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"3 Body Problem" Is a Rare Species of Sci-Fi Epic
- nathan_compton 3y agoI didn't find the Three Body Problem particularly compelling. Almost everything in it is goofy.
- protomolecule 3y agoWhat would you recommend reading instead of it?
- riku_iki 3y agoBlindsight is my fav if you didn't read it yet.
- nathan_compton 3y agoBlindsight was a little better.
- nathan_compton 3y agoStanislaw Lem, Greg Egan.
- protomolecule 2y agoThanks! I've read a lot of both and still like 3BP)
- riku_iki 3y agogenuinely curious what is not goofy in your experience. While books are not perfect, imo they are one of the best hard fiction books available. I think I enjoyed only several other books more in this genre: Blindsight for example.
- nathan_compton 3y agoPretty much everything about the premise seems silly to me. A civilization that can unwrap protons and build machines that violate energy conservation inside of them wouldn't need to care about taking over other species as basically all the material and energy of any solar system, regardless of whether it had life in it or not, would be available to them. And if you could build such objects you could probably find a better way to destroy our enemies than fiddling with their particle accelerators. The Dark Forest idea is also very dumb. The universe is so stupidly big that going out of your way to destroy other lifeforms, especially if you are a technologically advanced species, is a huge waste of resources for no gain whatsoever. Furthermore, even in a hostile universe there is much to be gained from alliances, especially for intelligent lifeforms for whom the idea of a "civilization" is not tightly coupled to a specific biological underpinning. I'm not saying a book couldn't be written with these premises. Obviously fiction can go all sorts of places. I just found the presentation of these ideas highly implausible in this text.
- riku_iki 2y ago> A civilization that can unwrap protons and build machines that violate energy conservation inside of them wouldn't need to care about taking over other species as basically all the material and energy of any solar system, regardless of whether it had life in it or not, it is not obvious that such tech automatically gives large scale terraforming capabilities. Also, I think one of the book premises is that trisolars are stagnant civilization, they achieved some advancements in some areas, but couldn't make breakthroughs in any others. They restarted evolving fast after learning from human civilization. > Furthermore, even in a hostile universe there is much to be gained from alliances, especially for intelligent lifeforms for whom the idea of a "civilization" is not tightly coupled to a specific biological underpinning. Price of the risk is too high if contact with totally different species won't go well.
- curiousDog 3y agoSuch an amazing show and kudos to Netflix!
- huitgr 3y agoHow would you know? It premieres in 3 days? (March 21, 2024) Or you were at sxsw? In which case you mean the first episode was amazing?
- ok_dad 3y agoIf anyone saw this and also read the books please say how the show is and if it’s worth watching! The books were excellent.
- danpalmer 3y agoWere the books excellent? I've heard that the sci-fi concepts are great, but that the writing and/or translation to English are poor. I also wonder if the books fall foul of the same tropes I see in some other Chinese storytelling, where themes are very obviously different to those in non-Chinese media. I love good sci-fi but haven't committed to the books yet because I'm concerned I might be wasting my time. Truly interested in opinions!
- lubesGordi 3y agoI was on the edge of my seat in a very novel way for the first half or so of the first book, then it turned fantasy (to me) quick. I know people are claiming this is hard sci-fi, it's not. But there are some very interesting ideas and they are strung together in a very big way. It was kind of too big for me, so I never read the next two. I'd recommend the first book just so you know what it's all about.
- snapcaster 3y agoI think by hard sci fi people mean that faster than light travel doesn't exist (aka the warp, tacheon drives, space folding, etc. etc.). I agree on it mostly being fantasy (and reading it just this year you can see it was written when string theory was hot)
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- bramgn 3y agoIn my opinion the story the books tell is excellent, after having been pulled in by the story, I would read it in stenography if necessary. I was blown away by the ideas brought forward by the books, but I was a bit surprised to find out that not every person who likes to consume sci-fi is automatically a fan of three-body problem.
- ryandvm 3y agoI read the first one and, while it's definitely epic, I couldn't get past the terrible dialog and cardboard characters. I get the nerd appeal, but just because you're mainlining hard sci-fi doesn't mean you should have to put up with awful writing. Reminded me of Ready Player One. I dunno - I guess if the concept is grand enough, maybe it's worth putting on the waders and slogging through the rest of the series.
- jeffbee 3y agoThe analogy with Ready Player One is apt. Both are things that my nerd friends raved about but I hated. Three-Body Problem had the excuse of being read (by me) in translation, though. Another nerd disconnect was all the people who told me I just had to watch "For All Mankind", a hideous alt-future soap opera that nobody should waste their time watching.
- flohofwoe 3y agoFWIW I consider myself a bit of a classic scifi nerd, but couldn't understand what's all the fuzz about both Ready Player One (stopped reading after 50 pages or so, since it didn't get any better) and the Three Body Problem (worked myself through the first book but there was absolutely nothing that would have stuck in my brain), and yes, in case of the latter it could just be a bad translation (I was reading the English version).
- vundercind 3y agoI’ve found sci-fi recommendations, in particular, to be totally useless unless I have a very good sense of the taste of the recommender. I think three factors are at play (though not necessarily all three in every case): 1 - Some sci fi fans care very little about some things I care about a great deal (quality of prose or dialog, characters, that sort of thing) so will judge “great” a book, movie, or show that’s not just mediocre, but terrible at those things, because those readers/viewers aren’t tuned-in to those qualities. 2 - Many sci fi fans tend to over-praise works that aren’t bad, but also aren’t very impressive. I dunno if this is due to a low rate of really good sci fi creation, or what. 3 - Some genre fans don’t seem to read much outside their preferred genre, and may even hold one or another kind (I’ve seen multiple causes) of grudge against e.g. capital-L Literature, all with predictable results when they judge and communicate about works of their preferred genre. (Clearly there may be some causal overlap between these, but I do think each likely occurs on its own, at least sometimes) Fantasy can also be rough when it comes to separating wheat from chaff based on fan “takes”, but sci fi seems to have it the worst, for whatever reason.
- sigmoid10 3y agoI'm having a really hard time to be optimistic about this. After all, it is still David Benioff and D. B. Weiss behind the scenes, aka the guys who screwed up GOT in a way that was thought to be impossible. I guess they can play more to their strengths with finished source material, but lack of story was clearly just one of many huge problems.
- micromacrofoot 3y ago> lack of story was clearly just one of many huge problems this wasn't THE problem? it seemed to go really well before they ran out
- klik99 3y agoYeah exactly - when they started writing plot GoT went off the rails. This bodes well for 3 body - it's right up their alley - huge cast, intrigue, spectacle and surprises that shock at first but make perfect sense in retrospect. I've got hope!
- sigmoid10 3y agoThey had already run out of books by season 6 and I'd say it was one of the best if not the best season. Yes it was a bit lighter on the plot than earlier seasons, but the execution was damn near perfect. But from there they stumbled over their own lack of ambition and morale. They could have had two more full seasons from the studio, but decided to cut 7 and 8 down drastically, while already being halfway off to their (ultimately doomed) Star Wars project.
- mullingitover 3y agoI loved/hated the books. I made it through the first two, and I loved parts about them, but I couldn't get myself emotionally invested in the characters enough to drag myself through the third. Maybe something was lost in translation. There are some great plot twists that I really enjoyed. I'm hoping the series goes through the third book, because based on my reading of the plot summary that's where things get really crazy.
- cflewis 3y agoYeah, every time I've attempted to read these the translated prose is really tough to enjoy.
- EA-3167 3y agoI had the same experience, after some time spent thinking about why I agree with your point about translation, but I also think it's the author's style. In many ways it's a series about big concepts, about communicating scale, and a series of fascinating events... but not really about people. I remember every story beat, but none of the characters except for the one who (to avoid spoilers I'll phrase this a bid oddly) tells the 'fairy tales' later in the books. I would recommend this series to anyone and everyone, but it's a great idea more than a great read.
- Lacusch 3y agoI think you naled it in the head. I would say the book is quite familiar to Asimov's writing in the Foundation trilogy. Trying to explain and explore concepts where the Characters are just talking carriers of ideas. It's b Not everybody's cup of tea but I loved it.
- EA-3167 3y agoSame here, it's one of the few works of fiction that gave me repeated bouts of goose-bump riddled shocks. I think it's also an amazing tool to teach people about the absurd scale of the universe we inhabit, and just how unfathomably small the scale of our everyday lives is in comparison. Plus it presented interesting mysteries, and the payoffs were huge. For that I can forgive the style of writing you described!
- dekhn 3y agoI didn't like the book, would I enjoy the movie. I did learn many of my issues with the book are related to the translation, but it's mostly the weird particles that made it feel off to me.
- snapcaster 3y agoThe sophons were definitely weird/fantastic but I do really like his breakdown of interstellar war in the context of no FTL travel and how it would behoove a civilization to invest enormous resources into something that can travel close to light speed and disrupt technological expansion
- kybernetikos 3y agoThe sophons were ridiculous and off putting for me too. I don't see how anyone can consider books with them in any kind of "hard" sci-fi.
- maskedinvader 3y agoI love this series, read all the books multiple times and also watched the 30 episode long book 1 tv adaption in Chinese. I can't wait to watch the book1 adaption on Netflix in a couple of days. I am really hoping its well received and they go on to make the season 2 based on book 2 which was by far my favorite book in the series.
- euroderf 3y agoThe Chinese series - does it do all three books ?
- aamoyg 3y agoThis show is so underrated and so good. I feel like certain viewers are expecting some kind of explosions or conflict in the first episode itself. There is so much tension in the Chinese show, and so much is going on at once (without much violence). It speaks to the quality of the writing. Also the music is really good.
- tshirttime 3y agoYou're mistaking morose insipidity for tension.
- AndrewStephens 3y agoThe original Three Body Problem novel is a real throwback to 1950s/60s style american big-concept scifi. I can understand why some modern readers bounce of it - it reads very strangely when judged by modern scifi tastes. The next two books continue in the same vein but I really hated the point-of-view characters and found the books a bit of a slog to get through. My longer comments[0] [0] https://sheep.horse/2017/3/book_review_-_the_three-body_problem_by_liu_cixin.html https://sheep.horse/2017/3/book_review_-_the_three-body_prob...
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- smellf 3y agohttps://archive.is/ATAkf https://archive.is/ATAkf
- ottaborra 3y agoMan, I don't get it. Was I the only one put off the video game portion of the story? It seemed so out of place and enough for me to go "rubbish" and toss the series aside
- 7thaccount 3y agoI made the mistake of reading the story synopsis awhile back and the dark Forest prob gets talked about on YouTube all the time now. It seems like the ending doesn't go well for humans though which is sad. I typically like scifi that has a positive spin. I do like hard sci-fi or sci-fi with expansive world building like ring world, mote in God's eye, revelation space, and rendezvous with Rama to name just a few. Spoilers: It seems to me that the major achievement of the book is in making the concept of dark Forest mainstream. The concept of being silent and not attracting unwanted attention is hardly new though. The spin is on how it might be best for any species to simply launch some planet killers in the direction of anything that makes noise. Of course I don't believe that.
- glenstein 2y ago>The spin is on how it might be best for any species to simply launch some planet killers in the direction of anything that makes noise. Of course I don't believe that. I had the same question, but more so. Why not just pre-emptively fire everywhere, all the time, 24/7, regardless of whether stuff makes noise? It seems like that would make just as much sense from the dark forest principles. If you wait for noise you're possibly leaving yourself open to existential danger.
- nabla9 3y agoI loved the books because: 1. It's old school high concept scifi where protagonists are smart like scientists. 2. It's alien in two levels. First story, secondly the writing and style has many aspects of Chinese culture that seems alien western reader. Really refreshing. ps. Chinese already made 3 body problem into long tv-series. It's really slow burn and follows the plot quite close. The ship cutting scene was well done.
- FooBarBizBazz 3y agoThanks for the tip about the original Chinese version. I'd be more interested in that with subtitles than in the Americanized Netflix version. Half the point of reading 3BP is to escape The Culture for a bit.
- quartesixte 3y agoA bit of a meta comment, but the character-based criticisms I find fascinating because: 1) Golden Age SciFi (Asimov, Clarke, etc) had the same “problems” 2) It’s leveled as real criticism instead of a matter of taste? I think there should be room for fiction-as-idea-vehicles as much as there is room for characters-as-core. 3BP and its sequels sit very squarely in both the latter camp as well as follows a lot of cues from Chinese fantasy epics (classic and modern). It has been a while since we have had some good High Science Fiction and the ideas were thought provoking enough. I have a personal bone to pick with the Cult-of-the-Character but that’s something for another day…
- ndsipa_pomu 3y agoI really enjoyed watching the Chinese version (with subtitles) when it came out and read the first book afterwards and have just re-watched the whole series in preparation for the Netflix version. I gather that the Netflix version will be jumping around the trilogy of books, so maybe I need to read the other two now.
- rKarpinski 3y agoThe story is a metaphor/sci-fi retelling of European colonialism encroachment into China, and the show runners un ironically chose to turn most of the characters to British
- __rito__ 3y agoI never really cared for SciFi before I read Neal Stephenson. I read Cryptonomicon (among my all-time top-5) and Diamond Age and I was hooked. Then I read 3BP, and I really really loved it. Historical plots, present day, big ideas, imaginitive author, focus on multiple technologies rather than one, and so on. Since then, I have been trying to find the high I found in them. And I am mostly failing. I disliked Blake Crouch's Dark Matter. But I liked the lighthearted "Project Hail Mary" by Andy Weir. I am currently reading "Anathem" by Stephenson. I really like it, and it's different from 3BP. I also found Ted Chiang's short stories, and liking them. Can you suggest me books that are like 3BP? I know they are not perfect, but damn did they blow my mind! I got Dandelion Dynasty by Ken Liu, but they read like fanstasy, and haven't given the series a proper chance. I wrote about my own thoughts on SciFi here: https://ritogh.substack.com/p/project-hail-mary-andy-weir-a-review https://ritogh.substack.com/p/project-hail-mary-andy-weir-a-...
- j_4 3y agoGreg Egan anything. Can't recommend him enough. BIG ideas.
- __rito__ 3y agoI already have two of his books. Will definitely read them. Anything else?
- pstorm 3y agoWhile I haven't read 3BP yet, you might be interested in the Zones of Thought series by Vernor Vinge. Extremely grand and unique universe, some politics, diverse cast, lots of interesting tech. I use it as a benchmark for grand space operas.
- slowmovintarget 3y agoI was so confused, because I tried an episode of "Three-Body" on Amazon Prime. This is the Chinese TV adaptation which seemed like a one-for-one adaptation of the book. It seems that very few people are aware of this series though. I didn't realize there is also now a Netflix series. I saw the promo on Netflix, but I thought they just licensed that same Chinese-made series. I'll have to check out the Netflix adaptation to see if it's more accessible than the first-mover. Review of "Three-Body" here: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/03/arts/television/three-body-review.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/03/arts/television/three-bod...
- aamoyg 3y agoThe Chinese show is much better than the Netflix one lol.
- tshirttime 3y ago[flagged]
- aplusbi 3y agoMinor spoilers ahead: I still can't get over the fact that Trisolaris is actually a four body problem, not a three body problem. I've heard some explanations that this is because you can ignore the mass of the planet. While I'm not an astrophysicist, I'm not sure that's true given that the entire point is to figure out how three suns affect the planet.
- billtsedong 3y ago[dead]
- jacknews 3y agoI found the first book at least to be just a cacophony of ideas, some interesting, some just weird, and all barely hanging together well enough to make an actual story.
- aamoyg 3y agoWatch the Chinese version of this it's 10x better and the intros are so good (the Cold War intro is super James Bondesque and sounds awesome).
- tshirttime 3y agoThe Chinese version is boring af.