The Sword and Laser discussion

Shi's got some meat on his bones! Who cast Ricky Gervais in this? Which one is Wang, Will? Isn't that Keiko O'Brien?

Yes Keiko.

I didn't read the book, have some basic understanding about it but liking the show so far. Will be curious to hear how it compares to book. I am 4 epis in.

I think after the boat stuff it moves onto book two.

I didn't like the book very much at all, I gave it 2 stars, but I am enjoying the show more. To be honest, I don't remember any of the plot from the book except for the 1960's China part so everything is coming as a surprise to me. It is a little slow and I find most of the scientist characters pretty unlikeable but it's holding my interest enough to finish it.

I have only watched part of Ep. 1. It is different from the book and the Chinese made TV series so far.

I will continue and see how it goes.

I just finished the season. There's both good and bad in it but overall I think it's worth watching.
Warning though, I found one scene pretty brutal to watch. (view spoiler)[ at the Panama canal (hide spoiler)] In episode 4 I think.

I found that scene hard in the book as well. I visualise too well.

I'll be interested to see how they handle it in the Netflix series. I thought the Chinese version did it well.

Another scene I want to see may not come until series 2 of the Netflix show. (view spoiler)[ It is the meeting of the Earth space fleet and the Trisolaran probe. It is another scene I visualised well and found shocking. (hide spoiler)]

I thought the scene I mentioned was interesting but hard to watch.
The scene you mentioned is not in this season.

The Netflix version is diverting more from the book than the Chinese TV series.

But I guess the Netflix series is only 8 episodes and the Chinese one was 30 episodes. So Netflix is trying to cram into 8hrs what the Chinese took 22 hours to do.

So far I prefer the Chinese version. It was a slow start, but told the story better.

Quinn's Ideas has a good video on the season and book differences. It sounds like they are going to adapt all three books.

I'm reading The Dark Forest now. The chapters are big. I'm pretending any '***' is a chapter division. I think Cixin was putting in more characterization in book 2 with for example Luo. The characters have different names in the tv show, but you'll know who he is by the end.