"The Expanse:" Heating Up

Syfy's "The Expanse" is billed as Space Opera, but--if the setting was on Earth--most of the first three episodes of that series could have been police procedural or political thriller.

Consider the action on Ceres: murders, bribery, theft.  The setting is new, but the action could have fueled a typical episode of "Law and Order." The data smuggler could have been found in any contemporary thriller, renamed as an industrial spy.

I associate Space Opera with battles between starships. Yes, the ice hauler Canterbury was destroyed in the first episode, but that was hardly a battle, since the Canterbury didn't have any weapons.

However, Episode Four (titled "CQB," military-speak for "Close Quarters Battle") finally delivered. The flagship of the Martian fleet, the MCRN Donnager, fought six smaller vessels. Plenty of excitement there: the pride of Mars was overcome by the mysterious, technologically-superior attackers. The Commander destroyed the Donnager to prevent boarders from taking the ship.

A few observations:

The Commander of the Donnager was an Asian female, which was a nice contrast to the typical rock-jawed Anglo-male ship's captain that we usually see.

On the various "Star Trek" shows, the bridge set was elaborate, while the hanger bay was almost featureless. The art director of "The Expanse" went the opposite way. The Donnager's Commander ran the battle from a fairly small room (I was unclear whether this was the bridge or the CIC, since both were mentioned). The special effects for the sensors were good, but the overall impression was underwhelming. Ah, but the hanger bay was spectacular! It was a multi-story structure with gantries and catwalks and various cool stuff. The walls looked like a theater with box seats that went all the way to the ceiling. It didn't make much sense, but damn! It looked great, even if it was mostly CGI.

On the negative side, the final ten minutes of the episode featured everyone in space suits...and you couldn't tell who was whom. Martian marines in black spacesuits fought boarders in similar suits. They were as indistinguishable as Stormtroopers on "Star Wars."

Now, I accept that, since soldiers fight in uniforms, space-suited Marines might wear identical suits. But there was no reason for the four surviving crew of the Canterbury to be in identical spacesuits!

Yes, their spacesuits were different from those used by the Marines. But, once again, we couldn't tell who was whom! With their suits on, I couldn't even tell which of the four was the sole woman!

Look, the crew of the Canterbury were civilian workers, not soldiers. There was no reason for them to wear identical spacesuits. In fact, since the corporation they worked for was so cheap, they might well have had to purchase their own spacesuits. A single line about how one penny-pinching character was wearing an older, bulkier model of spacesuit would have explained all of that.

In my last post, I mentioned Larry Niven's Gil the ARM stories. In one of them--I believe it was "Death by Ecstasy"--he mentions that a spacesuit is the most expensive possession a belter owns. It's almost like a home, and they usually spend a fortune customizing it. And after they customize it with gizmos, they paint it.

If the art director of "The Expanse" had followed that precedent, we would have had no trouble figuring out who was in each of the belter's suits.

Overall, though, "The Expanse" has improved as it's gone along, and I expect to watch it to the end. 

Some Thoughts on "The Expanse"

Tonight the Syfy channel debuted a new series titled "The Expanse." After a long period in which the channel broadcast nothing of interest to me (sorry, I didn't watch "Sharknado"), they've finally come up with a decent show.

Not that I don't have issues with the show.

I'm not expecting innovative science fiction. The show is based on a series of books, which the authors intended to be space opera. Now, space opera can be a lot of fun. But it's focused on action, not new concepts.

Most of my own science fiction reading took place 30 years ago. Yet I've seen nothing in "The Expanse" that wasn't explored by other writers long ago.

For example, the independence of the inhabitants of the Belt was explored in Larry Niven's "Gil the ARM" series. He also wrote a lot about how humans would be changed by living in varying gravity. War between Earth and its colonies was one feature of Samuel R. Delaney's Triton. And so on.

No, space opera like The Expanse (the book) or "The Expanse" (the TV series) lives or dies on action and its characters.

I've only seen the first episode, but so far the producers have done a satisfactory job. The sets (most of which are probably CGI) are too pretty and too large, but this is TV. I did read the first book in this series, and most Belters are supposed to live in cramped, rather shabby spaces.

(SPOILER) In a later episode, Detective Miller is fired and leaves Ceres. He carries everything he owns in a single bag. We only saw one short scene of Miller in his lodgings, but it didn't look like the apartment of someone who could fit all his belongings in a backpack.

But this is TV. People want to see pretty pictures, and CGI can make us lots of pretty pictures.

There are also some aspects that they're just not going to get right. Gravity, for one thing. Ceres is supposed to be under .3 of Earth gravity. You'd walk differently under .3 g. But, even if the show could do that, it would look very strange. Another gravity-related issue is the attenuated bodies of the Belters. But there just aren't that many tall, extremely thin actors available--not good ones, anyway. So most of the Belters are just skinny-but-normal actors.

By the way, wouldn't low gravity attenuate the rat and the bird? I don't know, but I assume it would.

One thing that the casting director could do, however, is give us more variety. I counted one African-American who had lines, and a few actors that I assumed were South Asians (Indians, Pakistanis, etc.). I didn't see a single East Asian (Chinese, Japanese, etc.). Most of the cast were Anglos.

If nothing else, more diversity would help us tell the actors apart. For example, on the shuttlecraft Knight, there was a crew of five. One was female, and the other four were all white guys with black hair! All of them needed a shave (or had full beards). Yes, one (the assistant engineer) was heavier than the rest, another (the pilot) always wore a watch cap, and the medic...well, I knew it was him because he wasn't a pretty as the lead, Holden. But why couldn't one of them have been Chinese? Or just an Anglo with red hair? In fact, the only blonde I recall in the entire cast was Holden's navigator girlfriend!

One last thing: we know how zero-g sex works. Yes, some of our Astronauts have had sex in space. And you don't do it like Holden and his blonde navigator girlfriend did it.

Sex involves thrusting, so there's an equal and opposite reaction. Our Astronauts found that you need to harness the participants together to keep them from flying apart. (I assume it's a stretchy, rubber harness.)

But again: show business! A harness would probably look like fetish or bondage gear.

Well, I expect to keep watching "The Expense"...at least for a few more episodes.