3 Body Problem

 

Alien invasion movies vary enormously in terms of technical quality and intellectual content. The new Netflix series 3 Body Problem scores quite highly on both axes. It explores the possibility of contact with an extraterrestrial civilization that is so sophisticated that it knows how to communicate using quantum entanglement and create designer matter from the subatomic level, something we humans have barely begun developing. When I first heard about quantum entanglement, "spooky action at a distance" it seemed obvious to me that if you could somehow capture the two entangled particles you could build a wonderful communications device. Unlike with electromagnetic waves, you wouldn't be constrained by the speed of light, saying hello to a distant star cluster and waiting 50,000 years for a response greeting, see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2017/12/ben-emlyn-jones-at-awakecon-2017.html. You could literally have a normal phone conversation with somebody in the farthest galaxy. In the series it is therefore particle physicists, not astronomers, who hear the first messages from the stars. The title refers to the problems a hypothetical planet would have if it were gravitationally influenced by two other heavenly bodies; for example, what would tides be like if the earth had two moons? The aliens live on a planet with three suns about four light-years away; therefore it is probably the Alpha Centauri system, the closest stars to the solar system. Their own three body problem has rendered their planet uninhabitable so they are heading for the earth in a fleet of ark spacecraft. They expect to arrive in about four hundred years. They also send a series of chilling messages to the people of earth demonstrating their awesome technical supremacy and declaring their contempt for humanity. When they arrive it will obviously not be with goodwill. An organization on the earth is set up to counter this threat and it recruits scientists to build weapons. Anything can be justified to protect the earth from the evil aliens, although this ethical equation is pushed to its limits. In one scene a weapon is built to destroy a ship run by human allies of the alien conquerors. A torpedo etc wouldn't be good enough because it would supposedly allow the crew an opportunity to destroy vital evidence, so the attackers create a mesh of microscopically thin, but extremely strong nanofibres which slice the ship into strips like very powerful cheese wire; including everybody inside it. This is one of the most grisly things I've ever seen on TV. The programme has a 15 certificate and a warning for violence, but why not an 18? So the programme does appeal to the side of the viewer that enjoys sadistic entertainment.
 
3 Body Problem is very woke; and this gives it a slightly retro feel. Wokery is something that seems to be going out of fashion a bit, and in my opinion that's a good job. Of course the box office has been demanding its departure for a very long time, but finally cinema and TV studios appear to be responding. Therefore the level of political correctness in the series would be better suited to something from the late 20-teens. As I've often noticed, the worst excesses of wokeism in a TV programme or film tend to be at the very beginning, for example see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2023/07/messiah.html. All the heroic characters are either female and/or non-white. Auggie, played by the Mexican actress Eliza González, is a cardboard cut-out "Strong!" "Independent!" "Woman!" The other female leads are very similar. The one exception being Ye Wenjie, a scientist working as a slave to the ChiComs in the '60's as they make an attempt to contact the aliens. Later on in the story she moves to Oxford with her daughter to work at the Harwell laboratory. She is a far deeper, more mature and more colourful character, more like a traditional heroine. She is played by Zine Tseng and by Rosalind Chao as her older self. (Chao was also in What Dreams May Come, the subject of a HPANWO TV watch-read party, see: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2023/06/what-dreams-may-come-watchread-party.html. I have also been to the Harwell laboratory, see: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2013/12/peasemore-2-harwell-laboratories.html.) The first white male we are introduced to is a drunken karaoke singer... and not a very good one... who tries to flirt with Jin and Auggie in a pub. When he asks them what their jobs are they sneer at him and describe their scientific professions in very technical terms. He frowns with incomprehension and walks away. Another white man is called Jack and he is an immature foul-mouthed overweight neckbeard addicted to computer games. He would live in his mother's basement except she was very rich and has died; so he has inherited her fortune. His whole giant house is his mother's basement. He dies early on in the series, killed by a woman of course. The only white male character approaching a respectful portrayal is Will, and his reverence comes only from his courage in the face of a tragic Cyrano de Bergerac kind of back-story and fate. I suspect the reason the producers have exhumed wokery from its shallow grave is because making this series was quite controversial. It is based on a book by Liu Cixin which won a Hugo Award, one the highest accolades in science fiction literature. China does not export a lot of its contemporary art and so this was a very remarkable achievement. There is an indigenous TV adaptation from last year called 三体(I don't know how that is pronounced) and it is far more faithful to the original story; not least because it is set in China and all the main characters are Chinese, like in the novel. To change those characters' nationalities and the setting is risking a charge of "cultural appropriation" and so the casting and portrayals were probably done to virtue-signal against that. They also make an attempt to maintain a link to the Chinese origin of the story through some of the characters and locations.

One thing that really surprised me about 3 Body Problem is that I can't help wondering if the producers have had some contact with the Conspirasphere. The reason is that Auggie looks and sounds very similar to Sarah Rachel Adams, see: https://www.sarahradams.com. Another character is called Thomas Wade and he is the leader of the earth defence programme. He is played by Liam Cunningham of Game of Thrones fame, but he is made to look, sound and act very like Miles Johnston, see: https://thebasesproject.org. I immediately went on the lookout for my own counterpart, but luckily they never included him. The eight part series is rather anticlimactic and has a very open-ended conclusion. This leads me to think there is a plan to adapt the novel's two sequels, what is known collectively as the 地球往事, "Remembrance of Earth's Past" trilogy. I was rather disappointed that the plot was not more complicated. Nobody in the story doubts the validity of the government's commentary about the alien threat, even to the point where they're willing to slice a ship and its passengers into strips like a loaf of bread. What if this is all a big hoax, a fake alien invasion false-flag; see here for details: https://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.com/2020/08/space-force-reply-to-steve-mumbling.html? The alien interventions could be simulated with Project Blue Beam technology. This element would have been a welcome addition to the storyline, but it is not even considered. This is despite the fact that the programme does include runaway climate change, sky quakes and bird deaths, see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2020/02/bird-death-update.html. There are some good performances by some old and semi-retired actors including a rare non-comedic role by Adrian Edmondson and also Jonathan Pryce who was made famous by Brazil, see: https://hpanwo.blogspot.com/2008/12/hanged-hangman.html. I have mixed feelings about 3 Body Problem. The first three or four episodes are very well done. The mystery is handed and delivered very skilfully and the characters are generally more amiable. From about episode five the energy slackens a bit and the story atrophies. As I said, a very obvious and fertile opportunity to enliven the narrative is not taken; which is even stranger if the creators did indeed study the Conspirasphere. This series is better than some alien invasion movies I could mention, and compared to Independence Day it is Shakespeare. However, it is definitely inferior to Arrival, see: https://hpanwo-voice.blogspot.com/2016/11/arrival.html. (Ironically that is also written by a Chinaman, Ted Chiang.) I will nevertheless look out for any sequels with moderate interest.

See here for more information: https://hpanwo.blogspot.com/2021/11/climate-change-portal.html.
And: https://hpanwo.blogspot.com/2021/08/political-correctness-portal.html.