi leans into the science tenfold, but sci fi should still be leaning on it nonetheless... Otherwise it's just fantasy. Again, see Star Wars.
I vastly prefer the Tencent version, but man, the decision to bring up the Death's End section to straighten out the timeline and its setup and the foreshadowings that came with it have been really well done. I think they've overdone a lot of the character related stuff but Will's part was absolutely phenomenal imo. Best depiction of the "You're special to me and I know I'm not that special to you but that doesn't make you any less special to me and I'd do anything for you but won't express my feelings cause I think you'll be happier that way" feeling I've ever seen on screen
I agree, that plotline in particular was what made the show go from "Eh, this was fun, but I couldn't really get past the flaws," to, "Wow, I actually really enjoyed that!" Still not a perfect show overall, but I'm disappointed that I haven't seen too many people praising the Will/Jin stuff. They're really taking full advantage of the foreshadowing potential and I'm all for it.
@@genericallyentertaining I agree it should be praised, it definitely worked much better. But I guess the author couldn't simply go back in time and change the first books, while the writers of the adaptation have the privilege of knowing it all :P
I'm the opposite I had tons of problems with Tencent 30 episodes that drag on and on. Chinese censorship Changing Ye backstory with her father. Explaining things over and over again and then making tou watch flashbacks of the same scenes. Lots of sides characters to fill runtime. I liked some of it but I had a lot of issues with it. It also was filmed like a commercial imo
Completely agree! However I really enjoyed the Netflix version just as much as the Tenecent version. I love how they decided to make the characters friends with each other. It will make their transition into the future more impactful. Especially if they do the scene where Jin reunites with Saul in the Deterrence center. That's gonna be hard to watch.
I thought the suicides were because other Scientist were seeing countdowns, or things like that too. That kind of psychological horror would do awful things to people
Yeah - I still don't have a clear grasp on what was causing the countdown - and whether it was happening to multiple people at once, or only one at a time
@@6Churches It would be the sophons wiggling inside their eyeballs creating the hallucination. Sophons are just protons, so they would produce electromagnetic radiation (light) when they accelerate.
@@6Churches that is a good point which breaks the physical rules of sophon tech. They are powerful enough to accelerate to near light speed while being remote controlled light-years away via quantum entanglement bs, but limited to only producing light. They cannot physically interact with anything in an OP way, like producing sound, pushing objects, or cutting things. The manipulation of electronics is also something that may not be a physically accurate sophon power, would need to consult a better physicist. Although if you allow for this, maybe we can say they used an electronic device to produce the audio. I don't remember auditory hallucinations or electronics manipulation occuring in the books, so I think just the show gets it wrong there.
The "universe winking" is great in that later scene when Saul is talking to Ye Wenjie and explains that even though people all over the world saw it, it had to be an illusion, one of the first hints that humans are not helpless in the face of the Trisolarians.
That was a facepalm moment. Universe blinking for everyone defies the purpose of what it was supposed to be shown and the meaning behind it. But hey, we are in the west so let's throw the Science out of the window because our dumbed down public will get hired and we aren't capable of explaining it in a comprehensive manner anyway.
@elenabob4953 it wasn't scientifically accurate but I found it very creepy and thought it worked well instead of having Wang running back and forth with goggles on freaking out with bad acting.
The "physics is broken" part, I agree with you that their actions might have been a bit exaggerated, but it's not just "because experiments are giving random results" - The Turkey story that is in the books and adapted in the Tencent version actually gives some insight into that: The reason for their despair was the possibility that there is NO WAY to understand what is actually going on in the universe. They felt like they were like those turkeys, that even the best of turkey science could never predict that they're actually just being bred for slaughter. It does make sense for a passionate scientist to feel some level of despair at that prospect. In fact it's one of the most memorable things about the book for me. The adaptations' straight up just muder a bunch of scientist is way less imaginative and boring... and also probably wouldn't work very well, science is a huge collaborative effort, they would have to murder a LOT more people for generations, hurting their chances of achieving their desired state of conquest.
Agreed -- the horror and despair is coming from the possibility that science as a concept itself does not work in the universe, and that the mechanisms of physics might be either random or fundamentally unknowable for humans. The depth of emotion that arises in this context makes sense for scientists, something that the books and Tencent adaptation understood, and I felt the Netflix show did not really care about. A related idea forms the premise of Ted Chiang's short story "Division by Zero" for example.
@@Stillnothereanymore In general, and the video also comments on that at the beginning, the adaptation from netflix fails to capture this scientific, even if fantastical, outlook that the book relies on to tell its' story.
Not to mention that it wasnt just random results it was the breaking of causality. Seeing that someone else got your random results before you ever did the experimemt must be spirit breaking especially when you bring in the pool analogies; ie does it matter where the pool table is to the result? Its a fundamental break in our ability to understand. Some greater power is actively fucking with you. The question is: is it a farmer or a bored sharpshooter? The book and tencent version also go in about this. It wasnt just how broken science was. It was that there was an alien worshipping cult presenting you with a false dichotomy as truth under the guise of religion. Their god gave them your random science experiment result before you did you experiment. Their god makes cosmic background radiation flicker. Imagine some young earth creationist prays and makes the universe flicker. That would be soul crushing. And all the while they are talking about how we don't deserve to live or the garden we live in. And using your answer of whether its a farmer or sharpshooter to help decide where to guide you or to eliminate you. To have a constant countdown projected onto your eyes that defies all known science.
@@Stillnothereanymore The notion that at that level of scale and energy the world is so random would still fail to explain why the world is so consistent at the macroscale. So even then I'd say high energy physics would still have plenty of avenues of exploration. Even just in trying to explain why experiments now are inconsistent with older ones.
So in an interview the creators said they're doind just the three books. They dont have any intention of doing the fourth and they said Netflix doesn’t even own the rights to that one anyway. Another interesting tidbit they dropped was they said under the contract they signed with the three body rights holders they were "only allowed " to do the Chinese parts in the past and modern day had to take place somewhere else. Apparently the Chinese rights holders wanted another version to be set more in the west
@Hurricayne92 so they signed a contract with the Chinese rights holders and they didn't go into detail what it all said only that they were only allowed a certain amount the take place in China
To echo a couple other comments, the "physics is broken" thing goes deeper than random results. (To an extent, randomness is expected in quantum physics anyways so it's not like that's a new thing.) Not that the show does a good job of portraying the nuances there-I had the same gut reaction of "new physics? Scientists would eat this up"-but on reflection I don't think the *concept* is unreasonable. The issue isn't that the understanding of physics was broken, it's that the *process* of science was being broken. Sure, you get weird results on an experiment, publish a paper... Now what? There's no way to achieve peer review because nothing is replicable (because it's being sabotaged). You have a flood of nonsense papers that are never used for anything, because they can't be. There's no underlying law or pattern to identify, so any attempts lead to running in circles. Lack of progress and meaningful outcomes leads to defunding, eventually, for the entire field-particle accelerators ain't cheap. In the face of that species of obsolescence, I can absolutely see utter despair overtake an alarming number of scientists. I don't know that it singularly kills all the top scientists-that may be a projection of Eastern honor and work culture to the rest of the world-but the morale hit would certainly be meaningful at the least. Other methods could also make up the difference too (countdown vision to undermine self-confidence, or just straight up murder as you said).
Exactly - and this would be a far more interesting drama to explore through Augie rather than the sensationalised numbers-countdown she gets (plus the Tatiana interlude and the sky blinking). If scientists cannot publish, then grants cannot be granted, tens of thousands of researchers lose their livelihoods and perhaps even their homes if they can't find new work. With Augie we just a sense she has such formidable independent wealth ... and this waters it all down, she never actually experiences desperation - nor does the show really explore the torment of being discredited
I think the random results is way more demoralizing than you make it out to be. At first I'm sure the scientists were excited to discover what was going on but you cannot fit any model to random noise so eventually they would lose hope in the field. I agree that it being like an epidemic felt very exaggerated but it's pretty devastating to have your entire field of study disappear after investing a good part of your life into it.
Yes. It makes publishing now impossible because all results are non-significant and also non-repeatable - making you look like all you have is noise, randomness and bias
I mean its heavily implied in the show that all the scientists (except Vera) were affected by the same thing as Auggie, hence the eyes being scratched out.
@@Hurricayne92 But how plausible is that? We see through Augie's eyes and she doesn't become s___cidal . Scientists would be curious about the phenomena
As someone who has neither read the original book nor the Chinese live action adaptation, I went into this show without any expectations. Some of it I liked, some of it just seemed kinda off or rushed. However some things really stood out to me, and by far the best (and most heartbreaking) was the exceptional writing and acting around Will/Jin: They both play it so genuine, I was legit sobbing in that one episode. I also think they truly thought about how Will would feel as his condition worsens. As someone who is chronically ill with a condition that may or may not at some point in my life deteriorate my body rapidly without warning, I resonated a lot with Will and his musings about his life and decisions. Heart wrenching, but in a good way. But then, the scene that truly broke me was the one where Jin asks for the seeds to be included, subsequently seeing it all fall apart and (presumably) being told that those seeds were the crucial tipping point. And to her it's not only a failure to succeed in a mission, it was a failure towards her last tether to Will. Honestly, superb writing that just twists the knife so well. As for Auggie's scene, I can see your point that this one went too far the other way with the kids. But at the same time I think it was a good example of how, even when trying to persuade ourselves that we're doing it for the right reasons, we can cause harm to whom we least expect and that more often than not "the enemy" is not one homogenous group of bad people and I think it solidifies Auggie's conviction to repent in any way she can. To which I gotta say that another scene that I just LOVED was her publishing her work and basically make the patent obsolete. Gating stuff behind patents that disproportionally hit marginalized people/areas has long been an issue and for her to just rip it away and make it accessible to everyone? Just beautiful. On a lighter and pettier note, I honestly enjoyed the scene with Auggie and Jin at the bar at the start. I know how many say it's more tell than show, that it gives off the image of scientist superior - you are a pleb - but at the same time, I've seen so many women (myself included) just minding their own business wanting to chat, just to be interrupted for no reason and therefore getting rebuffed like that, gave me joy :')
I've heard that designing a bear proof trash can is incredibly difficult due to the fact that there is a significant overlap between the smartest bear and the dumbest human.
I haven't yet started the video, but I have to say I am overjoyed to see more long-form content on your channel! Not that I don't enjoy all of your content, but long form is my favorite. Alright let's gooooooo
Thanks, I want to do more long form videos, but I keep putting them off! Lately, I've only been doing one long-form video every two months or so, which is horrible. Will try to get the next one out quicker.
41:45 I do have to say that I think that’s the point of that scene. We’re put in Auggies place, she doesn’t really know what’s on that ship either. She’s just letting military use her equipment. And then she gets into those ruins and personally experiences how her choice killed hundreds of innocent children. It’s supposed to be unexpected and gory.
I didn’t like it at all and I’m glad I read the books first. The series is just watered-down garbage. You lose most of the characters and details that make the story interesting
I appreciated that someone actually looked like they were dying of pancreatic cancer, instead of romantically dying of cancer like all the suspiciously health-looking people in the "dying teenager" movies of the last ten years or so.
Apparently, the actor really committed to the role he spent a week at a cancer ward talking to patients and researching their behavior and physical appearance, and he lost weight for the role. Actually, apparently, all the cast did a lot of research. The other cast spent 2 weeks every day at a university studying scientists and students, and they said one thing they found was TV shows and movies wildly misrepresent scientist most of the time. They said they're mostly just normal people. They curse and joke a lot. They go out to bars and have drinks with each other. They have interpersonal relationships and date each other. They're not these people in lab coats that have all the answers and have no flaws. Instead, the complete opposite.
In general, I agree with most of your points, though of course not all. One thing that stands out to me is your comment about foreshadowing the paper boat and fairy tales: I assumed that was exactly the point of it in the book. She only knows to look deeper into his fairy tales for hidden messages BECAUSE she knows it's a lie, which implies that there is a different reason for him to tell them to her. If they truly had shared fairy tales as children, there would have been a reasonable chance she would have just accepted it as a sort of fulfillment of an emotional wish to relive that. Only because it was such an obvious lie did it work to get his true message across with 100% certainty!
Yeah I'm mixed on this. On the one hand, their relationship in the books was really bad, this was compounded by my general dislike for Cheng Xin, in the series their relationship is much better and I don't hate Jin (so far). But yeah it showed Tianming's cleverness and was a stronger scene in the books because it was a lie.
It also seems like they are having Auggie take on some of the characteristics (and role) of AA from Death's End. We'll have to wait til later seasons to see for sure but I think that is what they're doing.
The characters were far better fleshed out in this version than in the books. They were two-dimensional and very monolithic in the books. And I don't mind at all that you convert a cast to be more like their intended audience. Or do we all expect actual Italians everytime we go to see "Romeo and Juliet"?
I mean this is common in Sci-fi book though, the ideas are the main character and the characters just facilitate the idea. Sci-fi readers won't find this an issue but the average Netflix watcher definitely needed the change.
I think the problem for us non western viewers is that this a story written from a Chinese perspective and have all of the nuances and traditions of the characters ripped out and pasted to London is a really lazy way to adapt a novel from another culture. Fellow youtuber AvenueX did a really well deep dive into a Chinese perspective of the Netflix three body problem why it wasn't well received within China. I really didn't like how they race swapped important characters to westerners in a age when we lack good Asian representations. Netflix turned Ye Wenjie from this nuanced but strong willed women into this angry and spiteful villain, turned Da shi from this down to earth cunning cop to this random bodyguard with no personality, and race swapped positive Chinese characters like Luoji and Zhangbeihai. It just feels incredibly disrespectful as they turned this beloved Chinese epic into a generic hollywood popcornflix. I think there is a clash in values between western audiences and the Chinese perspective of the original trilogy that the screen writers unfortunately didn't try to bridge.
is not just race swap, the whole vibe are just... gone. might be a culture thing, there's a lot of characteristic gone and does not feel right. While foreigner had no problem watching. For example, in original book, it gave a feeling of everyone in the world are doing their part. But in netflix they making every character know each other, it given a dorm friends go haha and rescue world vibe. The scale are shrunken really fast. And Also too many ooc. Things like Ye Wen Jie bang someone who met in few day is just unimaginable. I mean do banging really something hard require for netflix series?
@slatealan7082 I have to disagree the first book is also pretty isolated to mostly just China and a small amount of characters also. The second book is really when it expands and the creators of the Netflix show said the second season is absolutely going to expand more I actually think the show did a really good job. My gripe with the books is they have great ideas but most of the characters are so dull and thinly written and lack almost any human emotions. I like that they gave the characters some human emotions and brought some in earlier so have it connect better on the later seasons. I liked some of Tencent but I had a lot of issues with the pacing and explaining things over and over again and they flashbacks to the same scene we already watched again along with some Chinese censorship also didn't help it imo. I actually think the did a really good job with Ye with the short amount of time they had. Apparently the creators said under the contract they signed with the Chinese rights holders they were only allowed a certain amount to be set in China. I completely disagree with her video and she seemed to do zero research about how the Chinese rights holders wanted a western version. Imo Netflix is the better show than Tencent
31:40 It's not that all of physics is wrong, it's not just that physics is "broken", it's that physics does not exist. It's not that the results haven't been figured out, it's that they can't be figured out.
It's interesting how the showrunners asked the author who gave them the greenlight, knowing there would be many changes. It is good that Dan and Dave asked the author for permission to make these changes before proceeding. I think Cixin Liu doesn't care about the character changes but he wants the overall theme of his stories to remain intact.
I like your overall point about what the writers were going for having all main characters be life long friends with each other. Ultimately I feel like it's an odd element to try to bring into a story that's about all of these different people from around the world drawing on human experiences to try to understand these greater concepts. I think back to the Trisolarans using historical scientists to relate their own problems, or the Aboriginal man in Australia in the 3rd book relating the experience of being colonized. I think that theme is kinda at odds with this whole "dynamic group of friends" they've all put together, and I hope it focuses more on splitting them all apart rather than having them share another AirBnB by the beach again lol.
The book was very light on character development or character relationships. This is common in written scifi, but I kind of wonder if it was a cultural difference too? Book was great but had very distinctive vibes to me - it "felt" Chinese. They couldn't do a straight adaptation because it just wouldn't play well on screen or to western audiences. Too fragmented, not human enough. Having the scientists be friends was a way to add back in that human element but still have the plot basically intact
The imaginary girlfriend part in the book was really weird but something about it worked for me and I felt connected to it in a weird way. Im glad they cut it though, the plot point would not have worked in the show at all. Edit: I will defend Redemption of Time. It isnt perfect, and has plenty of issues, and some of the characterization seems a tad bit off, however it feels like a love letter to A Remembrance of Earths Past. One that got the attention of the original creator. I dont think of it as cannon though, but it does explore some interesting ideas.
I read RoT in one or two sittings and the only thing I remember thinking was how it was just a long string of Cheng Xin stepping on the same rake named "don't let your womanly love steer your choices". I did however love the imaginary girlfriend plot in the second book. It was the one redeeming thing about Luo Ji.
Sadly, the series had too few episodes. I love what they did to Will's character, tho. They took out Tian Ming's creepyness and made him likeable and endearing. Love the idea of Auggie becoming a version of Ding Yi, instead of Aa.
I loved the 4th book! It's definitely worth checking out. A very thoughtful nerd put it together, someone who was obviously obsessed with the original trilogy
As someone who read The redemption of time, the themes and concepts it dwells in are endlessly fascinating and on par with the original trilogy. However, its treatment of previous characters are arguably lackluster, but as someone mostly invested in the big ideas I remained hooked throughout the end.
I just finished the series and except for the scientist who jumped into the accelerator, I didn’t think any of the others were caused by despair over science. (And even then, I thought maybe she had a countdown.) It seemed more like they were going insane from the countdown/the countdown being the literal cause. Maybe even whatever they were shown after the countdown. If there were scientists that died unrelated to the countdowns, that detail was completely lost on me.
In the books the scientist suicides remain a mystery, even after the revelation of Sophon. One plausible theory is some grew deranged from the visual hallucinations of Sophon. Others may have become despondent at the failure of their research (through Sophon's interference). Another plausible theory is some had suicide "happen to them" - that is, they were assassinated by ETO members and their deaths made to look like suicides. In the show, ETO is not named and its organisational structure has been greatly simplified. In the books, ETO is a deeply divided, deeply dysfunctional organisation. It has many smaller factions within itself like Frontiers of Science, which tries to recruit scientists like Wang Maio (roughly Jin/Auggie) to solve three body problems. These ETO splinter factions broadly fall into 3 opposing schools of thought - Adventism, Redemptionism and Survivalism. Frontiers of Science is a Redemptionist faction. They don't want the Trisolarans (San-ti) to invade earth but do want to co-operate with them by solving each other's problems. The Adventists think humanity is the author of its own demise and cannot help but destroy the natural world. The Adventists are opposed to the Redemptionists because if they succeed in their mission to solve the three body problem, they believe the Trisolarans wont need to invade earth and the natural world will die at our own hands. The book characters Pan Han and Mike Evans are Adventists. The Survivalists intend to sell everyone out to ensure their own survival in whatever new world emerges post human/trisolaran contact. They are thought of as cowards and everyone hates them. They all have conflicting goals and they all have extremist elements that sabotage, terrorize and murder each other. Shit gets crazy. In the show, ETO is depicted like a cult with singular vision and purpose. In the books, ETO is depicted as all of Ye Wenjie and Mike Evans's inner conflict and doubt made real. It shows how the road to hell is paved with good intentions. That even the most enlightened thinkers are not above dogmatism and when they are given over to extremist thinking, the ends will justify the dirtiest means.
Love the long form video! Ofc I dont expect every video on every channel to exceed 30 minutes but the little 2 and 5 minute ones just don't hold my interest. And as someone who just can't get into the 3 Body books, I appreciate being able to find solid reviews that do spoil things and acknowledge issues with both the original work and the adaptations
Thank you for this video, very fair critiques of the source material and the adaptations. So I watched the Netflix version first, then I bought the three body book and read that approximately the same time as I watched the tencent show. I agree with you that none of them are perfect, and if we could just put them all together it would be great. That said, knowing all the stories I can kind of do that in my mind so that's fine. Some of the nitpicky parts of the video, I can see where you're coming from although I enjoyed some of the scenes you didn't like, probably because the Netflix show was my first exposure to any of this. Lastly, I'm glad you brought up auggie again towards the end. I think you're pretty spot-on, I think she'll likely fill in for AA and Ding Yi, as well as luo jis wife- I imagine she'll be an amalgamation of all that and possibly more. Really looking forward to the future seasons, particularly how the wall breakers, sword holders, tian Ming's fairy tales and more are handled. I could speculate on many things but I feel like that may just be setting up for disappointment... I actually am fine with the source and the adaptations being quite different because, as I said, I can fill in the blanks in my mind.
about the "physics is broken" plot line, my take is that the in the book it is more philosophical. because the data are random, the cause-effect logical chain for human being to understand the world is broken. and that is the philosophical basis of physics and science.
Yeah, I understand this, but I would still argue that most physicists don't think about their work purely from a philosophical perspective. After all, physicists have been debating the implications of quantum mechanics for a hundred years, but we're no closer to a deep philosophical explanation for that theory. Not to say that philosophy of science isn't a huge and important topic, but there's a reason physicists say "Shut up and calculate," regarding quantum mechanics: at a certain point, you just have to accept the experimental results and work backwards from there, even if the results don't immediately appear to follow the law of cause and effect or contradict all your philosophical notions. And anyway, how could you conclusively prove that "the data are random?" From a physicist's perspective, there could very easily be factors influencing the experiments that you're not aware of - and indeed, there are, since the interference is caused by sophons - and it would then be your job to find these unknown factors. The law of cause and effect is something that can be reasoned out a priori, not something that can be disproven experimentally, and I think physicists in this case would hold true to it while spending however many years it takes to figure out what is causing the interference. Wow, this turned into a long comment. But anyway, those are just my thoughts.
@@genericallyentertaining Yeah, that is one thing I find ridiculous from the book and the Tencent series, tho it sounds scary, no physicist in real world would actually ended their life when they found out physics doesn't exist, it would excited them. Yang Dong was a special case. Perhaps those who killed themselves were driven into serious existential crisis by sophon similar to Wang Miao's case but we never know. In the Tencent series the other two scientists other than Yang Dong that shown off-ed themselves seems to portrayed as they have strong belief in current science almost religously. However the Tencent series did mentioned on how different scientist react to the crisis and how those who didn't ended up killing themselves were either ended up joining ETO or killed by ETO disguised as suicide or incident, we were shown in some scene that Shen Yufei and Pan Han taking orders to "get rid of" Wang Miao from ETO's higher up, so probably not all suicide case were actually suicide case. The Netflix series also brought up similar plot with a scientist found "drowned" himself in a bathtub and the murder of Jack. One thing I find kinda dumb in the Netflix series is why sophon only removing the killer from CCTV footage but not the whole killing intead? Or the scene when Tatiana lit a cigarate for Auggie but the CCTV footage only shown the cigarate lit up itself. Wouldn't it made more sense if they just altered the CCTV footage by removing everyone? It would left more mystery to the authority and Auggie would suffers more serious crisis because there's no evidence of her meeting Tatiana therefore she couldn't talks to anyone without her sounding like she's making things up.
@@genericallyentertainingtheoretical physicists do think about philosophy. At least the good ones should At the philosophical level at the foundation of all of the theoretical physics are invariants and simmetries. The basis of physics shouldn't depend on your location and time. If this doesn't hold you basically have no way to repeat the experiment so there's no way to check the results. This basically cripples science, because it's based on reproducibility of experiments
@@genericallyentertaining It would have been nice to see some of this show's incredible budget go to paying for real life popular physicists ... Michelle Thaller, Neil DT, Micchio and Brian Cox all arguing on the set of a talk show to underscore the colossal, global impact and catastrophe of this and the arguments that now erupt in the public sphere about the collapse of physics
I think it would be better if the explanation was that the sophons were directly flashing messages into the eyes of scientists to coerce them to commit suacede. Lil microscopic LowTierGod.
15:20 I can see where you’re coming from but I think painting some of critique of Auggie as based on misogyny is far too broad of a brush. FWIW, I’m female and I also could not stand her character. IMO, the character was not at all believable as a nanomaterials scientist. Personality-wise, She didn’t carry herself in a way that made it believable to me that she was someone of that stature and intelligence and experience. I think there are some people commenting on her “looking like a supermodel” out of bad faith, but I think the point people were trying to get at is that her glamorization (if you see her that way) just adds to the disbelief of her character - she just felt out of place for the role she was supposed to be in. I went into the show completely blind, but I can totally see how hearing the critique of Auggie beforehand would seem like an exaggeration. Kind of like people hyping up a show or movie as like the best ever, and when you watch it, it just doesn’t live up to the expectations that had been built up. That being said, my biggest complaint of the show by far is that I found most of the characters annoying. I could not be bothered to care about most of their emotional drama which paled in comparison to the rest of the story in terms of holding interest. IMO, Auggie was the most egregious example of that. By the time we get to her emotional difficulty handling her moral dilemma, I felt like it was too late for the character to redeem herself as a believable, realistic person by that point so despite the gravity of the situation, it just felt like more melodrama from her character.
The red coast base scene is literally more acurate to the books in the netflix version. In the books, she instantly wants to go inside, and the officers have to tell her to slow down and think about it. And she refuses and still wants to instantly go inside. Its one of the few things that the netflix version does more acurately.
so i watched the show, then read all 3 books, then rewatched the show. i think the netflix adaptation is a perfect adaptation. it isn't a 1:1 translation between mediums. but the broader plot is close enough to be recognizable. especially with the tencent adaptation existing. you don't need westerners just doing the same thing. it builds off of the original in a really functional way.
The reason it bothered me that Auggie looked like a super model is that she (actress) had no other qualities that justifies Netflix's choice of hiring her. None of the other characters look especially pretty, regardless of their jobs, so seemed like Netflix really wanted her character to stand out from the rest. I think the fact that the "lead female" has to look like a super model is more misogynist. Also her acting / the writing was not convincing me that she is a scientist, it just looks like Auggie is trying very hard to act smart. It seemed to me like Netflix choose her because they wanted a pretty lead female instead of a actress/actor more fitting for the roll. This is not saying a scientist can't look like a super models, its simply saying you still need to be a good actress regardless of your looks. also saying that the character is meant to be unlikable is just an excuse. You can still be a good actor/actress and have good writing even for characters that are meant to be "unlikable".
@@changdemi514 yes and also in the books wade was stressed out, sleep deprived, desperate, hopeless, he really felt like he was on his last leg, and Auggie doesn't really get that across for me, and i think part of it is that she always looks like a team of people spent hours on her hair, makeup, and outfit. her friends are being killed and she's seeing a countdown in the corner of her vision while mysterious strangers tell her to stop her work and always looks like she could be on the cover of a fashion magazine
This doesn't have to do with anything, but I just want to say that when I first had heard of the title of the show, I thought that it was a murder mystery about finding three "odd" bodies.
a bit late to the party, but here are my 2 cents ^^ i am clearly leaning heavily towards the tencent version and the books. netflix did some things right, but not many. also i am pretty harsh in my criticism and kind of a book fan to the point i dont necessarily see that many "book flaws" as you described them as that bad or better portrayed in the netflix version. but i think theres one thing they did right: the soundtrack. you may call it boring, but some themes are sticking out for me, so much that i put the score of the netflix series over the tencent one (which may be more colorful and diverse, but also has many clearly ripped versions of other western media soundtracks, e.g. Interstellar). Origami boats is grim and melancholic and punches me in the gut every time its on, and the intro scene was the BEST for me. this track will clearly be my no1 track on spotify this year, and the intro is great as well. netflix just did a huge crime by cutting the intro out of 7 of the 8 episodes. I love it to death, and this may be over the top, but a company that doesn't even take the time to leave in an 80 second intro into an aleeady insanely cut-down show, shouldn't be allowed to tell a story this grand.
Nice review, I've just finished the books and am now looking forward to seeing the TV adaptations. It was interesting to get an outline from your review, I'll try both! Of the books my reviews are: 1. Meh! 2. Very good. 3. Endlessly inventive and entertaining! I wanted more! You pointed out some of the interesting flaws, particularly of book 1 and the VR game. I always thought that this was somehow connected directly to Trisolaris, but here I am probably wrong, but without this, as you say, it doesn't make much sense. And I agree about Tianming, without them being better friends (as in the TV series) then his behavior is a bit odd! However, the relationship I have the most problem with is that of Cheng Xin with Sophon! I mean, she only tried repeatedly to kill everybody, the way of tea doesn't seem enough as an apology!
As someone who doesn't really like Sci-fi shows or books, generally because most of the science in them usually flies way over my head. Somehow I was able to finish this show with a moderate understanding of things that were going on and I still loved it.
The ”cool” characters Saul and Auggie made me give up on the show after only half an episode. After a prolonged break I gave it another go. Saul did mostly redeem himself while Auggie was developed into a thoroughly unlikable character. So I can watch it while disliking her character. Win win.
You are right in the representation of the game. Yet the shortcut of the science itself is the problem with it. I read these books like 5 times now? and never found it boring or the game part annoying. But immediately noticed that Netflix’s show (again) thinks that the audience is dumb. Not just here. They simplify everything. As you said, there is no opposition in the traitors. The behavior of the scientists is really bad. And of course they had to look good. No, you are not right, this super model look was really outstanding. I’m not the one who jump on this but as Doctor House said: he hired Alison for her looks. 😁Elisode 1 season 1… As for the cut out of the Chinese part is one of the biggest mistakes. It’s one essential aspect of the book and that could give 1/3 of the season- we didn’t need the second book yet. It’s incredibly important and I just watched and didn’t understand why they did that first.. then I saw the full twist to a western style story. Of course Netflix had to do that too. This book is Chinese, period. The behavior of the characters (being badly portrayed or not) is typical Asian, not western how they react. There is no hope or at least not that big as usual, this book as Merphy Napier says a sci-fi horror. I would not say that but her emotional reaction is this and she is not really wrong.
The thing about the Judgement Day scene that I really hated is how it isn't just confusing to understand what's happening until it's happening--it's the fact that it was clearly intended. During the scene there's someone that's part of the operation that, after seeing the boat pass through, remarks that it isn't working, as if he was led on to believe it was going to work like a net (which was actually the impression I was under at first) and didn't even know the purpose of the operation. I can see Wade being reserved about sharing this knowledge, but Augie is the first person to point out that it is working as intended, so surely that means she knew this was going to happen, but she's just been uncharacteristically quiet about it until the moment bodies start dropping. It really feels like a weird contrivance for the sake of an Epic Twist™, and it honestly made Augie in the back half feel a lot more whinny than depressed to me, because she really didn't seem to give a shit about the people she was going to kill before they actually started to die, at least not to the degree you'd expect from her character given how she acts in every other situation.
I clearly didn't see it that way. I'm pretty sure the plan was clear for everybody involved. They didn't use her tech just to make a "net", the whole point was that they ruled out a traditional assault could result in loosing the data (I assume they thought even if they were so unlucky as having the harddrive cut, it could still be mended, put back together?). Why I think Raj is thinking it's not working is because he expected it to much more visually obvious limmediately that the thing was splitting the ship appart, but as we saw in the first episode when she splits the diamond, it doesn't instantly fall appart - I think the point is that she agreed because she experienced the countdown, was traumatized by it and its consequences, got a chance to "go back to work", and was sold on doing something to "save humanity". But she obviously couldn't stomach actually seeing the consequences. A sort of Oppenheimer situation if you will. She focused on the science, ignored the casulties that were going to be involved "for the greater good", cause "they're a group of traitors to humanity who get people killed, some she knew" but that all shattered once she saw the bodies drop.
I have dug through the bottom of the barrel inside kindle unlimited hard science fi!!! Lol. During times on said couch with other nutcases from the phsych wards, I could read up to 600 wpm, track conversations, tell guy who wants mental piracy, while I still keep track of time. Therapist turns me on to 3 body. First two books paid for kindle unlimited. Last book, hard cover he loans me. He sits across the living room watching my eyes to understand how fast wpm I can get up to. In bed, reading alone, my stress levels increased when they were cooking fish on a boat swirling down a maelstrom of water.
very nice video, you pointed things that i didnt realize. Just one sugestion just about the form. Sometimes your sentences are edited so close together that it almost sounds like they overlap. I am non native speaker, not sure if it is relevant. But it made listening to it slightly uncomfortabe in those moments.
I think what I didn't like about Auggie was just that she was so unrelatable, she felt the least like a real person and it stood out, especially when compared to Jin and Wenjie. Every scene her hair is perfect, her makeup is perfect, her clothing is perfect, and it personally just took me out of it considering everything they were going through. I think it's more of a personal gripe I have with a lot of portrayals of female characters in shows, and this just sort of tipped me over cause it was so unnecessary. She can still be beautiful but like damn, let a girl have a bad hair day or something like the rest of us :'0
No bro, there are already a TV series. Why waste time doing something so primitive as reading a book when there's a film/TV series already based on it? A book will just be the first draft of any story, film makers can develop and fully realize a story when adapting it. Also remember that any book worth reading will be adapted for the screen, so the smart thing to do is just to wait till that happens instead of potentially reading a bad book. I'm not saying that every single film based on a book will be good though, as sometimes a film maker will choose to adapt a bad book without being able to fix the story - this is what happened to The Hobbit film trilogy for example.
@@oonmm Good grief, I hope this is some sort of joke/parody. There are both poorly done books and poorly done movies. They are two separate things. But reading is not "primitive." It's the foundation of a society. It's not "the first draft" and then the story is the real thing or the finished thing. Unbelievable.
The mental seal is The important catalyst for the government to awaken Baihai/Raj and give him command of a ship. But it can honestly just be introduced by a random scientist and then debated for the same effect while saving time. However, I am going to miss Bill's wall breaker reveal.
I think with Ye's character in the netflix adaptation may have been them not wanting to be seen sucking up to China as many films and shows have done to death. I thought they had done the best to keep to the original but keep it fresh and digestible for english audiences.
The idea that Auggie is too good looking has nothing to do with misogyny. Dismissing it as such is just a weak approach to your argument. (I don't like what you said so I'm going to call you a name and drop the mic.) My wife (and engineer) actually pointed out the reason that her good looks are not typical for top end scientists. The main reason is that looking that good is hard work. How much does that actress work out? How closely does she watch her diet. How many hours in makeup did she spend before the shoot each day. People at the top of their fields in things like science and engineering just put their priorities elsewhere. Only so many hours in a day.
lol well, that’s just wrong and small minded. I went to graduate school at an engineering school and there were tons of beauties at my school. People that are mad at the casting of a good looking woman as a scientist just have no real life experience in these spaces so they turn to hating her for absolutely no reason, i.e. misogyny. It’s just nonsensical.
Hey man, nice video. However, I must say, I completely disagree with your take about that flickering star illusion. Light pollution in big cities part is true and it hurts my suspension of disbelief too, however, an entire sky blinking out of nowhere is literally a cosmic horror show. Starting from simulation theory, it either implies there might be something between us and the starts that cuts all the vision or the literal lights of the universe went out for a second. Consider this, I am a nitpicker too and didn't know anything about the books and didn't know what to expect. It was quite exciting to speculate what it could be (as the show has a serious science fiction setting) until they explained it. Note: I just watch the season last month and gave it a solid 7 out of 10
great review thanks, i have seen both tv versions and read the books, i agree the chinese version is better than netflix even though i have to read subtitles, cant wait for season 2 and cant wait for season 3 of wheel of time and rings of power but they can keep the acolyte
I think this is going to be one of the shows that is excellent once it has all of its parts. This book series really needs each of its parts to function as a whole, and I don't mean that as a bad thing by any means. It is a very measured and well structured literary pie.
Love the ' it's not the end of world'. Definitely going to watch more of the Chinese show now, have read the all the books and you do a great comparison. Thank you.
unfolding a proton into the size of a planet in order to etch microprocessor patterns onto it's surface requiring engineering feat and humongous amount of energy that can bankrupt the resources of that civilization that attempt it, hence can only create a handful. And energy force field is needed in order to protect the fragile 2-dimensional proton surface from high-energy particles from the surrounding environment. Folding back into it's original size after completion also required the same resources. Unfolding the proton without the original alien equipment near Earth is very dumb in the Netflix show
I think you got the suicide plot in the Netflix series wrong, and this is just how I saw it. Okay, the Tri-Solarins have demonstrated the ability to manipulate human environment. With the visors, what they did the Auggie and how they went full comic book villain with Thomas Wade. The scientist who jump in the 1st episode was the daughter of Ye Wenjie who discovered her mother's real plan and probably understood what the Tri-Solarins wanted all along. With Auggie they just straight up threatened her but she couldn't tell her friends she was seeing a countdown clock before her eyes because that sound like mental issues. And we all remember the scenes when they confronted Thomas Wade. So what they told me is that maybe a lot of physics principals being upturned could have been upsetting but the Tri-Solarins were also applying other pressures to push them in that direction. I don't think the show was clear on the Tri-Solarin;'s motivations for wanting the scientist dead, I don't remember them referencing it. (I could be wrong, I only watched it twice.) My impression from everything in the Netflix series was that the Tri-Solarin's pushed them to it. And I realize that I am colored because I have read the books - and hated all the science theory in it, especially The Dark Forest which was so colonialist European in it's thinking I kept trying to make sure the author was actually a native from China - and I knew their motivation for wanting scientist gone before they arrived.
So many people miss out on the point of the first bar scene. It's not meant to show them as smart yet cold and unable to connect to people. It's meant as a counterpoint to the Cultural Revolution: even in a free society, humans are shitty to each other - like the guy who goes up to hit on them when they are clearly not interested, does not get the hint that they aren't there to meet people (they're there to catch up because it used to be their chill hangout spot), and then was clearly about to make some very sexist assumptions about what they do for work. Maybe you've never been hit on by someone who doesn't take no for an answer and demeans you, but I think that scene resonates for many, many women. And it's not just some kind of "men bad" feminism either - the first intro we get to that scene is an embarrassingly un-self-aware woman singing, and then either she or another woman (i forget which) really gets up in their personal space when she picks up her drinks at the bar. I'd even go so far as to say that it's foreshadowing for (or reference to) the critique of overly indulgent utopian societies post calamity in the second book.
No, one missed out, they just saw it for what it was - pointless neo-feminist activism bullshit about being strong independent female against the "typical toxic male." It was completely presumptive, and did NOTHING to further the story - It was a girl-boss talk-down with zero purpose other than to reinforce other sexist stereotypes about men, while trying to pretend they are addressing other problematic social norms. Utter garbage and a waste of time.
Spoilers... . . . . . I think the choice to put Auggie as the Ding Yi character is the best option, but perhaps not as Ding Yi. Ding is a physicist and Auggie doesn't have the same qualifications. If they can find a way to work her into the scene it would work well, and would also allow Saul/Luo Ji to become Swordholder without the baggage of a wife and kid, who don't have any future relevance to the plot as a whole. It also does not make sense to have Auggie as AA. AA is Cheng/Jin's expositional bridge to the future. However, this brings up consequences for the ending. If there is no Auggie, or if Auggie is stuck with Will on Planet Blue (AA and Yun), then who is with Cheng/Jin while they discover the death lines? Raj/Zhang? That would require him to survive the battle of darkness. This would end with Jin and Raj together in the pocket universe while Will and Auggie (or whoever plays AA) stranded on Planet Blue... all this kind of works together nicely with the actual ending where Cheng/Jin and Will/Yun never reconcile their true feelings, and gives the goldfish scene massive weight.
TV shows are much better at adapting books, IMO, to better and worse effect depending on the adaptation. I can't imagine how terrible a 3PB movie would be. Way too short a format. Great video! 😃
The suicides made no sense if it was just "physics is broken." But, it made me relieved that I'm too "stupid" to understand what it meant. I am relieved that there were other reasons. No one commits suicide because of one factor of their belief system has changed, unless that is literally all they have. I'm a therapist that worked in suicide prevention for 15 years ANd I have a HUGE math learning disability, I like physics but literally need it explained to me in a story or I won't get it. So, I appreciate this video!
I agree and disagree at the same time. What if Augie's nano-fibers were cut by the sophons during every alpha-test? Every pre-check would be green, all the science would affirm the inevitable success ... and yet ... the fibers fall apart, having been struck by the sophons. This would be a public and personal and professional humiliation for Augie. She may even begin to suspect espionage, she may start to develop paranoia because the material world is rebelling against her every (years of academic effort) certainty. Perhaps she starts to even think her closest friends are conspiring against her to stop her from succeeding because they're jealous. Then the company starts to close down departments - she feels responsible for the destruction of dozens of careers. Then the economic impacts finally hit her - she has to sell off investment properties because she's no longer being paid an executive salary. People are calling for the retraction of papers she's published now because her alpha-test has failed so spectacularly - she's accused of falsifying science because it doesn't actually work. Her legacy, career, reputation and future prospects seem to be disintegrating. Then there's just the raw human psychology of it, suicides, like divorce often occur as social contagions - spreading in 'popularity' because others have done it. If an esteemed colleague self-ended, the weight starts to pile up. THIS would be a far more enthralling story that a stupid visual hallucination of a countdown and a mysterious woman and a blinking sky.
@@6Churches Except if the sophons could interact with the physical world in such a massive way as breaking the strongest material ever made, it would also break the story because then they could just destroy everything before the San Ti arrive. The fact that the sophons can only create illusions and temporarily manipulate electronics at best is their defining weakness.
@@saucevc8353 The sophons can directly impact particles, right? Is there that much difference between a particle in a collider and a particle in a nano-fiber? I assumed the Sophons could do a lot - the Netflix show implies they temporarily took over the entire internet and power supply right? When the 'You are bugs' incident happened -was this not sophon related? If not - then how was it achieved?
@@6Churches Uh yeah, there’s a big difference between hitting a single free flying proton and disrupting the bonds of multiple carbon atoms arranged in literally the most powerful chemical bond possible.
@@6Churches The “You are bugs” was the sophons interfering with electronic devices. That’s different from them interacting with the physical world though because they’d just need to interfere with electrons and not atomic structures.
regarding the idea of a photon being an entire civilization, there's an animated film called "Horton hears a who!" i recommend to watch. its story has a similar idea and made a deep impression on me.
I’ve not read the books (yet) and not seen the Chinese adaptation but the Netflix version seemed a bit cheap. I watched it all and then forgot about it.
I enjoyed it as my first exposure to the series. I enjoyed the books far more, and im hyped about this chinese series, hoping to find it subbed and watch. I agree about Yie. 3 body just made me see her as akin to a school shooter, but the books showed her as more complex. Really looking forward to the original adaptation, especially since i consumed the audiobooks and the names were difficult to keep track of fully without a visual representation. Purely because im not used to chinese naming convention, i found it harder than russian names lol, my very own three syllable problem 😅
it was my interpretationin the books that many of the suicides were actually murders and siphon driven suicides. also, the hidden consciousness inside protons was my favourite bit. almost lovecraftian. lastly, I turned the show off for weeks after the dumbass flickering scene. edit: Can't forget the western "China bad" stuff from the adaptation.
great review, thanks, i also enjoyed all 3 adaptations up to date, and the books being my fav, and i agree the chinese adaptation is better than the netflix version even though i have to read subtitles , cant wait for season 2 of both versions , and cant wait for season 3 of wheel of time, cant wait for rings of power either, but i will not be watching a second season of the acolyte except to see just how bad it is, its the only reason i sat through season 1, and it was maddening , insulting.
Not sure what could take the place of the struggle sessions. Perhaps victims of McCartyism or the Miner's strike. Yeah... doesn't really compare. I like that some of it is rooted in China, and some in the West, I think it gives the story a much needed well rounded (as it were) and global feel, essential regarding the threat facing the whole world. If anything the show needed more of that.
I don't think I really enjoyed the netflix adaptation at all. Making all the main characters from the books part of the same friend group in 21st century Britain is just stupid to me. Everything about the netflix show was just so flat. The cinematography, the lighting, the music, the writing. It just fucking sucked
The cinematography was definitely one of the weakest parts of the show for me; the lighting and compositional choices were rather uninspired, albeit typical for many shows these days. But the story itself was enjoyable enough that I didn't hate the show at all.
@@genericallyentertainingI disagree I mostly liked the look of it I liked the look of the game and really liked the look of 1960s red coast base I also think the character writing was much better than the books the characters are so poorly written in the books imo and lack any human emotions
25:10 but isn't the San-ti unable to lie? I mean i guess it's not a direct lie but it is manipulation and hiding their intentions from him which is an alien concept to them in the show
@@tiefensucht I’m sorry that scene upset you so much - I wanted so badly for there to be a way for them to escape that part :( I feel like the point of that was to emphasize how morally grey the situation was. They have to stop a greater problem, but it will involve killing innocent people, including children. I think showing that there were children on the ship really drove that point home and had a harder emotional impact.
I was very pleasantly surprised by the Netflix adaptation and happy that they seem to be ready to complete the story. The Tencent adaptation is immersive once you've adjusted to its glacial pace but I doubt I'd have been interested if I hadn't already known the story.
I was very skeptical going into the Netflix adaptation but I was pleasantly surprised. I completely agree that Da Shi was a bit fumbled in the show but the character that really bothered me was Raj Varma. It is clear that Raj is supposed to be Zhang Beihai but not only are they very dissimilar in terms of personality, Raj also doesn't seem to have the sense of duty and singular purpose that drove Zhang Beihai. I have always viewed Zhang Beihai as a sort of fifth, secret wall facer in that he has a goal and works towards it without sharing any details of his plans with anyone and I just don't see Raj accomplishing this. He isn't shown to have that level of intelligence, subtly, foresight or zeal. He is just a follower, doing what he is told and he even seems to have a petulant streak.
when compared to the chinese one its inferior but one thing they did well imo for the most part is the 60s timeline in mao's china....but the chinese one was done so much better
Yes, it sucked. The "writers" were more worried about expressing girl-power and diversity than honoring the story and viewers. It was pandering that got in the way of an already complex story. Not to mention they injected all kinds of vulgarity that just did not belong. I had to grind my teeth through the first two episodes, and could barely make it past the third.
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The "strong female character" BS was off-putting. I came to 3 Body not having read the books. I'd seen the Chinese show's trailers but never watched it because subs are too fast and I tend to watch these shows while I work on a different PC.
The bar scene where they rattle off their exploits to the nice guy is not the sole instance of the "strong female" trope. There is another on-the-nose scene where one woman says "I was at the doctor's office" (or something) and the other woman says "What did he say?" and the first woman says "Not he... she". I rolled my eyes hard.
The gender swapping was much more obvious once I listened to reviews of the Chinese one then it made sense why the male characters in the western version were dumb, designed to be unlikeable or weak and the women were constantly being praised with "she is the smartest person i have ever met", "she is the only one who can do this", "we have 100's of the best engineers and physicist but we need her". I was just like... sigh... really?
Even the prime anti-hero, wenjie... she doomed earth because of her feelings but in the western version u can see she gets the "women can't do wrong" treatment. A male character dooming earth to ruin would have been portrayed less favourably... probably getting the littlefinger exit.
The scientist suicides in the book weren't about the experimental results not matching theories, it was about them not being consistent. Doing the experiment over and over gave completely random results every time. It made it look like causality isn't real. It made the very idea of science seem wrong.
“…comes from string theory and so probably has no basis in real science.”
BRUTAL
Well, that's why it's called science fiction
Yet true
KO!
@@hexPixelStarshipsNot to get all argumentative, but science fiction is SUPPOSED to be based on science, science FANTASY (Star Wars) doesn't care.
There's a reason why there's a hard line between Hard Sci Fi, and Sci Fi, hard sci fi leans into the science tenfold, but sci fi should still be leaning on it nonetheless... Otherwise it's just fantasy. Again, see Star Wars.
We should ban all peope who don't have degrees in physics from the internet, the strnig theory hate is so cringe
I vastly prefer the Tencent version, but man, the decision to bring up the Death's End section to straighten out the timeline and its setup and the foreshadowings that came with it have been really well done. I think they've overdone a lot of the character related stuff but Will's part was absolutely phenomenal imo. Best depiction of the "You're special to me and I know I'm not that special to you but that doesn't make you any less special to me and I'd do anything for you but won't express my feelings cause I think you'll be happier that way" feeling I've ever seen on screen
I agree, that plotline in particular was what made the show go from "Eh, this was fun, but I couldn't really get past the flaws," to, "Wow, I actually really enjoyed that!" Still not a perfect show overall, but I'm disappointed that I haven't seen too many people praising the Will/Jin stuff. They're really taking full advantage of the foreshadowing potential and I'm all for it.
@@genericallyentertaining I agree it should be praised, it definitely worked much better. But I guess the author couldn't simply go back in time and change the first books, while the writers of the adaptation have the privilege of knowing it all :P
I'm the opposite I had tons of problems with Tencent 30 episodes that drag on and on. Chinese censorship Changing Ye backstory with her father. Explaining things over and over again and then making tou watch flashbacks of the same scenes. Lots of sides characters to fill runtime. I liked some of it but I had a lot of issues with it. It also was filmed like a commercial imo
Completely agree! However I really enjoyed the Netflix version just as much as the Tenecent version. I love how they decided to make the characters friends with each other. It will make their transition into the future more impactful. Especially if they do the scene where Jin reunites with Saul in the Deterrence center. That's gonna be hard to watch.
Well i prefer the Minecraft version
I thought the suicides were because other Scientist were seeing countdowns, or things like that too. That kind of psychological horror would do awful things to people
Yeah - I still don't have a clear grasp on what was causing the countdown - and whether it was happening to multiple people at once, or only one at a time
@@6Churches It would be the sophons wiggling inside their eyeballs creating the hallucination. Sophons are just protons, so they would produce electromagnetic radiation (light) when they accelerate.
@@randallte2556 Wade can hear the Sword Lady speaking as if she were standing in front of him - this is a multi-modality hallucination
@@6Churches that is a good point which breaks the physical rules of sophon tech. They are powerful enough to accelerate to near light speed while being remote controlled light-years away via quantum entanglement bs, but limited to only producing light. They cannot physically interact with anything in an OP way, like producing sound, pushing objects, or cutting things.
The manipulation of electronics is also something that may not be a physically accurate sophon power, would need to consult a better physicist. Although if you allow for this, maybe we can say they used an electronic device to produce the audio.
I don't remember auditory hallucinations or electronics manipulation occuring in the books, so I think just the show gets it wrong there.
@@randallte2556 thanks man. You're not responsible, it's D&D being sloppy show runners
The "universe winking" is great in that later scene when Saul is talking to Ye Wenjie and explains that even though people all over the world saw it, it had to be an illusion, one of the first hints that humans are not helpless in the face of the Trisolarians.
Not helpless? To me "had to be an illusion" means that humans are largely incredulous ... not resilient
Well you have the right spirit 😂@@6Churches
That was a facepalm moment. Universe blinking for everyone defies the purpose of what it was supposed to be shown and the meaning behind it. But hey, we are in the west so let's throw the Science out of the window because our dumbed down public will get hired and we aren't capable of explaining it in a comprehensive manner anyway.
@elenabob4953 it wasn't scientifically accurate but I found it very creepy and thought it worked well instead of having Wang running back and forth with goggles on freaking out with bad acting.
The "physics is broken" part, I agree with you that their actions might have been a bit exaggerated, but it's not just "because experiments are giving random results" - The Turkey story that is in the books and adapted in the Tencent version actually gives some insight into that: The reason for their despair was the possibility that there is NO WAY to understand what is actually going on in the universe. They felt like they were like those turkeys, that even the best of turkey science could never predict that they're actually just being bred for slaughter. It does make sense for a passionate scientist to feel some level of despair at that prospect. In fact it's one of the most memorable things about the book for me.
The adaptations' straight up just muder a bunch of scientist is way less imaginative and boring... and also probably wouldn't work very well, science is a huge collaborative effort, they would have to murder a LOT more people for generations, hurting their chances of achieving their desired state of conquest.
Agreed -- the horror and despair is coming from the possibility that science as a concept itself does not work in the universe, and that the mechanisms of physics might be either random or fundamentally unknowable for humans. The depth of emotion that arises in this context makes sense for scientists, something that the books and Tencent adaptation understood, and I felt the Netflix show did not really care about. A related idea forms the premise of Ted Chiang's short story "Division by Zero" for example.
@@Stillnothereanymore In general, and the video also comments on that at the beginning, the adaptation from netflix fails to capture this scientific, even if fantastical, outlook that the book relies on to tell its' story.
Not to mention that it wasnt just random results it was the breaking of causality. Seeing that someone else got your random results before you ever did the experimemt must be spirit breaking especially when you bring in the pool analogies; ie does it matter where the pool table is to the result?
Its a fundamental break in our ability to understand. Some greater power is actively fucking with you. The question is: is it a farmer or a bored sharpshooter?
The book and tencent version also go in about this. It wasnt just how broken science was. It was that there was an alien worshipping cult presenting you with a false dichotomy as truth under the guise of religion. Their god gave them your random science experiment result before you did you experiment. Their god makes cosmic background radiation flicker.
Imagine some young earth creationist prays and makes the universe flicker. That would be soul crushing. And all the while they are talking about how we don't deserve to live or the garden we live in. And using your answer of whether its a farmer or sharpshooter to help decide where to guide you or to eliminate you. To have a constant countdown projected onto your eyes that defies all known science.
@@Stillnothereanymore The notion that at that level of scale and energy the world is so random would still fail to explain why the world is so consistent at the macroscale. So even then I'd say high energy physics would still have plenty of avenues of exploration. Even just in trying to explain why experiments now are inconsistent with older ones.
Short Form over here sponsoring your first long-form video? That's rich. Congrats, my dude.
So in an interview the creators said they're doind just the three books. They dont have any intention of doing the fourth and they said Netflix doesn’t even own the rights to that one anyway. Another interesting tidbit they dropped was they said under the contract they signed with the three body rights holders they were "only allowed " to do the Chinese parts in the past and modern day had to take place somewhere else. Apparently the Chinese rights holders wanted another version to be set more in the west
You mean Tencent/(likely) The CCP
@Hurricayne92 so they signed a contract with the Chinese rights holders and they didn't go into detail what it all said only that they were only allowed a certain amount the take place in China
"They dont have any intention of doing the fourth and they said Netflix doesn’t even own the rights to that one anyway."
LETS FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
@@didyoutakemykombucha8336 lol I had a sigh of relief when they said that also
To echo a couple other comments, the "physics is broken" thing goes deeper than random results. (To an extent, randomness is expected in quantum physics anyways so it's not like that's a new thing.) Not that the show does a good job of portraying the nuances there-I had the same gut reaction of "new physics? Scientists would eat this up"-but on reflection I don't think the *concept* is unreasonable.
The issue isn't that the understanding of physics was broken, it's that the *process* of science was being broken. Sure, you get weird results on an experiment, publish a paper... Now what? There's no way to achieve peer review because nothing is replicable (because it's being sabotaged). You have a flood of nonsense papers that are never used for anything, because they can't be. There's no underlying law or pattern to identify, so any attempts lead to running in circles. Lack of progress and meaningful outcomes leads to defunding, eventually, for the entire field-particle accelerators ain't cheap.
In the face of that species of obsolescence, I can absolutely see utter despair overtake an alarming number of scientists.
I don't know that it singularly kills all the top scientists-that may be a projection of Eastern honor and work culture to the rest of the world-but the morale hit would certainly be meaningful at the least. Other methods could also make up the difference too (countdown vision to undermine self-confidence, or just straight up murder as you said).
Exactly - and this would be a far more interesting drama to explore through Augie rather than the sensationalised numbers-countdown she gets (plus the Tatiana interlude and the sky blinking). If scientists cannot publish, then grants cannot be granted, tens of thousands of researchers lose their livelihoods and perhaps even their homes if they can't find new work. With Augie we just a sense she has such formidable independent wealth ... and this waters it all down, she never actually experiences desperation - nor does the show really explore the torment of being discredited
I think the random results is way more demoralizing than you make it out to be. At first I'm sure the scientists were excited to discover what was going on but you cannot fit any model to random noise so eventually they would lose hope in the field. I agree that it being like an epidemic felt very exaggerated but it's pretty devastating to have your entire field of study disappear after investing a good part of your life into it.
Yes. It makes publishing now impossible because all results are non-significant and also non-repeatable - making you look like all you have is noise, randomness and bias
I mean its heavily implied in the show that all the scientists (except Vera) were affected by the same thing as Auggie, hence the eyes being scratched out.
@@Hurricayne92 But how plausible is that? We see through Augie's eyes and she doesn't become s___cidal . Scientists would be curious about the phenomena
As someone who has neither read the original book nor the Chinese live action adaptation, I went into this show without any expectations. Some of it I liked, some of it just seemed kinda off or rushed. However some things really stood out to me, and by far the best (and most heartbreaking) was the exceptional writing and acting around Will/Jin:
They both play it so genuine, I was legit sobbing in that one episode. I also think they truly thought about how Will would feel as his condition worsens. As someone who is chronically ill with a condition that may or may not at some point in my life deteriorate my body rapidly without warning, I resonated a lot with Will and his musings about his life and decisions. Heart wrenching, but in a good way. But then, the scene that truly broke me was the one where Jin asks for the seeds to be included, subsequently seeing it all fall apart and (presumably) being told that those seeds were the crucial tipping point. And to her it's not only a failure to succeed in a mission, it was a failure towards her last tether to Will. Honestly, superb writing that just twists the knife so well.
As for Auggie's scene, I can see your point that this one went too far the other way with the kids. But at the same time I think it was a good example of how, even when trying to persuade ourselves that we're doing it for the right reasons, we can cause harm to whom we least expect and that more often than not "the enemy" is not one homogenous group of bad people and I think it solidifies Auggie's conviction to repent in any way she can. To which I gotta say that another scene that I just LOVED was her publishing her work and basically make the patent obsolete. Gating stuff behind patents that disproportionally hit marginalized people/areas has long been an issue and for her to just rip it away and make it accessible to everyone? Just beautiful.
On a lighter and pettier note, I honestly enjoyed the scene with Auggie and Jin at the bar at the start. I know how many say it's more tell than show, that it gives off the image of scientist superior - you are a pleb - but at the same time, I've seen so many women (myself included) just minding their own business wanting to chat, just to be interrupted for no reason and therefore getting rebuffed like that, gave me joy :')
My sister when that scene came on said "so many rude guys have done that to me before at a bar" lol
TV Show runners just don't have the balls to respect the viewers' intellect.
Maybe they were afraid of getting the reception "Tenet" got. Which wasn't as confusing as some people made it out to be.
@@danielsjohnson that's why I respect Nolan. He doesn't give a fuck.
I've heard that designing a bear proof trash can is incredibly difficult due to the fact that there is a significant overlap between the smartest bear and the dumbest human.
@@Hurricayne92 😂😂 Well, yeah... that makes sense.
Just like Liu Cixin. Thats why it is insulting to call these books hard scifi.
I haven't yet started the video, but I have to say I am overjoyed to see more long-form content on your channel! Not that I don't enjoy all of your content, but long form is my favorite. Alright let's gooooooo
Thanks, I want to do more long form videos, but I keep putting them off! Lately, I've only been doing one long-form video every two months or so, which is horrible. Will try to get the next one out quicker.
41:45 I do have to say that I think that’s the point of that scene. We’re put in Auggies place, she doesn’t really know what’s on that ship either. She’s just letting military use her equipment. And then she gets into those ruins and personally experiences how her choice killed hundreds of innocent children. It’s supposed to be unexpected and gory.
When I watched that part I was really interested how they will work it out and man it is incredibly brutal to see it play out.
I didn’t like it at all and I’m glad I read the books first. The series is just watered-down garbage. You lose most of the characters and details that make the story interesting
The books are watered down garbage. Seriously, the fucking so called science in these book is like magic.
I appreciated that someone actually looked like they were dying of pancreatic cancer, instead of romantically dying of cancer like all the suspiciously health-looking people in the "dying teenager" movies of the last ten years or so.
Apparently, the actor really committed to the role he spent a week at a cancer ward talking to patients and researching their behavior and physical appearance, and he lost weight for the role. Actually, apparently, all the cast did a lot of research. The other cast spent 2 weeks every day at a university studying scientists and students, and they said one thing they found was TV shows and movies wildly misrepresent scientist most of the time. They said they're mostly just normal people. They curse and joke a lot. They go out to bars and have drinks with each other. They have interpersonal relationships and date each other. They're not these people in lab coats that have all the answers and have no flaws. Instead, the complete opposite.
In general, I agree with most of your points, though of course not all. One thing that stands out to me is your comment about foreshadowing the paper boat and fairy tales: I assumed that was exactly the point of it in the book. She only knows to look deeper into his fairy tales for hidden messages BECAUSE she knows it's a lie, which implies that there is a different reason for him to tell them to her. If they truly had shared fairy tales as children, there would have been a reasonable chance she would have just accepted it as a sort of fulfillment of an emotional wish to relive that. Only because it was such an obvious lie did it work to get his true message across with 100% certainty!
Yeah I'm mixed on this. On the one hand, their relationship in the books was really bad, this was compounded by my general dislike for Cheng Xin, in the series their relationship is much better and I don't hate Jin (so far). But yeah it showed Tianming's cleverness and was a stronger scene in the books because it was a lie.
It also seems like they are having Auggie take on some of the characteristics (and role) of AA from Death's End. We'll have to wait til later seasons to see for sure but I think that is what they're doing.
The characters were far better fleshed out in this version than in the books. They were two-dimensional and very monolithic in the books.
And I don't mind at all that you convert a cast to be more like their intended audience.
Or do we all expect actual Italians everytime we go to see "Romeo and Juliet"?
Absolutely they had actual human emotions in the show
Wrong
@@alexanderoneal6553
Would you care to add any final thoughts to your thoroughly convincing argument?
I mean this is common in Sci-fi book though, the ideas are the main character and the characters just facilitate the idea. Sci-fi readers won't find this an issue but the average Netflix watcher definitely needed the change.
I think the problem for us non western viewers is that this a story written from a Chinese perspective and have all of the nuances and traditions of the characters ripped out and pasted to London is a really lazy way to adapt a novel from another culture. Fellow youtuber AvenueX did a really well deep dive into a Chinese perspective of the Netflix three body problem why it wasn't well received within China. I really didn't like how they race swapped important characters to westerners in a age when we lack good Asian representations. Netflix turned Ye Wenjie from this nuanced but strong willed women into this angry and spiteful villain, turned Da shi from this down to earth cunning cop to this random bodyguard with no personality, and race swapped positive Chinese characters like Luoji and Zhangbeihai. It just feels incredibly disrespectful as they turned this beloved Chinese epic into a generic hollywood popcornflix. I think there is a clash in values between western audiences and the Chinese perspective of the original trilogy that the screen writers unfortunately didn't try to bridge.
YES, CHEESUS FRIED CRUST, YES!
is not just race swap, the whole vibe are just... gone. might be a culture thing, there's a lot of characteristic gone and does not feel right. While foreigner had no problem watching.
For example, in original book, it gave a feeling of everyone in the world are doing their part. But in netflix they making every character know each other, it given a dorm friends go haha and rescue world vibe. The scale are shrunken really fast. And Also too many ooc.
Things like Ye Wen Jie bang someone who met in few day is just unimaginable. I mean do banging really something hard require for netflix series?
@slatealan7082 I have to disagree the first book is also pretty isolated to mostly just China and a small amount of characters also. The second book is really when it expands and the creators of the Netflix show said the second season is absolutely going to expand more I actually think the show did a really good job. My gripe with the books is they have great ideas but most of the characters are so dull and thinly written and lack almost any human emotions. I like that they gave the characters some human emotions and brought some in earlier so have it connect better on the later seasons. I liked some of Tencent but I had a lot of issues with the pacing and explaining things over and over again and they flashbacks to the same scene we already watched again along with some Chinese censorship also didn't help it imo. I actually think the did a really good job with Ye with the short amount of time they had. Apparently the creators said under the contract they signed with the Chinese rights holders they were only allowed a certain amount to be set in China. I completely disagree with her video and she seemed to do zero research about how the Chinese rights holders wanted a western version. Imo Netflix is the better show than Tencent
@@jeffbachman2949
So many problems people have with Netflix's casting will be understood if they all knew about the contract
@Roachh2877 and that the Chinese rights holders wanted a western version but that would require doing some actual research
31:40 It's not that all of physics is wrong, it's not just that physics is "broken", it's that physics does not exist. It's not that the results haven't been figured out, it's that they can't be figured out.
It's interesting how the showrunners asked the author who gave them the greenlight, knowing there would be many changes. It is good that Dan and Dave asked the author for permission to make these changes before proceeding. I think Cixin Liu doesn't care about the character changes but he wants the overall theme of his stories to remain intact.
I like your overall point about what the writers were going for having all main characters be life long friends with each other. Ultimately I feel like it's an odd element to try to bring into a story that's about all of these different people from around the world drawing on human experiences to try to understand these greater concepts. I think back to the Trisolarans using historical scientists to relate their own problems, or the Aboriginal man in Australia in the 3rd book relating the experience of being colonized. I think that theme is kinda at odds with this whole "dynamic group of friends" they've all put together, and I hope it focuses more on splitting them all apart rather than having them share another AirBnB by the beach again lol.
The book was very light on character development or character relationships. This is common in written scifi, but I kind of wonder if it was a cultural difference too? Book was great but had very distinctive vibes to me - it "felt" Chinese.
They couldn't do a straight adaptation because it just wouldn't play well on screen or to western audiences. Too fragmented, not human enough. Having the scientists be friends was a way to add back in that human element but still have the plot basically intact
The imaginary girlfriend part in the book was really weird but something about it worked for me and I felt connected to it in a weird way. Im glad they cut it though, the plot point would not have worked in the show at all.
Edit: I will defend Redemption of Time. It isnt perfect, and has plenty of issues, and some of the characterization seems a tad bit off, however it feels like a love letter to A Remembrance of Earths Past. One that got the attention of the original creator. I dont think of it as cannon though, but it does explore some interesting ideas.
I read RoT in one or two sittings and the only thing I remember thinking was how it was just a long string of Cheng Xin stepping on the same rake named "don't let your womanly love steer your choices". I did however love the imaginary girlfriend plot in the second book. It was the one redeeming thing about Luo Ji.
@@kleko lmao the thing about RoT definitely feels accurate.
Sadly, the series had too few episodes. I love what they did to Will's character, tho. They took out Tian Ming's creepyness and made him likeable and endearing.
Love the idea of Auggie becoming a version of Ding Yi, instead of Aa.
A 50 min video is not "extreme" in depth review of a series. Its a review.
I loved the 4th book! It's definitely worth checking out. A very thoughtful nerd put it together, someone who was obviously obsessed with the original trilogy
As someone who read The redemption of time, the themes and concepts it dwells in are endlessly fascinating and on par with the original trilogy. However, its treatment of previous characters are arguably lackluster, but as someone mostly invested in the big ideas I remained hooked throughout the end.
I really liked the Netflix show, I feel like a lot of the changes worked really well and I'm excited for season 2
I just finished the series and except for the scientist who jumped into the accelerator, I didn’t think any of the others were caused by despair over science. (And even then, I thought maybe she had a countdown.) It seemed more like they were going insane from the countdown/the countdown being the literal cause. Maybe even whatever they were shown after the countdown. If there were scientists that died unrelated to the countdowns, that detail was completely lost on me.
In the books the scientist suicides remain a mystery, even after the revelation of Sophon. One plausible theory is some grew deranged from the visual hallucinations of Sophon. Others may have become despondent at the failure of their research (through Sophon's interference). Another plausible theory is some had suicide "happen to them" - that is, they were assassinated by ETO members and their deaths made to look like suicides.
In the show, ETO is not named and its organisational structure has been greatly simplified. In the books, ETO is a deeply divided, deeply dysfunctional organisation. It has many smaller factions within itself like Frontiers of Science, which tries to recruit scientists like Wang Maio (roughly Jin/Auggie) to solve three body problems. These ETO splinter factions broadly fall into 3 opposing schools of thought - Adventism, Redemptionism and Survivalism.
Frontiers of Science is a Redemptionist faction. They don't want the Trisolarans (San-ti) to invade earth but do want to co-operate with them by solving each other's problems.
The Adventists think humanity is the author of its own demise and cannot help but destroy the natural world. The Adventists are opposed to the Redemptionists because if they succeed in their mission to solve the three body problem, they believe the Trisolarans wont need to invade earth and the natural world will die at our own hands. The book characters Pan Han and Mike Evans are Adventists.
The Survivalists intend to sell everyone out to ensure their own survival in whatever new world emerges post human/trisolaran contact. They are thought of as cowards and everyone hates them.
They all have conflicting goals and they all have extremist elements that sabotage, terrorize and murder each other. Shit gets crazy.
In the show, ETO is depicted like a cult with singular vision and purpose. In the books, ETO is depicted as all of Ye Wenjie and Mike Evans's inner conflict and doubt made real. It shows how the road to hell is paved with good intentions. That even the most enlightened thinkers are not above dogmatism and when they are given over to extremist thinking, the ends will justify the dirtiest means.
Love the long form video! Ofc I dont expect every video on every channel to exceed 30 minutes but the little 2 and 5 minute ones just don't hold my interest. And as someone who just can't get into the 3 Body books, I appreciate being able to find solid reviews that do spoil things and acknowledge issues with both the original work and the adaptations
Thank you for this video, very fair critiques of the source material and the adaptations. So I watched the Netflix version first, then I bought the three body book and read that approximately the same time as I watched the tencent show. I agree with you that none of them are perfect, and if we could just put them all together it would be great. That said, knowing all the stories I can kind of do that in my mind so that's fine. Some of the nitpicky parts of the video, I can see where you're coming from although I enjoyed some of the scenes you didn't like, probably because the Netflix show was my first exposure to any of this. Lastly, I'm glad you brought up auggie again towards the end. I think you're pretty spot-on, I think she'll likely fill in for AA and Ding Yi, as well as luo jis wife- I imagine she'll be an amalgamation of all that and possibly more. Really looking forward to the future seasons, particularly how the wall breakers, sword holders, tian Ming's fairy tales and more are handled. I could speculate on many things but I feel like that may just be setting up for disappointment... I actually am fine with the source and the adaptations being quite different because, as I said, I can fill in the blanks in my mind.
Happy for the sponsor man, Buy nice things
about the "physics is broken" plot line, my take is that the in the book it is more philosophical. because the data are random, the cause-effect logical chain for human being to understand the world is broken. and that is the philosophical basis of physics and science.
Yeah, I understand this, but I would still argue that most physicists don't think about their work purely from a philosophical perspective. After all, physicists have been debating the implications of quantum mechanics for a hundred years, but we're no closer to a deep philosophical explanation for that theory. Not to say that philosophy of science isn't a huge and important topic, but there's a reason physicists say "Shut up and calculate," regarding quantum mechanics: at a certain point, you just have to accept the experimental results and work backwards from there, even if the results don't immediately appear to follow the law of cause and effect or contradict all your philosophical notions.
And anyway, how could you conclusively prove that "the data are random?" From a physicist's perspective, there could very easily be factors influencing the experiments that you're not aware of - and indeed, there are, since the interference is caused by sophons - and it would then be your job to find these unknown factors. The law of cause and effect is something that can be reasoned out a priori, not something that can be disproven experimentally, and I think physicists in this case would hold true to it while spending however many years it takes to figure out what is causing the interference.
Wow, this turned into a long comment. But anyway, those are just my thoughts.
@@genericallyentertaining Yeah, that is one thing I find ridiculous from the book and the Tencent series, tho it sounds scary, no physicist in real world would actually ended their life when they found out physics doesn't exist, it would excited them.
Yang Dong was a special case. Perhaps those who killed themselves were driven into serious existential crisis by sophon similar to Wang Miao's case but we never know. In the Tencent series the other two scientists other than Yang Dong that shown off-ed themselves seems to portrayed as they have strong belief in current science almost religously.
However the Tencent series did mentioned on how different scientist react to the crisis and how those who didn't ended up killing themselves were either ended up joining ETO or killed by ETO disguised as suicide or incident, we were shown in some scene that Shen Yufei and Pan Han taking orders to "get rid of" Wang Miao from ETO's higher up, so probably not all suicide case were actually suicide case.
The Netflix series also brought up similar plot with a scientist found "drowned" himself in a bathtub and the murder of Jack. One thing I find kinda dumb in the Netflix series is why sophon only removing the killer from CCTV footage but not the whole killing intead? Or the scene when Tatiana lit a cigarate for Auggie but the CCTV footage only shown the cigarate lit up itself. Wouldn't it made more sense if they just altered the CCTV footage by removing everyone? It would left more mystery to the authority and Auggie would suffers more serious crisis because there's no evidence of her meeting Tatiana therefore she couldn't talks to anyone without her sounding like she's making things up.
@@genericallyentertainingtheoretical physicists do think about philosophy. At least the good ones should
At the philosophical level at the foundation of all of the theoretical physics are invariants and simmetries. The basis of physics shouldn't depend on your location and time. If this doesn't hold you basically have no way to repeat the experiment so there's no way to check the results. This basically cripples science, because it's based on reproducibility of experiments
@@genericallyentertaining It would have been nice to see some of this show's incredible budget go to paying for real life popular physicists ... Michelle Thaller, Neil DT, Micchio and Brian Cox all arguing on the set of a talk show to underscore the colossal, global impact and catastrophe of this and the arguments that now erupt in the public sphere about the collapse of physics
I think it would be better if the explanation was that the sophons were directly flashing messages into the eyes of scientists to coerce them to commit suacede. Lil microscopic LowTierGod.
The Minecraft version is goated
15:20 I can see where you’re coming from but I think painting some of critique of Auggie as based on misogyny is far too broad of a brush. FWIW, I’m female and I also could not stand her character. IMO, the character was not at all believable as a nanomaterials scientist. Personality-wise, She didn’t carry herself in a way that made it believable to me that she was someone of that stature and intelligence and experience. I think there are some people commenting on her “looking like a supermodel” out of bad faith, but I think the point people were trying to get at is that her glamorization (if you see her that way) just adds to the disbelief of her character - she just felt out of place for the role she was supposed to be in.
I went into the show completely blind, but I can totally see how hearing the critique of Auggie beforehand would seem like an exaggeration. Kind of like people hyping up a show or movie as like the best ever, and when you watch it, it just doesn’t live up to the expectations that had been built up. That being said, my biggest complaint of the show by far is that I found most of the characters annoying. I could not be bothered to care about most of their emotional drama which paled in comparison to the rest of the story in terms of holding interest. IMO, Auggie was the most egregious example of that. By the time we get to her emotional difficulty handling her moral dilemma, I felt like it was too late for the character to redeem herself as a believable, realistic person by that point so despite the gravity of the situation, it just felt like more melodrama from her character.
The red coast base scene is literally more acurate to the books in the netflix version. In the books, she instantly wants to go inside, and the officers have to tell her to slow down and think about it. And she refuses and still wants to instantly go inside. Its one of the few things that the netflix version does more acurately.
so i watched the show, then read all 3 books, then rewatched the show.
i think the netflix adaptation is a perfect adaptation. it isn't a 1:1 translation between mediums. but the broader plot is close enough to be recognizable. especially with the tencent adaptation existing. you don't need westerners just doing the same thing. it builds off of the original in a really functional way.
I absolutely loved this show and rewatched it probably 5 times
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The reason it bothered me that Auggie looked like a super model is that she (actress) had no other qualities that justifies Netflix's choice of hiring her. None of the other characters look especially pretty, regardless of their jobs, so seemed like Netflix really wanted her character to stand out from the rest. I think the fact that the "lead female" has to look like a super model is more misogynist. Also her acting / the writing was not convincing me that she is a scientist, it just looks like Auggie is trying very hard to act smart. It seemed to me like Netflix choose her because they wanted a pretty lead female instead of a actress/actor more fitting for the roll. This is not saying a scientist can't look like a super models, its simply saying you still need to be a good actress regardless of your looks.
also saying that the character is meant to be unlikable is just an excuse. You can still be a good actor/actress and have good writing even for characters that are meant to be "unlikable".
yeah like Wade is exactly a character that is meant to not be liked but was done well.
@@changdemi514 yes and also in the books wade was stressed out, sleep deprived, desperate, hopeless, he really felt like he was on his last leg, and Auggie doesn't really get that across for me, and i think part of it is that she always looks like a team of people spent hours on her hair, makeup, and outfit. her friends are being killed and she's seeing a countdown in the corner of her vision while mysterious strangers tell her to stop her work and always looks like she could be on the cover of a fashion magazine
This doesn't have to do with anything, but I just want to say that when I first had heard of the title of the show, I thought that it was a murder mystery about finding three "odd" bodies.
a bit late to the party, but here are my 2 cents ^^
i am clearly leaning heavily towards the tencent version and the books. netflix did some things right, but not many. also i am pretty harsh in my criticism and kind of a book fan to the point i dont necessarily see that many "book flaws" as you described them as that bad or better portrayed in the netflix version.
but i think theres one thing they did right: the soundtrack. you may call it boring, but some themes are sticking out for me, so much that i put the score of the netflix series over the tencent one (which may be more colorful and diverse, but also has many clearly ripped versions of other western media soundtracks, e.g. Interstellar). Origami boats is grim and melancholic and punches me in the gut every time its on, and the intro scene was the BEST for me. this track will clearly be my no1 track on spotify this year, and the intro is great as well. netflix just did a huge crime by cutting the intro out of 7 of the 8 episodes. I love it to death, and this may be over the top, but a company that doesn't even take the time to leave in an 80 second intro into an aleeady insanely cut-down show, shouldn't be allowed to tell a story this grand.
Nice review, I've just finished the books and am now looking forward to seeing the TV adaptations. It was interesting to get an outline from your review, I'll try both!
Of the books my reviews are:
1. Meh!
2. Very good.
3. Endlessly inventive and entertaining! I wanted more!
You pointed out some of the interesting flaws, particularly of book 1 and the VR game. I always thought that this was somehow connected directly to Trisolaris, but here I am probably wrong, but without this, as you say, it doesn't make much sense.
And I agree about Tianming, without them being better friends (as in the TV series) then his behavior is a bit odd!
However, the relationship I have the most problem with is that of Cheng Xin with Sophon! I mean, she only tried repeatedly to kill everybody, the way of tea doesn't seem enough as an apology!
19:40 - When I found out Benedict Wong would play Da Shi, I was pretty happy because he's who I imagined in that role when I was reading.
As someone who doesn't really like Sci-fi shows or books, generally because most of the science in them usually flies way over my head. Somehow I was able to finish this show with a moderate understanding of things that were going on and I still loved it.
33:30 the self offing we see at the start of the show has nothing to do with the science but the San'Ti/Trisolarans are still involved.
Yes. It sucked. Can’t wait for season 2 of the Chinese version 🤷♂️
The ”cool” characters Saul and Auggie made me give up on the show after only half an episode. After a prolonged break I gave it another go. Saul did mostly redeem himself while Auggie was developed into a thoroughly unlikable character. So I can watch it while disliking her character. Win win.
You are right in the representation of the game. Yet the shortcut of the science itself is the problem with it. I read these books like 5 times now? and never found it boring or the game part annoying. But immediately noticed that Netflix’s show (again) thinks that the audience is dumb. Not just here. They simplify everything. As you said, there is no opposition in the traitors.
The behavior of the scientists is really bad. And of course they had to look good. No, you are not right, this super model look was really outstanding. I’m not the one who jump on this but as Doctor House said: he hired Alison for her looks. 😁Elisode 1 season 1…
As for the cut out of the Chinese part is one of the biggest mistakes. It’s one essential aspect of the book and that could give 1/3 of the season- we didn’t need the second book yet. It’s incredibly important and I just watched and didn’t understand why they did that first.. then I saw the full twist to a western style story. Of course Netflix had to do that too. This book is Chinese, period. The behavior of the characters (being badly portrayed or not) is typical Asian, not western how they react. There is no hope or at least not that big as usual, this book as Merphy Napier says a sci-fi horror. I would not say that but her emotional reaction is this and she is not really wrong.
Ah, perfect. Now I can stop thinking about maybe watching this show.
The thing about the Judgement Day scene that I really hated is how it isn't just confusing to understand what's happening until it's happening--it's the fact that it was clearly intended. During the scene there's someone that's part of the operation that, after seeing the boat pass through, remarks that it isn't working, as if he was led on to believe it was going to work like a net (which was actually the impression I was under at first) and didn't even know the purpose of the operation. I can see Wade being reserved about sharing this knowledge, but Augie is the first person to point out that it is working as intended, so surely that means she knew this was going to happen, but she's just been uncharacteristically quiet about it until the moment bodies start dropping. It really feels like a weird contrivance for the sake of an Epic Twist™, and it honestly made Augie in the back half feel a lot more whinny than depressed to me, because she really didn't seem to give a shit about the people she was going to kill before they actually started to die, at least not to the degree you'd expect from her character given how she acts in every other situation.
I clearly didn't see it that way.
I'm pretty sure the plan was clear for everybody involved. They didn't use her tech just to make a "net", the whole point was that they ruled out a traditional assault could result in loosing the data (I assume they thought even if they were so unlucky as having the harddrive cut, it could still be mended, put back together?).
Why I think Raj is thinking it's not working is because he expected it to much more visually obvious limmediately that the thing was splitting the ship appart, but as we saw in the first episode when she splits the diamond, it doesn't instantly fall appart -
I think the point is that she agreed because she experienced the countdown, was traumatized by it and its consequences, got a chance to "go back to work", and was sold on doing something to "save humanity". But she obviously couldn't stomach actually seeing the consequences. A sort of
Oppenheimer situation if you will. She focused on the science, ignored the casulties that were going to be involved "for the greater good", cause "they're a group of traitors to humanity who get people killed, some she knew" but that all shattered once she saw the bodies drop.
I have dug through the bottom of the barrel inside kindle unlimited hard science fi!!! Lol. During times on said couch with other nutcases from the phsych wards, I could read up to 600 wpm, track conversations, tell guy who wants mental piracy, while I still keep track of time. Therapist turns me on to 3 body. First two books paid for kindle unlimited. Last book, hard cover he loans me. He sits across the living room watching my eyes to understand how fast wpm I can get up to.
In bed, reading alone, my stress levels increased when they were cooking fish on a boat swirling down a maelstrom of water.
very nice video, you pointed things that i didnt realize. Just one sugestion just about the form. Sometimes your sentences are edited so close together that it almost sounds like they overlap. I am non native speaker, not sure if it is relevant. But it made listening to it slightly uncomfortabe in those moments.
I think what I didn't like about Auggie was just that she was so unrelatable, she felt the least like a real person and it stood out, especially when compared to Jin and Wenjie. Every scene her hair is perfect, her makeup is perfect, her clothing is perfect, and it personally just took me out of it considering everything they were going through. I think it's more of a personal gripe I have with a lot of portrayals of female characters in shows, and this just sort of tipped me over cause it was so unnecessary. She can still be beautiful but like damn, let a girl have a bad hair day or something like the rest of us :'0
I saw tons of female scientists praise the female characters especially Jin
Darnit, I STILL have to read these books!
No bro, there are already a TV series. Why waste time doing something so primitive as reading a book when there's a film/TV series already based on it? A book will just be the first draft of any story, film makers can develop and fully realize a story when adapting it.
Also remember that any book worth reading will be adapted for the screen, so the smart thing to do is just to wait till that happens instead of potentially reading a bad book. I'm not saying that every single film based on a book will be good though, as sometimes a film maker will choose to adapt a bad book without being able to fix the story - this is what happened to The Hobbit film trilogy for example.
@@oonmm Good grief, I hope this is some sort of joke/parody.
There are both poorly done books and poorly done movies. They are two separate things. But reading is not "primitive." It's the foundation of a society. It's not "the first draft" and then the story is the real thing or the finished thing. Unbelievable.
@@oonmm lol quality b8
It’s one of the greatest book series I’ve ever come across
@@tremarley9648 So everyone says! I hate that I'm missing out. I'm just buried in books at the moment.
NETFLIX´s 3body was a very well made fan fiction of the original. I was really sceptical, but pleasantly surprised in the end.
I can't imagine Shi being whimsical and the show keeping the neccessary tone.
The mental seal is The important catalyst for the government to awaken Baihai/Raj and give him command of a ship. But it can honestly just be introduced by a random scientist and then debated for the same effect while saving time. However, I am going to miss Bill's wall breaker reveal.
I think with Ye's character in the netflix adaptation may have been them not wanting to be seen sucking up to China as many films and shows have done to death. I thought they had done the best to keep to the original but keep it fresh and digestible for english audiences.
The idea that Auggie is too good looking has nothing to do with misogyny. Dismissing it as such is just a weak approach to your argument. (I don't like what you said so I'm going to call you a name and drop the mic.) My wife (and engineer) actually pointed out the reason that her good looks are not typical for top end scientists. The main reason is that looking that good is hard work. How much does that actress work out? How closely does she watch her diet. How many hours in makeup did she spend before the shoot each day. People at the top of their fields in things like science and engineering just put their priorities elsewhere. Only so many hours in a day.
lol well, that’s just wrong and small minded. I went to graduate school at an engineering school and there were tons of beauties at my school. People that are mad at the casting of a good looking woman as a scientist just have no real life experience in these spaces so they turn to hating her for absolutely no reason, i.e. misogyny. It’s just nonsensical.
Good Lord 🙄
Amazon dropped the ball by not getting dubbed versions of the Tencent Adaptation in several languages.
Hey man, nice video. However, I must say, I completely disagree with your take about that flickering star illusion. Light pollution in big cities part is true and it hurts my suspension of disbelief too, however, an entire sky blinking out of nowhere is literally a cosmic horror show. Starting from simulation theory, it either implies there might be something between us and the starts that cuts all the vision or the literal lights of the universe went out for a second. Consider this, I am a nitpicker too and didn't know anything about the books and didn't know what to expect. It was quite exciting to speculate what it could be (as the show has a serious science fiction setting) until they explained it. Note: I just watch the season last month and gave it a solid 7 out of 10
我不确实是不是翻译的问题，但是刘慈欣对书中的内容很严谨，很多科学家的“自杀”是来自于降临派的杰作
great review thanks, i have seen both tv versions and read the books, i agree the chinese version is better than netflix even though i have to read subtitles, cant wait for season 2 and cant wait for season 3 of wheel of time and rings of power but they can keep the acolyte
Thanks so much for your support! I really appreciate it.
Honestly I liked it at the start but the ending kind of felt drawn out and kind of dissapointing
I think this is going to be one of the shows that is excellent once it has all of its parts. This book series really needs each of its parts to function as a whole, and I don't mean that as a bad thing by any means. It is a very measured and well structured literary pie.
I've got a bunch of games downloading. What a great way to pass the time!
Love the ' it's not the end of world'. Definitely going to watch more of the Chinese show now, have read the all the books and you do a great comparison. Thank you.
Auggie is irredeemable. She walked into her company's cleanroom without gowning.
unfolding a proton into the size of a planet in order to etch microprocessor patterns onto it's surface requiring engineering feat and humongous amount of energy that can bankrupt the resources of that civilization that attempt it, hence can only create a handful. And energy force field is needed in order to protect the fragile 2-dimensional proton surface from high-energy particles from the surrounding environment. Folding back into it's original size after completion also required the same resources.
Unfolding the proton without the original alien equipment near Earth is very dumb in the Netflix show
I think you got the suicide plot in the Netflix series wrong, and this is just how I saw it. Okay, the Tri-Solarins have demonstrated the ability to manipulate human environment. With the visors, what they did the Auggie and how they went full comic book villain with Thomas Wade. The scientist who jump in the 1st episode was the daughter of Ye Wenjie who discovered her mother's real plan and probably understood what the Tri-Solarins wanted all along. With Auggie they just straight up threatened her but she couldn't tell her friends she was seeing a countdown clock before her eyes because that sound like mental issues. And we all remember the scenes when they confronted Thomas Wade. So what they told me is that maybe a lot of physics principals being upturned could have been upsetting but the Tri-Solarins were also applying other pressures to push them in that direction. I don't think the show was clear on the Tri-Solarin;'s motivations for wanting the scientist dead, I don't remember them referencing it. (I could be wrong, I only watched it twice.) My impression from everything in the Netflix series was that the Tri-Solarin's pushed them to it. And I realize that I am colored because I have read the books - and hated all the science theory in it, especially The Dark Forest which was so colonialist European in it's thinking I kept trying to make sure the author was actually a native from China - and I knew their motivation for wanting scientist gone before they arrived.
So many people miss out on the point of the first bar scene. It's not meant to show them as smart yet cold and unable to connect to people. It's meant as a counterpoint to the Cultural Revolution: even in a free society, humans are shitty to each other - like the guy who goes up to hit on them when they are clearly not interested, does not get the hint that they aren't there to meet people (they're there to catch up because it used to be their chill hangout spot), and then was clearly about to make some very sexist assumptions about what they do for work. Maybe you've never been hit on by someone who doesn't take no for an answer and demeans you, but I think that scene resonates for many, many women. And it's not just some kind of "men bad" feminism either - the first intro we get to that scene is an embarrassingly un-self-aware woman singing, and then either she or another woman (i forget which) really gets up in their personal space when she picks up her drinks at the bar. I'd even go so far as to say that it's foreshadowing for (or reference to) the critique of overly indulgent utopian societies post calamity in the second book.
No, one missed out, they just saw it for what it was - pointless neo-feminist activism bullshit about being strong independent female against the "typical toxic male." It was completely presumptive, and did NOTHING to further the story - It was a girl-boss talk-down with zero purpose other than to reinforce other sexist stereotypes about men, while trying to pretend they are addressing other problematic social norms. Utter garbage and a waste of time.
I mean that wheel of time poster should have been a warning about the quality of the adaptation 😅
China still has dowry for women. Written under that culture, I can't see any misogyny. Rather, it's revolutionary in equality.
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I think the choice to put Auggie as the Ding Yi character is the best option, but perhaps not as Ding Yi. Ding is a physicist and Auggie doesn't have the same qualifications. If they can find a way to work her into the scene it would work well, and would also allow Saul/Luo Ji to become Swordholder without the baggage of a wife and kid, who don't have any future relevance to the plot as a whole.
It also does not make sense to have Auggie as AA. AA is Cheng/Jin's expositional bridge to the future. However, this brings up consequences for the ending. If there is no Auggie, or if Auggie is stuck with Will on Planet Blue (AA and Yun), then who is with Cheng/Jin while they discover the death lines? Raj/Zhang? That would require him to survive the battle of darkness. This would end with Jin and Raj together in the pocket universe while Will and Auggie (or whoever plays AA) stranded on Planet Blue... all this kind of works together nicely with the actual ending where Cheng/Jin and Will/Yun never reconcile their true feelings, and gives the goldfish scene massive weight.
I think they cut the fourth wall facer because Wade is essentially a wall facer already
Amazing video 🙏
Now let's watch it
TV shows are much better at adapting books, IMO, to better and worse effect depending on the adaptation. I can't imagine how terrible a 3PB movie would be. Way too short a format. Great video! 😃
The suicides made no sense if it was just "physics is broken." But, it made me relieved that I'm too "stupid" to understand what it meant. I am relieved that there were other reasons. No one commits suicide because of one factor of their belief system has changed, unless that is literally all they have. I'm a therapist that worked in suicide prevention for 15 years ANd I have a HUGE math learning disability, I like physics but literally need it explained to me in a story or I won't get it. So, I appreciate this video!
I agree and disagree at the same time. What if Augie's nano-fibers were cut by the sophons during every alpha-test? Every pre-check would be green, all the science would affirm the inevitable success ... and yet ... the fibers fall apart, having been struck by the sophons. This would be a public and personal and professional humiliation for Augie. She may even begin to suspect espionage, she may start to develop paranoia because the material world is rebelling against her every (years of academic effort) certainty.
Perhaps she starts to even think her closest friends are conspiring against her to stop her from succeeding because they're jealous. Then the company starts to close down departments - she feels responsible for the destruction of dozens of careers. Then the economic impacts finally hit her - she has to sell off investment properties because she's no longer being paid an executive salary. People are calling for the retraction of papers she's published now because her alpha-test has failed so spectacularly - she's accused of falsifying science because it doesn't actually work. Her legacy, career, reputation and future prospects seem to be disintegrating. Then there's just the raw human psychology of it, suicides, like divorce often occur as social contagions - spreading in 'popularity' because others have done it. If an esteemed colleague self-ended, the weight starts to pile up.
THIS would be a far more enthralling story that a stupid visual hallucination of a countdown and a mysterious woman and a blinking sky.
@@6Churches Except if the sophons could interact with the physical world in such a massive way as breaking the strongest material ever made, it would also break the story because then they could just destroy everything before the San Ti arrive. The fact that the sophons can only create illusions and temporarily manipulate electronics at best is their defining weakness.
@@saucevc8353 The sophons can directly impact particles, right? Is there that much difference between a particle in a collider and a particle in a nano-fiber?
I assumed the Sophons could do a lot - the Netflix show implies they temporarily took over the entire internet and power supply right? When the 'You are bugs' incident happened -was this not sophon related? If not - then how was it achieved?
@@6Churches Uh yeah, there’s a big difference between hitting a single free flying proton and disrupting the bonds of multiple carbon atoms arranged in literally the most powerful chemical bond possible.
@@6Churches The “You are bugs” was the sophons interfering with electronic devices. That’s different from them interacting with the physical world though because they’d just need to interfere with electrons and not atomic structures.
I enjoyed it, so that's enough for me to say that it didn't suck 🥰
Excited to hear your take though!
regarding the idea of a photon being an entire civilization, there's an animated film called "Horton hears a who!" i recommend to watch. its story has a similar idea and made a deep impression on me.
and it's apparently based on a Dr. Seuss story!
I’ve not read the books (yet) and not seen the Chinese adaptation but the Netflix version seemed a bit cheap. I watched it all and then forgot about it.
I loved it
I enjoyed it as my first exposure to the series. I enjoyed the books far more, and im hyped about this chinese series, hoping to find it subbed and watch. I agree about Yie. 3 body just made me see her as akin to a school shooter, but the books showed her as more complex. Really looking forward to the original adaptation, especially since i consumed the audiobooks and the names were difficult to keep track of fully without a visual representation. Purely because im not used to chinese naming convention, i found it harder than russian names lol, my very own three syllable problem 😅
it was my interpretationin the books that many of the suicides were actually murders and siphon driven suicides.
also, the hidden consciousness inside protons was my favourite bit. almost lovecraftian.
lastly, I turned the show off for weeks after the dumbass flickering scene.
edit: Can't forget the western "China bad" stuff from the adaptation.
Yes it did
i was fucking GLUED to that book
great review, thanks, i also enjoyed all 3 adaptations up to date, and the books being my fav, and i agree the chinese adaptation is better than the netflix version even though i have to read subtitles , cant wait for season 2 of both versions , and cant wait for season 3 of wheel of time, cant wait for rings of power either, but i will not be watching a second season of the acolyte except to see just how bad it is, its the only reason i sat through season 1, and it was maddening , insulting.
Not sure what could take the place of the struggle sessions.
Perhaps victims of McCartyism or the Miner's strike.
Yeah... doesn't really compare.
I like that some of it is rooted in China, and some in the West,
I think it gives the story a much needed well rounded (as it were) and global feel,
essential regarding the threat facing the whole world.
If anything the show needed more of that.
I actually liked Auggies character, i cant believe people were hating smh 🙄
I don't think I really enjoyed the netflix adaptation at all. Making all the main characters from the books part of the same friend group in 21st century Britain is just stupid to me. Everything about the netflix show was just so flat. The cinematography, the lighting, the music, the writing. It just fucking sucked
The cinematography was definitely one of the weakest parts of the show for me; the lighting and compositional choices were rather uninspired, albeit typical for many shows these days. But the story itself was enjoyable enough that I didn't hate the show at all.
@@genericallyentertainingI disagree I mostly liked the look of it I liked the look of the game and really liked the look of 1960s red coast base I also think the character writing was much better than the books the characters are so poorly written in the books imo and lack any human emotions
I disagree i really liked the show
25:10 but isn't the San-ti unable to lie? I mean i guess it's not a direct lie but it is manipulation and hiding their intentions from him which is an alien concept to them in the show
Yeah that scene with the nanomaterials really upset me.I wasn't ready to see all those kids dying and I had an anxiety attack after
..and there was zero reason to do this. All just for the "cool" effect.
@@tiefensucht I’m sorry that scene upset you so much - I wanted so badly for there to be a way for them to escape that part :( I feel like the point of that was to emphasize how morally grey the situation was. They have to stop a greater problem, but it will involve killing innocent people, including children. I think showing that there were children on the ship really drove that point home and had a harder emotional impact.
I was very pleasantly surprised by the Netflix adaptation and happy that they seem to be ready to complete the story.
The Tencent adaptation is immersive once you've adjusted to its glacial pace but I doubt I'd have been interested if I hadn't already known the story.
I was very skeptical going into the Netflix adaptation but I was pleasantly surprised. I completely agree that Da Shi was a bit fumbled in the show but the character that really bothered me was Raj Varma. It is clear that Raj is supposed to be Zhang Beihai but not only are they very dissimilar in terms of personality, Raj also doesn't seem to have the sense of duty and singular purpose that drove Zhang Beihai. I have always viewed Zhang Beihai as a sort of fifth, secret wall facer in that he has a goal and works towards it without sharing any details of his plans with anyone and I just don't see Raj accomplishing this. He isn't shown to have that level of intelligence, subtly, foresight or zeal. He is just a follower, doing what he is told and he even seems to have a petulant streak.
when compared to the chinese one its inferior but one thing they did well imo for the most part is the 60s timeline in mao's china....but the chinese one was done so much better
This is literally the swordholders but in real life
Yes, it sucked. The "writers" were more worried about expressing girl-power and diversity than honoring the story and viewers. It was pandering that got in the way of an already complex story. Not to mention they injected all kinds of vulgarity that just did not belong. I had to grind my teeth through the first two episodes, and could barely make it past the third.
I was waiting for this!! Will watch it later tonight
The books give a 2001: A space Odyssey and Hitchhiker’s Guide kind of vibe.
Wait, why HHGTTG?
@@singgihsuwangsa8650 The Vogons destroying the Earth.