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Sci-Fi

Netflix is Making a Series Based on 'The Three-Body Problem' (techcrunch.com) 80

Posted by msmash from the something-to-look-forward-to dept.
Netflix today announced its plans to turn Cixin Liu's "Three-Body Problem" trilogy into an original, English-language science fiction series. From a report: The show will be executive produced and written by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss (the "Game of Thrones" showrunners signed a multi-year deal with Netflix last year that is reportedly worth more than $200 million), along with Alexander Woo, who previously served as showrunner for "The Terror: Infamy." "The Last Jedi" director Rian Johnson and his producing partner Ram Bergman are on board as executive producers (Benioff and Weiss spent some time working on a since-abandoned Star Wars trilogy), while Liu and his American translator Ken Liu (no relation) will serve as consulting producers. "I have the greatest respect for and faith in the creative team adapting The Three-Body Problem for television audiences," said Cixin Liu in a statement. "I set out to tell a story that transcends time and the confines of nations, cultures and races; one that compels us to consider the fate of humankind as a whole. It is a great honor as an author to see this unique sci-fi concept travel and gain fandom across the globe and I am excited for new and existing fans all over the world to discover the story on Netflix."
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Netflix is Making a Series Based on 'The Three-Body Problem' More

Netflix is Making a Series Based on 'The Three-Body Problem'

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  • Well Netflix.. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by r1348 ( 2567295 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @04:17PM (#60463024)

    You better not screw up this one.

    • I'm still waiting for the 'Consider Phlebas' series, but that's Amazon.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • The book was awesome hard sci fi. But it was also a bit of a meander with a lot of too draw out and repeated concepts. Things that went no where much. It would be better to shorten it then stretch it out in a series that goes on and on each season.

      • That's what I like about mini-series: you get closure instead of 4 seasons of uninspired meandering followed by the whole thing getting cancelled. With this particular series of books, I think people will lose interest if you stretch it too much. One single season will do.

        • Re:The book is already a bit of a wander (Score:4, Interesting)

          by youngone ( 975102 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @07:55PM (#60463766)
          I might be in the minority, but I lost interest about 2/3 of the way through the first book and never finished the series.
          It was a pretty cool sci-fi idea poorly written (In my view anyway).

          • I know what you mean. However, the odd 'rhythm' of the writing and the culturally unfamiliar character actions/interactions stuck in my mind, so I started again and ended up enjoying the whole series. I've become really interested in China ever since.

          • I read and enjoyed the first book, coasted through the second book, and tolerated the third book. They required more than the usual "suspension of disbelief" for me. There were many parts of the story that jarred me out of "the zone" as I read, thinking "humans don't behave that way" or "why would anyone -- anywhere -- do that?" or "this character didn't learn anything from the catastrophes of their predecessor" or "this part was written by a teenager". My friend's answer: It's just poorly written.

          • Among my fellow avid sci-fi readers your story is the typical one for the series. I got through the first book and about 1/4 through the second and then just plain gave up. I can't speak for others, but for me, the political backstory was far more engaging than any of the actual science fiction. And the sci-fi parts I found to be such a stretch that I assumed they were either talking purely in allegory or would later realize they were wrong.

            I honestly don't understand why the series became so popular. P

            • I found it to be low-quality SF that explored derivative, old ideas in a poor manner with no good rationale (really, aliens can build folded-dimension spacecraft but can't numerically integrate orbital motions for a few thousand years?).

            • Seriously, the wikipedia synopsis is WAY easier to understand than reading the actual first book.

              That is an excellent point.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            They always say it's better in the original language but often that's as much to do with the culture. It's like a lot of Japanese stuff, it's great but to someone who isn't familiar with that culture it can be impenetrable or boring.

            The Netflix version could potentially be better for Western audiences if it westernizes it a bit.

          • No, that seems common in my experience. The first book is honestly a bit tough and confusing to get through—too many names and characters. The payoff in the third book is very satisfying, though. Read a summary of the first book, and jump straight to the second—the series is good enough that you should really try to get to the end.

      • I like how some seemingly big things lead to dead ends. That's how it is. As big as any event was, time eventually erased its importance. It should seem nihilistic but somehow it's reassuring too.

    • They hired the D's from Game of Thrones to do this. This is going to be a MASSIVE train-wreck. Their egos won't allow them to work with the original material without "enhancing" it to the point of utter absurdity. And once they go off-book, it'll just turn into terminator runs and sex scenes.

  • Game of thrones was good while on George Martin (Score:4, Interesting)

    by sinij ( 911942 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @04:20PM (#60463034)
    I hope last two seasons, where Game of Thrones run ahead of George R. R. Martin's books, are not a preview of what going to happen with this project.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Indeed. What a shame about tGoT. It had everything except competent writers and show-runners. I cannot even watch the last season, I get far to angry at the incredible mess they have made of things.

    • Re:Game of thrones was good while on George Martin (Score:4, Insightful)

      by _merlin ( 160982 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @08:30PM (#60463892) Homepage Journal

      Martin's writing slipped anyway. Early on in the series, every character had a purpose. It often took a while to work out what the character's purpose actually was, but it all ended up fitting together perfectly. As you get further through the series, you start to get characters that have no purpose at all, and do nothing to drive the story. Did he just have too much going on to tie things together? Did he start skipping the planning process? I don't know. It doesn't fall off a cliff the way the HBO series does, but it still doesn't maintain the quality it had at the outset.

    • GoT was so successful they had to stretch it out.

      At least that beats the alternative of a miniseries never being finished because it wasn't that good and too few people were watching it.

    • Two seasons? No way, They ran off course at the end of season 4. Season 5 episode 3 was when they really went off the rails and turned shite.

  • Rian Johnson (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Cpt_Kirks ( 37296 )

    This has SJW shit show written all over it.

    Too bad.

  • This is the problem, right there in the summary (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DontBeAMoran ( 4843879 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @04:24PM (#60463048)

    Sentences after sentences about the authors and their previous works, followed by a description of what the actual movie is about. I keep seeing this structure everywhere, on iTunes, Amazon Prime, etc. Stop telling me who made it and tell me what the story is about.

    Not only is it annoying and ego-centric but on something like an old Apple TV, sometimes there's so much text before it gets to the description of the movie that I can't even see that description, because it's cut off after X characters. Idiots.

    List things in order of importance for your customers, not your freakin' fragile ego:
    - what the movie is about
    - what actors are in that movie
    - how long the movie is
    - who wrote the movie

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dabadab ( 126782 )

      Well, the Three-Body Problem is basically about the horrors and injustices of China's Cultural Revolution and justification for xenophobia.

      • Well, the Three-Body Problem is basically about the horrors and injustices of China's Cultural Revolution and justification for xenophobia.

        For those unfamiliar with the Chinese Cultural Revolution ... image the youth of a nation having a woke off to see who can be the most woke. Now imagine the children being put in charge and there being severe punishment for being mildly not woke enough. Of course there is a Chinese flavor to this, with woke social justice defined by Mao's Little Red Book.

      • I don't see how the cultural revolution can transfer into film as written for American audiences. I assume they'll have to change the political scenes to be about wealth instead of education. That would fit better with the "Eat the rich" meme that is floating around.

        That, and the party would be greatly displeased to see its foibles represented in film.

    • In this case, knowing the people involved is more important than the project itself, because it lets sane people know to stay far away from it.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Snard ( 61584 )
        Agreed, sort of. I have already read the books, but would be interested in seeing the story brought to the screen. The fact that both the author and the English translator are on board as producers bodes well for the series, I think (or I hope).
    • I couldn't disagree more. When I'm deciding whether I want to spend 90-120 minutes on a movie, the first thing I want to know is who directed it, who wrote it, and who produced it. I don't really care what it's about. If it's made by smart people, it could be about literally anything and be entertaining. For example, if it's David Lynch, Wes Anderson, PT Anderson, I'm going to watch it, because I've liked so much of what these people have done previously.

      It's more likely that I'll see a movie about a
  • Benioff & Weiss, AND Rian Johnson? The guys who ruined a great series and the other guy who ruined a decent series? That's a hard pass from me.

  • Series seemed a little ponderous (Score:4, Interesting)

    by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @04:43PM (#60463122)

    The first book was kind of interesting, but a little slow at times.

    The second one I found just too slow and not interesting enough, I have not yet finished it...

    And this is coming from someone who easily read all of the Foundation and Dune novels.

    Maybe as a Netflix series it will be tightened up enough to be more interesting.

    However....

    Rian Johnson and his producing partner Ram Bergman are on board as executive producers

    Going to be pretty confusing having all these Chinese actors with contrived southern accents...

    • "The first book was kind of interesting, but a little slow at times.
      The second one I found just too slow and not interesting enough, I have not yet finished it...
      And this is coming from someone who easily read all of the Foundation and Dune novels."

      It is different. I used the audio-books while doing chores around the house.
      The Chinese names alone would have broken me too.

      • It is different. I used the audio-books while doing chores around the house.
        The Chinese names alone would have broken me too.

        Maybe I'll try an audio book to finish the second one...

        The names were actually not much of a problem in print, at least I seem to remember not having an issue with knowing which character was which. It seemed like they were mostly distancing enough from each other I could keep them straight.

        • The 2nd and third book is where it really picked up. The whole wife and remote house part I slept through. I also recommend the audiobooks.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by pjt33 ( 739471 )

        The Chinese names alone would have broken me too.

        Surely can't be as difficult as e.g. The Lord of the Rings, where everyone has three or four different names (or titles which are used as self-contained ways of naming them; e.g. Strider/Aragorn is referred to in places as just the Heir of Isildur) and you have to take notes to remember the correspondences.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Tom ( 822 )

      I thought the 1st to be slow at times but a bit unusual.

      The 2nd has long parts, just like the 2nd Lord of the Rings books, but wow does it get amazing.

      The 3rd blew me away. All together, they are possibly the most important SciFi since Asimov.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dargaud ( 518470 )
      I gave up on the 1st book after a few pages. I kept dozing while trying to read it. Since then I saw "Wandering Earth" which was a shit of a movie (and a really bad one at it), so I feel even less willing to try and pick it up again.
      • I have to comment - Wandering Earth the movie is NOTHING like the book's story, and can be utterly ignored. The book includes other brilliantly original short stories, and the ending weaves a few of them together delightfully.

    • In my opinion, the first book was totally boring with a few somewhat interesting concepts. I don't know if that's because it seems focused on Chinese politics and history that I don't know about. The second book is still a bit boring, but better, and it finishes strong. The third book is really interesting.

      It's a shame if you made it through the first one and halfway through the second one, and then gave up.

      • Ok, thanks to you and the others for the followup info - I agree with you about the first book having interesting concepts (although I disagree with the fundamental premise on which the series is based of the inherent risk in letting others know you exist).

        I'll carry on with the second since it offers the promise of a strong finish.

  • turn Cixin Liu's "Three-Body Problem" trilogy

    But someone somewhere won't get the message, and it'll turn into a tiddly Three's Company -- with John Ritter and Don Knotts as virtually appearing stand-ins.

    It'll be great! (Unplugs TV so there's absolutely no chance to turn it on.)

  • This is Slashdot (Score:3)

    by NoNonAlphaCharsHere ( 2201864 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @04:51PM (#60463142)
    I think most of us would prefer a series on the Double Slit Experiment.

  • So Benioff and Weiss should be okay as showrunners.

    Unless they've gotten too big for their britches. Showrunners who think they're clever enough to move on from the original instead, as a rule, routinely manage to completely ruin things. The last two seasons of Game of Thrones obviously come to mind... but so does season four of Sherlock.

  • The Three Body Problem series was one of my favourite Sci-Fi reads since Asimov's Foundation. So I hope Netflix can make something that's true to the novels and doesn't just ruin the whole thing like I'm afraid Apple have with Foundation!

    • I wouldn't say I'm optimistic about Apple's Foundation, however I've not seen any reason to think they have ruined it - what makes you think the Apple series has problems?

      It still seem really early to say if it's even going to be good or bad.

      It seems to me like Foundation may have a better chance to be good than Three Body (in series form).

  • Rian Johnson == Bad Film (Score:3)

    by Shadowhawk ( 30195 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @05:21PM (#60463238)
    Rian Johnson (fuckwad extraordinaire) doesn't care about fans (his own words) and won't follow story from others (threw away the notes from Abrams). The Last Jedi is easily the worst Star Wars film ever. Why anyone would hire him to do another movie is beyond me.

    • Come on, Last Jedi was clearly better than any of the prequel trilogy. I'd call it the best of the new trilogy, but that's pretty faint praise.

    • Add on DB Weiss and David Benioff and you've got a trifecta of fail. I honestly thought those two would be run out of Hollywood permanently after what they did to Game of Thrones. And the fact they bragged about ruining characters because they didn't like the actors.

      This show has clusterfuck stamped on it before it even gets through the planning stages. It makes me want to drop Netflix preemptively in protest.

  • I liked the books, but between D&D and Rian Johnson this is totally fucked. They'll get a couple seasons in and railroad through the rest of the shit-show, after Rian Johnson has destroyed any consistency in the story season to season and packed it with SJW bullshit.

  • to me it seems like you would need a budget of a trillion dollars. all three books together are like star wars multiplied by star trek plus an opera / historical drama.

    doing even the first book justice would strain the vfx infrastructure of the world. you would have to invent new algorithms to portray n dimensional space, and that is just the beginning.

    i see that Cixin Liu and Ken Liu are on board... but i just kind of scratch my head imagining how it would even be possible.

  • The book was exceptionally boring (Score:3)

    by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Tuesday September 01, 2020 @06:28PM (#60463440)

    I guess its only merit is bringing some very old ideas from SF to a greater audience that is more into light reading (or viewing) than actually thought-provoking things.

    • Yes; I can't see how anyone familiar with the history of SF could find it interesting. Perhaps the real benefit of the book is introducing some basic SF ideas to a wider audience, pulled in by the cross-cultural tie-in?

  • Okay but knowing Netflix's history with productions they will cancel it before it finishes. Honestly who cares what Netflix is making until Netflix actually keeps making any sustained content.

  • Now that was a summary worthy of being made into a movie.

    Three Body Problem series - omg! for real! yeah! wonderful! brilliant! and Netflix, so it'll have some budget and they've shown they can make great shows and... oh wow... amazing...

    oh

    oh

    oh-my-....

    what the?

    They've given ANOTHER great subject material to dumb and dumber to ruin? Isn't it enough that they ruined GoT ? Does anyone in the movie industry ever learn anything?

    Seriously?

    Can't believe they're doing that.

    WHY ? WHHHYY ???

    (oh, and if anyone doubts

  • Can someone explain the relationship between the terms showrunner, director, writer, and producer?

  • This was recommended to me, so I tried. I am assured that it gets better after the first couple hundred pages, but I found too much stilted translation (or original writing, you can't tell), too much careful tip-toeing around the various political land mines, and just plain technical nonsense. Keeping names straight from a naming structure unfamiliar to me didn't help, but that is not the fault of the author. At some point I put it down and it got buried. Maybe some day. It will take a lot of work to make a
  • I just finished the second book yesterday. I will admit the first book starts out slow, but it builds quite nicely. I don't know how the third one pans out, but I think the story is physiological si-fi as much as scientific. The science itself is a little hit or miss, but what I enjoyed and found interesting were the discussion of human society in relation to certain problems and technology. I am looking forward to the third book and hope the Netflix series does it justice.

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