You won't understand 3 Body Problem until its fourth episode but you should stick with it. The payoff is spectacular.

I've been making my way through Netflix's 3 Body Problem, which is an adaptation of a science fiction novel I had never even heard about written by an author named Liu Cixin. After watching the episodes that are available on Netflix, I gotta say that I'm hooked. However, it took a long time getting there (longer than most series that hook me). It wasn't that the series didn't have much going on. It absolutely did. Rather, the problem for me was that for the first three episodes, I had absolutely no idea what was going on. So consider that conundrum: how many people stick with something after three hours, and they still can't explain to another person what the show is about? That's literally what I faced with 3 Body Problem. But it did get there, and the payoff was huge as my mind was blown about the whole story, and how it connected to everything that I'd seen in those first three episodes. Now, I think of it as a brilliant piece of hard science fiction, one in which I eagerly anticipate the next installment.

On that front, I have heard that the streamer has yet to confirm more seasons to adapt. It is a series from the Game of Thrones showrunners, David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, so I think it has a good chance to get more seasons. But Netflix has a way of canceling things early. I hope that this doesn't happen with 3 Body Problem as I'm now invested and want some resolution on the things that unfolded plot-wise that I shall not go into in this post. Rather, I'd try and convince you that you should watch at least four episodes. If you're like me, you will be completely lost in the first three. It is the fourth episode where the light turns on and you go, "Oh wow! This is what they've been building to?" I think it is worth the wait, you just need to extend the storytellers some trust that they won't leave you hanging like Lost did for many folks.

In many ways, 3 Body Problem is borrowing from what Asimov and Herbert started with a story that is set to unfold over centuries rather than in a single lifetime of one protagonist. I also look forward to seeing how the storytelling evolves to keep us rooting for a single protagonist (or even if this is that kind of show). However, they have already laid the groundwork to propel one or more of these protagonists forward through the centuries to monitor the scale of the project that is at the core of 3 Body Problem in ways that strike a similar tone to what I'm watching in Apple TV+'s adaptation of Asimov's Foundation. With a television series and unlike a book, many people desire some kind of character continuity. With the way that Liu Cixin has approached the telling of this tale, it is apparent that they are embracing only hard science fiction processes that can exist within the framework and upon those ethereal layers within which science plays on the margins. So you get quantum entanglement for example, with computers that can talk to each other no matter how far apart they are. Impossible for us with our current level of knowledge as a civilization, but not impossible for aliens who are far more advanced than us.

The only thing that isn't fresh with the ideas presented in 3 Body Problem, is an obvious one. The question of "Is the human race worth saving?" is at its core. And this kind of question annoys me. Of course it is, although humans are far from perfect. If humans did become extinct then there would exist no possibility of growth and improvement. And as far as the San-Ti go (these are the aliens who are the villain of the story) if they're willing to wipe out an entire species in order to steal their planet, then they are not more worthy than humans for sure. And this then leads me to think: why don't they just take Mars or some other planet? If they are capable of making a journey across the stars and have that kind of technology, terraforming shouldn't be all that difficult for them. But...whatever. The story has got me intrigued and hooked in all of the right places so I won't question the motivations of the villain of the story other than: they are bad and they are coming (similar to "Winter is coming"). And the visuals that I've seen this first season are impressive as hell. It's difficult to remember a season one that looked this lavish and this good on its debut.