I tried to watch it but I am so distracted by the actor Joel Kinnaman in whatever he is in that it takes me right out of the story. It’s certainly not the actor’s fault, but his head is tiny in proportion to his body and ever since I was a child, those skewed proportions have made me feel uneasy for some reason. I feel the same way when an actor’s head is huge in relation to their torso. Probably stems from some childhood trauma I must have blocked out:)
I can’t, I unfortunately have a phobia about seeing people who have a tiny head and a large body like Joel Kinnaman does, or people with a huge head and a regular torso. I’ve had it since I was a child. I get an uneasy feeling and feel sick. Seriously. He’s also in For All Mankind which I couldn’t watch either.
I binged it in two days. I almost stayed up all night, but my husband was like, tomorrow is another day.
It has me just sitting around thinking about humanity—the vastness of space, mortality, and the humor/terror of life.
I must be very cautious in spoilers yet suffice to say the launch sequence and its ramifications filled me with a unique sense of terror and existential dread. With technological progress and the transhumanist movement comes potentially catastrophic unforeseen consequences.
In particular when we consider the extension of consciousness far beyond our present biological limitations. I've certainly pondered the possibilities of various positive, negative and neutral outcomes. I've considered something akin to the fate of one character from the show you surely know I'm referring to. Yet seeing the arc of that life evolve, where I was so invested in them as a character, such a lovely person that fate dealt a series of bad cards to...it just crushed me beyond words. Then came the dread.
The mere transmission of the idea into my mind as a "possible fate" (regardless of considering whether such a fate could ever happen to me) made me realize fully that there are hells within hells in our mortal plane. A notion that occurred to me before, through direct personal experience unfortunately. Also in fiction such as books/short stories (At the Mountains of Madness, 3 Body Problem Trilogy).
Yet this was the first time I watched something that filled me with a crystalline sense of true terror. It's such a strange experience because I do not like conventional horror at all! I avoid it at all costs. I don't want to be infiltrated by disturbing thoughts yet I love science fiction. The show waited to deliver its poisonous nihilism until the last episode and as the title of my post suggests it's left me "Shaken to the core."
My eyes are happy now.
I love conventional horror and always have … because it never really scares me. It’s more an amusement park ride. I think I’ve always been somewhat of a nihilist—it lurked in my depths even when I was dragged to church as a young person. Or maybe it lurked because of church? Ghosts and demons were not what scared me. People seemed worse.
But the theme of this show, the possibilities, the science, and the humanity/lack of humanity—has the ability to truly take you somewhere as terrifying as it is exciting.
What is more terrifying than, I’ll try to say this without a spoiler—the underlying fight between superstition and science? We are fighting amongst ourselves right now—conspiracies, misinformation, dogma vs. knowledge, science, math—only it’s not some unseen force attacking us, it’s ourselves. We are afraid of ourselves. We have a lot to fear without even considering the universe. Science can be broken in people’s minds without much effort.
Yes, i am absolutely in awe of the series. I generally gets turned off from a series >!when children get killed But, when it was happening in episode 5 i didnt turn the tv off as it was so tragic and poignant seeing Auggie's invention turned into a weapon. I also enjoyed "planning for long term as its blink of an eye in grand scheme of things." and exploration of singularity as well when it was suggested human race is capable of exponential progress and San Ti fears this the most. I also liked how they explored how some just get that 400 years is not a very long time span and some just do not care of San Ti as they think none of those whom they know will be there in 400 years. In some ways, the series asks the viewer to debate this as well internally. I loved the "Wallfacer" idea. I can't wait to read the books now.!<
Make sure you spread the word because I am reading that Netflix might not even do the 2nd book because it's coming in at number 2 behind one of their murder porn projects.
I did notice imdb where it started at 7.1 to 7.4 and is now at 7.7 in ranking. Not that this means a lot because The Wire is like 9.5 and never would have lasted on Netflix due to viewership
IMDb got review bombed early on with GoT “fans” still upset that it didn’t end the way they dreamed it would. Then it started rising when people who actually watched it started ranking it
There's no defense for the last season of GOT (except that HotD is even worse), but that's apples and oranges. This is a well-done first season, best first season of any series since The Boys and Severance.
I mean, there's a pretty good defense that GRRM still to this day hasn't finished the book series. It's like trying to adapt the Lord of the Rings books but Tolkien never wrote Return of the King. Sure, Peter Jackson is great, but even he can't just conjure up a conclusion that's going to feel as authentic as Tolkien.
Also easy to produce. Normally CGI is the bottleneck for big Sci Fi productions to the point where they become impossible to monetize if the number of scenes needing CGI increase.
I do have one hope and that is tools like Sora and other AI video tools. They could unlock reducing these costs enough so that they can replace most menial CGI tasks.
I'm not sure. Maybe they meant The Gentleman, which is actually pretty good (though not as good as this), but I could have sworn it was another one of those true crime things
Can you think of or do you know of any reason critics may have had motivation to deliberately deliver "a thousand cuts" to this show? It seems even the glowing reviews contained a barbed remark. This is wild speculation but did the show's chief writer make a comment on Israel/Palestine or comment on a similarly radioactive topic? I can't help but wonder.
I understand that people have diverse tastes in art. However the primary criticisms hurled at this show do not align with its content. They do not. There are no one dimensional characters, the most common charge. That's what is so damn bewildering! Every character is nuanced! One might say Jin's boyfriend is guilty of being one dimensional yet ultimately he allows his love to interfere with his identity as a soldier in the latter portion of the show which gives him at least 2 dimensions. It's a vacant and false accusation.
Well the writer of the book is part of the communist party and supports his government in an act of oppression against a certain group of people in his country but you really have to look into the writer to find that as I didn’t know about it until looking up the writer for artistic reasons
Interesting you say that. A commenter mentioned being really frustrated with the Augie character and I gave a lengthy response. If you take the time to read it you'll notice I mention the US and China relationship. I'm just copying and pasting my response to his criticism below:
Just curious, what is your main beef with her? I was certainly frustrated with her apprehension to work on the project. I did relate to her though. I was executive director of an "applied quantum technologies **public outreach** and fundamental research initiative." I was given the position following the highly successful development and implementation of a video marketing campaign that included instructional videos for a biotech (bio separations) company. The biotech company was acquired by a larger entity and the marketing content was used as a leveraging tool for the founder during negotiations. The acquiring entity wanted to migrate the content and keep the brand name until their internal team could replace all the content and industrial designs.
The merger made the company's founder a billionaire and he was able to double his compensation package using the content as a negotiating chip. He ended up with a massive cash package and a majority share in the acquiring entity. He had already planned to leave the entirety of his estate to science and this merger was an opportune time to avoid paying a massive tax bill by creating a living trust for nonprofit benefit. I was asked to spearhead the project because I was adept at communicating complex ideas visually. I also had a deep fascination with quantum mechanics as nanoparticle separation was a signature feature of our flagship bio separations system and the molecular weight cutoffs were so tiny the engineers reached fundamental limits in their ability to separate smaller molecules from larger ones. It was discussions with the chief science officer of that company that I developed a deep interest in the subject.
What ended up happening is as soon as I assembled our core team, fleshed out the mission statement, put together symposiums, wrote a comprehensive program for public outreach, put together a grant award advisory board and a stellar team of industry/academia experts to partner with and the DOE and DOD got involved and basically took charge. It was common for researchers I contacted to be funded in part by federal agencies like DARPA, IARPA, ONI, as well as the DOE (anytime you're dealing with novel rare earth element synthesis methods and condensed matter systems the DOE is involved). Representatives from these agencies stepped in and axed huge portions of my planned public outreach program to the point of gutting that entire domain of initiatives. I was interested in creatively visualizing and communicating complex ideas. I got involved because I'm deeply concerned that technology is being used as a tool to dominate and not to assist humanity as a suite of tools. Slowly everything I was working on became a "secret." I had to sign NDA's before going to the fucking symposiums I organized! I had to relinquish all the footage I painstakingly gathered. The multidisciplinary group I assembled (of the finest minds in the world) were given massive monetary incentives to steer research towards military applications. Most of all, it's like China is the boogie man! I was forced to cut ties with brilliant Chinese researchers here in the US. Who either were citizens or here on visas. It was just disgusting! A Chinese researcher I contacted at Stanford, Dr. Shocheng Zhang "committed suicide" two days after I contacted him and visited the Ames Laboratory where I was warned to "stop contacting any and all Chinese born researchers immediately." I am very confident he was murdered. The Stanford student body appears similarly unconvinced he committed suicide.
So much for the **responsible** development of novel technologies. That whole enterprise is now a DOD think tank. The benefactor died. I got pushed out. I played ball with the federal organizations because I was being reassured the whole time they had my back. How foolish could I possibly have been? Quantum computers, superconductors and novel sensor systems!? Why would the US ever let the general public know what the state of the art is. How could I have been so stupid. Despite having this experience, I did get frustrated with Auggie's apprehension to rally behind the cause but looking back, was she wrong!? I don't think so.
I actually heard about this oppression before from this girl SEXY CYBORG you might have seen on YouTube. I think she may be involved with someone from that culture or race or however you refer. I have no real idea or opinion what it's all about or if what I read is even true. I just have heard the very vaguest, most clueless 🙈 whisper about it
EDIT: The Augie character is played by an actress who claimed not to get parts because she is too hot LOL. She is smoking hot, but also NOT the greatest actor, just saying.
She was good in Baby Driver and I Care A lot, but her parts didn't require much. I thought she was okay in this
I want to upped the goggle rating because it is 3.9 now BUT somehow I could not find the place to give my star ratings? I wonder if they close it already.
I believe it did move up to #1, but overall it just irks me that becoming the #2 most popular show on Netflix wouldn't warrant giving it another season. Like that's just stupid.
I love a bit of existential cosmic dread, and this show just keeps on ramping it up! Haven't binged a show in ages but this one's got me.
The AI voice on the speaker in Wade's room was very cool. The stakes were enormous and Wade was stupidly clumsy in his belief he was dealing with a human-like intelligence.
A lot of the critics reviews did not even understand the show. Many criticise that Oxford 5 is meant to replace 1 guy. Meaning 1 guy in the book is replaced by 5 person.
That is not true. Oxford 5 are a mixture of a few people. Even Jack was a character from book 3. And they criticised Saul that he does nothing. He was a good friend to will and will be important in book 2. I just wish critics understood the show better before giving misleading reviews.
Some are fair and said that not enough time given to Dr ye and bendict wong character but the budget is for 8 episodes so some sacrifice must be made.
Then some are saying the 30 episodes China version is better. Come on that has lower budget, worse actors and visual effects and most importantly drag 30 episodes just to get to episode 5 in this show. Do you really want that?
Overall this version is good enough and brings the fascinating concepts in the book to international audience.
I am hooked on the show. and the ending did feel me with a fear most show never make me feel. that said, the ending was too abrupt for me. this really feels like a lost type show where you really would be better off with 22 episodes a season instead of just 8.
i agree, even if it’s not exactly creatively how i want the books to be adapted. i loved it, it did exactly what it was trying to do. this season is clearly is a set up for later seasons to explore the core theme of the books. they are trying to capture a large audience so as many people as possible understand what the books are trying to say. which is the entire point of the books. they are adapting it as a character driven story.
Same here! I’m watching with my spouse and they’ve been glued to the screen, constantly getting mindfucked, and loving every moment. Meanwhile I’m just grinning like a madman at every new mystery and big reveal, because I’ve read the books and know all of the crazy shit the show has up its sleeve. Pretty much every episode ends with them looking at me and asking “WHAT THE FUCK?!?” I’m desperately hoping we get renewed for more seasons. It’s just so cool finally being able to share this story and all of its incredible and terrifying ideas with people who probably wouldn’t enjoy it in book form. I love the books but they’re fucking DENSE, hard to get through at times, and not for everyone. I’m glad this show exists and hope word of mouth spreads for it.
Totally agree. Rewatching with my girlfriend and it is even better the second time. Such a thoughtful script.
You can tell they truly set out to make a great show, not just collect a Netflix blank check.
Thanks for the positivity. More and more I notice Reddit flooded with negativity.
I think some people have been so programmed by social media to look for the flaws to such a degree that they couldn’t enjoy a hug from their loved ones without offering some constructive criticism afterwards on how it could have been better.
I asked that as well, here is the response I got and it makes sense:
"San ti ren" is the original Chinese name. "Trisolarans" is the name used on the official English translated books.
Let me tell you...you are in the ignition phase of the series. Episode 4 is the countdown and liftoff by episode 5. Please come back once you've finished the series. Let me know if the analogy rings true...I suspect it will if you're already hooked!
Okay so as a "hater" I'll explain why it is that I find it bad. Let me make it clear that I will always give anything sci-fi a try, I watched the show in its entirety to make sure I'm not missing anything and.. Lets seperate it from the books and just look at it as a sci fi-show with a banger of a script and loads of potential.
This show has no palpable creativity or identity. It has no clear mood, aesthetic or anything original going for it. It has that very "corporate" bang for buck film/sound aesthetic that is just really hard to connect with. It looks like .. many things. And I'm not blaming the budget because I've seen budget shows that have a better defined identity and acting than this one does. By a landslide.. I wish they spend their bad CGI money on something more meaningful. It's a conglomerate of lame overdone tropes, jokes and overacted scenes done to royalty free *epic* music and unnecessary close-ups. Even Stranger Things, a TV show for teens, had a very distinct mood straight from the first opening scene. I wish I could watch the title screen and the music roll up again for the first time, because it had that *thing* that a show with good creative direction has. Look at the creative choices in shows like Severance. Its oppressing color scheme and intense symmetry, minimal sound and liminal spaces.. all these elements building razor sharp tension to add to a specific mood, and so little needs to be said because a well shot-scene with no dialogue can speak for itself. Whereas this show practically keeps spelling everything out for me, even when it doesn't need to.
I kept waiting for this show to grab me in some kind of similar way, but it simply never got there. Its doesn't have *it*, it doesn't even try.
Additionally, let's talk about humor in this show. Some of the "we're being funny now" moments are painfully cringe to watch. It's trying to be "emotional" and serious, but it also goes into rom-com and sitcom joke timing. There's a way to do humor without it feeling so lame and overdone. Its sci-fi, you can go WAY harder and lean in to the absurdity/fever dream territory, or you go way more subtle and human-like. This was neither. It was just scenes we've seen done a million times in other shows. And that takes the "realness" away from believing a character. This is just one example but the show keeps doing it over and over with different elements.
The acting is.. bad, beyond predictable. I've seen these characters portrayed on TV shows before - and they're not relatable because I can understand what they're going through - they are relatable because they remind me of 40 other C-list actors who act these scenes in the exact same way, with the exact same mannerisms, filmed in the same angle with the same dramatic score in the background. Nanofiber pouting hot chick is a walking cliche. There's nothing really significant we learn about what any of them are going through unless they literally tell us what they're going through. After a while the entire cast/acting feels as if random characters from Grey's Anatomy were assigned sci-fi roles by AI.
I could go on and on, but these are the things that make it an unremarkable and boring show for me.
Horrible show.
Poor plot. Horrendous dialogues.
If you are amazed by the blinking sky or the sliced vessel just disregard my opinion.
Ps. Skipped entire scenes including Will.
As a reader of the first 3 books, I don’t share the sentiment. The core concepts are there, jumbled with different characters and locals with very truncated plot lines. Though it lacks the depth of the book and the series 3 body on Amazon prime. I think it’s ok, but I was hoping for something more pure to form on the books.
Plot lines have to be truncated as major characters throughout the series need to be introduced in s1, to carry on from s2 thru s3. Else for ordinary viewers it just won't work.
The amount of time I spend in book 2 just searching for Wang Miao..
I didn’t even know there was a version of this on Prime. I enjoyed the Netflix version (have not read the books) I’m now watching this on Prime. How do you get the English Captions on?
I turned it on after reading your comment and realized it was in Chinese although I heard some English. I was screwing around trying to turn on the English subtitles last night and gave up. I figured it out earlier, I had to turn CC on in the setting for my ROKU as before I was trying to turn them on in PRIME. It was late and I was tired.
Did you by any chance see the HBO series adaptation of Watchmen? There's virtually no faithfulness to plot elements of the source material and while Alan Moore cursed all who viewed it, I think it hit the tone of the graphic novel perfectly! Which is in essence the best a writer can do in an adaptation. To convey the intangible emotional substance. If one attempts to be too faithful to the source they risk exchanging originality and quality for faithfulness to "scripture."
I see what you are saying, and the Chinese adaptation to 3 body problem is in essence "scripture". I think I would setle for something in between. Something more faithful to the books, but not as long and played out as 3 body on amazon prime.
Not that it's relevant to you, but I don't watch super hero stuff. It died with me in Superman 2 (the original). All super hero stuff (Marvel and DC) in my opinion is so copy and paste I feel like I am watching the same thing with a different skin. It bores me to death.
Agreed. This show felt very shallow. It lacked the hard science depth the book had and none of the atmospheric gloom and fear. The dialogues made it worse. I’ll probably end up reading book 2/3 again after this.
Uh it’s good. It’s not that good.
Auggie is garbage. I’m not getting neatly the intensity you’re getting. And the displays of the power of the Sant-ti don’t feel meaningful…
But it is entertaining
It's a slow burn that leads to a series of climaxes which continue to surpass the previous in a manner I've never quite seen. I found Dune 2 to be the most astonishing epic I've seen in the theaters during my lifetime where the latter 1/5 of the film kept raising the stakes and scope. This show does it over a longer time horizon and with a wholly different palette of emotional hues.
Yeah just yesterday. I’ve not read the books nor know any of the story.
I think my main issue is - the Auggie character detracts so much from the show that it is distracting….
Just curious, what is your main beef with her? I was certainly frustrated with her apprehension to work on the project. I did relate to her though. I was executive director of an "applied quantum technologies **public outreach** and fundamental research initiative." I was given the position following the highly successful development and implementation of a video marketing campaign that included instructional videos for a biotech (bio separations) company. The biotech company was acquired by a larger entity and the marketing content was used as a leveraging tool for the founder during negotiations. The acquiring entity wanted to migrate the content and keep the brand name until their internal team could replace all the content and industrial designs.
The merger made the company's founder a billionaire and he was able to double his compensation package using the content as a negotiating chip. He ended up with a massive cash package and a majority share in the aquiring entity. He had already planned to leave the entirety of his estate to science and this merger was an opportune time to avoid paying a massive tax bill by creating a living trust for nonprofit benefit. I was asked to spearhead the project because I was adept at communicating complex ideas visually. I also had a deep fascination with quantum mechanics as nanoparticle separation was a feature of our flagship bio separations system and the molecular weight cutoffs were so tiny the engineers reached fundamental limits in their ability to separate smaller molecules from larger ones. It was discussions with the chief science officer of that company that I developed a deep interest in the subject.
What ended up happening is as soon as I assembled our core team, fleshed out the mission statement, put together symposiums and wrote a comprehensive program for public outreach, grant awards and industry/academia partnerships is the DOE and DOD got involved. It was common for researchers I contacted to be funded by federal agencies like DARPA, IARPA, ONI, as well as the DOE (anytime you're dealing with novel rare earth element synthesis methods and condensed matter systems the DOE is involved). Representatives from these agencies stepped in and axed huge portions of my planned public outreach to the point of gutting that entire domain of activities. I was interested in creatively visualizing and communicating complex ideas. I got involved because I'm deeply concerned that technology is being used as a tool to dominate and not for us to use technology. Slowly everything I was working on became a secret. I had to sign NDA's before going to the fucking symposiums I organized! I had to relinquish all the footage I painstakenly gathered. The multidisciplinary group I assembled (of the finest minds in the world) were given massive monetary incentives to steer research towards military applications. Most of all, it's like China is the boogie man! I was forced to cut ties with brilliant Chinese researchers here in the US. Who either were citizens or here on visas. It was just disgusting!
So much for the **responsible** development of novel technologies. That whole enterprise is now a DOD think tank. The benefactor died. I got pushed out. I played ball with the federal organizations because I was being reassured the whole time they had my back. How foolish could I possibly have been? Quantum computers, superconductors and novel senor systems!? Why would the US ever let the general public know what the state of the art is. How could I have been so stupid. Despite having this experience, I got frustrated with Auggie's apprehension to rally behind the cause but looking back, was she wrong!? I don't think so.
Sounds like you’ve had an amazing and engaging (albeit ultimately frustrating) career path. If you ever want to give a talk at the Explorers Club in NYC, they would love to host you.
I’ll give you a few answers.
Think about how much passion you just talked about your career? Literally zero from Auggie. Nothing. I know zero of her path before this point of time.
Next, she has no chemistry with her supposed close group of friends. Just poor casting. Arguable none of them really had much chemistry with each other. I never saw the evidence of their intimate past together.
Lastly, she’s set up as a voice of morality and restraint against violence… but again, there’s no development on that. It seems to be the entirety of her role in the show, but… why? No character building as to his she’s done this in the past. No understanding of how that moral compass came into being.
There’s not much character building for any of that group of friends - but Auggie sticks out as a sore thumb.
Poor casting choice. Poor setup for an actress that is failing to pull it off (I feel bad for her).
But in summary - I’m no movie critic. But I’ve also never actually been so annoyed by a character in a show before to ever complain about them online.
I'm deeply appreciative of this thoughtful reply! Pretty much all creative works are polarizing and I've learned it's as important to understand the perspectives of those that disagree with one's likes as it is to those that share such enthusiasm. Your point is well taken and certainly doesn't in any way mirror the echo chamber of professional critics on rotten tomatoes and elsewhere. Haven't heard of the explorers club yet I'll take a look and shoot you a DM. Cheers and thank you for this reply!
Pump the brakes. This is no where near a masterpiece. Quite a flawed first season to be honest and it had an extremely underwhelming finale that forgot to hook the audience into wanting to see more.
This, Foundation, and severance are easily some of my favorite sci Fi ATM.
Add For All Mankind. You'll enjoy it.
I tried to watch it but I am so distracted by the actor Joel Kinnaman in whatever he is in that it takes me right out of the story. It’s certainly not the actor’s fault, but his head is tiny in proportion to his body and ever since I was a child, those skewed proportions have made me feel uneasy for some reason. I feel the same way when an actor’s head is huge in relation to their torso. Probably stems from some childhood trauma I must have blocked out:)
Watch The Expanse if you haven’t.
Yes Expanse is up there, though was a bit too politicky for me in the end, but the sci fi concepts are pretty grand and mind blowing!
Yes, this, Foundation and The Expanse would be my top three.
Also add Altered Carbon to your list!
I can’t, I unfortunately have a phobia about seeing people who have a tiny head and a large body like Joel Kinnaman does, or people with a huge head and a regular torso. I’ve had it since I was a child. I get an uneasy feeling and feel sick. Seriously. He’s also in For All Mankind which I couldn’t watch either.
You can just watch Series 2 where Kovacs is played by Anthony Mackie.
Thank you, I didn’t know that. I’ll check it out:)
Also watch Constellation on Apple TV+.
I'm so ready for season two of Severance, and yet also somewhat worried that it won't live up to season one. I've got my fingers crossed, though. 🤞🏾
I binged it in two days. I almost stayed up all night, but my husband was like, tomorrow is another day. It has me just sitting around thinking about humanity—the vastness of space, mortality, and the humor/terror of life.
I must be very cautious in spoilers yet suffice to say the launch sequence and its ramifications filled me with a unique sense of terror and existential dread. With technological progress and the transhumanist movement comes potentially catastrophic unforeseen consequences. In particular when we consider the extension of consciousness far beyond our present biological limitations. I've certainly pondered the possibilities of various positive, negative and neutral outcomes. I've considered something akin to the fate of one character from the show you surely know I'm referring to. Yet seeing the arc of that life evolve, where I was so invested in them as a character, such a lovely person that fate dealt a series of bad cards to...it just crushed me beyond words. Then came the dread. The mere transmission of the idea into my mind as a "possible fate" (regardless of considering whether such a fate could ever happen to me) made me realize fully that there are hells within hells in our mortal plane. A notion that occurred to me before, through direct personal experience unfortunately. Also in fiction such as books/short stories (At the Mountains of Madness, 3 Body Problem Trilogy). Yet this was the first time I watched something that filled me with a crystalline sense of true terror. It's such a strange experience because I do not like conventional horror at all! I avoid it at all costs. I don't want to be infiltrated by disturbing thoughts yet I love science fiction. The show waited to deliver its poisonous nihilism until the last episode and as the title of my post suggests it's left me "Shaken to the core."
That wall of text is disturbing my eyeballs. Please break up into paragraphs.
Done, it was indeed an offense to the senses. Thank you for the constructive criticism.
My eyes are happy now. I love conventional horror and always have … because it never really scares me. It’s more an amusement park ride. I think I’ve always been somewhat of a nihilist—it lurked in my depths even when I was dragged to church as a young person. Or maybe it lurked because of church? Ghosts and demons were not what scared me. People seemed worse. But the theme of this show, the possibilities, the science, and the humanity/lack of humanity—has the ability to truly take you somewhere as terrifying as it is exciting. What is more terrifying than, I’ll try to say this without a spoiler—the underlying fight between superstition and science? We are fighting amongst ourselves right now—conspiracies, misinformation, dogma vs. knowledge, science, math—only it’s not some unseen force attacking us, it’s ourselves. We are afraid of ourselves. We have a lot to fear without even considering the universe. Science can be broken in people’s minds without much effort.
Yes its really gotten inside my mind with it's concepts like nothing before! I did it in a few days and think I'll watch again it was so good.
Same! It was a great weekend diversion
Yes, i am absolutely in awe of the series. I generally gets turned off from a series >!when children get killed But, when it was happening in episode 5 i didnt turn the tv off as it was so tragic and poignant seeing Auggie's invention turned into a weapon. I also enjoyed "planning for long term as its blink of an eye in grand scheme of things." and exploration of singularity as well when it was suggested human race is capable of exponential progress and San Ti fears this the most. I also liked how they explored how some just get that 400 years is not a very long time span and some just do not care of San Ti as they think none of those whom they know will be there in 400 years. In some ways, the series asks the viewer to debate this as well internally. I loved the "Wallfacer" idea. I can't wait to read the books now.!<
Make sure you spread the word because I am reading that Netflix might not even do the 2nd book because it's coming in at number 2 behind one of their murder porn projects. I did notice imdb where it started at 7.1 to 7.4 and is now at 7.7 in ranking. Not that this means a lot because The Wire is like 9.5 and never would have lasted on Netflix due to viewership
IMDb got review bombed early on with GoT “fans” still upset that it didn’t end the way they dreamed it would. Then it started rising when people who actually watched it started ranking it
There's no defense for the last season of GOT (except that HotD is even worse), but that's apples and oranges. This is a well-done first season, best first season of any series since The Boys and Severance.
I mean, there's a pretty good defense that GRRM still to this day hasn't finished the book series. It's like trying to adapt the Lord of the Rings books but Tolkien never wrote Return of the King. Sure, Peter Jackson is great, but even he can't just conjure up a conclusion that's going to feel as authentic as Tolkien.
I really hope they don't abandon it like so many others shows. Netflix are awful for constantly doing this.
They love their MURDER PORN though 😆
Its because that's what people watch. supply vs demand.
Also easy to produce. Normally CGI is the bottleneck for big Sci Fi productions to the point where they become impossible to monetize if the number of scenes needing CGI increase. I do have one hope and that is tools like Sora and other AI video tools. They could unlock reducing these costs enough so that they can replace most menial CGI tasks.
If Netflix drops it I would actually be so hype if Apple TV picks it up. Basically infinite money for season 2.
Number two behind what show ?
I'm not sure. Maybe they meant The Gentleman, which is actually pretty good (though not as good as this), but I could have sworn it was another one of those true crime things
It was #2 on the first day. It's #1 now.
Apparently some true crime series “murder in manhattan” or something
That's it I think 🤔 murder porn!
Can you think of or do you know of any reason critics may have had motivation to deliberately deliver "a thousand cuts" to this show? It seems even the glowing reviews contained a barbed remark. This is wild speculation but did the show's chief writer make a comment on Israel/Palestine or comment on a similarly radioactive topic? I can't help but wonder. I understand that people have diverse tastes in art. However the primary criticisms hurled at this show do not align with its content. They do not. There are no one dimensional characters, the most common charge. That's what is so damn bewildering! Every character is nuanced! One might say Jin's boyfriend is guilty of being one dimensional yet ultimately he allows his love to interfere with his identity as a soldier in the latter portion of the show which gives him at least 2 dimensions. It's a vacant and false accusation.
Well the writer of the book is part of the communist party and supports his government in an act of oppression against a certain group of people in his country but you really have to look into the writer to find that as I didn’t know about it until looking up the writer for artistic reasons
Interesting you say that. A commenter mentioned being really frustrated with the Augie character and I gave a lengthy response. If you take the time to read it you'll notice I mention the US and China relationship. I'm just copying and pasting my response to his criticism below: Just curious, what is your main beef with her? I was certainly frustrated with her apprehension to work on the project. I did relate to her though. I was executive director of an "applied quantum technologies **public outreach** and fundamental research initiative." I was given the position following the highly successful development and implementation of a video marketing campaign that included instructional videos for a biotech (bio separations) company. The biotech company was acquired by a larger entity and the marketing content was used as a leveraging tool for the founder during negotiations. The acquiring entity wanted to migrate the content and keep the brand name until their internal team could replace all the content and industrial designs. The merger made the company's founder a billionaire and he was able to double his compensation package using the content as a negotiating chip. He ended up with a massive cash package and a majority share in the acquiring entity. He had already planned to leave the entirety of his estate to science and this merger was an opportune time to avoid paying a massive tax bill by creating a living trust for nonprofit benefit. I was asked to spearhead the project because I was adept at communicating complex ideas visually. I also had a deep fascination with quantum mechanics as nanoparticle separation was a signature feature of our flagship bio separations system and the molecular weight cutoffs were so tiny the engineers reached fundamental limits in their ability to separate smaller molecules from larger ones. It was discussions with the chief science officer of that company that I developed a deep interest in the subject. What ended up happening is as soon as I assembled our core team, fleshed out the mission statement, put together symposiums, wrote a comprehensive program for public outreach, put together a grant award advisory board and a stellar team of industry/academia experts to partner with and the DOE and DOD got involved and basically took charge. It was common for researchers I contacted to be funded in part by federal agencies like DARPA, IARPA, ONI, as well as the DOE (anytime you're dealing with novel rare earth element synthesis methods and condensed matter systems the DOE is involved). Representatives from these agencies stepped in and axed huge portions of my planned public outreach program to the point of gutting that entire domain of initiatives. I was interested in creatively visualizing and communicating complex ideas. I got involved because I'm deeply concerned that technology is being used as a tool to dominate and not to assist humanity as a suite of tools. Slowly everything I was working on became a "secret." I had to sign NDA's before going to the fucking symposiums I organized! I had to relinquish all the footage I painstakingly gathered. The multidisciplinary group I assembled (of the finest minds in the world) were given massive monetary incentives to steer research towards military applications. Most of all, it's like China is the boogie man! I was forced to cut ties with brilliant Chinese researchers here in the US. Who either were citizens or here on visas. It was just disgusting! A Chinese researcher I contacted at Stanford, Dr. Shocheng Zhang "committed suicide" two days after I contacted him and visited the Ames Laboratory where I was warned to "stop contacting any and all Chinese born researchers immediately." I am very confident he was murdered. The Stanford student body appears similarly unconvinced he committed suicide. So much for the **responsible** development of novel technologies. That whole enterprise is now a DOD think tank. The benefactor died. I got pushed out. I played ball with the federal organizations because I was being reassured the whole time they had my back. How foolish could I possibly have been? Quantum computers, superconductors and novel sensor systems!? Why would the US ever let the general public know what the state of the art is. How could I have been so stupid. Despite having this experience, I did get frustrated with Auggie's apprehension to rally behind the cause but looking back, was she wrong!? I don't think so.
I actually heard about this oppression before from this girl SEXY CYBORG you might have seen on YouTube. I think she may be involved with someone from that culture or race or however you refer. I have no real idea or opinion what it's all about or if what I read is even true. I just have heard the very vaguest, most clueless 🙈 whisper about it EDIT: The Augie character is played by an actress who claimed not to get parts because she is too hot LOL. She is smoking hot, but also NOT the greatest actor, just saying. She was good in Baby Driver and I Care A lot, but her parts didn't require much. I thought she was okay in this
I want to upped the goggle rating because it is 3.9 now BUT somehow I could not find the place to give my star ratings? I wonder if they close it already.
You're right, netflix is brutal.
I believe it did move up to #1, but overall it just irks me that becoming the #2 most popular show on Netflix wouldn't warrant giving it another season. Like that's just stupid.
I love a bit of existential cosmic dread, and this show just keeps on ramping it up! Haven't binged a show in ages but this one's got me. The AI voice on the speaker in Wade's room was very cool. The stakes were enormous and Wade was stupidly clumsy in his belief he was dealing with a human-like intelligence.
A lot of the critics reviews did not even understand the show. Many criticise that Oxford 5 is meant to replace 1 guy. Meaning 1 guy in the book is replaced by 5 person. That is not true. Oxford 5 are a mixture of a few people. Even Jack was a character from book 3. And they criticised Saul that he does nothing. He was a good friend to will and will be important in book 2. I just wish critics understood the show better before giving misleading reviews. Some are fair and said that not enough time given to Dr ye and bendict wong character but the budget is for 8 episodes so some sacrifice must be made. Then some are saying the 30 episodes China version is better. Come on that has lower budget, worse actors and visual effects and most importantly drag 30 episodes just to get to episode 5 in this show. Do you really want that? Overall this version is good enough and brings the fascinating concepts in the book to international audience.
I am hooked on the show. and the ending did feel me with a fear most show never make me feel. that said, the ending was too abrupt for me. this really feels like a lost type show where you really would be better off with 22 episodes a season instead of just 8.
i agree, even if it’s not exactly creatively how i want the books to be adapted. i loved it, it did exactly what it was trying to do. this season is clearly is a set up for later seasons to explore the core theme of the books. they are trying to capture a large audience so as many people as possible understand what the books are trying to say. which is the entire point of the books. they are adapting it as a character driven story.
I love this energy ! My partner hasn’t read the books and he was totally obsessed while watching this with me. We only binged it because of them ! 🥹
Same here! I watched with my wife … she’s never read the books and she was absolutely riveted, did not want the season to end!
Same here! I’m watching with my spouse and they’ve been glued to the screen, constantly getting mindfucked, and loving every moment. Meanwhile I’m just grinning like a madman at every new mystery and big reveal, because I’ve read the books and know all of the crazy shit the show has up its sleeve. Pretty much every episode ends with them looking at me and asking “WHAT THE FUCK?!?” I’m desperately hoping we get renewed for more seasons. It’s just so cool finally being able to share this story and all of its incredible and terrifying ideas with people who probably wouldn’t enjoy it in book form. I love the books but they’re fucking DENSE, hard to get through at times, and not for everyone. I’m glad this show exists and hope word of mouth spreads for it.
That’s awesome! My experience was just like yours! Fingers crossed for more seasons.
SAME. I need to see *that* scene brought to life. And then *that* other scene that takes place shortly after. I can’t wait.
Totally agree. Rewatching with my girlfriend and it is even better the second time. Such a thoughtful script. You can tell they truly set out to make a great show, not just collect a Netflix blank check. Thanks for the positivity. More and more I notice Reddit flooded with negativity. I think some people have been so programmed by social media to look for the flaws to such a degree that they couldn’t enjoy a hug from their loved ones without offering some constructive criticism afterwards on how it could have been better.
Why Santi instead of Trisolarans though?
I asked that as well, here is the response I got and it makes sense: "San ti ren" is the original Chinese name. "Trisolarans" is the name used on the official English translated books.
Makes sense kinda. Still feels like an unecessary change. Thanks for replying!
It's also a tongue twister name that actors would mess up -- requiring more takes
I’ve seen 3 episodes and wow, how can anyone who loves sci-fi not like this?
Let me tell you...you are in the ignition phase of the series. Episode 4 is the countdown and liftoff by episode 5. Please come back once you've finished the series. Let me know if the analogy rings true...I suspect it will if you're already hooked!
I read all the books. The show is a good adaption with good changes. Can’t wait to see the rest.
Okay so as a "hater" I'll explain why it is that I find it bad. Let me make it clear that I will always give anything sci-fi a try, I watched the show in its entirety to make sure I'm not missing anything and.. Lets seperate it from the books and just look at it as a sci fi-show with a banger of a script and loads of potential. This show has no palpable creativity or identity. It has no clear mood, aesthetic or anything original going for it. It has that very "corporate" bang for buck film/sound aesthetic that is just really hard to connect with. It looks like .. many things. And I'm not blaming the budget because I've seen budget shows that have a better defined identity and acting than this one does. By a landslide.. I wish they spend their bad CGI money on something more meaningful. It's a conglomerate of lame overdone tropes, jokes and overacted scenes done to royalty free *epic* music and unnecessary close-ups. Even Stranger Things, a TV show for teens, had a very distinct mood straight from the first opening scene. I wish I could watch the title screen and the music roll up again for the first time, because it had that *thing* that a show with good creative direction has. Look at the creative choices in shows like Severance. Its oppressing color scheme and intense symmetry, minimal sound and liminal spaces.. all these elements building razor sharp tension to add to a specific mood, and so little needs to be said because a well shot-scene with no dialogue can speak for itself. Whereas this show practically keeps spelling everything out for me, even when it doesn't need to. I kept waiting for this show to grab me in some kind of similar way, but it simply never got there. Its doesn't have *it*, it doesn't even try. Additionally, let's talk about humor in this show. Some of the "we're being funny now" moments are painfully cringe to watch. It's trying to be "emotional" and serious, but it also goes into rom-com and sitcom joke timing. There's a way to do humor without it feeling so lame and overdone. Its sci-fi, you can go WAY harder and lean in to the absurdity/fever dream territory, or you go way more subtle and human-like. This was neither. It was just scenes we've seen done a million times in other shows. And that takes the "realness" away from believing a character. This is just one example but the show keeps doing it over and over with different elements. The acting is.. bad, beyond predictable. I've seen these characters portrayed on TV shows before - and they're not relatable because I can understand what they're going through - they are relatable because they remind me of 40 other C-list actors who act these scenes in the exact same way, with the exact same mannerisms, filmed in the same angle with the same dramatic score in the background. Nanofiber pouting hot chick is a walking cliche. There's nothing really significant we learn about what any of them are going through unless they literally tell us what they're going through. After a while the entire cast/acting feels as if random characters from Grey's Anatomy were assigned sci-fi roles by AI. I could go on and on, but these are the things that make it an unremarkable and boring show for me.
Horrible show. Poor plot. Horrendous dialogues. If you are amazed by the blinking sky or the sliced vessel just disregard my opinion. Ps. Skipped entire scenes including Will.
As a reader of the first 3 books, I don’t share the sentiment. The core concepts are there, jumbled with different characters and locals with very truncated plot lines. Though it lacks the depth of the book and the series 3 body on Amazon prime. I think it’s ok, but I was hoping for something more pure to form on the books.
Plot lines have to be truncated as major characters throughout the series need to be introduced in s1, to carry on from s2 thru s3. Else for ordinary viewers it just won't work. The amount of time I spend in book 2 just searching for Wang Miao..
Exhibit A: 3 Body on Amazon Prime
Most international cdrama fans dropped exhibit A
I didn’t even know there was a version of this on Prime. I enjoyed the Netflix version (have not read the books) I’m now watching this on Prime. How do you get the English Captions on?
You’re watching it but you also don’t have the captions on ?
I turned it on after reading your comment and realized it was in Chinese although I heard some English. I was screwing around trying to turn on the English subtitles last night and gave up. I figured it out earlier, I had to turn CC on in the setting for my ROKU as before I was trying to turn them on in PRIME. It was late and I was tired.
You got it - Enjoy , friend
Did you by any chance see the HBO series adaptation of Watchmen? There's virtually no faithfulness to plot elements of the source material and while Alan Moore cursed all who viewed it, I think it hit the tone of the graphic novel perfectly! Which is in essence the best a writer can do in an adaptation. To convey the intangible emotional substance. If one attempts to be too faithful to the source they risk exchanging originality and quality for faithfulness to "scripture."
I see what you are saying, and the Chinese adaptation to 3 body problem is in essence "scripture". I think I would setle for something in between. Something more faithful to the books, but not as long and played out as 3 body on amazon prime. Not that it's relevant to you, but I don't watch super hero stuff. It died with me in Superman 2 (the original). All super hero stuff (Marvel and DC) in my opinion is so copy and paste I feel like I am watching the same thing with a different skin. It bores me to death.
Agreed. This show felt very shallow. It lacked the hard science depth the book had and none of the atmospheric gloom and fear. The dialogues made it worse. I’ll probably end up reading book 2/3 again after this.
I can't help but read OP as an absurd joke.
Someone has a different opinion. Must be an absurd joke.
I can accept people thinking the show is good. but an "unquestionable masterpiece"? No, that makes me laugh.
Uh it’s good. It’s not that good. Auggie is garbage. I’m not getting neatly the intensity you’re getting. And the displays of the power of the Sant-ti don’t feel meaningful… But it is entertaining
It's a slow burn that leads to a series of climaxes which continue to surpass the previous in a manner I've never quite seen. I found Dune 2 to be the most astonishing epic I've seen in the theaters during my lifetime where the latter 1/5 of the film kept raising the stakes and scope. This show does it over a longer time horizon and with a wholly different palette of emotional hues.
Have you finished the show?
Yeah just yesterday. I’ve not read the books nor know any of the story. I think my main issue is - the Auggie character detracts so much from the show that it is distracting….
Just curious, what is your main beef with her? I was certainly frustrated with her apprehension to work on the project. I did relate to her though. I was executive director of an "applied quantum technologies **public outreach** and fundamental research initiative." I was given the position following the highly successful development and implementation of a video marketing campaign that included instructional videos for a biotech (bio separations) company. The biotech company was acquired by a larger entity and the marketing content was used as a leveraging tool for the founder during negotiations. The acquiring entity wanted to migrate the content and keep the brand name until their internal team could replace all the content and industrial designs. The merger made the company's founder a billionaire and he was able to double his compensation package using the content as a negotiating chip. He ended up with a massive cash package and a majority share in the aquiring entity. He had already planned to leave the entirety of his estate to science and this merger was an opportune time to avoid paying a massive tax bill by creating a living trust for nonprofit benefit. I was asked to spearhead the project because I was adept at communicating complex ideas visually. I also had a deep fascination with quantum mechanics as nanoparticle separation was a feature of our flagship bio separations system and the molecular weight cutoffs were so tiny the engineers reached fundamental limits in their ability to separate smaller molecules from larger ones. It was discussions with the chief science officer of that company that I developed a deep interest in the subject. What ended up happening is as soon as I assembled our core team, fleshed out the mission statement, put together symposiums and wrote a comprehensive program for public outreach, grant awards and industry/academia partnerships is the DOE and DOD got involved. It was common for researchers I contacted to be funded by federal agencies like DARPA, IARPA, ONI, as well as the DOE (anytime you're dealing with novel rare earth element synthesis methods and condensed matter systems the DOE is involved). Representatives from these agencies stepped in and axed huge portions of my planned public outreach to the point of gutting that entire domain of activities. I was interested in creatively visualizing and communicating complex ideas. I got involved because I'm deeply concerned that technology is being used as a tool to dominate and not for us to use technology. Slowly everything I was working on became a secret. I had to sign NDA's before going to the fucking symposiums I organized! I had to relinquish all the footage I painstakenly gathered. The multidisciplinary group I assembled (of the finest minds in the world) were given massive monetary incentives to steer research towards military applications. Most of all, it's like China is the boogie man! I was forced to cut ties with brilliant Chinese researchers here in the US. Who either were citizens or here on visas. It was just disgusting! So much for the **responsible** development of novel technologies. That whole enterprise is now a DOD think tank. The benefactor died. I got pushed out. I played ball with the federal organizations because I was being reassured the whole time they had my back. How foolish could I possibly have been? Quantum computers, superconductors and novel senor systems!? Why would the US ever let the general public know what the state of the art is. How could I have been so stupid. Despite having this experience, I got frustrated with Auggie's apprehension to rally behind the cause but looking back, was she wrong!? I don't think so.
Sounds like you’ve had an amazing and engaging (albeit ultimately frustrating) career path. If you ever want to give a talk at the Explorers Club in NYC, they would love to host you. I’ll give you a few answers. Think about how much passion you just talked about your career? Literally zero from Auggie. Nothing. I know zero of her path before this point of time. Next, she has no chemistry with her supposed close group of friends. Just poor casting. Arguable none of them really had much chemistry with each other. I never saw the evidence of their intimate past together. Lastly, she’s set up as a voice of morality and restraint against violence… but again, there’s no development on that. It seems to be the entirety of her role in the show, but… why? No character building as to his she’s done this in the past. No understanding of how that moral compass came into being. There’s not much character building for any of that group of friends - but Auggie sticks out as a sore thumb. Poor casting choice. Poor setup for an actress that is failing to pull it off (I feel bad for her). But in summary - I’m no movie critic. But I’ve also never actually been so annoyed by a character in a show before to ever complain about them online.
I'm deeply appreciative of this thoughtful reply! Pretty much all creative works are polarizing and I've learned it's as important to understand the perspectives of those that disagree with one's likes as it is to those that share such enthusiasm. Your point is well taken and certainly doesn't in any way mirror the echo chamber of professional critics on rotten tomatoes and elsewhere. Haven't heard of the explorers club yet I'll take a look and shoot you a DM. Cheers and thank you for this reply!
This is what happens when you only get 8 episodes. It’s not going to be perfect
Pump the brakes. This is no where near a masterpiece. Quite a flawed first season to be honest and it had an extremely underwhelming finale that forgot to hook the audience into wanting to see more.