The Expanse, Season 5: Jesus Christ, that's really how you go through life, isn't it?

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > TV IV > The Expanse, Season 5: Jesus Christ, that's really how you go through life, isn't it?

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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I was really unhappy with Season 1, in part because Avasarala wasn't written or played as the foul-mouthed force of nature she is in the novels, but I'm glad I stuck with it. Season 2 was a huge step-up over season 1.

One thing that the books consistently do better than the show is the action scenes. You'd think they would be better in a visual medium but due to time and budget constraints the TV show's fight scenes are brief and serve to move the story along. For example, the Clarissa Mao/Naomi fight in season 3 is a quick two minute fight with no real consequences while in the book it's a vicious back and forth that takes place over 1549 words that leaves Naomi seriously wounded.

TommyGun85 posted:

e: also, Alex is reaaaallly underserved in the books, which is a shame. The actor has done a great job making him feel a part of the family because he is barely present in the books so far. Im hoping that changes moving forward. I have not read any of the short stories.

Generally the novellas flesh out a side of the world that the main novels don't focus on, e.g. Gods of Risk explains on what life is like on Mars for the average person, the Vital Abyss what life is like on basic (and introduces Cortozar), etc. They're obliquely referred to by later novels but aren't essential to understanding the narrative. I think The Churn is different as a significant part of book 5 depends on knowing what happened in the Churn.

I almost stopped reading the books after book 6's entire last ~200 pages were just downright boring, but the novella after it, Strange Dogs, was so weird and wonderful that I was motivated to read the last two.

# ¿ May 24, 2020 06:42

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 18:36

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Cojawfee posted:

Aside from a few throwaway lines, it would be easy to think that those slums were what basic was like. Hopefully they do show it off at some point. Basic seems like it was designed specifically to get people out of the way. They act like there's not enough jobs to go around for people who want them, but it seems like there is all kinds of empty land around that could be used for agriculture. A lack of decent food seems to be a big issue for almost everyone in the system aside from rich people.

Earth has 30 billion people, so land is in short supply. Holden's eight parent's formed their polycule so they could get 22 acres of land.

The loving constant mentions of how all of the food is actually fake mycoprotein or vat grown is by far the most annoying authorial tic in the novels.

# ¿ Jun 23, 2020 19:28

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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SpookyLizard posted:

No? Am I supposed to take every accusation as factual poof? All I've seen posted is hearsay about it. I'll condemn the dude if he gets convicted of something, but people talking on twitter does not meet anything resembling a burden of proof.

OJ wasn't convicted therefore he didn't murder his wife, beep boop I'm a rape apologist.

# ¿ Jul 1, 2020 08:05

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Grand Fromage posted:

I really do not think they're going to change the whole series to write out a main character instead of just recasting him. They recast Arjun and he is a very minor character by comparison.

The core cast is already pretty lean, they'll probably just recast him, but eliminating the character is a real option. Alex is completely extraneous in the novels and could be replaced by some rando who flies ships good.

# ¿ Jul 7, 2020 05:21

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Sankara posted:

I mean, let's be real here. Alex isn't exactly an important character. "Guy that flies the ship and makes silly shaped lasagna" isn't foundational to the plot character writing.

I haven't read the books, so perhaps he becomes more interesting? But it seems like a very easy character to get rid of.

Alex is also undeveloped in the books. His storyline after book 5 is solipsistic and has zero impact on the plot and the other characters.

# ¿ Jul 11, 2020 21:50

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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TraderStav posted:

The Expanse won the Hugo!

I'm half way through book 6 and once I got past the show it felt like it really started cooking! Probably because I watched the show first did I not gel as much with the books.

No, the books really improved after book 4 (ie after where the show is). Book 5 is when they finally gave the crew personalities and back stories, much of which was incorporated into the earlier seasons of the TV show.

Are you reading the novellas too?

# ¿ Aug 1, 2020 21:21

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Toxic Fart Syndrome posted:

If Netflix et al aren�t dumping their billions into animation right now we will all be getting into re-runs for a year or two...

Look at how excited people got over Netflix licensing Avatar: the Last Airbender. Tons of social media buzz.

The cheapest content they could create would probably be dubbing existing foreign TV shows/movies like Dark.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2020 00:10

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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pixaal posted:

It only matters if he stops being entertained if he doesn't season 10 is going to get weird when they run out of books .

There is zero chance the show continues after the books. The ninth book will definitively end the series.

# ¿ Sep 13, 2020 01:35

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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I was also ready to give up on the books after Book 6 (I spent the last ~150 pages extremely loving bored), but the novella between 6 & 7, "Strange Dogs", was so weird and wonderful that it made me want to keep going.

# ¿ Nov 23, 2020 00:28

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Joe Mantis posted:

One thing that doesn't make sense to me upon rewatch is why Fred Johnson offered the Rocinante safe harbor at Tycho right after the Donnager. Presumably a martian corvette fleeing a martian battleship would be crewed by martians, so they would have no need of safe harbor? Even if it was a shot in the dark gamble it still implicates him to the martians by raising questions about why he has a telescope pointed at the battle?

Because it was based on a tabletop roleplaying game on a messageboard and Tycho was the group's crash pad.

# ¿ Dec 5, 2020 04:30

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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pixaal posted:

Well that was earlier this year

They did the same thing with The Boys. All of Amazon's marketing said new episodes went up on Friday and they posted every single episode Thursday, sometimes as early as 6 PM EST.

# ¿ Dec 16, 2020 01:32

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Carbon dioxide posted:

How do those cups keep the coffee in in 0g anyway but you can still sip from them like from a normal cup?

It's probably a budget issue. In the books everyone in space exclusively drinks fluids out of plastic "bulbs" (which have magnetic bottoms) that are sort've like a capri sun or a baby's bottle, e.g. "She took a long pull at the bulb, the soft plastic collapsing under the suction, then expanding out a little as the beer outgassed." On the show they just drink out of off the shelf coffee mugs.

# ¿ Dec 20, 2020 19:06

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Grand Fromage posted:

Has the amazon player forced subtitles on anyone else before? All the text was subtitled in German for me and subtitles were turned off, so I couldn't make it stop.

I found that if I turn english subtitles on and back off it fixes the problem, at least if using Firefox on a Windows PC, no idea about any other platform.

# ¿ Dec 30, 2020 03:21

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Baron Fuzzlewhack posted:

You'd think after Epstein himself, they'd have switched over to eye-tracking UIs or something.

It's a show thing. In this scene in the books Bobbie can't even speak due to the high-G burn, she can only tap out a text message to Alex.

BrotherJayne posted:

Yeah, the ships that have high thrust and high directional authority have chairs that align so the squishies can handle it

timp posted:

That Razorback maneuvering loving owned. Is the idea that it orients the passengers to a relative “gravity” to help with maneuvering? What exactly is going on with the gyros?

Get ready for the juice!

All of the crash couches on every ship "should" look something like the Razorback's, but they don't have the budget for that, so they just use padded chairs.

# ¿ Dec 30, 2020 19:06

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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CLAM DOWN posted:

They're not all like the Razorback's in the books, it's nothing to do with budget.

From Book 2:

quote:

The Roci bucked hard, and Avasarala pressed back into her seat. The shuddering rhythm seemed to be her own trembling muscles and then the firing PDCs and then her body again. On the display, the combined forces of Earth and Mars spread out, running after the near-invisible foes. Thrust gravity shifted, spinning her couch one way and then another without warning. She tried closing her eyes, but that was worse.

The Roci's crash couches can spin around like an amusement park ride, which sounds more like the Razorback's crash couches than the La-z-boy's they use.
edit:

banned from Starbucks posted:

I know it's a racing ship or whatever but are you just kinda stuck in those chairs on the Razorback the entire time? Can you not get up and stretch or walk around if you're gonna do a long(ish) trip?

quote:

But even the Roci had tons of metal and ceramic. She could spin fast and hard, but there was an authority behind the movement. Muscle. Piloting the racing pinnace Razorback was like strapping onto a feather in a thunderstorm. There was nothing to the ship but a blister the size of the Roci �s ops deck strapped to a fusion drive. Even the engineering deck was a sealed compartment, accessible to technicians at the dock. It wasn�t the sort of ship the crew was going to maintain; they had hired help for that. The two crash couches huddled close together, and the compartments behind them were just a head, a food dispenser, and a bunk too small for Bobbie to fit in. There wasn�t even a system to recycle food, only water and air. A maneuvering thruster could spin the ship around twice in ten seconds with power output that would have shifted the Roci five degrees in twice the time.
...
Rather than trying to fold into the bunk, Bobbie slept in her couch. Out of unspoken solidarity, Alex did the same. It meant they wound up on the same sleep cycle. Bad for rotating watches, good for long meandering conversations.

Basically yeah.

Gobbeldygook fucked around with this message at 19:42 on Dec 30, 2020

# ¿ Dec 30, 2020 19:39

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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T-man posted:

we've seen the computers in the expanse do some pretty slick stuff in the past, i'm pretty sure voice authentication is in their wheelhouse. of course, that doesn't stop you from deepfaking a voice, but there could be countermeasures in place anyway.

The Expanse's computers are Star Trek level. The Roci's medical bay is completely automated, it can diagnose and treat patients without any human input besides making sure it has sufficient supplies.

# ¿ Dec 30, 2020 23:06

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Regarde Aduck posted:

That's also Stalinist Russia so?

Leninist Russia

quote:

He who does not work, neither shall he eat is a New Testament aphorism originally by Paul the Apostle, later cited by John Smith in the early 1600s colony of Jamestown, Virginia, and by Communist revolutionary Vladimir Lenin during the early 1900s Russian Revolution.

# ¿ Jan 2, 2021 00:15

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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From book two:

quote:

As a junior lieutenant Holden had spent days in scout ships so small that you literally could not bend over to scratch your feet. He�d climbed around between the inner and outer hulls of warships. He�d once been confined to his crash couch for twenty-one days during a fast-burn trip from Luna to Saturn. He never had nightmares of being crushed or being buried alive.

This requires poop tubes to exist in The Expanse.

# ¿ Jan 3, 2021 22:04

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Centrist Committee posted:

I love this show but when peaches went crazy on the prepper I laughed out loud at how ridiculously corny that was.

This is how it was described in the book.

quote:

�That�s okay,� the man said, lifting the rifle to his shoulder and sighting on Amos. The end of the barrel looked as big as a cave. �I can get it myself.�

Before he could pull the trigger, something moved through the field of his yard like a gust of wind. Only this wind had teeth. The man staggered back, then yawped in confusion and pain. With her chemical hormone blockers having faded in the days since they left the Pit, Peaches moved too quickly for Amos� eye to follow. It was like she�d become an angry hummingbird. The man fell to his knees, his assault rifle suddenly gone and one of his fingers broken and bleeding. As he curled to grasp his broken hand, the gun stuttered, opening the man�s chest along the side.

And then Peaches went still, her prison gown flapping around her in the breeze, blood spattered down the length of her body, the assault rifle held in one hand. Slowly, she sank to the ground. By the time Amos had his pants back on and got over to her, her eyes had rolled back and she was vomiting. He put his shirt over her and waited until the fit passed. It wasn�t more than about five minutes, and since no one else had come out of the house to investigate or take revenge, Amos was feeling pretty confident the dead man had been a bachelor.

Whatever else you can say about the Peaches scene they absolutely made her look like an angry hummingbird.

# ¿ Jan 7, 2021 22:11

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Kaedric posted:

Honestly surprised that clarissa bit made it past QA. Like, did anyone watch it before they released it into the wild? no one said anything? The whole thing was awful, even the sudden awkwardly framed zoom in on the pupil contracting/quick-cut to Clarissa falling down.

There was an insanely bad sword special effect on this season of Star Trek Discovery which we've mostly written off as being a side effect of post-production being done at home during a pandemic.
edit: Video of the SFX in question, which is a significant spoiler for Season 3 of Star Trek Discovery

Gobbeldygook fucked around with this message at 05:50 on Jan 8, 2021

# ¿ Jan 8, 2021 05:42

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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twistedmentat posted:

But holy poo poo Naomi got through to Filip but Marco completely undid it, but he didn't actually change his behavior. Filip is his, not his son, but property. Though then Filip sees Naomi literally sacrifice herself for a chance to save her family. Marco would never, ever do that.

Book reader clarification, but arguably extractable from the show too and will almost certainly be clarified next week: Filip thinks he watched Naomi space herself in despair and nothing more.

# ¿ Jan 13, 2021 06:09

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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niethan posted:

Idk I think they could have done it like Narcos or inglourious basterds, with everybody speaking their language. Maybe even subtitles or something.

Book Belters would definitely require subtitles, e.g. from book 3:

�Bien alles,� she said. �Welcome aboard. Bring them through in sixpacks and we�ll get you sorted, sa sa?�
�Yes, ma�am,� Verbinski said.
�Corin,� one of the twins said. The woman turned to see him gesture toward Holden with his chin. �Pa con es� parlan, si?�

# ¿ Jan 14, 2021 20:38

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Kazinsal posted:

One of us could probably just ask Ty on Twitter what happened to Morty.

Book 4 ends with Amos telling Murtry, who's recovering in the Roci medbay, that he's going to beat the poo poo out of him when he's no longer helpless. In Book 5:

�If you�re here for Murtry, he isn�t on Earth right now,� Avasarala said. �He claims you beat him half to death in the Rocinante �s airlock during the flight back. Do you mean to finish the job?�
�Murtry swung first, so technically, that was self-defense. And if I�d wanted him dead, don�t you think he�d be dead? It�s not like I quit hitting him because I was tired.�

# ¿ Jan 16, 2021 05:04

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Cojawfee posted:

I'm not sure what your point is. If the ships were accelerating when he died, he would have collapse to the floor because he would stop holding himself up and the floor would move up while he stayed at the speed he was going when he died. The fact that he's still standing up shows that he's in zero-g.

You are correct that they were in zero g. At 41:50 of episode 7 you see both ships burning and then stop. This is in order to detach the docking bridge connecting the two ships.

Blind Rasputin posted:

What I didn’t understand is why she couldn’t just leave the door open from the inner hull to the outer hull and let it partially flood with atmosphere from the ship to work for a bit?

It's a piece of poo poo, so she couldn't be sure the outer hull was actually sealed. She was also still losing a room full of air into the outer hull every time she cycled the airlock.

# ¿ Jan 20, 2021 07:13

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Baronjutter posted:

As a non book reader I wish they'd diverge from the books way more when poo poo doesn't work for TV or was bad to begin with. Like being early 2000's scifi there was apparently a whole run and gun first person shooter zombie sequence they cut. They created drummer apparently too and from what everyone says so many character are vastly expanded and improved. It sounds like nearly every case where they diverged from the books has been an improvement.

gently caress the books, just make a show vaguely based on the setting and the best plots. Then book people wouldn't even need to worry about spoilers.

The thing people are specifically complaining about right now - too many characters, too many plots - is actually a problem with the TV show. Book 5 is told from only four perspectives: Naomi, Holden, Amos, & Alex, plus Filip in the prologue and Someone Else in the epilogue. Avasarala, Drummer, Filip, Bobbie, etc only exist when the four POV characters are interacting with them. The problem is the TV show can't put Avasarala on ice for a season or the actress will book other opportunities and now they might need to recast an iconic character in season 6, so they have to give her more than the few scraps she gets in the book.

One consequence of giving Avasarala, Drummer & Bobbie screentime is they've had to cut a lot of material from Book 5. They cut at least 2/3 of Alex's story and what is there is significantly different.

Gobbeldygook fucked around with this message at 22:26 on Jan 21, 2021

# ¿ Jan 21, 2021 22:08

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Wheeee posted:

The book excerpts posted in this thread look like they were pulled from a Dan Brown novel, so yea it's good that the show has largely done its own thing when it comes to the details.

don't you loving dare compare the Expanse to Dan Brown novels

quote:

Eventually one of them [editor: NSA cryptographers] explained what Becker had already surmised. The scrambled text was a code‑a �cipher text�‑groups of numbers and letters representing encrypted words. The cryptographers� job was to study the code and extract from it the original message, or �cleartext.� The NSA had called Becker because they suspected the original message was written in Mandarin Chinese; he was to translate the symbols as the cryptographers decrypted them.

For two hours, Becker interpreted an endless stream of Mandarin symbols. But each time he gave them a translation, the cryptographers shook their heads in despair. Apparently the code was not making sense. Eager to help, Becker pointed out that all the characters they�d shown him had a common trait‑they were also part of the Kanji language. Instantly the bustle in the room fell silent. The man in charge, a lanky chain‑smoker named Morante, turned to Becker in disbelief.

�You mean these symbols have multiple meanings?�

Becker nodded. He explained that Kanji was a Japanese writing system based on modified Chinese characters. He�d been giving Mandarin translations because that�s what they�d asked for.

�Jesus Christ.� Morante coughed. �Let�s try the Kanji.�

Like magic, everything fell into place.

# ¿ Jan 21, 2021 23:27

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Groetgaffel posted:

We know that she injected herself with the super oxygen after about 15 seconds to not pass out. It can't have been earlier than halfway, or she would have passed out before getting to the airlock.

That's 30 seconds. She bumped into the hull with what looked like the velocity of briskly walking, or maybe running into a wall.
So, let's say 3, maybe 4 m/s. That would make the distance somewhere around a hundred meters.

In the book her leap of faith is across about a 50 meter gap and she injects after 10 seconds, so you pretty much got it.

# ¿ Jan 22, 2021 23:42

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Sab Sabbington posted:

That final big Amos sequence was sick as hell, I can't wait to rewatch it. Was it edited (or actually done as) to look like one continuous shot? I didn't think about it until afterwards.

Yes it looks like about a two minute long shot. There were a few places they could have snuck in a cut, I'll definitely check out the after show for this one.

# ¿ Jan 27, 2021 02:23

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# ¿ Apr 25, 2024 18:36

Gobbeldygook: May 13, 2009; Hates Native American people and tries to justify their genocides.

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Nail Rat posted:

Not book spoilers I hope, but book 6, the one they're on, really doesn't have much happening and they already killed one of the more interesting characters in it offscreen. They're even shoehorning in a novella that came out after book 7 (the opening vignettes) just to pad out for 6 episodes. Which means at least so far it seems like they didn't come up with anything new the way they usually do.

No, the novella came out after book 6. I was ready to give up on the books after book 6 was so loving boring but that novella was so good it got me to push through to the end of the series.

# ¿ Dec 17, 2021 22:08

The Something Awful Forums > The Finer Arts > TV IV > The Expanse, Season 5: Jesus Christ, that's really how you go through life, isn't it?