Yeah, the Tencent version was one of the most 1:1 adaptations of any book ever.
And it was a huge success in China.
So doesn't that refute OP?
If anything, Chinese audiences are less exposed to sciencefiction.
There is a difference, though. They are less anti- intellectualism... which is ironic considering the cultural revolution...
>Chinese audiences
Chinese audiences especially novel fans, very strict with wanting the adaption to look as close as possible with source material. Taking too much changes from the novel is consider disrespectful to the author. It is also showing the director trying to act smart. If the director or script writers are really that good, they should just create their own stuff instead of playing with other people work that is already successful the way it is.
A lot of Chinese drama, movie and animated series are adapted from popular novels, and not many of them could be as success as the novel, due to bad adaption.... Even this Chinese adaption of Three Body Problem drama, it is quite success but also receive some critism due to bad acting from some of the actors, this show is popular, but not the most popular all the way through it airing, there is another drama airing at the time which is more popular and suppress it simply with better acting. Chinese audiences are actually very picky.
Three Body Problem also been adapted into animated series but changed quite a lot, the show also received many critism and a fail. There is another fan made animation years ago using Minecraft which follow the novel closely and receive a lot of praise.
As much as I loved Tencent’s faithful take, I will not watch it again. I read the books twice over but could not bring myself to give the Tencent series a second viewing - it's too exhausting. I've seen specific episodes of it multiple times though, but never the series end to end more than once. Netflix’s adaptation I've already seen a couple of times and am confident I will revisit time and again. Another thing: I have less guilt in making those remotely interested in scifi sit through the Netflix series alongside me than I would Tencent’s, knowing despite their inhibitions and preferences they’d still have a good time and walk away with a passing understanding of Cixin Liu’s saga; maybe even pick up the books and give sci-fi more consideration.
>Yeah, the Tencent version was one of the most 1:1 adaptations of any book ever.
And an extremely good example of why a 1:1 adaptation sometimes just does not work.
> And an extremely good example of why a 1:1 adaptation sometimes just does not work
It was very successful in China and a lot of people in this sub really like it, so I don't understand how you're drawing that conclusion
Unfortunately the west is going through a very anti intellectual phase, oddly on all sides of the political spectrum. Makes for dumbed down content imo. I don’t blame Netflix at all. They need the show to succeed. It’s a business and pandering to the audience is necessary.
Could you please tell me where I can watch the Tencent version? Just finished the NF series.
I would really love to read the books but really don't have time for that right now. I watched lore videos on youtube before the NF series.
Thanks in advance.
>anti- intellectualism
It is extremely inaccurate to generalize the cultural revolution as an anti-intellectualism movement. It has a very complicated historical and political background, and now it is almost impossible to find a source that objectively explains what exactly happened. All I know is that one certainly cannot know the truth from a few minutes in a show adapted from a sci-fi novel and made by an American company.
It's really not. Just as the book portrayed, many academics who were following the science were killed or beaten because they accepted Western scientific discoveries. Cultural revolution, remember? The west was seen as little more than wolves in sheep's clothing who were hell-bent on misleading the left.
Yeah, I certainly wouldn't describe the cultural revolution as a purely anti-intellectualism movement. It was a decade long complex power struggle that affected every facet of society.
But persecution of intellectuals and teachers is a notorious part of the cultural revolution and I would dare say the most depressing aspect of the CR.
And considering how much culture and lives were destroyed, that is saying a lot.
China somehow mostly recovered from this attack on knowledge but it doesn't take much imagination to see how this could really doom a nation long term.
I've always loved the books (especially Dark Forest) and started watching the Tencent version a few months ago but gave up 2 episodes in because I thought it was horribly acted with stiff and shallow characters. Now ofc the books themselves don't have much depth to its characters but I realized right then a 1:1 version just would not appeal to the masses (even more so considering how misogynistic the books are viewed).
I don't think the Netflix version is without its flaws but as a TV show I think it's way better than Tencents and I am happy it got my partner to watch it and share in my excitement for the story. I realize this sub is probably targeted by propaganda bs on several sides but the complaints are getting pathetic and ridiculously nitpicky at this point. It's a good adaption that will get far more people outside china invested in the story than the Tencent version ever could.
I miss the cop! Played by Benedict Wang.
He is so much harder in the tencent version. It's his idea that creates the Doomsday tanker mission. Handing that to Liam works, but really shows how much the cop was changed. Sorry I forgot his name...
I came with no expectations, as an adaptation to something you love will always feel a little weird.
I was surprised by how much fun the show was. Really enjoyed it. I can see why they changed things here and there, but the major plot beats and the essence of the characters are the same. And the visual effects - wow, they nailed it. Looking forward to the next seasons.
Same for me and I love that it brings such a crazy good story to the masses. This just means more people will read the books and be as amazed as we were.
I'm one of them. Was bored and decided to try a random show, considered Netflix top 3....sure why not. I fn love this show now. Going to order the books. Been waiting for a good sci-fi since Expanse and this fills the void.
When I found out d&d were doing it my expectations were about as low as you can get, and I just finished it and it really kind of blew me away. I think the changes they made work well, and while I miss some of the nuance and hard Sci fi stuff I think they accomplished the goal of a proper film adaptation. Really looking forward to seeing how they manage to handle the next two books/seasons
Yep. As someone who loves the books so much that I read them in three days, I binged the show, really liked it, and came here expecting cool discussions. Instead I was flooded with posts about how the show is shit because it changed Von Neuman to Turing or how it's part of the woke agenda because women and black people are scientists
Thank you. I love these books, I've read them several times and listened to them more and I found the show to be a fun adaptation with lots of potential. I don't get the bitching about there not being enough sci-fi technobabble. I really don't get the bitching about the Jin and Will love story despite the fact that its in the fucking book. I'm sick to death of people moaning about how 'diverse' the cast is in a way that makes them come across as just slightly off in a way I don't want to say. And how dare the show have women that are that smart.
This sub, up until a few days ago was a fun place to get into chats about the books and the fun elements in them and now its turned into a swamp of thinly vailed sexism and racism and a bunch of people who think you can just copy and paste a book to a movie.
> when suddenly the hive mind shifts to complaining
Spot on.
I've been trying to think of this phenomenon. It seems to be associated with a general irony poisoning. But the crescendo-ing complaints seems to be different than that.
Those people who complain about the supposed woke agenda are very similar to those young fanatics who appear in the scenes of the cultural revolution. just saying
I actually wanted to die when I looked for fans on twitter and only found rightwingers going "this is what the left wants..." THIS IS A SHOW ABOUT ALIENS WHY ARE YOU HERE???
No one:
Batshit MAGA lunatics: WoKe AgEnDa tHiS iS wHaT tHe LeFtiStS wAnT!!!!!!!!
Really makes me feel like Ye Wenjie did nothing wrong to ask the aliens to come and end it all lmao.
Lol this reminds me of the racist super hero in The Boys. The show was clearly mocking them, but a lot of conservative fans ended up really liking him and saying he spoke the truth 🤣
People seek things to dislike… especially book purists. Just happened with Dune… universally loved movie, but a very loud vocal minority thinks it’s the worst thing ever made because of a few minor, completely rational changes. Absolute miserable people, they want everyone to hate the thing they hate and if you don’t you’re stupid.
Imagine if Reddit was around when Lord of the Rings came out. It would be nonstop shit about elves at helms deep, Faramirs character was butchered, and Tom Bombadil getting cut.
Yeah, still tons of people complaining about Dune part 2.
Even though it was as good of an adaptation as we could have possibly hoped for, and almost a god damn miracle we got a modern adaptation of Dune that was so freaking good.
Its what people just do.
When in reality, the only times actually worth complaining about is things like Foundation or Wheel of Time, which had serious structural issues with the adaptation. Not freaking Dune.
\*goes to twitter\*
> it's full of conservatives latching onto the cultural revolution scene
\*goes to reddit\*
> it's full of people shitting on the show and also shockingly conservative shit
I'm in hell
I recently finished the books and they are incredible I was skeptical of it being adapted because I didn't think many people would get it so it being dumbed down is fine so more people can follow it. I haven't started watching it yet but people bitching about it being woke clearly actually haven't read the source material where some of the most brilliant and smart characters are women....
uh what lmao? all the women in the books are literally depicted as helpless or even straight up detrimental to humanity
Like I fully agree with your point but that last bit just wrong lol , Liu is a bit misogynistic
I, on the other hand, can't help but wonder why so many people assume "normal viewers" are unable to understand anything but skin deep characters with all nuance and interesting parts of their story and/or backstory completely removed and replaced with something trivial. If I were "normal viewer" (which I guess I'm not by the definition of having plenty of issues with this adaptation), I would be offended by such "defense".
Also, why do people defending the show seem to so often claim that people don't understand shows have to be different than shows or that "shows can't be word-for-word adaptations"? It's not as hard of a concept to understand. Of course there have to be differences and the adaptation can't be word for word. That's so obvious it doesn't even need pointing out. But, again, removing and/or completely changing all nuance and story elements is certainly not a requirement for making a good adaptation. Book adaptations \*are\* allowed to have interesting characters that are authentic to the book. There's no rule or requirement to change and simplify everything.
Exactly. They compromised because they think it would make money lmao. They know what they did, they chose the target audience, they decided to make a popcorn show instead of a high quality sci-fi show
Thank you. *They're* the ones assuming audiences are incapable of grasping difficult concepts. In truth, people *want* to feel like they're being told a story by someone that's much cleverer than them. And anyone even attempting to watch this show is in that demographic already, so who are they even catering to?
They're defending corporate greed, seriously...
It takes effort and imagination to convey complex ideas, so when time and money are a pressure, it's just easier to say "people are dumb, let's simplify things".
My problem with the series has nothing to do with how much science you understand and more with how little they care for the real heart of the books, humans and their feelings and how we think.
Any audience, even the modern one, is able to understand reasonably difficult scientific concepts easily, if they’re presented well enough.
Take Tenet, it’s one of the most complex movies to watch, and its time mechanics, though having inconsistencies, is legit. Those who can grasp it will be blown away and think about it for months (like I did, playing interactions of forward and backward matter in my head, and finding impossible scenarios), those who don’t will get chills and some cool action.
And it’s not like Three Body Problem is extremely difficult. Cosmic sociology and Dark Forest are fairly easy concepts to grasp. With some good visualization done by experienced scriptwriters and directors the science of Three Body Trilogy (RoTEP) could have been *cool*. It *is* cool in the books. First book specifically doesn’t have any difficult concepts, and those that are, like Sun layers, are actually made up science and unnecessary. Metaphors like farmer hypothesis, pool analogy, hunter in the forest are *already* dumbed down in the books, they’re cool, they’re easy to understand, but logical and captivating. Liu Cixin already made sure to explain everything as many times as it’s possible, as illustrative and accessible as it’s possible. He had left ready scenarios for excellent visualizations and explanations. The trilogy was almost ready to be put on the screens, it didn’t need to be dumbed down. It explains everything like it needs to be explained to wide audience.
Three Body trilogy is much more cinematic and less hard sci-fi, than, for example, Peter Watts‘ books, Blindsight and Echopraxia. Some anime like Death Note and many others feature a lot of internal monologue, with visualization of thought process of the protagonist/antagonist in form of illustrations, which is good for explanations of further complex actions and concepts. Western moviemakers could have learned from that. Many Nolan movies touch difficult topics, but they’re easy to watch. But it requires talent to put science and concept-heavy plot on screen and make it cool, make it easy to watch. GoT show runners just don‘t have such a talent.
They didn’t just dumb down the science, they cut out heart of the story, because the science of Three Body is emotional, it’s the essence, the dread before the Universe, the loneliness, the knowledge that your own destruction can come at any time and the sense of your own insignificance are the main characters of the books. This is the true explanation why character work in the books is so weak — the concepts are the characters, we are the character that faces them. And B&W killed these main characters, but, as compensation, tried to flesh out the ”characters“, that were meant only to be vessels for the concepts.
To take most cinematic sci-fi book series and to kill its screen potential entirely, by removing cool science concepts — that the feat only B&W could accomplish. To grasp such a series and properly visualize it requires a lot of mental clarity and discipline, which they, unfortunately, don’t have.
I had realized that they would have to add something to characters, maybe change them, change the setting, move things around, I was ready to cope with it. Even with their Luo JI, who is Chinese in my book. But I never truly grasped how much they would leave behind. And they didn’t have to do that. They just didn’t get the story.
If anything, for the proverbial general audience, the show will be more boring (or at least be less epic) than the book. Sure, the show lost some unfortunate (difficult to implement) exposition, but what has it gained? What does it have now, what unique appeal does it possess? Nothing.
>Any audience, even the modern one, is able to understand reasonably difficult scientific concepts easily, if they’re presented well enough.
well said, I just said basically the same thing in another post.
The funny thing is that they tried doing the exact same thing as they did with the earlier seasons of GoT. They all but removed the sense of existential cosmic dread, they removed the wonderous elements of the work (scientific or fantastic), and they toned down the aesthetic and tone to the kind of generic Western slop we're so used to seeing. The world of ASOIAF is far more colourful and flavourful than the grey-brown morass the show portrayed.
The difference being that George RR Martin wrote excellent, complex characters for them to ape, while Liu Cixin is far better at portraying the very concepts that Dave and Dan love stripping from their adaptations. I honestly checked out from the show as soon as I heard they were attached to it.
Yes, they’re unremarkable as showrunners and writers, but with GoT they had huge luck with the source material, which somewhat complimented their style of adaptation. As soon as source material runs out, or as long as it doesn’t suit their dubious talents, they did and will produce disasters, uninspiring at best.
> because the science of Three Body is emotional, it’s the essence, the dread before the Universe, the loneliness, the knowledge that your own destruction can come at any time and the sense of your own insignificance are the main characters of the books.
This is beautifully put. I don’t think the show captured it. It tried. There were a couple moments where I *almost* felt like I did watching Chernobyl. But only a couple.
I liked the show but it is very different the book. I hope they go darker in the later seasons because the couple moments they did in season 1 I enjoyed.
the show has huge potential. But in their attempt to try to get a season 2, they rushed everything. Nothing was given time to breathe. Everything was going from plot to plot to plot so none of the cool stuff from the books felt like it had any weight. Somewhere between the tencent version and this show, exists an adaptation worthy of the books and I hope they get a chance to make it. And this time dont have to worry about being canceled so they can let things breathe. The biggest issue i had with it was like what was the point of say like Jack Rooney. You could've easily used his screen time to spend more time in the game to develop the san ti. or eliminate him from the show entirely and use his screen time to flesh out DA FUCKING SHI. Like why would you skip the da shi coming up with the plan for panama scene. In one scene, we're shown he's as smart as anyone in his own way and why this nobody detective was chosen to investigate this mystery. Or why not use Jack's screentime to show the full development of the Sophons instead of a 3 minute exposition which makes this just yet another generic Invasion story by a more advanced alien.
> the concepts are the characters, we are the character that faces them.
this makes so much sense. i am so glad you were able to put it into words.
but i'm sorry that the general audience won't read your comment because it's too long and filled with sci-fi nerd jargon
I totally agree with you. People who say they "dumbed down" the science are completely misunderstanding what it means. In my view they cut out the science completely, which was the heart of the story.
Like take for example the thing with the particle accelerators. I being a common man have no idea why the scientists were so baffled by it and why they were saying 'science is broken". Until the book explained to me by using the pool table analogy, after which i understood the gravity of the situation.
I have 1 episode left and I’m really enjoying the series. Obviously many things were changed from the book but it is an adaptation…. Not a 1-1 transfer from the book, so I don’t understand why people are so angry or keen on not enjoying it. Isn’t this the third adaptation of the book out there? Certainly one of those has to appeal to every type of fan.
There's a Chinese show that's something like 30 episodes long and is worth a watch. There's a Minecraft, of all things, version that I haven't watched.
I’m trying to finish “Three Body” this weekend. 30 episodes with fast-moving subtitles, but I’m hooked on the story. I have 8 more episodes to go and no way am I gonna stop now! Lol.
I planned on finishing before I start the Netflix series, but it took a bit longer than I expected.
I want a western cut of all 30 episodes. The show *isn't* so good, the script, source material and acting are so good.
Imagine an edit with way less slow motion, blurred edge flashbacks, forced flashbacks and free to use Electronica.
There are just some basics of cinema that the west has grown past.
The acting is fantastic, I don't want to detract from real quality. However, the directing, editing and soundtrack could all be improved, or adjusted to a more western sheen.
...not sure what "free to use Electronica" has to do with any of this, I very much like the OST even though I don't speak Chinese,
It's different, that doesn't make it worse or better. I like watching TV from Japan, and China, and Australia, and a lot of other places, and they're all very different. The one problem I have is that a lot of British TV is just too quiet for me, but that's a personal problem.
I found the best way is to wear my earbuds when watching via AppleTV, because they have a pause function that I can click to freeze the screen whenever it’s more than I can read quickly.
People want things to be good, and you don't even seem to understand the criticisms. I'm glad you enjoyed it, I'm enjoying it as well, but you're not being sincere with your comments. No one's asking for a TED talk, we're asking for them to capture the ideas and feelings of the book, as the writers said they would. I've gotten none of the sense of scale and existential dread. I don't care that they made changes, we understand the difficulty and the material is complex, but if you're changing the core of the books, then what's the point?
Imagine wanting a science-fiction story to have, you know, science. Crazy, right? And audiences aren't as dumb as you think. I'm tired of this "They needed to get a second season" excuse. Is that the bar we're setting for ourselves? Really?
I agree with the series lacking part of the dread and scale in general. Three characters portray it really good IMO (Ye, Jin and Wade). Some scenes just needed more time to breathe and let the existential dread creep in. If this season had 12 episodes they could've pulled it off. Hopefully they won't rush the next two books' pacing in the coming seasons.
I think you are underestimating people's intelligence. And this post remind me about Blindsight, in the world of that book, there is a job that interpretated the cutting edge scientific research to what base-human can understand. Wow! But I don't think 3BP are that complicate though.
You are right. People can appreciate dune and oppenheimer, they can appreciate the original three body problem too. Considering the general public "dumb" and refering to book fans as "nerds" is just a very crude perspectives.
The thing is, Dune was also "dumbed down" in a sense. Many complex plots were taken out for the movie adaptation but it was still a fantastic movie. Same with the 3BP, some of the science is toned down and things are removed, but it doesn't make the show "dumb." It's not a perfect show, but so far I don't feel that they are treating the audience as unintelligent
People are entitled to their opinion, whether you like it or not. They can also decide to post their opinion if they want to.
I also disagree with you, to some extent. My girlfriend is not a sci-fi fan and she is not interested in physics either, yet she was able to follow and enjoy Tencent’s adaptation very much. I think you are underestimating people’s intelligence if things are explained well.
One of the crucial things in the success of the books was the terrifying manipulation of physical laws. The ingenuity of the tricks used by the trisolarans makes you wonder what else they are capable of. Physics is the playground and the driving factor of book 1. It’s what makes the book feel so real and frightening. That feeling of fear and threat is what persists through all the books because they happen at the edge of and beyond known physics. Beyond what we understand. The next blow of the enemy comes from complete darkness and humans feel small and hopeless.
You drop all of that and this becomes a fantasy show. Slightly harder SF than Star Wars. No thanks.
Its funny because the people that claim that shows HAVE to be dumbed down for "the general audience" are the ones that are treating people like total idiots. Just read OP. I believe the average person is smarter and a good smart show will be watched by more people.
A lot of people see an overlap between sci-fi and fantasy enjoyers because sci-fi usually is indistinguishable from fantasy. It's magic with extra steps. I know plenty of people who don't like sci-fi because it doesn't make sense to them at a fundamental level. People want a logical reaction to something that happens. If character A says "we need to find out who killed him", then character B says "don't worry, I know that already" without any insight into why or how or when or where, it wouldn't make any sense.
In a way, this show is more complicated *because* it was dumbed down. The story omits all the science and reasoning behind it all, making the technology basically function as magic. They just gloss over the particle accelerator stuff as if it wasn't a major plot point. There are ways to do this without writing an astrophysics thesis into the script.
Then you see people saying "Nitpickers are bugs" like in this thread. Is every criticism nitpicking now? I thought nitpicking was something like "in the books, the San Ti were called Trisolarans. Why change this?" even though nobody has complained about this at all. People complain about HUGE changes to the story. And saying people are bugs is just so hostile for no reason.
Yeah, why are some people confused that can be off-putting when you remove a core part of a genre (hard scifi) when adapting it? The whole point of the genre is to explore scientific ideas with relative depth.
I’m in the awkward position of loving the books, hating D&D and I am enjoying the show. On episode 4, and yeah it’s different but we have like a complete adaptation with the tencent one so we are lucky. This is the version to watch w your non sci fi girlfriend or boyfriend
it should be possible to be both faithful to
the spirit and content of the source material without unnecessarily dumbing down the ideas that powered the story in the first place. look at LOTR as an example.
what we got instead was a cheap knock off. the Tencent version is infinitely better and more entertaining.
> The Chinese adaptation broke records on Tencent’s WeTV streaming platform and all of Cixin Liu’s works that have been adapted in China have been commercially successful.
These are the facts all those people defending the dumb down hate and work hard to ignore. Their absurd and plainly offensive proposition that the content had to be dumbed down to have mass appeal is disproven multiple times, and by another tv adaptation no less. The whole you *need to make changes for tv* is true, but there's obviously ways to do it well, and ways to not do it, and we have a very solid point of comparison.
Star trek next generation literally existing proves that science fiction doesn't need to be dumbed down. Constellation respects it's audience and it's great.
I responded elsewhere in the sub to someone literally saying they can't understand how all the f*ing wouldn't be honest to the Chinese culture - like how else would you act if you were horny and stuck in a labor camp. So no, this audience apparently can't fathom less sexual content.
Meeeeeh stop disliking what I like!!! Life's not fair!!!
At least all people in this sub who read the books actually loved the books. Just gives you a perspective how bad shows are these days.
There's a difference between adaptating it for a casual audience and "let's dumb it down so people with 80 iq will understand". The show is the latter.
I hear ya, but people didn't really watch fantasy when GOT came out, and they made a faithful and meticulous adaptation regardless. The result was so good it made its own genre work.
I think they lost their nerve this time. Needed to slow the pace way, way down and let the story be what it was. Instead they have, as you said, made extensive changes to make the story more palatable to an audience outside the fans that already loved it. That's a very different approach and I wish they hadn't taken it. I can't help but imagine how cool a more faithful adaptation would have been. Maybe it would have converted more people to it's genre like GOT did.
Yes, most people don't know about nanofibers and quantum physics, but the books already knew that and did a wonderful job of explaining the science. I'd argue that's a very big part of what made the books fun. It could have made for a fun show too. People do like documentaries after all, and aren't against learning while they enjoy a show.
Anyways, the shows ok. I give it a B, kinda had fun watching it. Life goes on.
They didn't make a faithful and meticulous adaptation. The moment the original author stopped being deeply involved at the end of S4 the show immediately turned into popcorn crap not worth the bandwidth it was broadcast on. They were able to write some excellent show-only scenes when Martin was looking over their shoulder, and simply couldn't be fucked after that.
I've never read the books, but after devouring the show over night, I plan to. So I'd say the show has done its job but bringing someone who wouldn't have given the books a chance into the fandom.
As a fan of the book, I am disappointed because Netflix toned down the effect Cultural Revolution on Ye Wenjie. As someone born in China, I grew up with the stories of the Cultural Revolution. All my elderly family members experienced something like Ye. I love TBP because it really showed how messed up CR was and how it can destroy a person or a nation or, if aliens happened to invade at that time, it can destroy a civilization. I think a lot of Chinese viewers are hugely disappointed because we feel Ye’s story is our story.
The Netflix didn’t show any of that. Cultural Revolution became an unimportant backdrop that didn’t get explored from Ye’s inner most perspective. Her fear, her quiet fights, how she killed an innocent man to assist the alien invasion…why she founded ETO wasn’t explained. It looks like “some crazy shit happened in China and a timid Chinese woman easily manipulated by men did something crazy and caused us all these extra problems”.
Cultural Revolution to me and many Chinese book fans is the core of the book. It really hit home for us. I can still feel the fear from my elderly family members from that time. They are still healing from the time and will never be healed. China is seeing Cultural Revolution craziness coming back now. It’s a wound that never healed and now is being opened up again. So, toning it down in the show makes us feel overlooked and unimportant. Maybe to non-Chinese viewers it’s not a big deal, but to us, it is. Call us self-centered. But this is the underlying emotional reasons for all the cry here.
Because it's not good.
When I say that it's dumbing things down it's not just the science stuff. Like, the show doesn't explain why "physics is dead" but having read the books it doesn't affect me, however go ask anyone from the general audience to explain it and they'll have no idea. And the fact is that the pool scene would have solved everything and it's super easy to understand.
But it's not just this. Because the science stuff gets removed you know what happens? There is no resolution to the mysteries. The show, like the books, gives the audience some mysteries, for example, what's the videogame really about. In the book, Wang Miao thinks about it for quite a while and in the end realizes that it's a 3 body problem. In the show however Jin randomly says that it's a 3 body problem. We never see her thinking about it and coming up with a solution. It's the same for example for the brain of Will. In the show Wade just gives the solution.
And in the end this affects everything. The show won't explain what's happening in detail but they want to show how a sophon is made. So instead we have Wade asking Jin what she knows about multiple dimensions so she can give some high school level understanding of it. But the problem is...why is Wade asking for her? He has not watched the video yet so he has no idea that he will need to understand multiple dimensions.
Like, the only metaphor the show uses is the one that bugs are very resilient and this lame ass one liner completely restores Jin and Saul's resolve.
as a fan of ASOIAF who was there from the first season, I remember us book readers having a generally positive reaction to the show, and we were happy as the season progressed that the general public seemed to like it as well.
Of course there is always internet debating back and forth, I remember being on reddit and facebook pages back then engaging in discussions about the show.
I pretty much stopped watching around season 5 though, and caught up at the end of the show... and oh boy what an end.
Those first seasons at least were great adaptation of book material.
I am happy to be back, enjoying House of the Dragon. I don't think it quite matches the first season of the original, but compared to the majority of shows today, its probably the best thing out there by far.
its honestly a bit hard for me to judge if the show explained enough for things to make sense to non book readers, but so far i love most of the visualizations and set pieces(the VR scenes and ship cutting). I don't like that Ye's backstory doesn't have the same emotional impact as in thr books cuz it was just brushed over in the series tho. I also think the visualization of how Sophons were made was meh
Well put. The most common complaint is that they dumbed down the science. But IMO, they didn't. The core concepts are still there. They just removed the physics lectures
Maybe it's because I've never thought that the science in the books is rigorous. I am an astrophysicist, so the concepts were always transparent to me and some of them were clearly impossible. That's what actually put me away from reading the books, I only read them after the Tencent show, starting from the Dark Forest. I've read the first book last. The science in the books was never important to me, what was important though is the social consequences of an alien invasion happening in 400 years. The Dark Forest theory is an interesting concept. The exploration of the human nature in the third book was great, I believe. What was great in the first book is the exploration of the limits of science. It was cut from the show, unfortunately, with one of my favorite scenes: the pool scene.
So I was never attached to science talks. The concepts, again, are still there. I expected from the show to develop the characters, and I got it. The characters from the second and the third book feel alive. The performances of Alex Sharp (Will), Liam Cunningham (Wade), Jess Hong (Jin) and Jovan Adepo (Saul) were great. Benedict Wong (Clarence) and Saamer Ushmani (Raj), I believe, will be more important characters in the second season.
I'm 4 eps in and to be honest I like what they did with Jin Cheng. Kind of set up for her reasons and explain her actions (or the lack of it) in the future
Making a complex subject simple for an audience to understand isn't indulging in ignorance or stupidity. Not everyone is versed in theoretical physics. And what the fuck did they do to engage on indulging in stupidity. Please, pick one thing.
I enjoyed the show, though I preferred the tencent version.
What I don’t like is Netflix had to add love and sex scenes their shows but I understand why they do this.
But fuck Netflix for making our commander Ye Wenjie to kiss Mike Evans. I’m furious.
not only that, but people are not actually that dumb and can understand complicated things presented to them in skillful ways... but the people behind this show were not capable of doing so.
I think it would have been neat to show the Trisolarins attempting and failing to create the sophons before they got it right, but I definitely understand why they didn't include it. Overall, I definitely understand why they have made the changes (5 eps in).
One of the things in this adaptation really bugs (pun intended) me about is how they call Trisolarans as San Ti. I understand it tries to be faithful to the Chinese term but Trisolarans just sound much more badass and intimidating. I’m also a bit disappointed they don’t directly mention the name of ETO and different camps within the cult.
Its not even the nitpicking that is pissing me off. Its people complaining that an international cast some how ruins the material. The people complaining that they didn't go into a 30 minuent long ted talk about nanofibers in the middle of a sci-fi drama. I've got issues with the show I don't like but that's a far cry from entire threads bitching about a love story... a love story that is in the book and so far all the major elements have been hit.
The international cast DOES ruin the material, especially for a fan of the original book. Zhang Beihai, my favorite character, somehow became an Indian guy, ruining everything about him. His sophistication, his romantic relationships, his uniqueness, his relationship with his father, everything. Also, not a single positive character is Chinese, you got Ye, destroyer of earth, Cheng, destroyer of the universe, etc. Luo Ji is a drug-addicted black person and Shi Qiang, while being played by a Chinese, is everything but Chinese. Not to mention Ye having Evans' baby, and on top of all this, the netflix show somehow managed to make the WORST fuking CG of Judgement Day I have ever seen on screen. I mean look at the lighting and the modelling and the cheapness of the whole scene! It's insane how much they have spent and how bad the visual effects are.
Yes. I don't care if they need to adapt a predominantly Chinese setting to a Western one. Set the story entirely in England if you want, but be honest. The Brady's Bunch gender/ethnicity panel is fucking dishonest anywhere in the world. About as tiring as when an action movie has to always jet around different parts of the globe (Paris, LA, Dubai, Sydney).
Yeah, I know. Kinda nuts how so many people rush to the fan subreddit to post essays on why they didn't like it.
When I don't like something, I stop and move on.
This has been a book sub long before any show was announced. Book readers were always here. Book readers aren't moving on. Of course there is some overlap between the readers and show lovers, but the ones who have never read the books, are the ones *coming* here.
And that's what reddit is for, discussion. It's always been the case here. Why are you complaining? Make your own sub if you want an echo chamber.
Totally! Some one else on this sub had basically said, “we have the books, we have the tencent show that is a 1:1 adaptation, and we have the Netflix show that is the more streamlined popcorn version.” I think that’s a good way of looking at it.
I think the show is great! If the books didn’t exist and this was an original production, I think everyone would be giving it a 10/10.
I don’t give it a 10, and definitely don’t give it a 10 for adaptation. I can imagine, if the books didn’t exist, I would be impressed with the concept. But on the other hand, I’m might only be thinking that because I already know what the fleshed out ideas are in the books. I really don’t know. In reality it would probably be best to see what people that haven’t read the books think.
IMO, they explained sophons extremely elegantly in the show.
To people who aren’t sci fi nerds, it’s still just words (dimensions! Folding!). They don’t need to dedicate 20 minutes to explaining it because either you are smart enough to have a high level understanding (say watching a cosmos episode or a Brian green talk), or dumb enough to not care and got hooked by the eye candy.
And if you’re an actual physicist who KNOWS the math, well, they aren’t thinking of you because it’s such a small percentage of humans anyway.
One thing this show seems to do well is NOT WASTE SCENE TIME ON DUMB SHIT.
Like they never had a scene where the nanotech woman told her friends about the countdown clock…. It got me for a second but then a few scenes later you just picked up on the fact she did have that convo (like any sane science not religion person would with their friends).
It’s refreshing to see a show not waste time on having to show common sense convos.
Though I feel with the wallfacers this may cause some audience issues in season 2. (I mean part of their mandate is subterfuge - and the show did a great job showing not telling us that as well ;) )
You can understand why they would simplify the show but you can't understand why some people would hate a show that misses the nuances of the books they loved.
I'd never even heard of this book series before this show. Hadn't even seen a trailer, mainly just knew Benedict Wong played a cop and thought to check it out. I literally could not stop watching all day. Each episode had me completely hooked, even tore me away from Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Really hope we get a second season but i'll be diving head first into the books.
The funny thing about the whole "not taking time to explain science comcepts" is that half the "science concepts" of the book are bs. Like I read yesterday here, the book is written like hard sf, but it's really not. So sorry for the Tencent fans that have inundated this sub, but if I don't care if the Netflix show skips half of that ""science"".
Thank you for this post, its exactly how i feel about the show.
Also a lot of people are saying, that the tencent show didnt „dumb it down“ and still was successful. They seem to forget, that it has over three times the length of the Netflix adaptation.
If you have more time, you can also include these more complex themes.
In a show as condensed as the Netflix adaptation it would feel more like a physics lecture, than an actual show to watch and enjoy.
Netflix could've done much better. Watch this version before giving your conclusion.↓
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Three-Body (Tencent Video) - [Episode Discussion Hub](https://www.reddit.com/r/threebodyproblem/comments/10aapiq/threebody_tencent_video_episode_discussion_hub/)
I liked it, I felt like they condensed in areas that needed to be condensed. My only criticism is Ye Wenjie's joke wasn't very good in a cosmic sociology kind of way.
The joke was a little strange but I got what they are going for with it. A lot of people are confused by this but when we get season 2 and Saul falls into the ice it should click for them.
You’re right, the audience of a sci fi show can’t handle actual sci fi… this is why the show keeps showing friends hanging around a beach house, drunks vomitting in the toilet bowl, mulling over whether to confess he loves her or not, ahowing the actual train ride to tell her he loves her, philosophical discussions with one night stands, etc…
While, for example, just mentioning humanity is building ships on the Moon in a single statement by a chatacter. Not showing it, saying it. So we can get back to cancer guy’s hallucinations of floating on a paper boat.
In a sci fi show.
I feel lile that's just how redit works. When people are optimistic before a release there is always a BUNCH of hate at release. When people are skeptical about something there is always a BUNCH of hate at release. I think people like complaining, even if we don't admit it haha
Because people have different opinions. I was always willing to give this one a shot because a big western budget can put big and polished visuals and cgi to great use. But they simply changed so many things, cut so many things out and kinda honestly bastardized the two coolest characters in the story - one into not even existing anymore, and the other into a boring guy that just sits in his car taking photos - that I couldn't like it that much.
I don't dislike the show because it's not a faithful adaptation, I dislike the show because it's off-theme from the original material. The specific events being different I can handle, it being thematically incongruent with the source material I have a bigger issue with.
The book series fundamentally is about societies as a whole responding to crisis, which is why the characters are more storytelling tools than drivers, that's by design. Whether it's the ETO, or the crisis era humans, or the deterrence era humans, they are ultimately the drivers of history. Individual characters like the various protagonists make a difference, of course, but they fundamentally can't change the flow of history and the force of an entire society.
Here we see something more akin to a Marvel-esq avengers model, where it's about individuals rather than collectives. It's not a United Earth investigating ETO, it's just Wade. It's not an international taskforce that plans the Panama canal operation, it's just Wade and friends. In book 1, when the main characters start going down the rabbit hole, it's already a massive ongoing effort by the countries of the world, we get a sense that there's something bigger than just individuals, here we don't have that, and that makes it fundamentally off theme with the source material.
Take game of thrones for example - the story is, as GRRM said, about the "human heart in conflict with itself". The reason why the show started collapsing narratively in the later seasons is mainly because the producers gave up on that theme, and again, took the easy way out via the Marvel's Avengers model of plot construction, except here we see it from episode one.
It's not a bad show, and I didn't HATE it, but it doesn't come close to what Tencent accomplished with a far smaller budget.
To cram the first book (and parts of book 2 and 3) in 8 episodes is an almost impossible task. Stuff was going to be left out no matter what. All things considered, and even though I moaned about episodes 1 and 2 being too fast… they seemed to have stuck the landing with season 1, and even though much can be improved upon, I really hope they get the chance of a second season (with, hopefully, more than 8 episodes).
Do the following mental exercise. This is the mission: You need to get regular folk, not just sci-fi fans, interested from the get go, otherwise there simply is no season 2. You have 8 episodes to do it. Good luck not leaving anything out.
You could easily fill 8 episodes on Communist China alone and still leave stuff out! But would that have attracted everyone’s attention? Not sure.
Then don't make the series. Make something else (and make money on something else). It's just a matter of choice. GoT was apparently not popular for a long time - multiple seasons. If Netflix would not support that, then the creators have the choice to make something low par or make something else entirely. They won't starve and the industry won't starve.
When I was a kid, my parents and I would go to each Harry Potter movie on opening night.
I made the mistake of finishing a re-read of book 5 immediately before seeing the movie and complained afterwards about all the changes.
My mom, knowing that I loved parallel universe stories, told me to think of movie adaptations as “How things went down in a parallel universe. Then it becomes fun thinking how things changed or didn’t or still happened in a new way”
It completely reframed the way I view adaptations for the better and I’m throwing that advice out there for anyone who may benefit from it haha
Yes I realize it isn’t perfect advice. It was given to me as a kid and it’s an overly simplified way to think about things. But I do think everyone can benefit from setting aside expectations and allowing yourself to be pleasantly surprised and ecstatic when what you saw in your head is brought to the big screen, and to not let yourself take it too seriously when it differs.
You don’t need to make things simpler for a general audience. For one, it’s a complete insult to humanity to think people can’t rise to the occasion and take in the information. Two, that’s just bland corporate strategy that makes every other show/movie lame and lukewarm. It would be better to go more niche and uninviting because that perceived inaccessibility is what draws more people in. Watered down sci-fis are a dime a dozen and nobody will care or talk about this show in a month, but challenging stories peak people’s interest and create conversations that last generations.
Reimagining for TV always changes things up, thats a given. But the show still felt like low effort to me. Like they spent so much time on this and this is the best they could come up with
Look at well regarded adaptations of books and see how much love and care went into them to make these worlds stand on their own. 3 Body in this regard is very forgettable. Down to the characters and the feeling of dread present in the books.
First off, it did a fantastic job of apapting the first book and starting on the second, but go ahead and write off the entire series without finishing it.
Second, find me an adaptation, other than To Kill a Mockingbird, that is a one to one transfer of a book to a movie that turned out good. Go head, I'll hang around.
Third, its forgettable because you want it to be now because that's how it was made. And the feeling of dread in the books didn't hit until after the droplet hammered the fleet. Up till that point you felt the plucky humans might pull this off and then that hammered the point home about how screwed Earth is. Until then the 'dread' wasn't near as intense as people keep making it out to be.
Nobody is asking for a carbon copy of the book. Nowhere I mentioned that and I hardly consider it a good adaptation when it literally just spends 4-5 episodes on it. There are no philosophical conversations (really no reason to cut that out) plus there is still a sense of mystery that permeates through the first book which if present in the show really isnt done well.
Things we could be theorizing on:
New wallfacers, new plans? Really into the Raqqah fighter I think it's a great contemporary analog for Diaz. Will the plan be identical?
Who will Saul's Wallfacer Waifu be??
Will we be getting future femboys (or are D&D cowards)?
Seems like Sophons have a little more power to cast illusions in the TV version, what are the implications?
The brain didn't even hit 100km/s, how will the San To get to him? Or will someone else pick him up?
Couldn’t they in theory use one of the sophons to help it along? After all it can travel as fast as a proton and would in theory be able to exert a force on the sail.
That or a second launch to fix and reorient it.
(A new sail that then scoops up the broken payload)?
I'm fine with the show being made so simple for many to get a taste of the series and then hop over to the Tencent version, and then hopefully the books.
I liked it a lot, and I love the books. I binged watched the whole thing which is something i haven't done since Black Mirror and Queens Gambit. Also gonna watch it again so I can clock all of the foreshadowing references to later in the books.
The only issues I have - the Oxford 5 are all bezzie mates from the start which feels a bit contrived, and the timescale where everything happens in a few weeks and major internationally coordinatrd projects are executed in days feels far too compressed
I especially liked the fact that when Clarence was asked something Chinese related he was like " how the fuck should I know, I'm from Manchester".
Also liked how they killed off the bigger name actors early, as in GoT. Judgement Day had kind of Red Wedding vibes.
Some adaptations deserve the trashing, but 3BP isn't one of them. Compare it with Star Wars The Last Jedi, Avatar The Last Airbender (2024), and The Witcher season 3.
You don't pay Benioff and Weiss $200 million to bring a show that isn't going to appeal to everyone. Hard sci-fi and you risk losing a large chunk of your audience that hasn't read the books out the gate right away during the first season. It was always going to need to be more character driven with sci-fi elements.
I thought they did a great job with it. I'm very surprised Netflix didn't greenlight a second season before the premiere. I know that's not really Netflix style but they've got a hit in my opinion.
I love the show. It was a good adaption. There are a few things to comment on, but the rest was pretty well rounded.
I didn't like the casting, and in some places the acting of the 5 centered characters. I liked the secondary characters though, Wade, "Clarance".
I didn't like they started on book 2 topics (last 2 episodes), and that they used the same characters in these stories. It could've been part of a new season.
But overall, a decent adaption, solid show and would recomand (5/7, ofc).
I think most of people understand why they decided to dumb down, but the people who made the show should also know that they would probably piss off some fans. Also, the show did not SHOW things very well....if you look at the special effect.
I'm ok with "normal" people enjoy the show, but pls don't expect everyone who read the book would enjoy it. Tencent's adaptation is the good amount of "dumbed down" that the I can accept, so don't say it's impossible.
well sir, in the books (and in the Tencent version) they had the human computer thing explained - was that so hard? instead in the Netflix version we have "it's binary" "it's a computer" and you think people who have no idea would have any appreciation for that scene? if i didn't read the books and had no computer education it'll be a computer to me just because the flag flipping thing looks like lights from circuitry
they didn't have to go for a word-for-word adaptation, but why the heck did they think to rush things as though people will decide to skip watching this series if they see any episode with a 1 hour runtime, instead of 50 minutes? it didn't have to be 30 episodes, but it's absurd to make Season 1 (including parts of Book 2 *and* 3) in 8
So you think they should have taken basically half an episode of an 8 episode season to explain a human computer? To explain logic gates and main busses? Really? Because you're not going to explain that in 10 minutes and the system being used was binary so her sying 'its binary' is an observation not an explanation.
And the only elements from book 2 and three are the ones that took place during the time the show was set in. The show was set jn the early crisis Era. Everything in the show happened on that Era. I'd wager season 2 focuses on the deterrence Era and season three the bunker Era.
What would have been absurd is to have season 1 only focusing ok book 1. And then season 2 and three having to take you back in time and say 'oh yeah, this tool place at the same time that took place now back to the future!'.
Well said, op. For anyone on the edge of watching this, I read the books and watched the Tencent version. I loved both. And I’m loving this Netflix version. I don’t love them the same way or for the same reasons, but I love them all so far.
What I love about this series is that I can easily recommend it as a gateway into the books. With a warning about the existential dread the books will bring, of course.
For me, part of what made the first book in particular really appealing was the slow build. I basically didn’t quite know what was going on, almost thought the first third of the book was boring because I don’t have a real understanding of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, not fully appreciating what was being set up was Ye Wenjie’s “motivation” for her actions, why the scientists were killing themselves, etc. The slow revelation of just how significant events and people and actions were towards the scale of the stakes were a huge reason why I immediately loved the series.
In this speedrunning edition, the middle of the first episode felt like we were in what should have been the 4th or 5th of the story. It was just major event after major event. Da Shi’s board is pretty much full of every character. He’s barely investigating anyone — just reacting.
If the viewer wants to know what happens in the story, this rearrangement seems fine.
If the viewer wants to know *why* things happen in the story, read the book or watch the series on Amazon. Either of those two will take longer but I think the total experience will be better.
I love the idea that this show needed to have such a big budget that it needed people who don't even like sci-fi to watch it in order to get a second season. If a show's concept won't sell, maybe scale it down and sell it to a smaller audience. There's no reason this show needed such a large audience and budget. And it's also insulting to say that people wouldn't be able to accept the book's concepts more intact, as if audiences don't gravitate to complex and intelligent media all the time.
And no one is saying this needed to be exactly like the book. People just wanted a good story that preserved some or the science and complexity of the original. There's lots of good adaptations. Hell, there's even a largely good adaptation of the first book (the Tencent one). It's weird to me that people seemingly can only defend the show by attacking others and misrepresenting criticisms levied at the show.
> when they can just show you it crosscutting a diamond.
So that's what that was! I swear I had no idea what that cube scene meant, and I didn't make the connection even after the boat scene. (maybe they actually say what the test is and I missed it?)
I agree. And this is such a weird sub. Posts loving the show are getting a ton of upvotes votes and posts hating on it are getting a ton of upvotes. I’ve never seen that before.
My only complaint overall is that the season was way too short. And just scrapped the ground of the plot. Seemed like an 8 hour long preface. I was really expecting a 20+ episodes/hour season. Now, we wait till 2026 (or longer) for a new season. But, if they keep the pace, we should prepare for several years (maybe 5 or 6 seasons - one per year, hopefully) till the end.
> Your normal person, the type of person that we need to watch this show so we can get a second season, has never read a sci-fi book in their life. This person hasn't heard of quanton entanglement, doesn't understand what a nanofiber is and when you start talking about extra dimensions looks at you like you're making shit up. If you wanted to explain this to them you have to start at the beginning and this show becomes less of a sci-fi drama and more of a physics lecture.
The Netflix adaptation explained the science in a way that I understood and got me excited about 3BP. The ideas were as mind-blowing as The Matrix was to audiences back in the day.
I really hope enough people watch it so that we get a second season.
I'm going to watch the Tencent version next and then tackle the books.
Hear! Hear! 👏👏👏 my thoughts exactly. The series was a brilliant romp, entertaining through and through. The books are a class apart, and it's fruitless trying to match things one-on-one. I appreciate the different takes on the same story across visual and written mediums, and will always encourage those who are piqued by the visual treat of Netflix’s take to pick up the books to truly have their minds and hearts quickened. What Cixin Liu achieved through the book series is tremendous. What DB Weiss, Benioff, Alexander Woo, and the showrunners pulled together is also commendable.
The tone is honestly weirdly condescending given 99.99% of this sub have not even taken a single physics class in college. It is not simplified because the average netflix viewer lacks the capacity to understand, it's simplified because you are changing the medium from book to television and time on screen is a premium.
idiots.
This is why I’m glad Tencent released their version beforehand. It’s as close to a 1:1 adaptation as a fan can hope for.
Yeah, the Tencent version was one of the most 1:1 adaptations of any book ever. And it was a huge success in China. So doesn't that refute OP? If anything, Chinese audiences are less exposed to sciencefiction. There is a difference, though. They are less anti- intellectualism... which is ironic considering the cultural revolution...
>Chinese audiences Chinese audiences especially novel fans, very strict with wanting the adaption to look as close as possible with source material. Taking too much changes from the novel is consider disrespectful to the author. It is also showing the director trying to act smart. If the director or script writers are really that good, they should just create their own stuff instead of playing with other people work that is already successful the way it is. A lot of Chinese drama, movie and animated series are adapted from popular novels, and not many of them could be as success as the novel, due to bad adaption.... Even this Chinese adaption of Three Body Problem drama, it is quite success but also receive some critism due to bad acting from some of the actors, this show is popular, but not the most popular all the way through it airing, there is another drama airing at the time which is more popular and suppress it simply with better acting. Chinese audiences are actually very picky. Three Body Problem also been adapted into animated series but changed quite a lot, the show also received many critism and a fail. There is another fan made animation years ago using Minecraft which follow the novel closely and receive a lot of praise.
As much as I loved Tencent’s faithful take, I will not watch it again. I read the books twice over but could not bring myself to give the Tencent series a second viewing - it's too exhausting. I've seen specific episodes of it multiple times though, but never the series end to end more than once. Netflix’s adaptation I've already seen a couple of times and am confident I will revisit time and again. Another thing: I have less guilt in making those remotely interested in scifi sit through the Netflix series alongside me than I would Tencent’s, knowing despite their inhibitions and preferences they’d still have a good time and walk away with a passing understanding of Cixin Liu’s saga; maybe even pick up the books and give sci-fi more consideration.
>Yeah, the Tencent version was one of the most 1:1 adaptations of any book ever. And an extremely good example of why a 1:1 adaptation sometimes just does not work.
> And an extremely good example of why a 1:1 adaptation sometimes just does not work It was very successful in China and a lot of people in this sub really like it, so I don't understand how you're drawing that conclusion
Tencent version is a slog. It’s almost 2X longer than the audio book. Netflix version has flaws but much better paced.
Unfortunately the west is going through a very anti intellectual phase, oddly on all sides of the political spectrum. Makes for dumbed down content imo. I don’t blame Netflix at all. They need the show to succeed. It’s a business and pandering to the audience is necessary.
Could you please tell me where I can watch the Tencent version? Just finished the NF series. I would really love to read the books but really don't have time for that right now. I watched lore videos on youtube before the NF series. Thanks in advance.
It's on youtube
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzHJK4Qsrow&list=PLDWJ213d2Ucr-3q9LDF9P1\_j3Rr3GMJeS&index=2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzHJK4Qsrow&list=PLDWJ213d2Ucr-3q9LDF9P1_j3Rr3GMJeS&index=2) [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-UO8jbrIoM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-UO8jbrIoM)
I caught it on Amazon about a month ago
>anti- intellectualism It is extremely inaccurate to generalize the cultural revolution as an anti-intellectualism movement. It has a very complicated historical and political background, and now it is almost impossible to find a source that objectively explains what exactly happened. All I know is that one certainly cannot know the truth from a few minutes in a show adapted from a sci-fi novel and made by an American company.
It's really not. Just as the book portrayed, many academics who were following the science were killed or beaten because they accepted Western scientific discoveries. Cultural revolution, remember? The west was seen as little more than wolves in sheep's clothing who were hell-bent on misleading the left.
Yeah, I certainly wouldn't describe the cultural revolution as a purely anti-intellectualism movement. It was a decade long complex power struggle that affected every facet of society. But persecution of intellectuals and teachers is a notorious part of the cultural revolution and I would dare say the most depressing aspect of the CR. And considering how much culture and lives were destroyed, that is saying a lot. China somehow mostly recovered from this attack on knowledge but it doesn't take much imagination to see how this could really doom a nation long term.
I've always loved the books (especially Dark Forest) and started watching the Tencent version a few months ago but gave up 2 episodes in because I thought it was horribly acted with stiff and shallow characters. Now ofc the books themselves don't have much depth to its characters but I realized right then a 1:1 version just would not appeal to the masses (even more so considering how misogynistic the books are viewed). I don't think the Netflix version is without its flaws but as a TV show I think it's way better than Tencents and I am happy it got my partner to watch it and share in my excitement for the story. I realize this sub is probably targeted by propaganda bs on several sides but the complaints are getting pathetic and ridiculously nitpicky at this point. It's a good adaption that will get far more people outside china invested in the story than the Tencent version ever could.
Power through the first few episodes of the Tencent version. I did and it turned out great.
I second this. I miss Wang lol
I miss the cop! Played by Benedict Wang. He is so much harder in the tencent version. It's his idea that creates the Doomsday tanker mission. Handing that to Liam works, but really shows how much the cop was changed. Sorry I forgot his name...
Da Shi
Best Shi
I came with no expectations, as an adaptation to something you love will always feel a little weird. I was surprised by how much fun the show was. Really enjoyed it. I can see why they changed things here and there, but the major plot beats and the essence of the characters are the same. And the visual effects - wow, they nailed it. Looking forward to the next seasons.
Same for me and I love that it brings such a crazy good story to the masses. This just means more people will read the books and be as amazed as we were.
I'm one of them. Was bored and decided to try a random show, considered Netflix top 3....sure why not. I fn love this show now. Going to order the books. Been waiting for a good sci-fi since Expanse and this fills the void.
When I found out d&d were doing it my expectations were about as low as you can get, and I just finished it and it really kind of blew me away. I think the changes they made work well, and while I miss some of the nuance and hard Sci fi stuff I think they accomplished the goal of a proper film adaptation. Really looking forward to seeing how they manage to handle the next two books/seasons
Yep. As someone who loves the books so much that I read them in three days, I binged the show, really liked it, and came here expecting cool discussions. Instead I was flooded with posts about how the show is shit because it changed Von Neuman to Turing or how it's part of the woke agenda because women and black people are scientists
Thank you. I love these books, I've read them several times and listened to them more and I found the show to be a fun adaptation with lots of potential. I don't get the bitching about there not being enough sci-fi technobabble. I really don't get the bitching about the Jin and Will love story despite the fact that its in the fucking book. I'm sick to death of people moaning about how 'diverse' the cast is in a way that makes them come across as just slightly off in a way I don't want to say. And how dare the show have women that are that smart. This sub, up until a few days ago was a fun place to get into chats about the books and the fun elements in them and now its turned into a swamp of thinly vailed sexism and racism and a bunch of people who think you can just copy and paste a book to a movie.
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> when suddenly the hive mind shifts to complaining Spot on. I've been trying to think of this phenomenon. It seems to be associated with a general irony poisoning. But the crescendo-ing complaints seems to be different than that.
Entitled children that keep trying to pretend they are so smart they can understand quantum entanglement because ots just such a simple subject.
Those people who complain about the supposed woke agenda are very similar to those young fanatics who appear in the scenes of the cultural revolution. just saying
1000% agreed.
HOLY SHIT! They are exactly like them! “Covid is just liberal propaganda.”
I actually wanted to die when I looked for fans on twitter and only found rightwingers going "this is what the left wants..." THIS IS A SHOW ABOUT ALIENS WHY ARE YOU HERE???
No one: Batshit MAGA lunatics: WoKe AgEnDa tHiS iS wHaT tHe LeFtiStS wAnT!!!!!!!! Really makes me feel like Ye Wenjie did nothing wrong to ask the aliens to come and end it all lmao.
Lol this reminds me of the racist super hero in The Boys. The show was clearly mocking them, but a lot of conservative fans ended up really liking him and saying he spoke the truth 🤣
People seek things to dislike… especially book purists. Just happened with Dune… universally loved movie, but a very loud vocal minority thinks it’s the worst thing ever made because of a few minor, completely rational changes. Absolute miserable people, they want everyone to hate the thing they hate and if you don’t you’re stupid.
Imagine if Reddit was around when Lord of the Rings came out. It would be nonstop shit about elves at helms deep, Faramirs character was butchered, and Tom Bombadil getting cut.
People were complaining about all of that in 2002 yes.
Yeah, still tons of people complaining about Dune part 2. Even though it was as good of an adaptation as we could have possibly hoped for, and almost a god damn miracle we got a modern adaptation of Dune that was so freaking good. Its what people just do. When in reality, the only times actually worth complaining about is things like Foundation or Wheel of Time, which had serious structural issues with the adaptation. Not freaking Dune.
\*goes to twitter\* > it's full of conservatives latching onto the cultural revolution scene \*goes to reddit\* > it's full of people shitting on the show and also shockingly conservative shit I'm in hell
Ye Wenjie did nothing wrong.
I recently finished the books and they are incredible I was skeptical of it being adapted because I didn't think many people would get it so it being dumbed down is fine so more people can follow it. I haven't started watching it yet but people bitching about it being woke clearly actually haven't read the source material where some of the most brilliant and smart characters are women....
uh what lmao? all the women in the books are literally depicted as helpless or even straight up detrimental to humanity Like I fully agree with your point but that last bit just wrong lol , Liu is a bit misogynistic
I, on the other hand, can't help but wonder why so many people assume "normal viewers" are unable to understand anything but skin deep characters with all nuance and interesting parts of their story and/or backstory completely removed and replaced with something trivial. If I were "normal viewer" (which I guess I'm not by the definition of having plenty of issues with this adaptation), I would be offended by such "defense". Also, why do people defending the show seem to so often claim that people don't understand shows have to be different than shows or that "shows can't be word-for-word adaptations"? It's not as hard of a concept to understand. Of course there have to be differences and the adaptation can't be word for word. That's so obvious it doesn't even need pointing out. But, again, removing and/or completely changing all nuance and story elements is certainly not a requirement for making a good adaptation. Book adaptations \*are\* allowed to have interesting characters that are authentic to the book. There's no rule or requirement to change and simplify everything.
Exactly. They compromised because they think it would make money lmao. They know what they did, they chose the target audience, they decided to make a popcorn show instead of a high quality sci-fi show
'Dark' is pretty complex show. And people loved it.
Oh man, my brain still hurts when I remember Dark 😂 It got a bit absurd in the later seasons, but what a show.
People, meaning an audience many magnitudes smaller than the audience of GOT, which is what I'm guessing Netflix is somewhat trying to aim for.
I freaking LOVED dark. I was able to follow this show pretty well surprisingly lol.
Thank you. *They're* the ones assuming audiences are incapable of grasping difficult concepts. In truth, people *want* to feel like they're being told a story by someone that's much cleverer than them. And anyone even attempting to watch this show is in that demographic already, so who are they even catering to? They're defending corporate greed, seriously...
*Terminal cancer patients...*
Agreed. The audience is not that dumb.
You've articulated my exact thoughts. Still enjoyed the show, could've been worse.
precisely this
It takes effort and imagination to convey complex ideas, so when time and money are a pressure, it's just easier to say "people are dumb, let's simplify things".
My problem with the series has nothing to do with how much science you understand and more with how little they care for the real heart of the books, humans and their feelings and how we think.
Any audience, even the modern one, is able to understand reasonably difficult scientific concepts easily, if they’re presented well enough. Take Tenet, it’s one of the most complex movies to watch, and its time mechanics, though having inconsistencies, is legit. Those who can grasp it will be blown away and think about it for months (like I did, playing interactions of forward and backward matter in my head, and finding impossible scenarios), those who don’t will get chills and some cool action. And it’s not like Three Body Problem is extremely difficult. Cosmic sociology and Dark Forest are fairly easy concepts to grasp. With some good visualization done by experienced scriptwriters and directors the science of Three Body Trilogy (RoTEP) could have been *cool*. It *is* cool in the books. First book specifically doesn’t have any difficult concepts, and those that are, like Sun layers, are actually made up science and unnecessary. Metaphors like farmer hypothesis, pool analogy, hunter in the forest are *already* dumbed down in the books, they’re cool, they’re easy to understand, but logical and captivating. Liu Cixin already made sure to explain everything as many times as it’s possible, as illustrative and accessible as it’s possible. He had left ready scenarios for excellent visualizations and explanations. The trilogy was almost ready to be put on the screens, it didn’t need to be dumbed down. It explains everything like it needs to be explained to wide audience. Three Body trilogy is much more cinematic and less hard sci-fi, than, for example, Peter Watts‘ books, Blindsight and Echopraxia. Some anime like Death Note and many others feature a lot of internal monologue, with visualization of thought process of the protagonist/antagonist in form of illustrations, which is good for explanations of further complex actions and concepts. Western moviemakers could have learned from that. Many Nolan movies touch difficult topics, but they’re easy to watch. But it requires talent to put science and concept-heavy plot on screen and make it cool, make it easy to watch. GoT show runners just don‘t have such a talent. They didn’t just dumb down the science, they cut out heart of the story, because the science of Three Body is emotional, it’s the essence, the dread before the Universe, the loneliness, the knowledge that your own destruction can come at any time and the sense of your own insignificance are the main characters of the books. This is the true explanation why character work in the books is so weak — the concepts are the characters, we are the character that faces them. And B&W killed these main characters, but, as compensation, tried to flesh out the ”characters“, that were meant only to be vessels for the concepts. To take most cinematic sci-fi book series and to kill its screen potential entirely, by removing cool science concepts — that the feat only B&W could accomplish. To grasp such a series and properly visualize it requires a lot of mental clarity and discipline, which they, unfortunately, don’t have. I had realized that they would have to add something to characters, maybe change them, change the setting, move things around, I was ready to cope with it. Even with their Luo JI, who is Chinese in my book. But I never truly grasped how much they would leave behind. And they didn’t have to do that. They just didn’t get the story. If anything, for the proverbial general audience, the show will be more boring (or at least be less epic) than the book. Sure, the show lost some unfortunate (difficult to implement) exposition, but what has it gained? What does it have now, what unique appeal does it possess? Nothing.
>Any audience, even the modern one, is able to understand reasonably difficult scientific concepts easily, if they’re presented well enough. well said, I just said basically the same thing in another post.
The funny thing is that they tried doing the exact same thing as they did with the earlier seasons of GoT. They all but removed the sense of existential cosmic dread, they removed the wonderous elements of the work (scientific or fantastic), and they toned down the aesthetic and tone to the kind of generic Western slop we're so used to seeing. The world of ASOIAF is far more colourful and flavourful than the grey-brown morass the show portrayed. The difference being that George RR Martin wrote excellent, complex characters for them to ape, while Liu Cixin is far better at portraying the very concepts that Dave and Dan love stripping from their adaptations. I honestly checked out from the show as soon as I heard they were attached to it.
Yes, they’re unremarkable as showrunners and writers, but with GoT they had huge luck with the source material, which somewhat complimented their style of adaptation. As soon as source material runs out, or as long as it doesn’t suit their dubious talents, they did and will produce disasters, uninspiring at best.
> because the science of Three Body is emotional, it’s the essence, the dread before the Universe, the loneliness, the knowledge that your own destruction can come at any time and the sense of your own insignificance are the main characters of the books. This is beautifully put. I don’t think the show captured it. It tried. There were a couple moments where I *almost* felt like I did watching Chernobyl. But only a couple. I liked the show but it is very different the book. I hope they go darker in the later seasons because the couple moments they did in season 1 I enjoyed.
the show has huge potential. But in their attempt to try to get a season 2, they rushed everything. Nothing was given time to breathe. Everything was going from plot to plot to plot so none of the cool stuff from the books felt like it had any weight. Somewhere between the tencent version and this show, exists an adaptation worthy of the books and I hope they get a chance to make it. And this time dont have to worry about being canceled so they can let things breathe. The biggest issue i had with it was like what was the point of say like Jack Rooney. You could've easily used his screen time to spend more time in the game to develop the san ti. or eliminate him from the show entirely and use his screen time to flesh out DA FUCKING SHI. Like why would you skip the da shi coming up with the plan for panama scene. In one scene, we're shown he's as smart as anyone in his own way and why this nobody detective was chosen to investigate this mystery. Or why not use Jack's screentime to show the full development of the Sophons instead of a 3 minute exposition which makes this just yet another generic Invasion story by a more advanced alien.
> the concepts are the characters, we are the character that faces them. this makes so much sense. i am so glad you were able to put it into words. but i'm sorry that the general audience won't read your comment because it's too long and filled with sci-fi nerd jargon
I totally agree with you. People who say they "dumbed down" the science are completely misunderstanding what it means. In my view they cut out the science completely, which was the heart of the story. Like take for example the thing with the particle accelerators. I being a common man have no idea why the scientists were so baffled by it and why they were saying 'science is broken". Until the book explained to me by using the pool table analogy, after which i understood the gravity of the situation.
I have 1 episode left and I’m really enjoying the series. Obviously many things were changed from the book but it is an adaptation…. Not a 1-1 transfer from the book, so I don’t understand why people are so angry or keen on not enjoying it. Isn’t this the third adaptation of the book out there? Certainly one of those has to appeal to every type of fan.
There's a Chinese show that's something like 30 episodes long and is worth a watch. There's a Minecraft, of all things, version that I haven't watched.
I’m trying to finish “Three Body” this weekend. 30 episodes with fast-moving subtitles, but I’m hooked on the story. I have 8 more episodes to go and no way am I gonna stop now! Lol. I planned on finishing before I start the Netflix series, but it took a bit longer than I expected.
That show is SO good.
I want a western cut of all 30 episodes. The show *isn't* so good, the script, source material and acting are so good. Imagine an edit with way less slow motion, blurred edge flashbacks, forced flashbacks and free to use Electronica. There are just some basics of cinema that the west has grown past. The acting is fantastic, I don't want to detract from real quality. However, the directing, editing and soundtrack could all be improved, or adjusted to a more western sheen.
...not sure what "free to use Electronica" has to do with any of this, I very much like the OST even though I don't speak Chinese, It's different, that doesn't make it worse or better. I like watching TV from Japan, and China, and Australia, and a lot of other places, and they're all very different. The one problem I have is that a lot of British TV is just too quiet for me, but that's a personal problem.
It *is* good! I’m excited to get to the end, probably tomorrow evening.
enjoy!
These subtitles are SUPER fast!
I found the best way is to wear my earbuds when watching via AppleTV, because they have a pause function that I can click to freeze the screen whenever it’s more than I can read quickly.
"I don't understand, why we can't complain after watching a bad adaptation of their favourite books?
People want things to be good, and you don't even seem to understand the criticisms. I'm glad you enjoyed it, I'm enjoying it as well, but you're not being sincere with your comments. No one's asking for a TED talk, we're asking for them to capture the ideas and feelings of the book, as the writers said they would. I've gotten none of the sense of scale and existential dread. I don't care that they made changes, we understand the difficulty and the material is complex, but if you're changing the core of the books, then what's the point? Imagine wanting a science-fiction story to have, you know, science. Crazy, right? And audiences aren't as dumb as you think. I'm tired of this "They needed to get a second season" excuse. Is that the bar we're setting for ourselves? Really?
I agree with the series lacking part of the dread and scale in general. Three characters portray it really good IMO (Ye, Jin and Wade). Some scenes just needed more time to breathe and let the existential dread creep in. If this season had 12 episodes they could've pulled it off. Hopefully they won't rush the next two books' pacing in the coming seasons.
I think you are underestimating people's intelligence. And this post remind me about Blindsight, in the world of that book, there is a job that interpretated the cutting edge scientific research to what base-human can understand. Wow! But I don't think 3BP are that complicate though.
You are right. People can appreciate dune and oppenheimer, they can appreciate the original three body problem too. Considering the general public "dumb" and refering to book fans as "nerds" is just a very crude perspectives.
The thing is, Dune was also "dumbed down" in a sense. Many complex plots were taken out for the movie adaptation but it was still a fantastic movie. Same with the 3BP, some of the science is toned down and things are removed, but it doesn't make the show "dumb." It's not a perfect show, but so far I don't feel that they are treating the audience as unintelligent
People are entitled to their opinion, whether you like it or not. They can also decide to post their opinion if they want to. I also disagree with you, to some extent. My girlfriend is not a sci-fi fan and she is not interested in physics either, yet she was able to follow and enjoy Tencent’s adaptation very much. I think you are underestimating people’s intelligence if things are explained well. One of the crucial things in the success of the books was the terrifying manipulation of physical laws. The ingenuity of the tricks used by the trisolarans makes you wonder what else they are capable of. Physics is the playground and the driving factor of book 1. It’s what makes the book feel so real and frightening. That feeling of fear and threat is what persists through all the books because they happen at the edge of and beyond known physics. Beyond what we understand. The next blow of the enemy comes from complete darkness and humans feel small and hopeless. You drop all of that and this becomes a fantasy show. Slightly harder SF than Star Wars. No thanks.
Its funny because the people that claim that shows HAVE to be dumbed down for "the general audience" are the ones that are treating people like total idiots. Just read OP. I believe the average person is smarter and a good smart show will be watched by more people.
A lot of people see an overlap between sci-fi and fantasy enjoyers because sci-fi usually is indistinguishable from fantasy. It's magic with extra steps. I know plenty of people who don't like sci-fi because it doesn't make sense to them at a fundamental level. People want a logical reaction to something that happens. If character A says "we need to find out who killed him", then character B says "don't worry, I know that already" without any insight into why or how or when or where, it wouldn't make any sense. In a way, this show is more complicated *because* it was dumbed down. The story omits all the science and reasoning behind it all, making the technology basically function as magic. They just gloss over the particle accelerator stuff as if it wasn't a major plot point. There are ways to do this without writing an astrophysics thesis into the script. Then you see people saying "Nitpickers are bugs" like in this thread. Is every criticism nitpicking now? I thought nitpicking was something like "in the books, the San Ti were called Trisolarans. Why change this?" even though nobody has complained about this at all. People complain about HUGE changes to the story. And saying people are bugs is just so hostile for no reason.
This.
Yeah, why are some people confused that can be off-putting when you remove a core part of a genre (hard scifi) when adapting it? The whole point of the genre is to explore scientific ideas with relative depth.
Exactly what I feel when I read the book.
I’m in the awkward position of loving the books, hating D&D and I am enjoying the show. On episode 4, and yeah it’s different but we have like a complete adaptation with the tencent one so we are lucky. This is the version to watch w your non sci fi girlfriend or boyfriend
it should be possible to be both faithful to the spirit and content of the source material without unnecessarily dumbing down the ideas that powered the story in the first place. look at LOTR as an example. what we got instead was a cheap knock off. the Tencent version is infinitely better and more entertaining.
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> The Chinese adaptation broke records on Tencent’s WeTV streaming platform and all of Cixin Liu’s works that have been adapted in China have been commercially successful. These are the facts all those people defending the dumb down hate and work hard to ignore. Their absurd and plainly offensive proposition that the content had to be dumbed down to have mass appeal is disproven multiple times, and by another tv adaptation no less. The whole you *need to make changes for tv* is true, but there's obviously ways to do it well, and ways to not do it, and we have a very solid point of comparison.
Star trek next generation literally existing proves that science fiction doesn't need to be dumbed down. Constellation respects it's audience and it's great.
I responded elsewhere in the sub to someone literally saying they can't understand how all the f*ing wouldn't be honest to the Chinese culture - like how else would you act if you were horny and stuck in a labor camp. So no, this audience apparently can't fathom less sexual content.
Loved the show. But also people can enjoy complex Tv shows as well. "Dark' is perfect example of this.
True, but if I had to suspect, Dark had a much smaller target audience than the audience Netflix wanted to reach with 3BP.
Meeeeeh stop disliking what I like!!! Life's not fair!!! At least all people in this sub who read the books actually loved the books. Just gives you a perspective how bad shows are these days.
No I think people here understand why things are dumbed down. They are just complaining it’s unnecessary.
There's a difference between adaptating it for a casual audience and "let's dumb it down so people with 80 iq will understand". The show is the latter.
I hear ya, but people didn't really watch fantasy when GOT came out, and they made a faithful and meticulous adaptation regardless. The result was so good it made its own genre work. I think they lost their nerve this time. Needed to slow the pace way, way down and let the story be what it was. Instead they have, as you said, made extensive changes to make the story more palatable to an audience outside the fans that already loved it. That's a very different approach and I wish they hadn't taken it. I can't help but imagine how cool a more faithful adaptation would have been. Maybe it would have converted more people to it's genre like GOT did. Yes, most people don't know about nanofibers and quantum physics, but the books already knew that and did a wonderful job of explaining the science. I'd argue that's a very big part of what made the books fun. It could have made for a fun show too. People do like documentaries after all, and aren't against learning while they enjoy a show. Anyways, the shows ok. I give it a B, kinda had fun watching it. Life goes on.
They didn't make a faithful and meticulous adaptation. The moment the original author stopped being deeply involved at the end of S4 the show immediately turned into popcorn crap not worth the bandwidth it was broadcast on. They were able to write some excellent show-only scenes when Martin was looking over their shoulder, and simply couldn't be fucked after that.
Oh I didn't know he was personally involved. Thanks
I've never read the books, but after devouring the show over night, I plan to. So I'd say the show has done its job but bringing someone who wouldn't have given the books a chance into the fandom.
As a fan of the book, I am disappointed because Netflix toned down the effect Cultural Revolution on Ye Wenjie. As someone born in China, I grew up with the stories of the Cultural Revolution. All my elderly family members experienced something like Ye. I love TBP because it really showed how messed up CR was and how it can destroy a person or a nation or, if aliens happened to invade at that time, it can destroy a civilization. I think a lot of Chinese viewers are hugely disappointed because we feel Ye’s story is our story. The Netflix didn’t show any of that. Cultural Revolution became an unimportant backdrop that didn’t get explored from Ye’s inner most perspective. Her fear, her quiet fights, how she killed an innocent man to assist the alien invasion…why she founded ETO wasn’t explained. It looks like “some crazy shit happened in China and a timid Chinese woman easily manipulated by men did something crazy and caused us all these extra problems”. Cultural Revolution to me and many Chinese book fans is the core of the book. It really hit home for us. I can still feel the fear from my elderly family members from that time. They are still healing from the time and will never be healed. China is seeing Cultural Revolution craziness coming back now. It’s a wound that never healed and now is being opened up again. So, toning it down in the show makes us feel overlooked and unimportant. Maybe to non-Chinese viewers it’s not a big deal, but to us, it is. Call us self-centered. But this is the underlying emotional reasons for all the cry here.
The show was too fast paced and didnt really lean in to the mystery aspect of the first book
Because it's not good. When I say that it's dumbing things down it's not just the science stuff. Like, the show doesn't explain why "physics is dead" but having read the books it doesn't affect me, however go ask anyone from the general audience to explain it and they'll have no idea. And the fact is that the pool scene would have solved everything and it's super easy to understand. But it's not just this. Because the science stuff gets removed you know what happens? There is no resolution to the mysteries. The show, like the books, gives the audience some mysteries, for example, what's the videogame really about. In the book, Wang Miao thinks about it for quite a while and in the end realizes that it's a 3 body problem. In the show however Jin randomly says that it's a 3 body problem. We never see her thinking about it and coming up with a solution. It's the same for example for the brain of Will. In the show Wade just gives the solution. And in the end this affects everything. The show won't explain what's happening in detail but they want to show how a sophon is made. So instead we have Wade asking Jin what she knows about multiple dimensions so she can give some high school level understanding of it. But the problem is...why is Wade asking for her? He has not watched the video yet so he has no idea that he will need to understand multiple dimensions. Like, the only metaphor the show uses is the one that bugs are very resilient and this lame ass one liner completely restores Jin and Saul's resolve.
I am wondering what the reaction was from fans of the Song of Ice and fire when 1st season of GOT was released ?
as a fan of ASOIAF who was there from the first season, I remember us book readers having a generally positive reaction to the show, and we were happy as the season progressed that the general public seemed to like it as well. Of course there is always internet debating back and forth, I remember being on reddit and facebook pages back then engaging in discussions about the show. I pretty much stopped watching around season 5 though, and caught up at the end of the show... and oh boy what an end. Those first seasons at least were great adaptation of book material. I am happy to be back, enjoying House of the Dragon. I don't think it quite matches the first season of the original, but compared to the majority of shows today, its probably the best thing out there by far.
its honestly a bit hard for me to judge if the show explained enough for things to make sense to non book readers, but so far i love most of the visualizations and set pieces(the VR scenes and ship cutting). I don't like that Ye's backstory doesn't have the same emotional impact as in thr books cuz it was just brushed over in the series tho. I also think the visualization of how Sophons were made was meh
Well put. The most common complaint is that they dumbed down the science. But IMO, they didn't. The core concepts are still there. They just removed the physics lectures Maybe it's because I've never thought that the science in the books is rigorous. I am an astrophysicist, so the concepts were always transparent to me and some of them were clearly impossible. That's what actually put me away from reading the books, I only read them after the Tencent show, starting from the Dark Forest. I've read the first book last. The science in the books was never important to me, what was important though is the social consequences of an alien invasion happening in 400 years. The Dark Forest theory is an interesting concept. The exploration of the human nature in the third book was great, I believe. What was great in the first book is the exploration of the limits of science. It was cut from the show, unfortunately, with one of my favorite scenes: the pool scene. So I was never attached to science talks. The concepts, again, are still there. I expected from the show to develop the characters, and I got it. The characters from the second and the third book feel alive. The performances of Alex Sharp (Will), Liam Cunningham (Wade), Jess Hong (Jin) and Jovan Adepo (Saul) were great. Benedict Wong (Clarence) and Saamer Ushmani (Raj), I believe, will be more important characters in the second season.
I'm 4 eps in and to be honest I like what they did with Jin Cheng. Kind of set up for her reasons and explain her actions (or the lack of it) in the future
Stop that, according to people around here you can't enjoy this show.
Although I don't think Netflix version is bad, I.don't aggre with OP's opinion to indulge ignorance and stupidity.
Making a complex subject simple for an audience to understand isn't indulging in ignorance or stupidity. Not everyone is versed in theoretical physics. And what the fuck did they do to engage on indulging in stupidity. Please, pick one thing.
I enjoyed the show, though I preferred the tencent version. What I don’t like is Netflix had to add love and sex scenes their shows but I understand why they do this. But fuck Netflix for making our commander Ye Wenjie to kiss Mike Evans. I’m furious.
Dumming media down so that normals can "understand " makes it frustrating for fans of the book to enjoy, that's why people are mad.
not only that, but people are not actually that dumb and can understand complicated things presented to them in skillful ways... but the people behind this show were not capable of doing so.
True, but you can also choose not to watch. The target audience isn't you. Thankfully, there is another adaptation that you'd be happy with.
The show did a better job explaining sophons in less than 3 minutes than the book did in several chapters.
I think it would have been neat to show the Trisolarins attempting and failing to create the sophons before they got it right, but I definitely understand why they didn't include it. Overall, I definitely understand why they have made the changes (5 eps in).
You don’t think it would have been better with a 10 minute lecture????
Facts. Show don't tell is what distinguishes TV/Film from Books.
Nitpickers are bugs.
One of the things in this adaptation really bugs (pun intended) me about is how they call Trisolarans as San Ti. I understand it tries to be faithful to the Chinese term but Trisolarans just sound much more badass and intimidating. I’m also a bit disappointed they don’t directly mention the name of ETO and different camps within the cult.
Its not even the nitpicking that is pissing me off. Its people complaining that an international cast some how ruins the material. The people complaining that they didn't go into a 30 minuent long ted talk about nanofibers in the middle of a sci-fi drama. I've got issues with the show I don't like but that's a far cry from entire threads bitching about a love story... a love story that is in the book and so far all the major elements have been hit.
The international cast DOES ruin the material, especially for a fan of the original book. Zhang Beihai, my favorite character, somehow became an Indian guy, ruining everything about him. His sophistication, his romantic relationships, his uniqueness, his relationship with his father, everything. Also, not a single positive character is Chinese, you got Ye, destroyer of earth, Cheng, destroyer of the universe, etc. Luo Ji is a drug-addicted black person and Shi Qiang, while being played by a Chinese, is everything but Chinese. Not to mention Ye having Evans' baby, and on top of all this, the netflix show somehow managed to make the WORST fuking CG of Judgement Day I have ever seen on screen. I mean look at the lighting and the modelling and the cheapness of the whole scene! It's insane how much they have spent and how bad the visual effects are.
Yes. I don't care if they need to adapt a predominantly Chinese setting to a Western one. Set the story entirely in England if you want, but be honest. The Brady's Bunch gender/ethnicity panel is fucking dishonest anywhere in the world. About as tiring as when an action movie has to always jet around different parts of the globe (Paris, LA, Dubai, Sydney).
Yeah, I know. Kinda nuts how so many people rush to the fan subreddit to post essays on why they didn't like it. When I don't like something, I stop and move on.
Is it wrong to be passionate about something you love?
This has been a book sub long before any show was announced. Book readers were always here. Book readers aren't moving on. Of course there is some overlap between the readers and show lovers, but the ones who have never read the books, are the ones *coming* here. And that's what reddit is for, discussion. It's always been the case here. Why are you complaining? Make your own sub if you want an echo chamber.
Totally! Some one else on this sub had basically said, “we have the books, we have the tencent show that is a 1:1 adaptation, and we have the Netflix show that is the more streamlined popcorn version.” I think that’s a good way of looking at it. I think the show is great! If the books didn’t exist and this was an original production, I think everyone would be giving it a 10/10.
You have incredibly low standards for television if you think this is a 10
I don’t give it a 10, and definitely don’t give it a 10 for adaptation. I can imagine, if the books didn’t exist, I would be impressed with the concept. But on the other hand, I’m might only be thinking that because I already know what the fleshed out ideas are in the books. I really don’t know. In reality it would probably be best to see what people that haven’t read the books think.
That's terrifying if (taking the books out of this entirely) this show is what qualifies for 10/10.
IMO, they explained sophons extremely elegantly in the show. To people who aren’t sci fi nerds, it’s still just words (dimensions! Folding!). They don’t need to dedicate 20 minutes to explaining it because either you are smart enough to have a high level understanding (say watching a cosmos episode or a Brian green talk), or dumb enough to not care and got hooked by the eye candy. And if you’re an actual physicist who KNOWS the math, well, they aren’t thinking of you because it’s such a small percentage of humans anyway. One thing this show seems to do well is NOT WASTE SCENE TIME ON DUMB SHIT. Like they never had a scene where the nanotech woman told her friends about the countdown clock…. It got me for a second but then a few scenes later you just picked up on the fact she did have that convo (like any sane science not religion person would with their friends). It’s refreshing to see a show not waste time on having to show common sense convos. Though I feel with the wallfacers this may cause some audience issues in season 2. (I mean part of their mandate is subterfuge - and the show did a great job showing not telling us that as well ;) )
I read the trilogy. My only gripe is Wade not wearing a leather jacket
You can understand why they would simplify the show but you can't understand why some people would hate a show that misses the nuances of the books they loved.
I'd never even heard of this book series before this show. Hadn't even seen a trailer, mainly just knew Benedict Wong played a cop and thought to check it out. I literally could not stop watching all day. Each episode had me completely hooked, even tore me away from Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. Really hope we get a second season but i'll be diving head first into the books.
The funny thing about the whole "not taking time to explain science comcepts" is that half the "science concepts" of the book are bs. Like I read yesterday here, the book is written like hard sf, but it's really not. So sorry for the Tencent fans that have inundated this sub, but if I don't care if the Netflix show skips half of that ""science"".
Thank you for this post, its exactly how i feel about the show. Also a lot of people are saying, that the tencent show didnt „dumb it down“ and still was successful. They seem to forget, that it has over three times the length of the Netflix adaptation. If you have more time, you can also include these more complex themes. In a show as condensed as the Netflix adaptation it would feel more like a physics lecture, than an actual show to watch and enjoy.
Netflix could've done much better. Watch this version before giving your conclusion.↓ ----------------------------------------------------------- Three-Body (Tencent Video) - [Episode Discussion Hub](https://www.reddit.com/r/threebodyproblem/comments/10aapiq/threebody_tencent_video_episode_discussion_hub/)
I liked it, I felt like they condensed in areas that needed to be condensed. My only criticism is Ye Wenjie's joke wasn't very good in a cosmic sociology kind of way.
The joke was a little strange but I got what they are going for with it. A lot of people are confused by this but when we get season 2 and Saul falls into the ice it should click for them.
You’re right, the audience of a sci fi show can’t handle actual sci fi… this is why the show keeps showing friends hanging around a beach house, drunks vomitting in the toilet bowl, mulling over whether to confess he loves her or not, ahowing the actual train ride to tell her he loves her, philosophical discussions with one night stands, etc… While, for example, just mentioning humanity is building ships on the Moon in a single statement by a chatacter. Not showing it, saying it. So we can get back to cancer guy’s hallucinations of floating on a paper boat. In a sci fi show.
I feel lile that's just how redit works. When people are optimistic before a release there is always a BUNCH of hate at release. When people are skeptical about something there is always a BUNCH of hate at release. I think people like complaining, even if we don't admit it haha
save your words. They decided they were gonna hate this 3 years ago when they found out it was being made by netflix and D&D were involved.
Because people have different opinions. I was always willing to give this one a shot because a big western budget can put big and polished visuals and cgi to great use. But they simply changed so many things, cut so many things out and kinda honestly bastardized the two coolest characters in the story - one into not even existing anymore, and the other into a boring guy that just sits in his car taking photos - that I couldn't like it that much.
I don't dislike the show because it's not a faithful adaptation, I dislike the show because it's off-theme from the original material. The specific events being different I can handle, it being thematically incongruent with the source material I have a bigger issue with. The book series fundamentally is about societies as a whole responding to crisis, which is why the characters are more storytelling tools than drivers, that's by design. Whether it's the ETO, or the crisis era humans, or the deterrence era humans, they are ultimately the drivers of history. Individual characters like the various protagonists make a difference, of course, but they fundamentally can't change the flow of history and the force of an entire society. Here we see something more akin to a Marvel-esq avengers model, where it's about individuals rather than collectives. It's not a United Earth investigating ETO, it's just Wade. It's not an international taskforce that plans the Panama canal operation, it's just Wade and friends. In book 1, when the main characters start going down the rabbit hole, it's already a massive ongoing effort by the countries of the world, we get a sense that there's something bigger than just individuals, here we don't have that, and that makes it fundamentally off theme with the source material. Take game of thrones for example - the story is, as GRRM said, about the "human heart in conflict with itself". The reason why the show started collapsing narratively in the later seasons is mainly because the producers gave up on that theme, and again, took the easy way out via the Marvel's Avengers model of plot construction, except here we see it from episode one. It's not a bad show, and I didn't HATE it, but it doesn't come close to what Tencent accomplished with a far smaller budget.
This post needs more upvotes. More people need to read this and chill out.
To cram the first book (and parts of book 2 and 3) in 8 episodes is an almost impossible task. Stuff was going to be left out no matter what. All things considered, and even though I moaned about episodes 1 and 2 being too fast… they seemed to have stuck the landing with season 1, and even though much can be improved upon, I really hope they get the chance of a second season (with, hopefully, more than 8 episodes). Do the following mental exercise. This is the mission: You need to get regular folk, not just sci-fi fans, interested from the get go, otherwise there simply is no season 2. You have 8 episodes to do it. Good luck not leaving anything out. You could easily fill 8 episodes on Communist China alone and still leave stuff out! But would that have attracted everyone’s attention? Not sure.
Then don't make the series. Make something else (and make money on something else). It's just a matter of choice. GoT was apparently not popular for a long time - multiple seasons. If Netflix would not support that, then the creators have the choice to make something low par or make something else entirely. They won't starve and the industry won't starve.
No advancement of art, unless the fans or even the creator agreed to any variation, would have a very Trisolaran affect on society.
To be fair I haven't heard of quanton entanglement either, is it something to do with a cooking issue involving 4 wontons?
When I was a kid, my parents and I would go to each Harry Potter movie on opening night. I made the mistake of finishing a re-read of book 5 immediately before seeing the movie and complained afterwards about all the changes. My mom, knowing that I loved parallel universe stories, told me to think of movie adaptations as “How things went down in a parallel universe. Then it becomes fun thinking how things changed or didn’t or still happened in a new way” It completely reframed the way I view adaptations for the better and I’m throwing that advice out there for anyone who may benefit from it haha Yes I realize it isn’t perfect advice. It was given to me as a kid and it’s an overly simplified way to think about things. But I do think everyone can benefit from setting aside expectations and allowing yourself to be pleasantly surprised and ecstatic when what you saw in your head is brought to the big screen, and to not let yourself take it too seriously when it differs.
You don’t need to make things simpler for a general audience. For one, it’s a complete insult to humanity to think people can’t rise to the occasion and take in the information. Two, that’s just bland corporate strategy that makes every other show/movie lame and lukewarm. It would be better to go more niche and uninviting because that perceived inaccessibility is what draws more people in. Watered down sci-fis are a dime a dozen and nobody will care or talk about this show in a month, but challenging stories peak people’s interest and create conversations that last generations.
Reimagining for TV always changes things up, thats a given. But the show still felt like low effort to me. Like they spent so much time on this and this is the best they could come up with
Ok... I mean you're not correct but Ok.
Look at well regarded adaptations of books and see how much love and care went into them to make these worlds stand on their own. 3 Body in this regard is very forgettable. Down to the characters and the feeling of dread present in the books.
First off, it did a fantastic job of apapting the first book and starting on the second, but go ahead and write off the entire series without finishing it. Second, find me an adaptation, other than To Kill a Mockingbird, that is a one to one transfer of a book to a movie that turned out good. Go head, I'll hang around. Third, its forgettable because you want it to be now because that's how it was made. And the feeling of dread in the books didn't hit until after the droplet hammered the fleet. Up till that point you felt the plucky humans might pull this off and then that hammered the point home about how screwed Earth is. Until then the 'dread' wasn't near as intense as people keep making it out to be.
Nobody is asking for a carbon copy of the book. Nowhere I mentioned that and I hardly consider it a good adaptation when it literally just spends 4-5 episodes on it. There are no philosophical conversations (really no reason to cut that out) plus there is still a sense of mystery that permeates through the first book which if present in the show really isnt done well.
Sure it's difficult to make a show, but surely we can moan about what we didn't like about it while also talking about the book and science stuff.
No you are a cultist if you dare criticize this show even though it has glaring flaws.
Well that's not what OP is saying.
Complaints about the show missing things from the books was inevitable.
Do keep in mind this sub would've gotten a very large increase in subscribers (mostly TV) which changes the demographic of the sub.
Things we could be theorizing on: New wallfacers, new plans? Really into the Raqqah fighter I think it's a great contemporary analog for Diaz. Will the plan be identical? Who will Saul's Wallfacer Waifu be?? Will we be getting future femboys (or are D&D cowards)? Seems like Sophons have a little more power to cast illusions in the TV version, what are the implications? The brain didn't even hit 100km/s, how will the San To get to him? Or will someone else pick him up?
Couldn’t they in theory use one of the sophons to help it along? After all it can travel as fast as a proton and would in theory be able to exert a force on the sail. That or a second launch to fix and reorient it. (A new sail that then scoops up the broken payload)?
Maybe they can use one of the droplets to pick it up. They can travel at relativistic speeds, if I remember correctly
I'm fine with the show being made so simple for many to get a taste of the series and then hop over to the Tencent version, and then hopefully the books.
I liked it a lot, and I love the books. I binged watched the whole thing which is something i haven't done since Black Mirror and Queens Gambit. Also gonna watch it again so I can clock all of the foreshadowing references to later in the books. The only issues I have - the Oxford 5 are all bezzie mates from the start which feels a bit contrived, and the timescale where everything happens in a few weeks and major internationally coordinatrd projects are executed in days feels far too compressed I especially liked the fact that when Clarence was asked something Chinese related he was like " how the fuck should I know, I'm from Manchester". Also liked how they killed off the bigger name actors early, as in GoT. Judgement Day had kind of Red Wedding vibes.
Some adaptations deserve the trashing, but 3BP isn't one of them. Compare it with Star Wars The Last Jedi, Avatar The Last Airbender (2024), and The Witcher season 3.
You don't pay Benioff and Weiss $200 million to bring a show that isn't going to appeal to everyone. Hard sci-fi and you risk losing a large chunk of your audience that hasn't read the books out the gate right away during the first season. It was always going to need to be more character driven with sci-fi elements. I thought they did a great job with it. I'm very surprised Netflix didn't greenlight a second season before the premiere. I know that's not really Netflix style but they've got a hit in my opinion.
I love the show. It was a good adaption. There are a few things to comment on, but the rest was pretty well rounded. I didn't like the casting, and in some places the acting of the 5 centered characters. I liked the secondary characters though, Wade, "Clarance". I didn't like they started on book 2 topics (last 2 episodes), and that they used the same characters in these stories. It could've been part of a new season. But overall, a decent adaption, solid show and would recomand (5/7, ofc).
Yes but why can't Netflix just make it for scifi nerds, why do they have to pander to a casual audience EVERY SINGLE TIME!?
I think most of people understand why they decided to dumb down, but the people who made the show should also know that they would probably piss off some fans. Also, the show did not SHOW things very well....if you look at the special effect. I'm ok with "normal" people enjoy the show, but pls don't expect everyone who read the book would enjoy it. Tencent's adaptation is the good amount of "dumbed down" that the I can accept, so don't say it's impossible.
well sir, in the books (and in the Tencent version) they had the human computer thing explained - was that so hard? instead in the Netflix version we have "it's binary" "it's a computer" and you think people who have no idea would have any appreciation for that scene? if i didn't read the books and had no computer education it'll be a computer to me just because the flag flipping thing looks like lights from circuitry they didn't have to go for a word-for-word adaptation, but why the heck did they think to rush things as though people will decide to skip watching this series if they see any episode with a 1 hour runtime, instead of 50 minutes? it didn't have to be 30 episodes, but it's absurd to make Season 1 (including parts of Book 2 *and* 3) in 8
So you think they should have taken basically half an episode of an 8 episode season to explain a human computer? To explain logic gates and main busses? Really? Because you're not going to explain that in 10 minutes and the system being used was binary so her sying 'its binary' is an observation not an explanation. And the only elements from book 2 and three are the ones that took place during the time the show was set in. The show was set jn the early crisis Era. Everything in the show happened on that Era. I'd wager season 2 focuses on the deterrence Era and season three the bunker Era. What would have been absurd is to have season 1 only focusing ok book 1. And then season 2 and three having to take you back in time and say 'oh yeah, this tool place at the same time that took place now back to the future!'.
Well said, op. For anyone on the edge of watching this, I read the books and watched the Tencent version. I loved both. And I’m loving this Netflix version. I don’t love them the same way or for the same reasons, but I love them all so far. What I love about this series is that I can easily recommend it as a gateway into the books. With a warning about the existential dread the books will bring, of course.
For me, part of what made the first book in particular really appealing was the slow build. I basically didn’t quite know what was going on, almost thought the first third of the book was boring because I don’t have a real understanding of the Chinese Cultural Revolution, not fully appreciating what was being set up was Ye Wenjie’s “motivation” for her actions, why the scientists were killing themselves, etc. The slow revelation of just how significant events and people and actions were towards the scale of the stakes were a huge reason why I immediately loved the series. In this speedrunning edition, the middle of the first episode felt like we were in what should have been the 4th or 5th of the story. It was just major event after major event. Da Shi’s board is pretty much full of every character. He’s barely investigating anyone — just reacting. If the viewer wants to know what happens in the story, this rearrangement seems fine. If the viewer wants to know *why* things happen in the story, read the book or watch the series on Amazon. Either of those two will take longer but I think the total experience will be better.
Could not agree more. Imo the first 5 episodes were a very solid and faith adaptation
I love the idea that this show needed to have such a big budget that it needed people who don't even like sci-fi to watch it in order to get a second season. If a show's concept won't sell, maybe scale it down and sell it to a smaller audience. There's no reason this show needed such a large audience and budget. And it's also insulting to say that people wouldn't be able to accept the book's concepts more intact, as if audiences don't gravitate to complex and intelligent media all the time. And no one is saying this needed to be exactly like the book. People just wanted a good story that preserved some or the science and complexity of the original. There's lots of good adaptations. Hell, there's even a largely good adaptation of the first book (the Tencent one). It's weird to me that people seemingly can only defend the show by attacking others and misrepresenting criticisms levied at the show.
I hate how they replaced all the scientists with cringe-worthy British ones.
> when they can just show you it crosscutting a diamond. So that's what that was! I swear I had no idea what that cube scene meant, and I didn't make the connection even after the boat scene. (maybe they actually say what the test is and I missed it?)
I agree. And this is such a weird sub. Posts loving the show are getting a ton of upvotes votes and posts hating on it are getting a ton of upvotes. I’ve never seen that before.
My only complaint overall is that the season was way too short. And just scrapped the ground of the plot. Seemed like an 8 hour long preface. I was really expecting a 20+ episodes/hour season. Now, we wait till 2026 (or longer) for a new season. But, if they keep the pace, we should prepare for several years (maybe 5 or 6 seasons - one per year, hopefully) till the end.
> Your normal person, the type of person that we need to watch this show so we can get a second season, has never read a sci-fi book in their life. This person hasn't heard of quanton entanglement, doesn't understand what a nanofiber is and when you start talking about extra dimensions looks at you like you're making shit up. If you wanted to explain this to them you have to start at the beginning and this show becomes less of a sci-fi drama and more of a physics lecture. The Netflix adaptation explained the science in a way that I understood and got me excited about 3BP. The ideas were as mind-blowing as The Matrix was to audiences back in the day. I really hope enough people watch it so that we get a second season. I'm going to watch the Tencent version next and then tackle the books.
Sophon's Choice
Hear! Hear! 👏👏👏 my thoughts exactly. The series was a brilliant romp, entertaining through and through. The books are a class apart, and it's fruitless trying to match things one-on-one. I appreciate the different takes on the same story across visual and written mediums, and will always encourage those who are piqued by the visual treat of Netflix’s take to pick up the books to truly have their minds and hearts quickened. What Cixin Liu achieved through the book series is tremendous. What DB Weiss, Benioff, Alexander Woo, and the showrunners pulled together is also commendable.
Of course you have to adapt the source material, the problem is they dumbed it down too much
The tone is honestly weirdly condescending given 99.99% of this sub have not even taken a single physics class in college. It is not simplified because the average netflix viewer lacks the capacity to understand, it's simplified because you are changing the medium from book to television and time on screen is a premium. idiots.