@viewlin I was disappointed with the pacing of the Chinese adaptation, although it covered much ground which accounted for a lot of that slow pace... coming from that to this Western adaptation I feel let down. The pacing seems better, but at the same time it loses you very fast by crunching into 1 episode what would have been 5 episodes of the Chinese version. If I abstract myself from the source material, then I'm at loss on much of the key events. Hopefully the 2nd season will be better at filling those gaps, which I doubt.
@ner0p Agreed. I can't forget what I know about the story, so I can't watch this with fresh eyes and know how well it would hold up. I enjoyed piecing the puzzle together with the Tencent adaptation, this version robs you of that experience, and sometimes has missing pieces. I think it's fine to watch this, but it should be done after the Tencent version or reading the books.
Well put! There were slow reveals in the book which gave me goosebumps, and this adaptation reduces them to one-liners.
I genuinely didn't mind the creative freedom they took with the characters. But they really fumbled with the plot.
It particularly irks me that episodes 6 and 7 were completely made up. D&D should know by now they do their best work when sticking to the source material. At least GoT S8 had a valid reason to write original material. But this is a complete trilogy. Eight 1 hour episodes would be rushed, but still could have done justice to Book 1. Then they crammed it into five episodes...only to make room for two shitty original episodes and even more original filler. At least they worked in some of Book 2 in Episode 8.
Suffice to say, I completely agree with you. That ended up being more of a rant than intended.
Review by viewlinBlockedParent2024-03-23T11:31:40Z— updated 2024-03-25T21:41:33Z
D&D have done it again! (created a disappointment)
While the Tencent adaptation had some flaws, notably very poor pacing and some downright bizarre acting and editing, I think it was an overall better experience. Netflix cut the runtime significantly, which could have been an improvement, but they did it to the point of skipping several important developments in the story. Yet, they found ways to waste precious minutes on scenes that dragged on longer than they should have, some of which didn't add anything to the story. It's only because I watched the Tencent adaptation that I was able to appreciate some of the ideas in the Netflix adaptation, since I knew what they were covering in spite of the skipped story beats. If I hadn't, I'd either feel like I was just watching a series of spoilers, or be confused about the point of it all.
Many positive reviews are downplaying negative ones for being pedantic and expecting a direct adaptation from the books, but this is feels reductionist and disingenuous. I think it's fine to diverge from the source material, but it should be done thoughtfully. In my opinion, the Netflix adaptation fails on its own merits. Some of the changes seem to be done in the interest of simplification, but this introduces plot holes, some of which must have been done against the recommendation of scientific advisors on staff. For example, I don't think the sophon was capable of unfolding itself (Trisolaris spent an unfathomable amount of time and energy building them), yet in this adaptation the sophon does it on a whim just to create a menacing eye in the sky? Why not just starve the planet of sunlight then and finish the story right there? Originally, the eye was observed during a failed Trisolaran unfolding attempt, alluding to a sentient threat gaining access to our universe from another dimension.
Tencent gave the viewer many episodes to theory-craft why "physics doesn't exist", what the motive could be for targeting scientists, who or what could be behind it, the purpose behind the game and so forth. The characters slowly whittled down the possibilities and eventually unveiled the truth. The show drip fed information to the viewer through the eyes of the characters which often became relevant much later, such as the flying blade. It went into philosophical thought experiments that conveyed the existential dread of the situation, like the turkey scientist and the farmer. It also covered several interesting physics concepts in a way that was easy to process and yet showed respect to the viewer.
Netflix? Nah, it's aliens bro, it's right there in the trailer on YouTube. There's no respect for the viewer, so there's no attempt made to even cover concepts like cosmic background radiation. It did cover a few at least, like FTL communication with entangled sophon pairs, the staircase project, etc. Netflix did also foreshadow some concepts that do come later in the books, sometimes with just novel covers shown on screen, some in dialogue, such as the Fermi Paradox and the Wallfacer project.
I believe the Oxford Five were created to be more relatable to the viewer than Wang Miao, but I think this again shows little respect for the viewer. They achieved this in part in the laziest way possible, such as having many of them just curse in every scene. I don't think it's necessary to relate to every character, and it can certainly be done in ways beyond superficial means like gender and race like what was attempted here. The story is about the science of it all, the universe, and this extends beyond the lifespan of a single person who likes to go drinking at a bar with friends. Most of us aren't top-tier scientists, we're not going to think like Oppenheimer or Feynman, this is fine. I found my immersion broken at several points when I saw the protagonists succumbing to irrational ways of thinking. To be a successful academic at such a high level would likely entail some core beliefs about the world and ways of thinking that wouldn't come off as people reading emotional lines off a script.
Is this D&D adaptation as bad as GoT S8? Definitely not. It's several points better, but the bar is pretty low. There were some redeeming moments, a few funny lines in almost every episode, I particularly liked some parts of the last one.
I do think it can still be worth a watch. However, I highly recommend starting with the Tencent adaptation, or reading the books first. Those are more of a journey, whereas this comes off more as a poorly written fan wiki with spoilers. I think this version can really rob you of the awe inspiring ideas in the source material and Chinese adaptation. My hope is that some people will find this version interesting enough to delve into the source material.