3 Body Problem: series created by David Benioff, D. B. Weiss and Alexander Woo

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

Just finished the first episode and am thinking this is going to be one of those that will talked about for some time to come. Streaming now on Netflix in a complete 1st season release.

A good spoiler free review here: https://www.npr.org/2024/03/22/1239945610/3-body-problem-review-netflix-sci-fi

[Nictuku]

1. I started it yesterday

I am a science and sci-fi fan. It does seem interesting to me. I made it through the first part (which is in subtitles because it is in China back in the 40's?) - that was OK, but I was glad to see that the entire thing wasn't going to be in subtitles. (takes a LOT of focus for me to read subtitles. Definitely have to be in the right mood), but again, that was just for the beginning.

I found that I had lost the thread of what was going on very early however. The way the script is written is as if it assumes that you already know what the hell they are all talking about. I understand that that is how some stories unravel on screen. It is a good plot device, at times.

I decided that I was going to have to start it all over again and give it my 100% focus to figure out what they are going on about. It does jump around a lot between different people. So you think it is worth a 2nd attempt?

I'm prepared to give it another chance.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

3. This is the 2nd time the books have been filmed. The first were Chinese while this is mostly English with few subtitle

[Pluvious]

8. To answer your question...

As a SciFi fan too, I consumed the whole trilogy in Audible

It's hard to start, but very layered and deep a bevy of story lines

But... Trying to avoid spoilers here...

There is a point where the early story development introduces a startlingly concept,
which takes the plot into nearly metaphysical SciFi Land

If/when you reach this point, and still are not hooked, then it's maybe not for you

Cheers

[Nictuku]

10. Thank you, I appreciate you taking the time

I think I will give the new TV series a 2nd chance to spark my interest.

(suggesting I read a Trilogy, as some other folks kindly offered, didn't quite do it for me. I used to read a LOT, but not so much nowadays). I miss reading. I hope I take it back up at some point. In the mean time, it is Netflix, etc. for me.

[NBachers]

2. It's a trilogy I read in 2022. Originally written in China, it's remarkable but a bit difficult to negotiate at times.

The translation into English makes it a bit rocky at times, but it's a remarkable book series. I still find myself referring back to it from time to time.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N198VU5/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title

[OAITW r.2.0]

4. binged over a couple of days, loved it.

some of the best special effects scenes I've ever seen.

[Picaro]

5. Read the books

I've read the trilogy and it was pretty incredible. The author is a genius.

[hunter]

6. I read this novel because so many people were saying it's a great story.

It did not resonate with me.

So I heard they were making the movie and I read it again, thinking maybe I missed something.

Couldn't find it. So then I start thinking, as is my usual habit, that something must be wrong with me.

I had similar empty feelings about Frank Herbert's Dune. I first read that in high school on the enthusiastic recommendation of friends and an English teacher who was doing her best to engage me in high school. (She was not successful, I quit the following year.)

Some twenty years later, and with a very respectable university degree proclaiming my completion of a requisite number of upper division English classes in addition to my primary degree, I read Dune again. Nope, still nothing. Who are all these people and why should I care?

I read Dune a third time near twenty years after that, hoping maybe six decades of life experience would inform me. It did not. I think it boils down to this: Most science fiction is fantasy. Star Trek isn't going to happen, not in this universe, no more likely that the bespectacled executive assistant who lives next door is actually Supergirl.

It seems to me that ponderous stories like Dune or the 3 Body Problem get bogged down by the pseudo-scientific set decorations. They'd be much livelier with magic instead of science and wizards instead of scientists.

The converse applies as well. One of the reasons I'm reluctant to put three or four hours of my life aside to watch Oppenheimer is my suspicion that he is portrayed as a wizard and the science magic.

I'm not an acolyte of Joseph Campbell. Christopher Nolan claimed he hadn't read Campbell but his movies do fit the frame.

Arthur C. Clarke's claim that "any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" is too shifty a foundation to build a heavy tower on.

I did watch Resident Alien. It's not a serious drama about aliens, no more than Strange New Worlds is a serious drama about space exploration. I watched Supergirl too.

[Tom Yossarian Joad]

7. I haven't read the novels but your experience with Dune resonates with me as well.

I must have tried3-4 read throughs but it never really clicked with me and there for a time I was a voracious science fiction reader.

[Pluvious]

9. We all have varying tastes...

I'm curious if you've enjoyed the novels of...

(Astrophysicist) Alistair Reynalds

Peter F. Hamilton

Ian M Banks (Culture novels)

[hunter]

11. Judging by my library I've read a lot by Alistar Reynalds. Can't claim it's stuck with me.

I've got a grudge with Peter F. Hamilton. At the beginning of the covid-19 lockdowns I cleared some of his books out of our home library to make room for others. I rarely do that. Soon after I got "A Hole in the Sky" as a gift and read it, spitefully.

I've avoided Iain M. Banks. My head is already a cracked and raging furnace of darkness, some of it actual memories. I don't need to add any fuel to that fire.

[Pluvious]

12. Interesting answers, thanks for sharing...

I too have grown wary and weary of dark entertainment, which certainly defines Banks and some other PFH's works (not to mention a preponderance of film and video these days)

There are some lighter and a few even hilarious novels to be found (eg Live Free or Die, by John Ringo, and some by John Scalzi like Red Shirts)

There's also another body of work i fell in love with - first in print, then the brilliant Audible performances of - by the Husband / Wife team of the Liaden Universe novels.

[hunter]

14. Here in the 21st century dystopias are lazy writing.

I like to explore worlds where humans generally have their shit together.

[nuxvomica]

16. The whole point of sci-fi is the absence of magic or deities

The difference between it and fantasy is more pretext than form. Sci-fi began (with Shelley's Frankenstein) near the end of the Enlightenment as a way to explore what were new issues of the time, like what do we do now that we have no gods to protect us or rule us? Are we now the gods? I define sci-fi as fiction that asks the question: What is the role of humans in a universe without gods or magic? Seen that way, even implausible plot devices (like Herbert's melange) fit into the genre because they are purely secular, not the product of magic or divine influence, and that places all the power and responsibility on the human or human-like players.

[bif]

13. It's in my queue

[Voltaire2]

15. I'm enjoying it.

I read the books and liked them a lot, and I was somewhat disappointed that the show resets the location from China to the UK, as the historical background in the books provided a Chinese perspective on the cultural revolution and its aftermath that appears to be mostly missing, or at least vastly reduced, in the show. That said - it is a high quality production and a welcome relief from the more less endless repetitive drivel that is being produced these days.