\n<\/p>\n
The blinking lights in the sky make the episode, and not just because they\u2019re the cliffhanger leading you to the next. While the characters seem prepared to take this event in stride, I sure wouldn\u2019t! For something so contradictory of every scientific principle we have to take place, at that large a scale \u2026 it virtually demands the existence of a force beyond human comprehension, and thus beyond humanity\u2019s power to defend itself. It\u2019s like God flicking the switch for the basement lights, telling you it\u2019s time to stop playing Xbox and go to bed, on a global scale.<\/p>\n
Plus, if you\u2019re the type of person who\u2019s ever looked up at the clouds or the stars and suffered the irrational fear that you might somehow defy gravity and fall up, the image is a vertiginous nightmare. Speaking as a sufferer of this particular fear myself, this is the second time a show this year has forced me to endure it, after Nathan Fielder and Benny Safdie\u2019s wondrously excruciating \u201cThe Curse.\u201d I humbly request that future showrunners refrain from exploiting my specific phobias from this point forward.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re in the early going yet, but it would be a tough sell to say the plot and the characters are strong suits of \u201c3 Body Problem.\u201d The actors are entertaining, but so far they\u2019re playing not much more than broad personality types engaged in a mildly interesting sci-fi mystery. Chao has the more dramatic backdrop of the Cultural Revolution, depicted here as a full-on \u201c1984\u201d meets \u201cThe Crucible\u201d dystopian nightmare, to play against \u2014 not to mention the more dramatic setting of that satellite installation. But it\u2019s a low bar to clear.<\/p>\n
No, it\u2019s the imagery that lingers more than anything else. The colossal transmitter, roosting at the cliff\u2019s edge like an enormous bird of prey. The gradual way the countdown clock emerges into Auggie\u2019s consciousness, from a blur on a karaoke video to a full-on superimposition over the face of anyone she tries to talk to. The uncanny sight of the stars flickering as one. Can the story and the characters rise to that level?<\/p>\n
I\u2019m a great admirer of the final season of \u201cGame of Thrones,\u201d in which the characters\u2019 and audience\u2019s long-held hope for heroic violence was revealed as disastrous folly. So I\u2019m excited to see what the co-creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have in store for this latest venture. (Their former \u201cThrones\u201d collaborator, the novelist George R.R. Martin, is a vocal admirer of the Liu books that inspired \u201c3 Body Problem.\u201d) Their co-creator and co-writer Alexander Woo\u2019s tenure on the second season of the anthology series \u201cThe Terror,\u201d meanwhile, left me cold.<\/p>\n
But it pays to go into new shows with an open mind if getting maximum enjoyment out of the work is your ultimate goal. So I\u2019m inclined to give \u201c3 Body Problem\u201d time to develop into something more than a few interesting images with just<\/em> enough story to connect them.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n