David Benioff and D.B.
Weiss return to TV, but don’t expect the smash success of “Game of Thrones.”
Scale is always a problem for fantasy and science-fiction stories.
Ed Miller/Netflix
Weiss TV adaptation of George R.R.
Martins fantasy novels was not a guaranteed success.
Now, Benioff and Weiss are back with their first TV show sinceGame of Thronesended in 2019.
Ed Miller/Netflix
Together with Alexander Woo, they have adapted Chinese author Cixin Lius highly acclaimed sci-fi novelThe Three-Body Problemfor Netflix.
Ed Miller/Netflix
Lius original novel (the first of a trilogy) is set almost entirely within China.
All of that is present in the new show, down to a near-perfect replication of the opening scene.
After that, things diverge.
This decision seems like a reasonable attempt to render a heady sci-fi premise recognizable in the TV format.
The problem is that these new characters are never integrated with Lius story in a way that makes sense.
