What Is the Story About?
Based on the Chinese sci-fi novel ‘The Three Body Problem’ by Liu Cixin, Netflix’s 3 Body Problem Season 1 combines Astrophysics and Alien-invasion theory using the conundrum of the Three-body-problem. The series follows Ye Wenjie, a skilled astrophysicist who after the brutal murder of her physics professor father during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, gets conscripted by the Military & sent to a secret radar base in a remote region. Tasked with the responsibility of sending signals to alien species in the space, the fateful decision she takes at the station mysteriously haunt a group of scientists in the present day, pushing them to tackle humanity’s greatest threat ever.
Performances?
Netflix’s 3 Body Problem has a cast that effectively holds on an ambitious show of this scale. Benedict Wong‘s Clarence Shi (based on Shi Qiang) is the audience voice throughout the show. The investigator echoes an average audience’s inquisitiveness around laws and occurences of physics while ably holding the guard of a skilled detective trying to hold the head and tail of the mysterious death-trail of famous scientists.
Jess Hong‘s Jin Cheng, the skilled scientist who takes upon herself to play the game that killed the scientists and solve the three body problem to get to the root of it is the most likeable character in the show. She is the tool that navigates throughout the mystery hidden in the show.
Jovan Adepo‘s Saul Durand, Eiza Gonzalez‘ Augustina Salazar, John Bradley‘s Jack Rooney and Alex Sharp‘s Will Downey form a very likeable friends-gang who together gets into the Matrix of the mysterious death trail of scientists.
However, Zine Tseng who plays the young Ye Wenjie holds the clue to connect the suspicious occurrences. The actor portrays the aggression of a wronged and vindictive daughter with panache and it’s her story that interests the most. Rosalind Chao plays the adult Ye Wenjie.
Analysis
Netflix’s 3 Body Problem, from the creators of Game of Thrones is an American science fiction adaptation of the eponymous Chinese novel ‘The Three Body Problem’ by Liu Cixin. Created by David Benioff, D. B. Weiss and Alexander Woo, the 8 episode series is the second adaptation of the source material after the 2023 Chinese series ‘Three Body’.
3 Body Problem begins with a teenage Ye Wenjie witnessing the brutal public murder of her physics expert father Ye Zhetai during Maoist China’s cultural revolution. The narrative then speeds past to current day London where a group of young and vivacious scientists lament over the shutting down of accelerators all over the world. With experiments failing the theories and cancellation of research activities, suspicious deaths of scientists surface, one after the other.
Detective Clarence Da Shi is summoned to a crime scene where a scientist has killed himself with number count-downs scribbled all over the wall. The investigation team is apalled at the blood-soaked ‘I STILL SEE IT’ scribbled on the wall. Multiple similar death cases of scientists is the reason why Da Shi is tasked with the investigation.
This is when Vera Ye, the director of a particle accelerator kills herself after the supposed shutting down of her experiment. Her death calls upon a group of young scientists to be curious of the reasons that led to such a situation. Her mother- Ye Wenjie seems to hold a clue to all these occurrences as the show moves back and forth to the kind of work she was subjected to do in a secretive laboratory in China.
One of the areas where 3 Body Problem excels is in maintaining the mystery uptight and central. Unlike namesake mystery shows, the series doesn’t hold a predictable and understated secret with it, there are unanswered and unjustifiable questions beneath the secretive occurrences in the series and Ye Wenjie could probably hold key to what happened in the past and what’s transpiring in the present.
As Jin Cheng discovers a mysterious helmet like device through which Vera Ye played a virtual game before her suicide and takes it on herself to get into it, the viewer sees through the mysterious connect between the game’s target, the deaths, count-downs and unexplained happenings that keep on happening to selected scientists. Her friends Saul, Auggie, Jack Rooney, Will and detective Da Shi joins her in finding an end to this ‘3 Body Problem’ – the missing piece in the labyrinth of a game she plays.
The first season of 3 Body Problem is a triumphant spectacle. It’s visually rich, stunningly scored and beautifully adapted to small screen with a complex narrative and tangled world Astrophysics. If you’re unfamiliar with certain terms in physics or remotely skipped your physics classes, you might want to run through Google quite a lot even when the creators simplify most of the convoluted scientific layers. But that is not a pitfall. What is a sci-fi show without the audience learning new things?
However, there are too many parallel tracks and time-jumps that could possibly confuse a simple viewer who just wants his weekend dose of entertainment. While the show is not as tricky to follow like time-travel shows like Dark, it’s not that simple either. The show sees alien invasion aka the invasion by San-Ti (as addressed in the show) through a perspective that’s akin to Arrival or Signs, but what leads to this situation and whys are addressed in the debut season.
To put it short, 3 Body Problem is an amply engaging sci-fi mystery treatment. It is without a doubt looking like the next big thing for Netflix, as it has a lot of mystery, entertainment and science to quench the thirst of the sci-fi genre fanatics who are not versed with the literary trilogy. With an open yet hopeful ending, the further seasons are expected to punch levels above and gather a strong fan-base on the way.
Music and Other Departments?
From the creators of Game of Thrones, arguably the benchmark in book-adaptations and fantasy shows, the technical departments of 3 Body Problem are beyond safe. GOT creators’ long time music collaborator – Ramin Djawadi’s exceptional score for 3 Body Problem teleports the viewer to a mystical world of marriage between physics, alien invasion and human nature. The music is one of the strongest selling points of the show, in fact a character of its own akin to The Game of Thrones and House of Dragon series.
The cinematography, colouring and lighting of 3 Body Problem are a sight to the eyes. It’s a challenging task to bring a massive and ambitious sci-fi show to life and the team of 3 Body Problem has succeeded with flying colours in the debut season, doing the undoable.
Highlights?
Ambitious Storyline
Scale & Mystery
Cast
VFX
Music
Drawbacks?
Non-linear narrative
Too many parallel tracks
Tough to follow physics terms
Did I Enjoy It?
Yes
Will You Recommend It?
Yes. Sci-fi/mystery genre fans would dig the show without a doubt.
3 Body Problem Series Review by Binged Bureau