Thread by @Michigandolf

Just finished all 30 episodes of Tencent's "Three Body Problem," adapted from my favorite sci-fi books of all time, & arguably the greatest work of fiction ever written in terms of scope, ideas, and impact on actual science.

Here's my thoughts for the 2 people that care 😂

Overall true to the 1st book in the series. As a diehard fan I enjoyed it, but so did my wife who's never read the books.

The visuals were 100x better than the acting. CGI wasn't blockbuster film quality, but used very well to explain difficult story concepts.

The pacing went from painfully slow to insanely fast throughout the series. This isn't a criticism because that's actually very true to the pacing of the books. I'm mentioning it because if all you're used to is American media, you'll hate the books and the TV version.

The show also did a good job of being virtually devoid of emotion, very much inline with the original Chinese publication. But I like that. All science, no dumb love stories or distractions meant to hide an authors lack of novel ideas or innovation.

Every English speaking actor was absolutely dreadful. I'm talking BAD. Like wouldn't even be able to land gigs as extras on Walker Texas Ranger bad.

I'm sure their casting choices were limited, but they were so bad it was a huge distraction for me anytime anyone spoke English.

However, the main Chinese characters were cast perfectly and absolutely nailed their depictions. Sometimes movies/TV can ruin books for me because it's hard not to see the media versions in your head but in this case I welcome it because they were cast so well.

I was disappointed in the last episode simply because of the Trisolaran depictions. Even though it was technically the ETO's depiction of what they thought they'd look like, the books never tell you what they look like so it was a bit jarring for me especially since it's not

even close to most fan's understanding of the Trisolaran form, which is more likely buglike and VERY small.

They also RUSHED through the last episode badly, making it difficult for my uninitiated wife to follow along.

Overall as a fan I liked it & I'm now very curious to see what the Netflix version will be like.

Translation on the YouTube version is FAR better than Amazon Prime. Prime has no commercials but I think the commercials are worth superior English subtitles.

#3BP #TBP @CixinLiu