The creators of “Game of Thrones” are back with the ambitious sci-fi series “The 3-Body Problem” on Netflix. If you’re lost, we’ll explain the ending to you. Warning, spoilers.
Warning, spoilers. It is advisable to have seen the series The 3-Body Problem before continuing to read this article.
It was one of the most anticipated Netflix series of the year and subscribers flocked to the platform in droves since it is already number 1 in the top views. And for good reason, this fiction is not only the adaptation of a famous science fiction work by Liu Cixin, we also owe it to David Benioff and DB Weiss, the showrunners of Game of Thrones.
The duo is joined by screenwriter and producer Alexander Woo (True Blood) for this ambitious transposition of the 3-Body Problem, which describes humanity’s first contact with an extraterrestrial civilization.
What is The 3-Body Problem about?
The 3-Body Problem follows the investigation of Clarence Shi (Benedict Wong), a British government agent, into the mysterious wave of suicides affecting the scientific community. He will join forces with a group of scientists, former students of Oxford University, to try to understand this mysterious phenomenon.
Their investigations lead them to a strange virtual reality game based on an advanced physics problem, but above all to the greatest threat Humanity has ever known: an extra-terrestrial invasion.
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And this future attack is due to a decision made by Ye Wenjie (Zine Tseng, young, and Rosalind Chao, old) in the 1960s. The latter is an astrophysicist who was forced during the Chinese Cultural Revolution by the army to work on a mechanism capable of communicating with a potential species coming from the sky.
The young woman succeeded thanks to the amplification of the signals by the power of the sun and even receives a message, which tells her not to respond if she does not want the Earth to be destroyed. Ye Wenjie responds anyway and even specifies that she will help the extra-terrestrial species in its endeavor. Seventy years later, this species puts its threats into action and begins its invasion of Earth.
What are the discoveries and challenges of the first season of The 3-Body Problem?
The group of scientists trying to understand how the extra-terrestrial threat will play out on Earth face many setbacks, although many elements of answers can be found in the virtual reality game The 3-Body Problem, sent by these same extra-terrestrials, called San-Ti represented by the guide played by Sea Shimooka.
Among them, Jack (John Bradley) dies refusing to continue the game and Auggie (Eiza González) understands that she must stop using her nanotechnology if she does not want to end her life. She will even go so far as to cede the intellectual property rights of her creation but makes her research public to expose the danger and goes to Mexico to help deprived populations.
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For his part, Jin (Jess Hong) discovers the plan of Mike Evans (Jonathan Pryce), the radical environmentalist who is in contact with the San-Ti to bring them to Earth, thanks to Ye Wenjie. She also understands that the San-Ti use intelligent computer protons called intellectrons (sophons) to cause and observe the frightening effects seen by humans on Earth.
Moreover, when the San-Ti notice that humans are capable of lies – and this facet of Humanity does not please them at all – they display the message “You are vermin” on all electronic devices in the planet. The tone is set.
And the planet is panicking. The Planetary Defense Council is forced to intervene and under the leadership of Jin, to set up the “Staircase” project, using a thousand nuclear bombs to propel a probe equipped with enormous solar sails in order to exceed the speed of light and to stop the San-Ti fleet on its way to Earth in time (they still need 400 years).
Problem, they can’t send a human there with but only a human brain. Jin suggests that the brain of their friend Will (Alex Sharp), who is dying, be sent. He accepts but the “Staircase” project fails and Will’s brain is lost in space, probably forever.
For his part, Wade (Liam Cunningham) seems to have another solution in mind: use cryogenic technology to enter cryo-sleep and be present when the San-Ti arrive on Earth in 400 years. Which the Council does not authorize him to do.
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Finally, Saul (Jovan Adepo) is recruited by the United Nations to be one of the three “blockers”, at the instigation of Wade, who appoint three chosen ones who will work on ways to combat the extra-terrestrial threat with their best means of defense: their thoughts.
The blockers will have free reign and can do whatever they want without anyone intervening as long as it furthers their plan. Although the San-Ti can monitor all means of communication and behavior, they cannot read minds. This major new function makes Saul a target for the San-Ti who try to eliminate him at all costs.
How does The 3-Body Problem end?
The last episode of the 3-Body Problem obviously does not close the entire story of the Netflix series. This first season serves as an introduction to a larger plot and helps establish the characters and the different issues.
So, we still know little about the San-Ti but we do know that they plan to invade Earth. And they will be able to count on their most faithful worshiper Tatiana (Marlo Kelly), who set up all their stratagems from the start, and who even killed Ye Wenjie, without whom the San-Ti would not have had the idea to come to Earth. Tatiana even gets a VR headset so she can play the 3-Body Problem game.
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Although more informed than the rest of the population, the group of scientists lost several battles against the San-Ti, as well as two of their friends. But he didn’t lose the war. And Jin, Saul and Auggie (if she returns) can count on the help of agents Wade, who still has the idea of cryogenics in his head, and Clarence Shi.
The latter will also try to cheer up Jin and Saul, who are disappointed. The latter thinks that the San-Ti are superior and that humans are “slow”, “stupid” and that they “die easily”. In short, that they are “vermin”, “insects”.
Clarence Shi then takes them to a swamp where swarms of cicadas have taken over the sky. “People hate bugs and have been trying to get rid of them forever,” he explains, “Look around you, they’re not going anywhere.”
This ending demonstrates that the war between humans and the San-Ti is only just beginning and that they will have to roll up their sleeves by finding a solution to combat this dangerous extra-terrestrial threat. But which ?
The series The 3-Body Problem is available on Netflix.