Series Review: 3 Body Problem

Official synopsis: A fateful decision made in 1960s China reverberates in the present, where a group of scientists partner with a detective to confront an existential planetary threat.

I've been cautiously excited for this series since its announcement. On one side, the series creators let me down massively by rushing the ending of my beloved Game of Thrones, but here they have a completed 3 book series to work with. One that I've also read. So how did they do?

I really enjoyed the first season, which is available to stream now on Netflix. I think the changes they made work overall. Instead of following one person with a ton of internal dialogue, he's essentially split into several different people. We get Saul, (Jovan Adepo) Jin, (Jess Hong) Auggie (Eiza Gonzalez), Will (Alex Sharp), and Jack. (John Bradley) Benedict Wong plays fan favorite Da Shi (though they never call him "Da." He's "Clarence" here, despite being credited otherwise. Ye Wenjie is a book character we don't get many changes to, and she's played wonderfully by two different actresses throughout time (Rosalind Chao and Zine Tseng)

I wondered going in just how much they were going to Westernize this very Chinese story, but Ye Wenjie is still an important part of it, and Jin, gets the most screen time of the "Oxford 5." I expected Eiza's character to have the main focus, and she does for the first couple of episodes, but it shifts more towards Jin and Saul later on. I preferred this, because I think those actors are stronger. There's a little unrequited love story in there as well that surprisingly works when on paper it shouldn't. 

There were aspects of this that were fun to see come alive. Like the video game they play, and the big "Ghost Ship" (if you know, you know) thing that happens much earlier then I expected it too. Over all, This was a strong first season and I'm curious to see what they do for season two, considering how far the second book jumps into the future.