The Expanse, new sci-fi show from SyFy

Is Thomas Jane still married to the fatty?

What is IGN? Link?

R2, IGN is a gaming and entertainment news site. The link to the first episode is in the OP.

So, IGN is an illegal copyright theft site?

IGN is one of the biggest and most respected gaming/comics/tv/nerd news sites out there. Streaming the first episode there is done in co-operation with SyFy and is promotion for the show.

No idea where you pulled your copyright theft theory, R4.

Metacritic has it at about 40%, but I downloaded it anyway. A lot of iffy sci-fi series start out strong before getting boring. Limitless for example, the pilot episode was a thrill ride, but I never liked any of the others and just gave up on it.

Yeah can't say I was too excited about it. Cinematography was very uninspired and I hate the super contrasty look done in post. Why are tv productions still using it? I assume it's meant to give some kind of great vibe but it just makes everything look music video glossy, skin deep and cheap. If you have to ape a certain look just use Alien for the inspiration, not video games or Battlestar Galactica's plastic look. And yes I realize it's got lot to do with using the green screen for the special effects.

The review bits at the end say it's gotten rave reviews ("Game of Thrones in space", "best show of the fall") but I must say I didn't really connect those with what I saw. It also says it's got writers from Iron Man and Children of Men. Well, I'll check out the next few episodes and see if there's anything there. At least with this pilot I didn't feel any emotional connection with the story or the characters. It didn't pull me in at all but hopefully that will change. I love space sci-fi but goddamn how hard it is to find well-made space sci-fi.

At least we got to see Strait's ass and it looked great.

Is it really Steven Strait's naked ass?

I remember there were rumors a few years ago during "Magic City" that Strait used a butt double.

R8, I've no idea but he didn't have trouble walking around in these in The Covenant so I assume he doesn't mind little exposure. Anything's possible, though, I didn't find pics of his butt when I googled.

Premieres tomorrow night right after Childhood's End (10pm, 9pm central).

I loved the books (can't wait for the next one... how long do I have to wait for that??)... and fingers crossed the TV series is good and does the books justice.

This is supposedly Steven Strait's butt from "Magic City":

And this:

Omfg, I cannot WAIT for the "magical 2-night premiere event" to be over so that I don't have to listen to the fucking radio commercial any more!

I swear to god, I've heard the commercial at least a hundred times in the past few days, seriously. And it's always the same one, and it's shitty, and I hate it!

Also, I downloaded and watched the first ep, and it was boring and uninspired. And some of the CG was cheap garbage.

Steven Strait got married when he was very young -- 21 years old.

But he & his wife got divorced a few years ago.

Now he's pushing 30 and seems to be single.

Anyone know what he's up to now?

Reviews are saying it's the new Battlestar Galactica.

[quote]Reviews are saying it's the new Battlestar Galactica.

Those reviewers are either lying or retarded, imo.

The BSG miniseries pilot was absolutely amazing: brilliant, breathtaking, surprising, original, and most of all, interesting.

The Expanse is *none* of these.

It's starting!

I did like the opening credits sequence.

HOT NAKED ALE ASS AT 12 minutes in!

So, it's hewing pretty close to the books so far, and I'm less upset by the casting now that I'm seeing them all together. The Belter patois is a bit impenetrable, and it feels like they're skipping out on some background and foundation that probably have people who haven't read the book feeling kind of lost... but so far, other than the awful CGI of the shuttle zipping through the tube, it's been very well done.

Hot male shirtless scene 25 minutes in.

Seriously, if this show gives us beefcake every 12 and a half minutes, it'll be more than worth it.

Not the James Holden I pictured when I read the book, but It's totally the James Holden I want to watch on big-screen TV.

The casting of Chrisjen Avasarala is near perfection. But I'd better see some damn pistachios too.

Amos is also well cast... I didn't think so at first, but now that I see him in character, he's not the pretty-boy he is in his photos... he's got a really good dose of crazy going on in those eyes, which is just what that character needs.

I have to say that while reading the book, I so thought that this first section (right up until the end of this show) would make a great TV episode. I wasn't wrong.

I assume the west-coaters are watching now... it was good.

Has Steven Strait just had one nude scene so far?

Well, one nude, one extended shirtless scene... good enough for the first episode.

I really liked it, but I'm wondering how anyone who [italic]hasn't[/italic] read the books is taking it. Some of it must be pretty confusing. I thought the cold open (the girl trapped in the locker, then escaping, then seeing something horrifying in the engine room) wasn't really done all that well or handled all that clearly. I mean, *I* knew what was going on because I'd read the books, but someone seeing that for the first time would likely be pretty confused.

[quote]I really liked it, but I'm wondering how anyone who hasn't read the books is taking it.

[quote]I really liked it, but I'm wondering how anyone who hasn't read the books is taking it.

R27/R28... are you having issues?

You quoted a line, twice, with no commentary added...

R29, ha ha, yes there were issues. I was trying to quote and after pressing enter suddenly out came R27 and R28. I must have touched the Post button by accident with my trackpad. I'm not too wild about the Synaptics trackpad software which keeps fucking up even if I try to make it less invasive. Bloody hell. Well, let's try again.

[quote]I really liked it, but I'm wondering how anyone who hasn't read the books is taking it.

I haven't read the books and I wrote my first impressions in R7. Storywise I wasn't pulled in at all. I didn't feel any real tension that good storytelling would create, I didn't care about the characters, and I didn't like the cinematography. I'm really hoping it gets better. I didn't know the show's based on a book series but now after hearing it I sort of understand why the first episode seemed so lifeless.

I loved the Battlestar Galactica mini-series and this was not even close to that.

Huh.

Well, here's the synopsis:

Julie Mao is the girl at the beginning. She's trapped in a locker. Her ship was invaded, she was thrown in a locker and left there. After DAYS she stops hearing noises, and manages to escape. She finds the ship empty except for something truly horrifying in the engine room... gory and awful remains of both her shipmates and the invaders in a twisted nightmare. And apparently a LIVING nightmare.

Miller is a detective in the Belt that has an earth-man as a new partner (and there's a lot of prejudice against his partner by other Belters), and he's hired to find Julie Mao, who "disappeared". She's the daughter of a major corporate CEO big-wig trillionaire. Miller is cynical, lightly corrupt, but with a good heart and more solid ethics under the crusty exterior than you'd imagine. And he loves his job... finding things out. Detecting.

Holden is unambitious, but also a wide-eyed optimist in a way... always believes in doing the right thing. To a fault sometimes. He is on the crew of an ice-hauler that runs from the rings of Saturn to supply water to the belters in the asteroid belt and other locations in the outer planets. HIs crew detects the distress signal from the ship Julie Mao was on, goes to investigate, and it turns out to be a trap... they were targeted by nukes (NUKES!) and the entire Canterbury ship is blow up, leaving Holden and his team alone in space.

This is all against a political background of the wealthy Earth, Militaristic Mars, and downtrodden Belters, and the simmering resentments and animosities among them. The attack seems like it could only have been done by the military might of Mars, and was seemingly unprovoked (i.e. seemingly designed to provoke a war). The mystery behind the attack, who it was, who it wasn't, and how it affects this unstable simmering pot drives a lot of the first book. Ditto with who Julie Mao is, and why she's important... and how everything -- all of these people and events -- connect in the end.

For only 40-some minutes, the first episode actually did a pretty good job of laying out the background, the politics, and introducing us to a ton of characters (including several who will never be seen again, given them -- and their expensive sets -- were all blown up at the end of the first episode). A rich and detailed and complex world was woven... more or less successfully, showing even the different cultures and accents among the parties, in particular the Belter Patois, and the different Belter physiology that comes from never growing up or experiencing much gravity.

But it's a lot to absorb. I'd suggest you give it another chance.

Holy shit, I typed a HUGE essay into R31... and it's BLANK!

Goddammit!

Fuck me. I'm not typing that entire thing again.

Here's a review that might be useful:

R32, no worries, your post in R31 came out just fine. Sometimes it takes a little time for a longer post to show after you've posted it.

The story sounds good but unfortunately the pilot didn't manage to make it alive. Let's hope it gets better.

WHEW!

It was blank for like FIVE MINUTES. I hit refresh and everything.

Anyway, read the link in R33 too. And do give it another shot.

Reminder: Episode 2 is on tonight.

The books are excellent so it's probably worth giving this TV show a chance to grow on you.

Looking forward to episode 2 tonight... and then to see what they do with the show going forward.

There are some scenes in the book coming up this season that I can't imagine how they're going to film. It would simply be too expensive. It'll be interesting to see what they do and how they cope.

I certainly hope the ratings are good enough for them to keep going through all the books.

Interesting

Ratings are not that awesome:

[italic]The premiere of “The Expanse” didn’t move the needle a whole lot for Syfy Monday. The show — which has already been renewed for a second season — debuted to a 0.3 rating in adults 18-49 and 1.19 million viewers, just a little ahead of the most recent numbers for the canceled “Defiance.”[/italic]

SyFy has now released the first four episodes 'on Syfy.com and On Demand cable, satellite and telco TV platforms'. Apparently they're desperately trying to get viewers for the show. I watched the second episode and unfortunately I'm out. The show lacks soul, intensity, tension, drama. It's flat. When I was watching episode 2 I kept thinking almost nothing about this feels right, everything is off somehow. The show is probably quite expensive to make but it still looks cheap. That wouldn't matter if the writing and directing was good. I seriously doubt there will be a second season even if SyFy already announced the renewal. Sounds like a desperate attempt to make the show look good.

I could be wrong, maybe some people will love it. Like I wrote earlier I haven't read the books so I knew nothing about the show before the pilot. It has 8.2 score at IMDb with over 1,000 votes so apparently people do like it.

R38, you shouldn't duck out after only two episodes. This is a story that builds. If it's anything like the books (and it's pretty close so far), it will reward your investment.

Steven Strait should be required to do more than one nude scene.

R39, the story might be great in the books but the tv show falls so flat that it's better I just read the books one day. I love sci-fi but it has to be well-made. The Expanse reminds me of another new SyFy show Killjoys which failed to impress me at all. Then again I absolutely loved the other cheap-ish SyFy summer space show Dark Matter which had drama and tension.

any more nude scene?

I enjoy it just because it's lavish FX and nice actors.

But it's got all the cliches of a space opera:

- Evil empires, downtrodden slave labor; imminent rebellion,

- "Oh, no; we're trapped with little oxygen!"

- 'Blade Runner-ish detective,

- runaway royalty girl,

- dark mysterious enemy,

I always fuck-up.

First sight of the "Butcher of Anderson Station" tonight!

I'm actually enjoying the show... but that's probably because I'm enjoying reliving the books in my head as I watch it.

I wish they had the budget to do the weightlessness stuff right.

Love the diverse cast... at least they got that much right from the book!

The battle scenes were a bit confusing. I'm guessing that was done to hide the low-budget.

Are there more episodes yet? I only see 4 on my bootleg site.

There have only been four. At the pace they're going though, I don't think they can finish book one in one season...

How many episodes in this first season? Because if it's only ten, they may not even get halfway through the first book.

Any more nude scene of strait or Jane after episode 1?

There was a naked guy on a slab (dead, in the autopsy room)... does that count?

no R51

Steven Strait needs to be forced to do more nudity.

The show has been picked up for a season two! WOO-HOO!!

It's an awesome show, but sadly it's on SyFy. SyFy became know for cheap, laughable sci-fi after it rebranded and got rid of its quality sci-fi programming. When the cheap sci-fi shit didn't work out and the network tried to go back to good programming...it was too late as viewers just abandoned the network. Nothing good will ever last on SyFy because the network is known as a joke that produces shit like Sharknado.

Unless there is more footage of Steven Strait's naked body, I don't see much point in it continuing.

Ditto R56

It's a really great story... it's worth keeping up with.

I actually like the adaptation they're doing from the book, and am impressed how close they're staying...

The one thing I can imagine is frustrating for people who haven't read the book is how many things that got deep explanations in the book are simply referenced w/o any real explanation in the show. Like the tubes on the chairs in the space-ships, and the apparent drugs they inject... in the book you understand exactly what those are and why. In the TV show, you've gotten two brief glimpses and really have to work to infer what's going on from them.

Ditto the Belter patois, and several other things.

You kind of have to pay attention in the show more than most shows... and it doesn't hurt to rewatch. In fact, this show seems more fit for binge-watching than being a weekly serial.

There are parts of the book coming up that are going to seriously strain the budget of this show...

That's a pretty common occurrence in sci-fi production, R59.

Yeah, I just wonder how they're going to possibly do justice to those up-coming scenes.

I mean, they've done okay so far... but there's some big shit coming up.

NEW EPISODE TONIGHT!!!!

Praying for Strait nude scene

Aside from the hot men, that Iranian-American woman is the COOLEST thing about the show!!! Love her buzz-saw voice and her character's cutthroat maneuvers!!!

She gets even better, R64. At least if they follow the books. Most of the stuff you're seeing now has been added for the TV show, implied backstory from her appearance in the second book.

Interesting... they're folding in the novellas as well... bits from the Butcher of Anderson Station.... this story wasn't in the books at all, but in a little side novella (there are four or so of those... I think even five now... little short-stories that expand on events in the universe, fill in background for the main characters).

This makes me think book one is going to take more than one year... two seasons to cover book two at this rate.

I have to say, the Rocinante doesn't look anything like I imagined while reading the book.

R64 Agree! She is amazing, and I love her voice.

Syfy has renewed it for season 2.

I thought it was mind-blowing how she loved her gay friends dearly but STILL backstabbed that old queen in order to get the information she needed! And the actress is PERFECT!!!!!!!!!!

DLers need to write to SyFy and tell them to make Steven Strait take his clothes off more in Season 2.

The guy who got impaled is pretty cute too.

Too bad he's pretty much sidelined from here on out.

I loved the moment when Millar, who considers himself an amazing detective, the star of the department, realized that the department considered him a joke, an old guy who was worthless... and that they brought him the cases they didn't want solved.

Miller is like the opposite of most protagonists... not cocky and always winning. but depressed and a loser. Cynical, but with reason. Morally gray.

He's a great character.

BTW, I'm beginning to think Alex is perfectly cast.

Some of the scenes really seem like they're shot in black and white, and then colorized selectively afterwards... it's a weird look.

One thing they've not made really clear is that the people on Ceres are INSIDE it... they spun it up to provide "gravity", and they're all walking with their feet pointed out towards space, their heads pointed towards the center. Ceres is big enough that you wouldn't see the curvature in the hallways.

Donkey Balls.

Another side-novella reference, with "The Churn".

They're really doing justice to the books for the most part.

I'm guessing this isn't a popular show amongst the denizens of DL.... not much activity here.

Love the show, am now reading book 2.

R77, be sure to read the side novellas, like "The Churn" and "Butcher of Anderson Station".... there are four or five in all.

Why did SyFy cancel 'Dominion'?

I liked Chris Egan & Tom Wisdom.

Because Dominion was awful.

It wasn't perfect, but I liked it.

It had a good cast, some interesting ideas about angels/God, the Bible, etc. And some good veteran actors like Anthony Head .

Meh, I couldn't even last through season 1 of Dominion.

The Expanse is MUCH better. And it's really revving up now that most of the groundwork has been laid. When Miller and the crew of the Rocinante come together is when the book takes off... on Eros.

So, the author(s) released another novella, called "The Vital Abyss". The main character is an unapologetic gay man, in a sexual relationship with another man. And even though I'm barely a quarter of the way in, it's VERY good.

I doubt anything in here would make it into the TV series (at least not before season 5). But still, it's very cool.

Everyone's on their way to Eros.... and the shit is about to go down.

Last night's episode was FANTASTIC. Everything started to come together, and they finally looped back to that very first scene of the very first episode.

They also have their first major deviation from the books. But I can also see now that it's how they're going to avoid a budget explosion by trying to stay true to the books. And stay within the "PG" rating that SyFy TV shows probably have to hew to.

I can't believe next week is the finale though! The two our season finale will hit about the half-way point of book one, so ... I guess that makes sense for why season 2 is already green-lit.

The first two seasons will close out book 1. Here's hoping they make it through all the books though, because the books are great.

Fingers crossed.

[quote]Meh, I couldn't even last through season 1 of Dominion.

How come?

Because it was nonsensical, tedious, didn't keep my interest, wasn't interesting, had poor production values, and wasn't going anywhere, R86.

But this isn't the "Why Dominion Sucked" thread.

This is the "The Expanse is a great show, SyFy is back" thread.

Two Hour Finale. Season two in a YEAR?!? Ugh. I don't want to wait that long, dammit.

Going by the books, they have ten years of this show if the ratings hold.

Honestly though I think book three can be condensed down to one short season. It's the weakest book, where the least happens.

So, the girl Thomas jane's character had a crush on without ever meeting her is dead and covered in some energy absorbing crystalized slime? Aw, that must suck.

I must say the show is better sci fi than Star Wars. I wonder if I will bite the bullet and read the books when the season is finished and then get pissed when the show deviates from the books?

R90, don't read book one until after next season.

And there's only been one rather mild deviation from the books that I can tell, and so far, it's not THAT significant (well, it sorta is, but... there's no way they could stay within the budget if they did things totally like the book). I imagine the finale will have more deviation in this same vein (since it has to do with what they found in the reactor room, and how they found the Mao girl in that flop-house/motel)... but again, I don't think it'll change things significantly.

The show has been VERY close to the books so far.

It should be noted that the writers of the book series are heavily involved in the show.

The books are way better than the TV Show. The TV show glosses over so much.

One note where the TV show is very different than the books... the UN Woman from Earth -- such a great character -- isn't actually introduced until the second book. They're pulling some of that stuff forward, and actually writing new scenes to show what is only referenced in retrospect in the books. It's a very smart decision, I think. Just don't read the first book expecting her to be in it at all.

How much more innocuously portrayed Mor(m)on crap can we expect? Are they producing this? Is the books' author a Mor(m)on?

R93, the whole Mormon sub-plot becomes important in the second half of the book.

See, the Mormons have contracted out a "generation ship" being built at the Tycho Station shipyards. They're intending to head out to the starts and found the first extra-solar colony. They think they have a destination in mind. So basically, there's this huge ship being built by the guy backing Holden and his crew. It's strange they haven't shown it, because in the books, nearly every scene at Tycho Station had some mention of this massive ship being built in the background, visible throught the windows, impressive in size. Since they have to show it sometime, I can't imagine why they haven't really featured it in any of the shots.

There's a lot of interesting detail in the books that is only hinted at in the show... like how most people from Mars seem to be east-Asian (Indian, Chinese, Philipino) in background, but speak with a texas twang. Lots of little cultural observations based on the history of how various areas got settled. How the "Belter Patois" (which sounds like gibberish to you I'm sure) formed... a mixture of English and Spanish and several other language, all given a spin of its own as it developed out among the asteroids. And aspects of belter culture, where air and water are so precious that anyone that endangers the supply of either is basically spaced through an airlock, because nobody has time for that shit.

But as to your implied worry, no, this isn't about being pro-Mormon or anything. Far from it, all the other characters view them as freaks.

And Mormonism itself doesn't play any real part in the book, beyond giving a reason for that big ship to be built. The ship is called the "Nauvoo", and it should feature prominently in the second season.

No, the Author(s) of the book are not Mormon.

Other things about Belter culture that have been shown but not really EXPLAINED, is that Belter-speak has a lot of hand and arm gestures... and they're exaggerated or hand gestures are used in place of shrugs or nods or head-shakes, because you can't SEE those head movements when you're wearing a space-suit. So a system of, basically, sign-language developed to augment speech in the same way we all have various head and body gestures when we talk... only this time it developed in the context of most people wearing space-suits most of the time, working out among the asteroids and out in space. In the first few episodes, you saw Miller's Earther partner trying to learn Belter patois and body language from the hooker. But they never really explained what or why.

And to be more clear about what was said above... Tycho Station is the largest mobile construction platform in the solar system, and the Belt headquarters of Tycho Manufacturing and Engineering Concern and, covertly, the Outer Planets Alliance (OPA). It's run by Fred Johnson (aka, "The Butcher of Anderson Station"), who is the guy that gave Holden and his crew safe harbor. His company is building the Nauvoo for the Mormons, who have contracted the ship's construction with him. He doesn't care where the money comes from, he just builds ships to spec.

Much of the story hinges on the politics and balance of power and tensions between the three major powers: Earth/Luna, Mars, and the Belter/Outer Planets (Asteroid belt, and moons of Jupiter and Saturn). Which makes Jim Holden's crew -- the remaining survivors of the attack on the Canterbury -- interesting. Jim and Amos are both from earth, Alex is from Mars, and Naomi is a Belter).

Detective Miller was born on Earth but grew up in the Belt, and his partner (who was nearly killed) is from Earth, while all the rest of the cops are Belters.... and for some reason Ceres (where he was stationed) is pretty much a protectorate of Earth.... for now. Kinda like how Americans have bases in the Middle East, earth has a base in the Belt in the for of Ceres. And yeah, there's a lot of resentment there.

Some really bad ju-ju is going to go down next week...

For the record, it WILL end on a cliff-hanger.

Because it's ending in the middle of the first book!

Did Steven Strait bother to do any nude scene after episode 1?

No, but there should be some ones coming up in Season 2, and beyond. Especially once he gets a steady partner (no spoilers) in Season 3 and beyond.

TWO HOURS SEASON FINALE!!!!

[quote]Did Steven Strait bother to do any nude scene after episode 1?

He's never been one to do a lot of nudity, and in the scene he did do, it was darkly lit.

Anyone watch? I had to DVR it (too much going on last night) but I'll watch the finale tonight...

So many questions left unanswered... and we have to wait a year!!!

The glowing goo is alive!!!

They mentioned "The Proto-molecule" exactly once. Next season we'll find out a whole lot more about it. It's not technically "alive".

They didn't really make it clear, but the population of Eros was pretty large... one and half MILLION people. So... this "experiment" was a pretty horrific thing. One and a half million people dead.

It also wasn't totally clear in the TV show but the reason Julie Mao turned off all the lights is that the protomolecule requires energy, any kind of radiation, including light. The radiation rooms on Eros were used to accelerate the activity of the proto-molecule.

I would think conspiracy buffs would love this show... it's centered around a HUGE conspiracy after all.

No, it was clear why Julie Mao turned off all the lights. The previous week's episode explained it thoroughly.

So, the lasers will break Dark Julie from her ego-skeleton? Is she some Dune Messiah now? Dark Phoenix?

All of the previous episodes were easy to follow but this finale was kind of boring and sluggish. ALL that drudging around in the underbelly...

Were those two gay men who joined up with Strait's gang?

I'm SO glad that Newt did NOT join Mohawk Storm!!!! NO children needed!!!!! No precocious star-children necessary!!!

The flip-flopping spy was HOT!!!!!!!!! I guess he got Borged or something...

They film the Iranian-American star SO beautifully!!! It must be in her contract!!! I loved her Kate Bush/Stevie Nicks cloaks!

I STILL think it's stupid that Thomas Jane FELL IN LOVE with Julie Mao over a photo... inane.

It wasn't so much 'falling in love with' as 'becoming obsessed with'.

I believe the 'spy' was a creation for the TV show (I don't remember that character from the books, but it's been a long time since I read book one)... a character used to get some necessary plot points and exposition into the show without using a narrator or having characters spout dialog they would never actually spout or even know about. That's also why they brought the UN woman into the first season even though she's not in the written story until the second book.

In the book, the whole Eros scene actually lasted a LOT longer... it was very condensed for the TV show. But in doing so, a lot of the dread and horror was erased. The TV show never really got across the scope of what was going on.

ALL of the best parts of the first season involved the UN Woman! The writing was crisper, the actress was subtle yet commanding in every single frame...

Unlike Thomas Jane's Hair... He was pretty pathetic. And AT LEAST two different characters remarked to Thomas Jane's Hair: "You're in love with her."

No, the TV series did not make it clear about the Texas accent on the Saudi Arabian pilot, that other folks had it, too, just him. I kept thinking he was maybe the UN Woman's son after the Frances Fisher episode.

Well, there was a texas twang on the other members of that Mars ship that got blown up... and it was also pretty clear most of the crew were east Asian of some sort (from India, China, Philippines) . So it was there, they just didn't make a huge deal out of it.

Belters are all supposed to be relatively tall and lanky... they did cast a few that way, but I imagine casting everyone that way would have been nearly impossible. It's due to the low gravity they spend most of their lives in. The "gravity" on Eros and Ceres is generated by spin, and is usually about one half earth normal G, or even less. Again, filming true to that (having everything move/fall more slowly) would have been nearly impossible regardless of the budget.

There is no "artificial" gravity in this world... everything is either gravity due to acceleration (in ships) or spin (in stations and moonlets). Elsewhere they're either in free-fall, or they use magnetic boots to "walk" in low/zero G.

And yes, it's easy to confuse obsession and love. Even Miller does so at a couple of points. But it's more like a feeling of wanting to protect her... it's not a sexual love thing. Almost parent/child. Miller is the kind of person who gets obsessed and wants to solve things... the fact that actually finding out something about her got him fired? Made him want to dig even deeper, and got him even MORE obsessed.

I think you are reading too much of the book into the way it was dumbed down for the "The Walking Dead" mouth-breathers who watch SyFy. The clear implication was that Thomas Jane's Hair was in love with Julie Mao, Star Goddess.

Happens all the time in Hollywood... Ever see the movie "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof"? Big changes there made for the unwashed masses...

I watched the whole show. Thomas Jane's hair was distracting. The finale was...meh.

So... the reveal that some unknown entity committed a huge atrocity by unleashing a dangerous nano-tech "proto-molecule" upon a million-plus people just to see what happened, as an experiment, and is playing all sides (Earth/Mars/Belt) against each other in the process... was 'meh'?

I agree the finale was hobbled by some obvious budgetary constraints, but it was still pretty well done and as close as probably could be to the (much more riveting) events in the book.

I'm thinking the author OR someone from SyFy is in this thread, doing crowd control...

REMEMBER THE CANT!

R114, parts of the story, the direction and some of the acting sucked. I thought Thomas Jane and the Iranian actress did a pretty good job but everyone else was passable. It was good in the first couple of episodes but seemed to go downhill and not be as interesting. The storyline of Thomas Jane falling in love with Julie Mao was unconvincing.

Here's a good review/write-up of the Finale and the series as a whole, imho:

Either the role of Chrisjen Avasarala was written for Shohreh Aghdashloo or else Shohreh Aghdashloo was born to play Chrisjen Avasarala.

I have enjoyed Aghadashloo in many things, but she totally owns this role.

I thought I might be able to at least stare at the flickering CGI images, but I'm usually not stoned and bored enough to. From reading the comments, the only way to love the show is to read the book series before or while watching it. But then apparently I would love it.

And you all needed to know this why? Because all work and no play makes Johnny a dull boy.

That's not the only way, no. MOST people who love the show have never read the books.

Are they widely available? Probably cheap on Amazon marketplace.

The whole falling in love with the dead girl being investigated is similar to the plot of an old movie called Laura.

And dozens of OTHER movies...

It's not original at all. And, yes, what aired on television was that Thomas Jane was in love with the image of a girl he never met or interacted with.

Shohreh made the series kick off so well but then she was nearly absent during the middle scenes. She really should have had more lines and scenes added to enliven the whole thing.

The black girl? So, what was her deal at all??? Really, I got nothing from that character, no motivation, not even hinted at secrets nothing. The first two episodes had other characters questioning her loyalty and background, but nothing ever happened. She just wandered along with the rest of the Funky Bunch.

I despised the doofus with the lazy eye who did whatever the black girl said. Like a trained pet. Like THAT hasn't been done to death in television and films...

I actually most enjoyed the "vignette" scenes which laid context for some of the main storylines. I LOVED the Russian uncle and nephew's episode! I barely knew these characters but BOTH were so well-written and acted, that I was heartbroken for both of them.

Jay Hernandez and Paolo Whatever were WASTED, despite both being very interestingly written. Jay is alive, so I guess we'll see more of his story in S2, but Paolo really got shafted. And gay male viewers got shafted in not getting to see more of these very attractive men.

Did the lazy-eyed doofus HAVE to kill Thomas Jane's black friend?

Oh well, I'm glad I watched the whole series but I'd only give it a 65% approval rating, and almost all of that goes to the splendid acting choices of Shohreh!!!!!

Has Steven Strait agreed to do more nudity yet?

Naomi is a brilliant engineer and computer programmer/technician (too brilliant for her occupation on the Cant), and she seems to know an awful lot about the OPA (read: "Terrorist organization" to many people), so those in themselves are kind of mysteries.

To dismiss her as "the black girl" seems... weird.

Amos is not pleased with you.

Sorry: the black mohawked girl.

And I already said that the first two episodes hinted at revealing more but then everything fell flat. Her wandering around the tunnels was stupid in the finale.

Lazy-Eyes Steroid Abuser is the latest in a long line of "loyal" guard dogs that appear in movies and TV. Very boring.

I'm sorry that you are upset that I am not fawning over your show, Obvious Author/Syfy Executive. Shohreh and Steven Strait's ass were the best things about S1. You trying to use the books to explain away stuff ON THE SCREEN is a waste of time, since it is a television show, not a multi-media experience.

Your simplistic facile interpretations are your own issues.

And actually, it IS a multi-media experience. Or haven't you bothered to check out the website?

No, Syfy Executive, it looked boring. Why should I buy the DVD set (already advertised last week) if I have to read several books and green information from a website JUST so I can supposedly fully appreciate a television show?

Also, I FF through all the commercials, Mr. Syfy Executive. Website click bait is almost as bad as those atrocious "Lost Girl" ads that have been airing for months. DID, "Lost Girl", DIE!!!!!!

"Green" = "Glean"

R129, were you held back in school? Your grammar is atrocious. Your assumptions wrong. Your mental state apparently unbalanced.

It's a little slow moving, but a good story. Shohreh is a terrible actress...hard to believe she won(?) an Oscar. I cringe when she selves her dialog. Very wooden, like she's reading off a cue card off screen.

BUMP for the promise of more Strait nudity!

And Thomas Jane looks damn good (I actually like the haircut).

Was Steven Strait ever a housemate on THE REAL WORLD?

[quote]BUMP for the promise of more Strait nudity!

The producers have promised more Strait nudity?

I wish. I hope. And I have to assume SOME more is happening, at least if they follow the books. Though it might be a while.

Season 2 premiers on February 8th. Mark your calendars!

Here's an interesting "Making of/look-back at season one/looking-ahead to season two" featurette:

I doubt anyone who hasn't watched the show at all is going to read this post, but if you want to know whether or not to watch the show, watching R138 might give you insight into whether you'd like it or not.

You can't binge it currently (you can pay for season 1), but hopefully it'll eventually make it to some binge-source.

I think it's available on Amazon Prime?

It's been available on DVD for several months.

Yeah, but who wants to buy DVDs? I was looking for streaming solutions... too bad it's not on Netflix.

It's available on Amazon Prime.

Just saw a scene from season 2, with Bobbie Draper, and boy did they mis-cast that role... she's way too "pretty". She's supposed to be a big, amazon-like Polynesian woman. Not pretty and girly in any way.

Hrm. The other cast won me over, but this might take some extra work. I didn't buy her as Bobbie in the one scene I saw.

The show's good.

The books are so much better.

Well, except the third one I think. I have a feeling they'll compress that way down for the TV show... skipping over most of it.

Anyone have any inside scoop on whether season 2 will end with the end of book 1, or whether they'll start into book 2? I could see it going both ways honestly... the first chapter or two of book two would allow them to end season 2 on a huge WTF cliff-hanger...

Will they run a marathon of season 1 before season 2 starts? It'd be the smart thing to do, ratings-wise...

Will Steven Strait give a better view of his ass in Season 2?

He does appear to have a sex scene this season if the previews are any indication.

I know there's more coming, based on what happens in the books.

Saw a few more previews, and boy they really got Bobbie wrong. She's supposed to be HUGE. Hulking. Tall and broad. Yet they cast what looks like a short pixie looking girl.

NEW EPISODES START TOMORROW!

Thomas Jane looks rough for 48. Still totally fuckable though. He should wear less clothes...like none.

FEWER clothes.

LESS clothing.

Jesus Christ, R152, are you trying to kill me with your atrocious grammar??

[quote]He does appear to have a sex scene this season if the previews are any indication.

Good.

Steven Strait needs to show his butt again.

Except when Steven is naked, there's bound to be a naked woman to spoil the view.

Yeah, from this point forward he only gets with Naomi.

I hope that isn't a spoiler.

R156 No, anyone who has watched season 1 knows that is coming.

Book six (Babylon's Ashes) seems like kind of a series finale. I'm hoping not. But it did seem to resolve just about everything.

I wonder if the TV show will ever get there. It'll probably take it 8 seasons at least, given that season one didn't even finish book one. But then again, season one DID incorporate things from the side books and from book two.... so who knows. But I can't imagine them getting to the end of Book two in season 2 so....

Anyone else read all the books?

Any non-spoilery thoughts about where the TV show will go in relation to the books?

Is season 2 tonight?

R159 Yes. The season 2 premiere is tonight.

R153: Just in case R152 is NOT trying to kill you, I will gladly step in and do the job.

Awesome! Thanks R60.

R150 - the actress playing Bobbie is named Frankie Adams.

She is 6 feet tall and of Samoan descent.

She's just not right for the part.

And they seem to have forgotten the Martians are predominantly east Asian (Indian) with Texan drawls.

Interesting how much of book 2 they're pulling into this, and how they're playing with the order of events. All the stuff on the Rocinate is book one, all the stuff on mars and with Bobbie Draper is book 2. There are HUGE parts of book one not even touched on yet.

And yes, there's a scene of Holden stripping down shirtless... god his body is amazing.

They generally do a decent with the gravity thing.

But that scene with Thomas Jayne where the gravity suddenly came back was bullshit. That's not how it works.

Over-all, that was a fucking awesome return for the series. A laugh-out-loud moment or two, great character- and world-building. Edge-of-your-seat excitement. Mind-blowing twists.

I can't wait for the rest of the season!

[quote]And yes, there's a scene of Holden stripping down shirtless... god his body is amazing.

No butt shot?

Not in this episode, no. But still. Guy's torso is a wonder.

So... they've completely downplayed the whole Mormon ship at Tycho so far (it's way more prominent in the books), and there's a fuck-ton of stuff to come involving it, so... wondering when they're going to get on that.

There was a vague glimpse of a butt shot of Stephen Strait when he pounded away / pinned his partner against the wall but most of his lower ass was coverved by a sliding door frame. Basically some butt crack view.

It's Game of Thrones in space. Ominous threat from some distant Alien lifeform, squabbling war threats between humanoids (humans of Earth, Mars, Belters), a Jon Snow wann-a-be, a rogue bunch of misfits on a mission to save themselves and the human race, etc.

What a revelation r172.

r173, thanks. I take what I can get, even sarcasm.

R173 Two white men will save the solar system... That's indeed a revelation!

Wait until you see what happens next. I can only imagine they're going to end the season with ... well... I can't say any more.

Hopefully nude pics of Steven Strait will leak.

"Do you like space gladiator movies?" Ha!!1

It's amazing how much they can compress into just a scene or two... I'm impressed with how many layers of stuff there are. It really rewards re-watching because there's a lot of subtlety going on.

Did one or two episodes air on Wednesday? The syfy app has episode two up. Was the first episode 2 hours?

R180 They aired two episodes.

Awesome. Thanks, r181. Watching episode two now. Loved episode one.

Any idea what the show's connection is to Staten Island, NY? Guy Molinari was a local SI politician and the name of the freighter in episode 2.

There are a lot of just plain random references, R183.

NEW EPISODE TONIGHT!

They also had a reference to the Mars ship Watney, a reference to Mark Watney from the movie/book "The Martian".

That's cool, r186. I have to keep a better eye out for these things now that I know.

Excellent discussion of an amazing scene (mild spoilers from the books but nothing that hasn't been at least implied on the screen) from last night's episode:

This show is like a great sci-fi movie I'd pay to see for free every week. It's amazing. Best thing on TV right now.

This is one of the few shows I plan to binge watch once it's over... from the beginning.

The last show I did that with was probably Buffy. I mean, who has the time? I only do it with shows that really engage me on some level.

Wasn't there a scene in the first season at a bar where it was pretty much established that Amos was a prostitute at one point (giving some pointers to some other guy at a bar) in his life? I guess the new shocking element is the whole pedophilia / child prostitute thing.

Yeah, it was mentioned. See the article at R188 for more info on that.

So even though they're bringing book 2 stuff forward, it does seem like season two is going to end with the big finish of book one. That actually makes sense. But it does make me wonder how season 3 is going to play out.

What I want to see is Holden and the meathead do some nekkid ass nekkid wrestling. Diogo could provide a running commentary in that obnoxious voice of his.

R194, only if Miller watches and jacks off...

BTW, you know Holden has more than one dad, right? I can't remember exactly, but I think he has four dads.

Holden has FIVE fathers. And three mothers.

A bit greedy, isn't he R196.

VIDEO CLIP of the Steven Strait shirtless scene:

HOLY SHIT! EROS JUST... MOVED! WTF?

The special effects are amazing. Though I thought the ending of the latest episode felt a bit, I don't know, anti-climatic? So, Eros moved out of the way of the impact zone.

Eros is an asteroid. It moved itself out of harm's way.

It consciously moved itself.

R200... you don't think that Eros suddenly moving all on its own through no mechanism visible or known to man is ... climactic? That was a totally "holy shit" moment for me...

To be honest the reveal felt too simple and gimmicky for me. Surprise, it moved! Joe is on that asteroid and doesn't notice it moves? But oooh! the monitor screen says so! Surprise! To me it would have been more of a WTF moment with Joe going WTF? What's going on with Eros? Why does it feel like it's moving?

[quote]is on that asteroid and doesn't notice it moves?

Actually yeah... that's actually a huge part of why it's so freaky. He feels nothing. He should have but didn't. I'm sure they'll talk about that more next week.

There's a REASON he doesn't feel anything.

Shora is so deliciously fine in her role as a haughty, secretly badass political leader on Earth.

This show marrows on me with almost every new episode. By the way, naming a ship after NY congressman Guy Molinari was strange; it must mean something. He was a republican who was a bit of a thug, helped take down a candidate for NY Attorney General by saying her being a lesbian disqualified her. But he was a friend to the working man

I ran into this in a Q&A with the author about naming the transport, Guy Molinari.

[quote]I wasn’t naming it after the man so much as the Staten Island ferry I used to ride on to work (which was, granted, named after the man). I thought having a transport named after the Staten Island Ferry was funny.

They really REALLY compressed and skipped a lot of the Julie Mao stuff. And you could really feel that tonight.

Tonight's was the first episode that I didn't think was amazing.

It was like a cliff's notes of what happened in the book.

Even though I would literally kill to get double penetrated by Thomas Jane and Chad Coleman while Steven Strait feeds me his beautiful cock, I would never watch even a second of this generic SyFy trash.

It's neither trash nor generic, dumbass.

Suck my taint, R209.

It probably has better taste than you, R210

Well, the sparkly glowing transformed chamber was very pretty, like Pandora.

Are we supposed to know which planet Eros crashed into? Looked like not-Earth.

The special effects are beautiful. The scene of Joe and Julie was beautiful. The episode had a nice 80s vibe to it (with Joe walking though these neon blue sets). Shora elevates every scene she's in.

I don't know if it's the current polical climate but I am rooting for the protomolecule.

Well, r212, since they repeatedly said it was Venus, I'm gonna go with Venus.

Best episode of the series so far.

Yeah, it was venus. They really didn't make that clear... Miller only mentioned it once, and Julie Moa rejected it... but they didn't make it clear that he convinced her, and that Eros changed course again, and crashed into Venus.

It felt like this episode needed about 15 more minutes to not feel rushed, truncated, and incomplete.

Wow, that was good. I agree, I wish it was longer.

Okay, I didn't read the books and I don't want to spoil, but I have a question: is HE really, you know...?

Did Miller die? Yes.

Is this the last we'll see of Miller? If they follow the books (and they should), no.

Sorta in the same way Julie Mao died, but we continued to see her after that.

Keep in mind it took a while for Eros to make it to Venus, and he was exposed to the Proto-molecule. They kinda glossed over that in the episode, but it's not like he hugged her in that scene and moments later crashed into Venus... it was days that passed (maybe weeks) before it made it to Venus. It was a long ways away.

Awesome, r219. You confirmed what I had hoped. Thanks.

What a kick-ass episode last night!

I love the way they wove in the history of the discovery of the Epstein Drive, the invention that opened up the solar system to human colonization.

It's also really interesting that they're going to play the Ganymede Incident as a sort of flash-back mystery to be solved. In the book, the entire event happened in detail, no mystery to the reader.

Only four more episodes... I honestly have no idea how they're going to end the season (at what point from the books).

I am hoping r222, they will end with something happening on Venus

R223, given they just started Book 2 threads, and THAT event happens at the end of book 2, that seems like seriously rushing things. There's so much to explore with the Ganymede incident....

Any word on if there will be a season 3?

There's enough material for at LEAST five more seasons... I sure hope they get to do them all.

Seems kind of early to expect renewal news, but I sure hope it gets renewed again and again until they finish the story.

Loved seeing Epstein (the werewolf from Being Human US version) and Strait's amazing chest muscles!!!

Amos (both the character and the actor) continue to amaze me. LOVE him.

Meathead for Prez!

NEW EPISOD TONIGHT!

Tonight we start to find out what happened to Bobbie Draper on Ganymede... they thought the protomolecule terror was over, but it's only getting started.

The Mars folk don't have the right accents. They should have texas drawls. Bobbie's accent is the worst. She's totally miscast. Too meek and girly.

Is it just me, or are they seriously RUSHING through book 2?

So, the burnt-looking alien from the shootout is a fully formed humanoid made of proto-molecule?

They're covering it up by denying the Aussie woman soldier's testimony. Why don't helmets have cameras?

And Belter lingo is supposed to be what; South African?

R234, Belter Patois is a combination of Spanish, English, and a few other dialects, mixed with just slang and "its own thing".

And she's NOT AUSSIE. She's supposed to be Philipino-ish, with a texas twang (most Martians are from east Asia/Pacific-Island but with a mixture of Texans that resulted in a Texas drawl accent). SO MIS-CAST!

I think the actress playing Bobbie Draper is great.

She's completely wrong for the part, R236. The only thing they got right about the character is "pacific islander-ish" and "tall-ish". She's NOTHING like Bobbie Draper in the books. Not that the other casting is perfect, but this one is WAY off.

I read the books as well.

This, however, is a teevee series.

She is fine.

Agreed, r238. The story is great and production is awesome.

R234, not a monster made of pure protomolecule, no. But one manufactured using protomolecule. Think of "Alien" and how the corporation wanted to 'weaponize' the aliens. Well, Mao's corporation is trying to do the same thing with the protomolecule.

But just like the Yatani corporation had no idea what it was dealing with and couldn't control it like they thought they could, the same is true here.

This is much bigger than Mao's corporation thinks.

Millions of years ago, aliens shot the protomolecule towards our solar system. There was a specific goal in mind (and you'll find that out soon), but it got trapped by the gravity of Saturn and landed on Phoebe, where it remained dormant until Mao's corporation -- Protogen -- found it millions of years later.

The only thing Protogen really knows is that the protomolecule is an agent that "reformats" biological matter, and they're trying to harness that. But they don't know the whole story.

So at the end of the last episode, the Earth soldiers were running from a seventh man--- and it wasn't human?

Right. They weren't shooting at the martian line... they were running from the escaped monster.

So... the Martians are going to lie about what happened in order to try and pin it on Earth, all the while the belters starve because their 'breadbasket' has been destroyed in an act of war.

The breadbasket did not serve only the belters. Earth has 30,000,000,000 people.

Mars has little means to sustain its own population.

The destruction of that breadbasket affects the entire system.

Right, but it's MOSTLY going to affect the Belters, at least initially.

Does Holden ever suck dick in the books? Cuz that's what I wanna see those DSLs do

No, R246.

New Episode Tonight!

They've completely (well, nearly so) changed Prax Meng's story.... all that stuff about a refugee ship and the spacing of his friend was made up for the TV show and not in the books. Weird.

Yeah, r249. Everyone know a teevee show must slavishly follow all plotlines, characters and themes of the source material.

r250, how else can book readers gloat about having read the books?

Thomas Jane's wife stilll looks good.

R250, it's not really about that... it's just that I can't see any real reason for the rewrite. To add the new stuff, they had to cut some pretty crucial stuff. It's weird.

And yeah, the books are great and you should read them.

Where else have we seen the cute Asian botanist?

R250 here.

R253, I've read the books. I love them.

Also love the series and am glad they are making a few changes.

I don't believe there has ever been an adaptation of a novel or series of novels that does not find the need "to cut some pretty crucial stuff."

I don't find that weird, I find it a necessary part of the process.

I thought there was only one more episodes (10 episodes a season like last year) but there's actually four more left (total of 13). AND it's been renewed for season 3 (also 13 episodes).

I had no idea how it was going to end with just one more episode, but with four more, I think I know how they're going to wrap it up... they'll finish off book 2 mostly it seems.

For those that love the show, now that book 3 is by far the weakest of the books, so next season I hope they compress out most of the crap in book 3 and actually start in on book 4 or something. When I heard it was going to be a TV series, I was worried about how they'd handle book 3, because it could conceivably lose people and thus not get renewed for season 4, where things get amazing again.

It's a necessary book and a necessary plot to get from here to there... but it's kind of a drudge compared to everything else. I hope they figure out a good way to finesse it and make it as compelling as the rest has been so far. I really want to see them make it to the end of book six.

They did a shitty job of explaining why the martian dude puked when he walked out of the shuttle.

Sadly, the show is apparently on the bubble, because I'm seeing a lot of stories about how not enough people are watching, and everyone needs to give it a try...

syfylis already renewed it for season 3

Excellent!

Last night was definitely one of the weaker episodes, imho. But then again, having read the books, it felt like a Cliff's Notes sketch of what's really happening. And I really felt the budget constraints. I'm kind of disappointed they're not taking a few moments in each episode (or at least every other one) for updates on what's going on on Venus. So far they've only had the one brief moment that most people will just think "oh, a crater, big deal".

And the longer they think that, r261, the better.

I just finished the episode and I guess I missed whatever with Venus...can someone please explain?

It was in the last episode.

The ship that went to inspect Venus did a scan, and ... there was a HUGE crater on the surface... and something was weird about it.

They didn't touch on it this episode.

Ah, thanks, r264. I'll have to re watch episode 9.

Loving this show, it's like reading a good science fiction novel.

R266, the actual science fiction novel is far, far better than the show. And I love the show.

Surprised they had the budget to pull it off on SyFy. Production values are pretty damn good.

Yeah, with occasional moments where you realize the budget is finite... but still damn good for SyFy.

I hope they keep getting renewed, but there are things coming up that would strain even an HBO budget.

Yeah. Book five will be damn difficult to do justice to, effects-wise.

Even book 3 is going to be a strain on the budget... especially given it's the weakest book and not something they're going to want to invest a ton of time in.

Book 1 was a season-and-a-half long. It looks like they're compressing all of book 2 into the remaining half-season (having also let some of it spill out over the earlier parts of season 2). I imagine they'll want to compress book 3 into half a season if they can, just to keep the costs down, and help punch it up ... book 3 kinda dragged in spots.

Cool article about "Belter patois"

Last night's episode was fantastic.

Things are starting to come together.

WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN TONIGHT?!?

I thought it was another mediocre episode (like two weeks ago), with some sketchy special effects where the budget constraints start to show... but it's all leading up to next week's season finale.

They're going to be packing a hell of a lot of stuff into that episode if they're going to finish book 2.

Fuck a duck, not that spasticated canard. Injun Joes didn't see Espangol ships cuz they had no concept of Espangol ships. Fuck you, show

... what, R275?

THAT set you off? Seriously?

Wes Chatham who plays Amos is so hot. Married too. He has gay face tho.

I'm the OP of this thread and I actually stopped watching the showing after two episodes on season one since I couldn't connect with it at all. However I decided to try again a few months ago and ended up binge-watching the rest of the episodes right before this season started. It's not a perfect show but it's best sci-fi available at the moment.

I understand that it's a massive story to tell and even if they get some things right you still see they're rushing though certain parts of the story. It unfortunately makes the show a bit hard to like at times since there's no emotional connection with half-baked characters and storylines. This is why novels are sometimes altered so much when they are filmed: The source material needs to be edited, sometimes drastically, to make the story work on screen. I haven't read the novels so I don't have any background with the story and apparently in this case it would be a plus.

It didn't help when Thomas Jane's character died. It made me realize how central he was for the show, both as a character but also for the gravitas Jane brought in as an actor. But still, I've come to accept the writing is quite uneven and I don't really mind. Production values are great and I'm enjoying the special effects work.

BTW, the writers of the novels Ty Franck and Daniel Abraham (writing under the pen name S.A. Corey) have been part of the writing team at SyFy. No idea how deeply they are involved but a Wired article from February says they've written at least three scripts for the show.

I love Amos. Such a shame he's not gay, or bi. Yes he's gay friendly but it would've been so hot to make him have sex with guys as well. I've actually sort of wanted him to end up in a bed with the pilot guy.

You haven't seen the last of Thomas Jane, if they follow the books.

R279, yes it was mentioned in earlier posts. Still, if and when he returns he's something else than he used to be.

Like, duh. Of course Thomas Jane will be back on the show.

Op, / r278, I love you for starting this thread, but I couldn't disagree with you more about connecting with the characters.

SHIT IS GOING DOWN ON VENUS, GUYS!!!

I love the Christian character, she's so exotic. Amazing wardrobe work.

R284, I just wish this were on paid cable because her character is supposed to be a lot more foul-mouthed. And they've also barely acknowledged her pistachio habit. I think they showed it once, early in season one. And not really since.

[quote] And they've also barely acknowledged her pistachio habit.

That post is tragic in so many, many ways.

Season finale tonight!

About to start the first book!

It really feels (as a book reader) like they needed another episode. Things were so compressed.

But a decent season finale I guess.

Protomolecule like ball.

Protomolecule catch ball.

Protomolecule incinerated.

that particular protoindividual. but now all 3 factions have the damn thing.

I'm confused as to why they changed some of the details in the series. Like Julie Mao's father's letter to his daughter was way different than the letter Miller reads on the series. The letter that Miller reads in the series is more like the letter her mom sent. Papa Mao's letter in the book, telling her to leave the station, was far more impactful. Also, not sure why they had Holden undelete the SOS signal they picked up in the series. In the book it was never a question that they would answer the call.

I agree, R292. There are lots of changes I understand (bringing some events and characters forward), but others don't make much sense to me.

The slow cascade of collapse on Ganymede didn't seem nearly as epic in the TV show as in the books.

They also messed up the Venus thing a bit... the whole point of the protomolecule taking apart the ship like it did was that the entire system was supposed to see it. But the way they have it in the show, nobody was there to witness it. That display of arbitrary power sent a shockwave through the system in the book. How does it have any impact now, in the series, since there was no other ship nearby to witness what happened?

Huh, I'm not up to that part in the book yet, r293. But from you describe, the change doesn't seem to make sense.

R293 I'm not a book reader and I was totally confused by that taking apart of the two ships. I had no idea it was a display of power.

But perhaps they have caught that event with some observation equipment and they will reveal it next season, along with the system's response to it?

And yeah, people talked about that Cascade thing beforehand on Reddit like it's some game-changing event. And it was a big ol' nothing in the show. I don't think the importance of Ganymede had been established that well in the first place, so I didn't really care what happened to it.

R295, it was interpreted as a display of power (I mean, what the fuck kind of power could completely disassemble an entire space ship instantly like that?) But it was really just curiosity... a powerful entity taking something apart to see how it worked. And all the humans sorta realized that, which is just as scary if not more so, that something is capable of doing that "just out of curiosity".

As for Ganymede: it's basically the 'bread basket of the belt' and outer planets. And there's a whole theme in there about how fragile the systems are out there... they don't have the natural resiliency and redundancy of natural systems evolved over eons like on earth. Pull one thread, and the whole thing starts to slowly collapse... in ways that aren't always obvious at first. And that theme plays out in larger and larger ways over the course of the books. It's an important bit, but they only really gave it a few minutes in the show.

They've also completely underplayed the Navoo -- the Mormon ship -- in that they haven't even mentioned it since it missed Eros when it moved. But it's still important and plays a major part in the stories to come. In fact, I thought it was weird how little they mentioned it in both seasons one and two, given how central it is to the plot of future books.

Anyway, the REAL purpose of the protomolecule is going to reveal itself soon enough. Humans have no clue, they just see a technology, and of course instantly assume it's a weapon and instantly start trying to pervert it to their own purposes... things it wasn't designed for. I'm assuming they'll do that reveal in season 3, but the way they're doing things, it could be they might shift it to season 4... but I'm thinking season 3.

And at that point, the protomolecule becomes the least of their worries.

R296 I see, thanks!

I wish they had shown us a quick and dirty infographic of all the celestial bodies affected by the destruction of Ganymede Station and the number of now deprived people on each of those bodies. I think the scope just wasn't conveyed very well so I wasn't emotionally involved as much. Avasarala didn't seem that bothered so I wasn't either. I'm obviously an Earther through and through.

Interesting bit regarding the Navoo still being around; I just assumed it went straight into the Sun.

Season 3 trailer. Won't play in my country. Is it exciting?

Premieres Wednesday, April 11th at 10 pm on SYFY.

Season 2 premieres tonight! Who else is pumped for it?!

And if anyone makes a fresh thread for the new season and needlessly fragments the discussion like that provocateur in the Legion thread, I shall go full-blown Avasarala on y'all's asses, with a bit of Lesley Manville from Phantom Thread thrown in. Understood? 🍵

Was there a longer wait than usual for Season 3?

r300 Yeah, the second season premiered in February. The writers explained in a tweet in December that this one got delayed because of Winter Olympics.

season 3 tonight! so glad this show is back.

I watch it for Steven Strait and Shohreh Aghdashloo.

Strait is hot to look at, and Aghdashloo is amazing as Avasarala.

Sorry, I meant Season [bold]3[/bold] at r299.

Great opener. Wouldn't we all like an emergency kit like that after a rough night out? But please give us more shirtless guys, showrunners.

Is this the thread to discuss season 3 or is there another one?

r305 This is the one!

Those planetary transitions were very nice (except for Jupiter which looked cheap) but I'm kinda despairing at all the light pollution on this imagined future Earth. It's a real problem for birds, insects, astronomers...

Well, I for one got hard.

Aww, it's not Roci any longer. Sad. Now will it be Coni or Conti? I hope it's Conti

P.S. Meathead's cum gutters 4 Prez

apparently the name will be changed back to Roci later....

Lesbian Lost fans rejoice; Elizabeth Mitchell enters the stage as Anna who - along with her wife Nono - seems to be an intriguing and well-adjusted character. I'm very interested in that church she belongs to or is heading, and what organized religion in general looks like in this world. Was anyone else half-expecting her to be addressed as Pope (Popess?) at the end of the episode? Wouldn't [italic]that[/italic] be something?

Avasarala and the main team finally meet!

Let me guess, her character becomes the new president (after her friend gets killed by Sadavir) of earth or something l ike that? Love her though.

Please no book spoilers in this thread, if someone is itching to answer r312's question.

I love the humor this season.

Holy crap that was an exciting episode!

This is easily one of the top five best shows on TV. Strange it gets so little mention or appreciation.

R307, in this time, Earth is home to 30 billion people. About four times more human beings than currently live here.

r316 I get that but that still doesn't explain the light pollution. Highly efficient LED street lamps which don't emit light above the horizontal have been an established thing for a while now and at least my city is almost completely covered with them. There's no excuse for still using current gross and electricity-guzzling sodium-vapour lights in the distant future.

That's a weird assumption.

And you realize that the frequency of sodium lighting is far more friendly to dark-skies and astronomy than the LED lighting that's becoming more and more common, right?

You're thinking about this WAY too much and it's leading you down some really bizarre roads that have no basis at all.

r318 Woah, calm down. It's not a weird assumption at all, it's an established fact. Also, I belong to the Dark Skies association which battles (urban) light pollution so I might know what I'm talking about here. *Any* light source that shines above the horizontal adds to the light pollution. Plus non-LED lamps are inefficient and why would you want to waste more electricity than you need to?

Dude. You're obsessed over a completely irrelevant detail and really need to calm the fuck down. You're being ridiculous.

There are 30 Billion people on earth. I think light pollution is the least of the planet's issues.

r321 Why would you assume that? Perhaps everything is powered by renewable energy at that time and they're all eating clean lab meat so no agriculture is required etc... Light pollution is a big issue for everyone who loves birds and casual astronomy. Like everything else in life, the importance of any issue is relative to the one observing it. The planet itself doesn't care as it's inanimate.

Aaaanywhooo...

Was I the only one who wanted the gang to destroy that Earth vessel completely? Or I'm a just a quisling, easily turned in exhange for some fireworks?

I was chomping at the bits for that shit to ignite and murder everyone on board. I think I just might be a Martian, you guys.

R322 because jobs, living space, food and potable water are the bigger issues in the series. Not sure what show you are watching.

A scifi series where light pollution is the major worry of an overpopulated planet would be dull.

r325 Who said anything about a "major worry"? I simply said I was despairing at the sight of it. That's all. Someone else then made a huge issue out of what I said.

Again, please calm down. It wasn't a slight against the show in any way. And I'm watching the same show as you are, evidently, or I wouldn't be posting in this thread.

Book fans are the most easily triggered creatures out there when it comes to these adaptations so don't worry about their meltdowns too much, r326.

[quote]Who said anything about a "major worry"?

Uh, you did, r326. When I said a planet of 30 billion has more to worry about than light pollution, you responded...

[R321] Why would you assume that? Perhaps everything is powered by renewable energy at that time and they're all eating clean lab meat so no agriculture is required etc...

Again, you seem like you are watching a completely different show.

You also keep telling people to calm down. Yet it is you with the hysterics over lighting in a scifi show.

Exactly, R328. Jesus, let it go.

Amos : Now you just walk around like you're in pumps.

Chrisjen Avasarala: What do you know what it's like to walk in pumps?

Amos: I didn't always work in space.

And... cancelled..

... by SyFy. It's being shopped around, though, and will probably have takers. SyFy didn't pay or produce the show and yet they are letting it go? What kind of idiots are running this "sci-fi" network?

luv Thomas jane. hot as fuk. sexy esp in The Punisher, a while back.

he alwys delivers the goods

dream of fucking him up ass in a dirty subway toilet....piss.

I imagine it's too expensive for SyFy even when it's filmed in Canada. The CGI must cost a fortune to look that good on the show.

R333, Deadline says the show is fully financed by the producing company Alcon Television Group.

What the hell is SyFy's reasoning then to cancel it? Do they have something way "better" to air, like "Sharknado: The TV Series" that would grant them higher ratings?

Are the DVD or Blu Ray sales that good that SyFy is pissed that they don't get a cut from the profits (because they don't caugh up any of the money to produce it)?

I was just going to start watching this. So, for those of you who watch it, if there is never another episode produced, would there be an actual ending or was it some cliffhanger that will never be resolved? I'm not going to start watching if it's never going to end well.

r337 unjnown, there is still one more episode....

Ah, shit.

I hope Netflix grabs it like they did with Longmire.

My understanding is that when a show is produced by an outside company then the profit is shared or the show is paid for by the network and then recoup's in advertising dollars. It may not be making money for SyFy. It's why networks like to produce content from their own studios.

Not sure how much claim SyFy would have on Netflix and DVD sales.

The Expanse was SyFy's current flagship. Equal to Battlestar Galactica and the Stargate series. WTF are they thinking? I really hope The Expanse gets picked up by someone else soon so that all of the actors are retained.

So, there's one more episode. I'm going to assume then, that they probably didn't know they were getting shitcanned by SyFy. I hope Netflix picks it up. I mean, Netflix had all the stupid Sharknado movies from SyFy.

SyFy lost me when they changed their name and programming to appeal to people scared by the word 'Science'.

There's more than that... they're only halfway through the season!

I'm really pissed off this was canceled. They're only in Book 2, and there are SEVEN TOTAL BOOKS.

If it's as popular as it seems to be among the sci-fi set and there's a lot of source material, I'd think it would be picked up somewhere.

Thomas jane was at his hotness peak in The Punisher, with john Travolta.

You think he let Travolta suk on his cock and asshole? I'm sure john wanted into that good stuff mighty bad..

THOMAS JANE WAS JUST ABOUT TO MAKE ANOTHER APPEARANCE!

[quote]Thomas jane was at his hotness peak in The Punisher, with john Travolta.

I preferred him in Deep Blue Sea.

This is bullshit. SyFy's best show, easily, with respectable ratings. Easily the best show of it's type around since Galactica. It's all about show ownership and future revenue. Not art. I'm confident someone, hopefully a streaming service, will continue this; lots of story left to be told. They're barely thru the second book of a seven book opus.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine just got picked up by NBC after Fox cancelled it. I'm sure The Expanse will be picked up in a few days as well.

Amos is such a great character. and the actor is HOTTTT!

[quote]Not sure how much claim SyFy would have on Netflix and DVD sales.

It looks like the answer to that is 0.

From the article: "The cancellation decision by Syfy is said to be linked to the nature of its agreement for the series, which only gives the cable network first-run linear rights in the U.S. That puts an extraordinary amount of emphasis on live, linear viewing, which is inherently challenging for sci-fi/genre series that tend to draw the lion’s share of their audiences from digital/streaming."

So in a way it makes some sense. The amount of money they make is limited and thus the show isn't worth their trouble.

That's what I thought when made the post, r350. I really hope Netflix picks it up.

The only thing I don't like with this last episode is that they seemed to have skipped large chunks scenes. Like we see Draper lying injured next we see her being led to sick bay by Alex. Same with the opening, I feel the opening left out some stuff from the previous episode.

maybe they think we are smart enough to know what has happened. ^

It seemed more like deus ex machina, r353.

I don't think you know what deus ex machina means... because all that was is skipping the boring part of getting her back on the ship. She killed the creature and wasn't completely incapacitated. Things were resolved. She could have either made it back herself, or the others could have put the kids away and then gone out to find her. She had communications and a locator in the suit. Why do we care about the details that are irrelevant and easily assumed?

If you want "deus ex machina", the only reason she survived is that the object on Venus chose that moment to launch, causing the creature (in communication with it all) to look up and away, giving Bobbie the chance to shoot its brains out. Quelle timing, eh? Lucky for her.

I want Amos in me, quite deeply.

Rumor has it Amazon is picking it up. Bezos is said to be a fan of the boos and wasn't happy it went to SyFy in the first place.

[quote]Bezos is said to be a fan of the boos

Odd fetish that.

PLEASE AMAZON PICK THIS UP AND MAKE TEN MORE SEASONS!

Diogo is back tonight. Woohoo

Holy Shit this is a great episode!

I'm loving it!

WOAH!

2 mouth dropping moments tonight. and right at the end. the body of that wildcatter pilot, and MILLER! back on the Roci!

Tonight's episode was mostly Chapter One of Book 3, for those playing along.

Time jump of about six months or so.

And the story is just getting started.

Amazon had better fucking pick this up.

Anyone know if the ratings were better last night?

So it's not a sure thing that it comes back for more on Amazon, or it is? I was bored by some of last season's eps, but hung in because I like the premise and love Shoreh A (sp?) in anything.

Haven't binged this season yet, but assuming SyFy allows it I will, but maybe only if I know it's coming back with more support.

Like Orphan Black, or The Americans, I think that if it had aired on pay-cable or these days, Netflix or Hulu, it would have caught fire. Basic cable seems to be where too many good shows go to die.

this season is so so so good. and it should be watch on the biggest screen you can find.

The clans and factions of The Belt are slowly and painfully maturing into a Nation, with the re-christened "Behemoth" as the centerpiece of their new fleet, projecting power alongside Earth/Luna and Mars.

And overshadowing everything is The Ring… an artifact of a hyper-intelligent, hyper-advanced alien race, that is able to program matter to self-assemble into massive technological monsters.

All that came before was merely prologue... with last night's episode, the story started kicking into high gear.

So... will season 4 be released all at once? So it can be binged?

I've been rewatching the show and it's so much better on re-viewing. Instead of being distracted by trying to figure out what's going on, you get a lot more of the nuance and callbacks. This is a very dense show and there's a lot happening at once, particularly when on Ceres.

just about half way thru the 2nd book. like rewatching the first season, but as a directior's cut. 500 plus pages in each book. and so, so good. but glad that i have Holden and Amos pictured as they are on the screen while reading. 7 more books to go. so i guess that means we could have had 7 or more seasons of Expanse.

Amazon was very smart to pick up this show. It has a dedicated fan base, loved by the critics and it's epic. I think they are preparing to surpass Netflix. Netflix seems to throw away their money just to get quantity, not quality. I can't believe all the crappy shows they have now. The money they give certain obnoxious celebrities like Amy Schumer-- whose comedy special hardly anyone watched--- is ridiculous.

So this racing club that originates in the Belt does crazy stupid stuff like that? It's hard to understand when these characters speak. I lose interest when the show centers on the Belt. They are the Deplorables of The Expanse.

So who is that woman mechanic at the end? Was she Julie Mao?

R371, we're in the middle of season 3 and they only JUST finished book 2.

I imagine there are a MINIMUM of seven more seasons worth of material, especially considering there are two more books coming out this year and next.

R374, close... Julie Mao died in Eros when it crashed into Venus.

But you're VERY CLOSE.

R373, not quite... they're the put-upon, oppressed, used, and abused people of this universe. The under-class. They live in a very harsh world, where simple mistakes mean death. So their justice is harsh. And they don't have a planet, so there are many factions, and they're only now trying to come together. But yes, there are some VERY deplorable people among them. Just as there are among those from Mars and Earth.

The sling racer isn't a belt-only thing. Julie Mao was a yacht racer (earth is a LOT more wealthy than the belt or mars). But Sling racing is different than yacht racing... it's about accelerating all at once, and from then on, using only gravity assists to hit a target along a complicated path. If this guy had managed to thread the ring from the distance of Jupiter, he would have had the universe's greatest hole-in-one. He would have been a major celebrity.

If only he'd known that the ring doesn't like fast things passing through it. AT ALL.

They haven't made it really clear yet, but The Ring is huge... the interior diameter is 1000km.... that's about half the diameter of the Moon.

Everybody wants to fuck Amos.

That's because Amos is fucking awesome.

I'm half way through the third book and was suprised that Amos is bi who leans more toward men in the book. Disappointing that they changed that for TV.

"Doors and corners... doors and corners... you gotta enter a room SLOWLY... or the room will eat you up..."

Strange, I could have sworn Zach Villa (Maneo, who drives his ship through the ring) looks familiar but I didn't see anything that is listed in his IMDB profile..

He's in a band and engaged to Evan Rachel Eood, r382. Maybe from pap shots with ERW?

Holy fuck, that was the best episode yet.

That was exciting as fuck!

Way to end on a cliff-hanger.

how the hell can they turn up the tension every episode? damn do i love Amos and Holden. its almost sexual tension between them.

Amos is an endlessly complex character, played to perfection by the actor. I love every moment he's on screen.

I read the books, I knew what was going to happen, and I still found those last several minutes extremely tense and exciting. HOW ARE THEY DOING THAT? I love this show.

I also got a homoerotic vibe from Strait and Amos in that convo. I said to myself, "What if... what if [italic]these two[/italic] got it on?!"

Great episode but all I could think about afterwards was this Canadian actor playing the tech guy on the Behemoth's bridge. He's so dreamy.

Best episode yet. I bet Amazon's glad they picked this up!

Stupid SyFy online limits episodes available for viewing. You can't see the entire Season 3 anymore, as the first 3 episodes have timed-out. So now I have to wait for the whole season to come to Amazon. Piglets.

[quote] half way through the third book and was suprised that Amos is bi who leans more toward men in the book. Disappointing that they changed that for TV.

Not really. Every time a woman makes a pass at Amos, he turns them down. Amos turned the blind guy down because he's so homely. Amos mentioned he used to be a hustler and hustlers rarely service women. There were hints that Amos had a big crush on Pax, the botanist, when he was talking about him wistfully.

I really love this show. I love how they try to use real science and physics in the background of their stories, making it believable that colonizing the solar system could actually happen.

However, I wanted to see more of that floating thing from Venus. How did it develop so fast into a ring that is non-living. I haven't read the books but it seems kind of far-fetched. I thought it was more exciting when Earth and Mars were ready for war.

So...will ALL episodes of Seasons 1, 2, and 3 be available on Amazon for binging?

Spoilers for the episode obviously, but kinda spoilery for future episodes from the books... but still a great recap:

Would it be too obvious to guess that the Mormons scheme to get their ship back, the ship (Behemoth?) the Belters claimed for themselves?

This is one of those shows I watch and let wash over me because I usually have no clue what is going on.

R394, if you have Amazon Prime, Season 1 and 2 are free. Season 3 is available if you buy the whole season.

[quote] Would it be too obvious to guess that the Mormons scheme to get their ship back, the ship (Behemoth?) the Belters claimed for themselves?

The female saboteur looked like Julie Mao -- could be her sister, trying to get back at James Holden? She could be part of the radical fringe of the OPA and worked with the blind guy in the ship. Would the Mormons be that vindictive? The Mormons would probably more pissed at Fred Johnson, then Holden.

I have not read the books r399, but it would make sense to turn Mars and Earth against the Belters with the Mormons swooping in, stealing the ship and being the heroes for taking the Belters' big ship away from them instead of being the religious idiots who, on their own, take on the Belters while Earth and Mars fell thankful to the Belters because of Fred Johnson.

Thanks, R398, but I know that. I already have paid for cable access to SyFy and Prime to Amazon. Why would I pay yet more for Season 3 when SyFy has it up (or claims to, but suckily only has all but the first few episodes) and it's not available on Amazon Prime yet?

Strangely, the Mormons never really make a big stink about their ship being stolen from them. The ship currently belongs to the Belters.

I guess that's a spoiler, but not really. It is something I think the books should have done something with. There's only mentions about "the Mormons are going to be pissed...", but they never actually seem to get so, at least not in any way that affects the story.

R397, if you have questions, feel free to ask here. We can help you figure out what's going on, and why, and how.

Eugh, Mormons. How the fuck are they so powerful in the future? I hate them. Anna's holier-than-thouness bugs me as well; feels like I'm watching another show entirely. Star Trek: Discovery is also doing this faith shit next season. Just give me science stuff, please, thank you.

I don't mind the religious stuff although Battlestar got ridiculous at the end with it and Starbuck.

I think it brings the show some levity and humor that Fred Johnson stole their ship and there are still Mormon paintings in the background. In other words, it's better to make fun of a current religion than make a made-up one to give it a pinch of possibility or realism. I have never read the book but did the Mormons pay for that giant ship? They should be pissed but they're probably too nice and passive to fight. But it's a plot-hole they should address.

the book r405? ther are 9 so far and more coming... and are great reads.

I'm glad there are more books because there will be more stories to churn out. At least it gives it a background from which the writers can work and keep the characters consistent.

There are 7 books, with 2 more coming (end of this year, and end of next) for a total of 9 books in the series.

The TV show JUST started book 3.

count them:

There are also several novellas.

The last 5 minutes of Episode 9 was one of the most thrilling moments I've seen on tv, next to the Frozen dragon melting the wall!

It really was. I was literally on the edge of my seat. That was such an amazing episode.

further tension... do not forget: we saw that damn blue protomolecule thingy hiding under the Roci's skin...

Why is that protomolecule cluster dormant? You'd think it would have spread out on the ship by now? And why can't it be detected by the scans?

Becaues "the work" is done. Of course it's not really 'dormant'... what do you think is generating Miller?

But why can't the other people see MIller? Don't tell me, book readers. I guess we will find out next week.

It's unlikely you'll find out next week.

"It reaches out, three times a second... but nothing answers... so it created me, to find things."

If that doesn't creep you out, it should.

[quote] Eugh, Mormons. How the fuck are they so powerful in the future? I hate them. Anna's holier-than-thouness bugs me as well; feels like I'm watching another show entirely. Star Trek: Discovery is also doing this faith shit next season. Just give me science stuff, please, thank you.

Churchy bitches of all sorts get nervous and twitchy when their religious notions aren't validated. The idea of an atheist future makes their little tummies churn with anxiety! Consequently, every now and then, some spiritual hoo-hah has to be thrown in by a show's writers.

It's not unlike when a child is introduced into a show in order to appeal to breeder moomies and their vanity.

There was some bitching by the Mormons about their ship being commandeered and basically stolen in the books. Honestly I can't remember if that was ever resolved. I think they tried to push them off with the whole "god used it as a tool to save the Earth" and made it all part of god's plan, just to shut them up.

Not in defense of religion but even the astronauts admit seeing Earth from space is akin to a spiritual experience.

You can't take religion out because a minority of people like you R418 are atheistic. Most people accept their spiritual side.

Everyone watching the show should read two of the novellas... very fast reads, cheap on Amazon Kindle... "The Butcher of Anderson Station" and especially "The Churn". Both are about events that pre-date the show, so there's no spoilers, but each provides some excellent background. Parts of "Butcher" were actually incorporated into the TV show in season one, and parts of "The Churn" have been obliquely referenced as well. Reading them will just flesh-out the experience for you, and I definitely recommend them.

i dreamt last night that i was among vomit zombie... trying to escape them. but then figured out that skinned bananas would cure the zombies. either by touching the banana fruit, or putting it in their mouths. (PAGING DR. FREUD!!)

I wanna watch the Holden & Miller show, with special guest star Amos... weekly adventures! The three of them rock. Especially given Amos can't see Miller and just has to 'trust' that Holden isn't crazy. :-)

Amos is a scene-stealer. The guy has biceps the size of a small child.

NEW EPISODE TONIGHT, BITCHES!

Fun fact: That slingshot ship that went through the ring didn't come out the other side.

Tonight, we get to see what's through the looking-glass.

Fun Fact:  we already knew that from last week's episode.

Shhh r427.

R426 thought he'd spoiled something for everybody.

No, just pointed something out. DUH.

I'm glad we had this talk

I'm glad we cleared this up

Tonight on The Expanse: MORE ANSWERS THAN QUESTIONS!

JULIE MAO'S SISTER SEEKING REVENGE AGAINST HOLDEN!

Must be nice to cling to petty revenge plots in the face of unprecidented world-changing, civilization-changing proof of highly advanced extra-terrestrial life right at your door step.

she's trying to make her dad love her.

So far the second half of this season is just okay. I wish it was playing out closer to the book.

how come my listings show only an hour show next week, and then no more episodes. some one said it was a double episode next week.

R436, the second half has been amazing, and it's following the book pretty closely.

No, not really, r438. Maybe on some broad themes, but otherwise the two are very different and sometimes inexplicably different. Like how are they going to explain the captain's incompetence as the basis for the mutiny? The character playing the captain wasn't even in this book and hasn't acted indecisive or irrationally.

The two are stunningly close. A few characters combined, but the plot points are all there. And what they've changed for the TV show works better for a visual medium and TV show than what happened in the book... there are already too many characters to keep track of, week-to-week, for instance.

Bringing forward Chrisjen to season one really worked well, for example. Pulling in a bit of "The Butcher of Anderson Station" novella worked well. Almost everything they're doing is working well, so I'm not sure what you're complaining about, really.

I think the season 3 has been the best season so far, and the episodes since the mid-point some of the best episodes by far.

Bringing The Chrisjen plot line forward from another book is not the same as having Naomi inexplicably on the Behemouth only to leave.

None of the changes have anything to do with it being a visual medium. It would have made more sense on TV if they left the civilian plot similar to the book. It actually plays a part in the mutiny.

And I can complain if I want to...I'm entitled to an opinion just as you are. And, in my opinion the second part of this season isn't as good as it could have been.

This season has been amazing R441. What are you complaining about? Have you seen the rest of the season? This episode was kind of slow but it is building towards something.

The actress who plays Julie Mao is beautiful. I hope she pops up more.

Did Naomi and Drummer have a thing?

No, R444.

And it's not "inexplicable" why Naomi is on the Behemoth either.

Yes it is, r445. She never left the Roci in the book. She was brought to the Behemoth on the show to act as the book's Sam and Bull and it doesn't work. The tension that Bull created and the incompetence of the Captain is what sets off the mutiny. Instead we have Naomi kicking around the Behemoth for no reason except to pine over Holden. At least the book didn't make these two into a space soap opera.

The Captin, who is being mentioned, is that David Strathairn's character Commander Klaes Ashford? I thought the Captain of the Behemoth is Naomi? Does that mean Naomi is leaving the ship, too?

she gone!

Naomi isn't captain of anything. How can anyone think she's captain of anything?

she was chief engineer on the behemoth

r447 here. Sorry, I mixed up the character's name. I didn't mean Naomi is the captain. I thought Drummer is the Captain?

I don't demand TV shows be slavish copies of the books. Given the authors of the books are consultants and producers and what-not on the show, I trust their decisions and changes.

EVERY TV show and movie of a book is significantly different. If you're upset by such changes, you'll never like anything.

Leave us non-book readers alone!

The books are great.

The TV show is different in details, but very close in the broad strokes and major plot points... and is also great.

I hope season 4 is binge-able, because this waiting an entire week between episodes is killing me!

I worry about the budget of upcoming seasons. It's going to get expensive.

just finished the 3rd book. finally i feel i'm ahead of the game. cannot wait to see how much of the book makes it to the screen. (hoping for the naked Holden)

All hell is about to break loose.

I'm amazed that week in week out, this show provides new hot totty for me to lust over. And as if by magic, they're exactly the type of guys I go for. I'd ride this guy's gorgeous schnoz until it snapped right the fuck off.

Loved the episode, by the way.

Oh, and Strait has the tautest bod [italic]ever.[/italic] "Body fat? What's that?"

Now excuse me while I go do lunges until I can't see straight.

I have to wonder what non-book readers made of this episode.

It made sense to me since I knew what was going on from the books, but on reflection, I think I'd be pretty lost without that background.

I was pretty puzzled as a non-book-reader but I don't mind as I trust it will all be explained by the end of the season. I actually enjoy the feeling of not knowing everything immediately. And I still remember the meltdowns some non-book-readers were having last year while watching American Gods. There's no way in hell I'd ever allow myself get irritated by a TV show like that.

I wish Strait had Insta and made daily Insta stories about his keto diet. Because there's no way he looks like that due to exercise alone. There's gotta be something more to that marblelike perfection.

Trippy bit with his protomolecule connection; very '2001: A Space Odyssey.'

Miller pointing to himself: “Calculus.”

Miller pointing to Holden: “Amoeba.”

Hint: Don't fire guns when inside an alien protomolecule station that just reached out and stopped any object going faster than X kilometers per second.

And for godsakes don't throw a grenade at a protomolecule security artifact.

The station has now decided that anything moving faster than a grenade is a threat, and has enforced that new speed-limit with extreme prejudice.

This did not go well for a great many people.

that naked Holden scene was so much more in the novel. he stood next to Miller and was at first embarrassed about being naked, and tried to hide his junk, but then did a "so what" shrug and got on with the program.

They need to contrive a naked holden scene at least once a season from now on. Especially since it's on Amazon Prime.

I can't wait to hear Chrisjen say "FUCK" more now.

I appreciated the lesbian minister saying that "accident while cleaning a gun" is a terrible euphemism. Made me wonder how many of these "accidents" in real life throughout history were actually suicides relabelled because of honour and stigma.

Acting, bitches.

I thought I had a grasp on that vision... until I read the speculation by non-book readers in the comments of this recap and now my brain hurts.

I like how well-behaved book readers are in responses to those comments. I definitely don't want this spoiled for me.

YouTube recommended this gay Brit's reactions to this show to me today (it knows me too well). He's up to the fourth episode - which may be my favourite of the series! - and I love how quickly he gets sucked in.

I still clearly remember watching the first episode when it dropped, knowing nothing going in, and thinking I'm finally seeing space sci-fi done right. Had no idea I was so starved for a show like this.

thank you r470 that was great to relive the episodes and a fan's reaction! so fun!

This may be unrelated, but I think I once got fucked by Michael Dorn. I used to cruise scifi conventions and this big black dude faghandled me into the shitter and worked my hole for a good ten minutes before unloading, zipping up and leaving. Not very romantic but I'm pretty sure I got fucked by a celebrity.

MAY be unrelated? Honey, that was completely unrelated in every way possible. Go sell your fantasy somewhere else.

Meanwhile, shit's getting crazy on The Expanse.

From the comments at that article... yeah, non-book readers are NOT getting it. No, it's not an intelligence test, and no, it's not genocidal.

I hope they clarify things next week with some exposition (like we got in the book) to truly understand that vision. Because it's fucking important.

[quote]This may be unrelated

Yes.

And I'm pretty sure I read that story in several threads in the past already so I guess your friends are hearing about it at every brunch? Unless he wouldn't pay child support for the subsequent butt baby, it's time to put those heavenly ten minutes to rest, I think.

Back on topic... they usually finish books mid-season it seems. I'd be shocked if they tried to finish all of book 3 in half a season.

And I wonder if the move to Netflix will change this... if they'll be allowed the number of episodes it takes to finish out a book, so one book equals one season?

[quote] And I wonder if the move to Netflix will change this... i

Netflix? I thought the show moves to Amazon?

Sorry, yes, Amazon. My bad. Just had Netflix on the brain becaues it picked up Lucifer.

The tension between Ashford and Drummer wasn't handled well. It's a bit silly to get angry about allowing the chief engineer to leave when Drummer's engineering skills are just as good as Naomi's. It's also hard to believe that a ship size of The Behemoth doesn't have an engineering team.

And a criticism...It's not that believable that Clarissa has gone unrecognized until she runs into Tilly given how prominent the Mao family is throughout the solar system. It would be like nobody recognizing Kim Kardashian anywhere on earth.

there was WAAAAY ore drama in the books between Drummer and Ashford. involving a mutiny and a counter-muntiny that took place before the naked Holden scene in the book.

Drummer wasn't in the book, r480.  Drummer doesn't come into the series until the fifth book.  In the book Ashford was the captain, and an incompetent one at that, and the XO was Michio Pa.  The Drummer character on the show this season seems to be an amalgamation of Sam, Bull, Ashford and Drummer from book 5.

I don't know why they kept the religious aspect to Anna's character either given how it is incredibly downplayed in the series.  It doesn't make much sense to have her on the bridge with the Captain all the time when she's there as a Reverend on a religious mission.

Given how they built up the character as a great communicator on the show, it would make more sense dropping the religious aspect and having her there in case communication with any alien life form is needed.  Having her on the bridge would make more sense then in that capacity and we wouldn't have to sit through crap like the suicide filler that was there to remind people that Anna is a Reverend.

The Expanse was a little interesting.

But it had its gratuitous homophobic gay-bashing moments for the fanboys.

I didn't stick with it.

...what? Um. No.

no gay bashing. and the authors are very pro-gay. lots of gay characters that are jsut accepted as natural.

Less so with the show, r484.

This was an amazing episode once again. As a non-book reader, I can't wait to see what this "thing' is.

I'm glad they have a character who is a minister to help others cope with this--- although she didn't do a good job with that one guy..

If this happened in real life, where we would be invaded by real extra-terrestrials, there would be people shooting themselves in the head all the time. The suicide guy's belief in God didn't vibe with what he was seeing, it was too overwhelming. It's sort of like hearing that there's the possibility of multi-universes, even a parallel one as we breathe and exist now. That idea is so freakingly insane and overwhelming, I can understand why someone would blow their brains out.

But as you said, the minister sucked at her job. So why have her?

^^^ typical asshole DL response.

Because 8 out of 10 people in the world believe in a God, that's why a minister or even therapists would be on board a ship like this if you want to be realistic as possible.

Why such an over the top nasty response to his simple and legitimate question? How odd.

Homophobic? Hardly. The Expanse has room for lots of different sexualities, including polyamory.

The Expanse - homophobic? Amos may be gay or bi.

even tho Amos turned down the creepy blind cameraman he never did so with any other reason that he didn't like the man, not the offer....

Amos has had sex with both men and women. He was pimped out as a child prostitute (heavily implied last season). He's had a rough life. On top of his psychopathy.

Holden has 7 parents in a loving polyamorous relationship. He has moms and dads. Plural.

There's nothing homophobic about the books or the show.

It's a pansexual paradise.

Why would Amos make out with creepy blind guy when he could have any hot muscle bear in the Belt? or cute biologist guy?

The ring in Sol system is currently the only operational ring.

In the past, there were thousands of systems with active rings all linked to the transit hub with the station at the center. But then something happened. Bad. Something attacked. Whole systems went dark. The station even tried to kill the ‘bad’ by blowing up whole stars. It didn’t work. So all the gates were closed, and locked.

The station is still active. Still defending. Still keeping things in lock-down to avoid the spread of the bad, the contagion, the “others”. I’m sure they’ll go over most of this in the next episode, but all of it was depicted and/or stated and/or implied in this episode, so none of this is REALLY a spoiler.

So far I thought they were the bad guys using the technology to destry other civilizations, because they want to dominate the universe and destroy the competition.

No.

Don't post book spoilers here. PERIOD.

When the TV show has a scene that was far more clear in the book, it's not a spoiler.

True 499.

But r498 will not accept that. PERIOD.

The station is an automated sentry that maintains the transportation hub. It was built by an intelligence millions of years ago, that spread across the galaxy. But at one point the station starting losing contacts with systems, one by one. It detected the grand star-spanning civilization was under attack. Things were getting desperate, and at one point, it tried to 'cauterize' the spread of the darkness by blowing up the star, hoping to kill whatever the contagion was. It didn't work. Finally, the station just shut down all the gates. Locked them. In the hopes that that would stem the disaster, by containing it. And it's remained in that lock-down state ever since.

The protomolecule is not a weapon. It's programmed matter, designed to be flung across space, and when it hits a target system, uses the resources there to build a new gate, so that that system can be added to the network. By random chance, the protomolecule capsule thrown towards our sun, didn't hit anything it could use, landing on Pheobe, a minor moon of Saturn, to lie dormant for millions of years until humankind stumbled out of their gravity well, and discovered it.

None of this is spoiler. ALL of it is in the show... though not even remotely as clear as it was in the books. I'm assuming they'll clarify this more this week, as Holden tells someone about the vision, or maybe he discusses it with "Miller".

Miller is a construct created by the gate to try and find out what went wrong. Each gate has intelligence programmed into it too. The gate is trying to find out what happened, and is using Miller for that task.

R501, while that information can be gleaned from the tv show by book readers, it is all still potentially spoilers for now. I expect some of the above information to come to light in this week's episode since last episode did not make it clear what was being seen. In my experience, I found it best to wait to fill in any gaps between books and tv shows until after the season or at the very minimum that it is clear the show has moved well beyond that part of the story or went in a different direction.

It is good to be excited about the story, but without the availability of spoiler tags, book spoilers are a minefield while a show is actively airing.

damn, i wanted to hold Amos so badly as he lay there in sickbay. and i was sure Naomi would at least give him one. when she said "family" i expected to see a tear run down Amos' cheek.

It's interesting that they got rid of the entire mutiny plot line.

They really are compressing the book down.

I think that purple haze field effect around the ships was invented for the TV Show (a visual medium) and wasn't in the books.

[bold]The Expanse's Cas Anvar Talks What To Expect From The Season 3 Finale[/bold]

[quote]All I can say is maybe you might want to wear some sort of motorcycle helmet or else you might have your mind blown. Something just to keep your head together because it's going to be insane. And now that we have been guaranteed a season 4, you guys are in for a ride next year! Season 3 is the end of a movement in a symphonic science fiction orchestra. [Seasons] 1, 2, and 3 are the end of the first movement of The Expanse journey and then season 4 is the beginning of the second movement of this space opera. So prepare yourselves for all these characters that you love to be going in a completely new and absolutely thrilling direction.

I don't know why they chose to sacrifice some of the better plot points like the mutiny to instead focus on some of the book's minutiae this season.

time constraints. and probably CGI expenses. the sphere looked nothing like it is in the book. way plainer, way less expensive to put on the screen.

Yeah, some episodes you can see the lack of budget pretty glaringly. I wish the show were more popular, so it would get the budget it needs and deserves.

I would think that with Amazon next season, the budget should be vastly increased, shouldn't it?

I don't think so. The show is produced by a completely separate company. We really don't have any clue about the financing arrangements, but I recall it's self-financed and presented to the broadcast or streaming services complete. Anyway, I can't see how getting canceled and having a life-line thrown to it would actually INCREASE the budget. In fact, it might get cut down from 13 episodes to just 10 for all wee know.

It's less expensive to use all that CGI once it's been created. They have the ships and space settings designed and available, and actual sets constructed. Unless there are a bunch more new ships and settings, the budget shouldn't blow up.

I haven't read the books yet, so I don't know about that part.

R512, where the show is going, though, is going to require all new sets and CGI very soon (by at least some point in Season 4). And in seasons beyond that, things are going to get REALLY expensive, effects-wise. No spoilers, but some seriously big shit happens later in the books that would be very difficult to 'cheap out' on.

Ooh, fun. Thanks. Hopefully Bezos can drop a $100 mil. That's what, a day's pay for him?

Bezos' love for the show is no secret. Maybe he'll just throw a bunch of extra millions at the production company to improve the SFX.

This would be Amazon's GOT so Bezos would surely drop millions into the show to upgrade the special effects to make it more spectacular. It's an investment for him.

Would the show's producers even accept Bezo's money and relinquish creative control and / or profit shares?

The weird part is that the section of story coming up is probably the weakest part of all the books. So the first part of the Amazon run is likely to be rather underwhelming unless they tighten it up and make some more changes.

But then after that (talking likely season 5-ish), it gets so damn amazing it's not even funny.

r518 underwhelming? planet blows up, people are killed, Miller! (not really spoilers, since that always happens) but anything but underwhelming.

I'm talking the part about the deadly leeches and everyone going blind, R519. That was kind of a tedious part of the book to get through for me.

Loving the finale so far and it's only 30 minutes in.

Seriously this is good.

So many things completely different from the Book, yet it's so close. It's weird to be so divergent yet to completely hit all the same beats.

This is exciting as hell. I love this show.

Okay, wow, that was totally different from the book. They cut out a LOT.

It seems like they cut out a scene that is VITAL to book 7 and beyond. Um.... I wonder how they're going to fix that?

Um... I thought it was a two hour finale, not a 90 minute finale.

Best thing about the move to Amazon will be unleashing the f-bombs. It was pretty awkward the way they avoided them tonight.

Season wrapped at the end of the third book. If they veer off from the books at this point, the show could become a spiritual successor to Firefly.

Setup for the later books can easily happen at the beginning of next season. The first three books were particularly plot dense and I can see how a lot had to be cut or changed for television. The later books which came after this show went into production seemed to be more tailored to filming. Books 5 and 6 in particular could be condensed into one season. Book 7 (out of a planned 9 for the series) poses a potential problem with a big time gap and could be the impetus to take the televised story in a completely different direction.

My only gripe with the series is that it has the same problem with this past season of Game of Thrones: ignoring travel time outside of designated plot points. One of the big points being driven home in the book series is that "space is big" and it takes a long time to get anywhere. Time compression has to be done in service to the tv format, but it gets the nerd in me agitated.

I can't believe the entire Battle for the Behemoth was condensed into essentially one episode.

And the way they completely short-circuited that ending... in the book, Holden and Miller "getting in" to shut down the station's security and re-open all the gates was MUCH, MUCH more involved. I'm sad at the lack of blue fireflies and return to the station. They seriously rushed all of that.

It seems like they cut out about half of book 3 for the TV show.

I wonder if they'll make Season 4 = Book 4. If any book was compressible, I think it's book 4.

It was weird the way they didn't even show Miller in this episode (except for a second or two at the very end).

I think the lack of Miller in particular and the other omissions and compressions noted above were a strong indicator of just how much the budget (or lack thereof) was hurting production.

Hopefully Amazon gives the show a cash injection. Especially for the stuff after the upcoming season since next season could be done fairly cheap with a lot less CGI.

That's how you do an action-packed episode of TV! Watching two episodes one after another made me realize how much I'd rather binge watch this show. The weekly wait kills me, and not in a good way.

I just loved how Amos looked at Lost lady like she's his saint/mom/best friend/possible new lover. Like a kid in a candy store. Hilarious!

And again with the handsome men on this show. This guy who played a medic is like a Steven Strait knockoff. There were some other ones as well but they weren't credited, unfortunately. All of their asses looked amazing in those Belter uniforms.

Steven Strait's tits urge you to maybe consider featuring them as the opening gif of the second thread, and also to hit the gym, you fucking slob!

And yes, they realize that gif is ridiculously crisp and thus large as fuck but you can't possibly mess with such perfect tautness. Or is it taut perfection?

Holden is hotness itself, but Amos has to be the best monster/hero ever created. damn is his character/actor a sexy man.

r533 Yeah, I know I keep making gifs of Holden but it's Amos and his very nice haircut and arms I'm staring at the most when I'm watching the show.

I wish I had a friend like Amos.

I thought a few scenes in the finale were so disconnected! One scene they're in an elevator, three scenes later they're hugging like they haven't seen each other.

Crazy girl was in jail, then on tech duty, then in jail again, then working again.

Same with captain lady and her injury.

But yes, Amos is undoubtedly a total fuck machine.

It does feel like maybe it WAS originally 2 hours, but was cut down to 90 minutes. There do seem to be some missing scenes.

The only thing I felt was really jarring was how Clarissa was in the 'prison', and then suddenly wasn't and was walking around free.

Also, during the conversation with Clarissa in the 'prison', Holden suddenly wasn't there? They were, like, together for just a hot second.

It felt a bit rushed, and a bit sloppy at times, but over-all it was still a thrilling, exciting season finale. And it's still one of my favorite shows on TV right now.

the explained Mao being on the bridge: she was known as someone who understood ship maintenance and they needed "all hands on deck"

I was so relieved when Drummer didn't have to blow herself up. Great and interesting show. I am glad it keeps on going on Amazon.

some one further up the thread claimed that Amos is bisexual. i'm almost thru the 6th book, and so far i've seen no evidence that he had sex with any one but women. (and darn few of them)

Then you're not paying attention.

Of course he doesn't have explicit gay sex in the books. It's all simply inferred when allusions to his past are made.

There were also nods to it a few times in the TV series.

This show going to Amazon will be a godsend. No limits on episode length; they'll be as long as they need to be. No basic cable censorship; let the nudity and profanity fly! And, it'll be bingeable, all the episodes will be up at once. And hopefully a bigger budget for effects. I'm excited.

I wonder what the TV producers' plan is for the future? Do they still finance the show themselves (without any financial help of the TV channel they are having a deal with)? Could get really expensive in the long run.

I'm going to guess they're going to dial back the season length to 8-10 episodes, and then do the entirety of Book 4 in the season.

I kinda wish they'd had an extra two episodes to do Book 3 right... things were so rushed the last couple of episodes.

[bold]‘The Expanse’ Boss Explains How Season 4 Will Be Better Now That It’s on Amazon[/bold]

[quote]“It’s going to be more awesome,” Shankar said. “We no longer have the language restrictions. [We can] curse like a sailor. We don’t have the nudity restrictions… and the 4K and HDR will look amazing on Amazon. We’re no longer constrained by a 43-minute box. We can put some air into it, let things breathe a little bit more. So we’re excited to be on Amazon Prime.”

Nudity and cursing and longer episodes; sounds great to me. Steven Strait already hard at work in the gym stepping his mussy up, I'm sure. Not that he needs it...

Though I'd temper your expectations regarding the budget. They're going to give them as much or less as those shows on Amazon that are on the same level, ratings-wise. Amazon had all the power in the negotiations and they're not paying anything more than an absolute minimum for this show. It was a bargain deal for them, really.

There were several episodes in season 3 where the lack of budget really showed. Distractingly so. I hope they at least find a way around that next season. Especially given there are some entire new sets needed for what comes next.