The Expanse

saneman

beauf wrote: »

... I should just wait and see how the TV series resolves.
...

Probably the best answer

And do continue with the books, they flesh out the story so much more. While there have been some changes between book & tv show the overall arc has been consistent.

pixelburp

I suppose when I said "self-sufficient" I was meaning in the sense that given the Belt lack any traditional natural resources you'd need for basic survival (food and water) - it's a civilisation one bad day away from total vacuum death - they're capable of supplying their own water through ice on asteroids or reclamation, coupled with the various hydroponics and artificial farming techniques supplying food. But primarily the issue for them is basic representation of course.

correct horse battery staple

breezy1985 wrote: »

The belt have no official representative when the show starts and belters don't own anything in the belt other than a few ships. The OPA were threatened only as terrorists and not a government so the main reason the belt can't be self sufficient right now is the inners won't allow it.

The ring is a blessing to an over populated Earth but could be good or bad for the belt and will definitely turn Mars into a backwater

In the books they basically imply that there simply not enough ships to depopulate earth, the moon alone has 1bln vs 30bln on earth when series started (and thats a close distance of a days travel, the planets on other side or rings are 1-2 years away one way),
not that it matters much those falling rocks are going to put quite a dent in the population

I dont want to say too much in case spoil it to those just watching the tv series

pixelburp

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

In the books they basically imply that there simply not enough ships to depopulate earth, the moon alone has 1bln vs 30bln on earth when series started (and thats a close distance of a days travel, the planets on other side or rings are 1-2 years away one way),
not that it matters much those falling rocks are going to put quite a dent in the population

I dont want to say too much in case spoil it to those just watching the tv series

Yeah, I've said it before but if there's one big flaw with the TV series IMO, is that distances and time just don't feel as vast as they should do. As you say, it takes 1-2 years to travel to these new worlds yet that never feels tangible on-screen. Season 4 in the books took place over the course of months IIRC, yet it felt like a couple of eventful weeks with the adaptation.

I'll give Marco's attack one unspoken advantage; once the ecological damage subsides, Earth won't be so strained by its outsized population anymore

correct horse battery staple

The books really put emphasis on space is expansive (ha) and everywhere takes forever to reach even with super duper drives accelerating/decelerating at 1g

I can see how this doesn’t translate well on screen tho, tho the have done good job with little eggs here and there, remember how they grow pile facial hair before arriving at ilus at start previous season

breezy1985

pixelburp wrote: »

Yeah, I've said it before but if there's one big flaw with the TV series IMO, is that distances and time just don't feel as vast as they should do. As you say, it takes 1-2 years to travel to these new worlds yet that never feels tangible on-screen. Season 4 in the books took place over the course of months IIRC, yet it felt like a couple of eventful weeks with the adaptation.

I'll give Marco's attack one unspoken advantage; once the ecological damage subsides, Earth won't be so strained by its outsized population anymore

The trip out to the ring was the only time they showed space travel as being a long journey. It's not easy though to make an hour look like months in a TV show

pixelburp

beauf wrote: »

If they are reliant on food and water from the corporations, they are not self sufficient. I don't see how that is possible with 50 billion scattered over a vast area. I'm being pedantic. I realize that. I should just wait and see how the TV series resolves.



Take the Irish Diaspora. We didn't lose our culture when vast numbers emigrated around the planet. Our identity and traits didn't evaporate.

We didn't, but our identity wasn't explicitly informed by a giant longterm goal that literally instructed every economic and social effort within the country. Again, the books do a better job highlighting how almost nothing on Mars happens (or, happened) without some relationship with the on-going terraforming project. You're born and work only to serve as some cog in a future you're unlikely to live to see; Mars is a unique structure in that its culture is less about nationality, language, religion or whatnot - but a huge planetary project with a generational end-goal.

The prize was something presumed to be rare - another hospitable planet. Strip the promise of a green Mars away and what's left? Not much TBH because they were always the dog chasing a bone. There was a similar scenario, albeit not explored through characters, with the Mormons who put their fortunes in a giant spacecraft - the Nauvoo - that was to take them out into deep space for generations on end (of course it got requisitioned by the OPA and is now Medina Station).

Mars was defined by <Future Green Mars>, energies focused by the belief there was nothing else to work for. Earth was choked and barely hanging on, the belt a series of low-G Death Traps strangled by the corporations. All of a sudden when the Ring Gate opened, a lot of very highly skilled people on Mars had a future they could actually work for themselves & their kids.

Then, of course, there's

Winston Duarte

, which takes all the above into a whole new interesting direction that unfortunately, we won't see if that threat of Season 6 being the last season is true. If they do, they should cast Edward James Olmos for the role

breezy1985 wrote: »

The trip out to the ring was the only time they showed space travel as being a long journey. It's not easy though to make an hour look like months in a TV show

Fair point, and not sure how I'd do it myself either; prodigious use of beards maybe

beauf

breezy1985 wrote: »

The trip out to the ring was the only time they showed space travel as being a long journey. It's not easy though to make an hour look like months in a TV show

Voyager had a two part episode where they traveled for weeks in sector with no stars just darkness. All went a bit stir crazy. It was done well though.

beauf

Too many posts there to reply to each one. But I don't disagree with any of it. All valid. I like the various perspectives.

breezy1985 wrote: »

I know he is mad but its hard not to agree with Marcos when he gets going

That's the danger of populists isn't it

beauf wrote: »

I'm not going to lose any sleep over it, but I don't find the Mars story arc that credible. Or the belter population being so large. But I'll suspend any disbelief and just go with it. But its the foundations of Marcos current story arc. So it nags.

The soviets lost a lot of frightening equipment, during their pull back out of Europe.
Maybe not subs etc but it's a lot easier to hide something in the blackness of space

beauf wrote: »

Take the Irish Diaspora. We didn't lose our culture when vast numbers emigrated around the planet. Our identity and traits didn't evaporate. If anything their success was fed back to Ireland. Same with a lot of other nationalities. I can't think of any that gave away all their crown jewels when they hit a bad spot. I know its perhaps mean to reflect the exploitations of developing nations, third world etc. But even those don't go. here are all our natural resources, we are leaving, we don't need them any more.

But hey I can just accept it as is. I just don't find it creditable thats all.

Still enjoying it. Great show. I've re-watched most of at it least twice if not three times. The books are lot more detailed than I was expecting. Great companion to the show though. Its answering allsorts of questions we had, Like what happened to the guy who invented the Epstein drive. I'm unlikely to over take the show with the books. It will take me a year of reading to get through them.

But Ireland is not death to walk outside your door.
If your entire view of self worth (and that of your society) is built around colonising a new world and hundreds of worlds appear which are better than the one you are on, how many would go.

Mars would be losing its engineers, scientists, builders. Everyone of them severely needed where they are and a massive loss to the terraforming project.

beauf

Deleted User wrote: »

The soviets lost a lot of frightening equipment, during their pull back out of Europe.
Maybe not subs etc but it's a lot easier to hide something in the blackness of space

The Russians took the best stuff and left the rest. Much of it junk. Because the only place those new countries were going to get spares was from Russia. A lot of it sat unused for a good few years, because the new countries were broke.

beauf

Deleted User wrote: »

But Ireland is not death to walk outside your door.
If your entire view of self worth (and that of your society) is built around colonising a new world and hundreds of worlds appear which are better than the one you are on, how many would go.

Mars would be losing its engineers, scientists, builders. Everyone of them severely needed where they are and a massive loss to the terraforming project.

Is that why Ireland is a Tech hub, now because all our best people left...

I don't see it.

beauf

saneman wrote: »

Probably the best answer

And do continue with the books, they flesh out the story so much more. While there have been some changes between book & tv show the overall arc has been consistent.

Enjoying the books. I'm impressed with how they translated the books to screen. As was said there's a greater scale to the books. Though the core stuff is much the same, and a lot of differences.

beauf wrote: »

Is that why Ireland is a Tech hub, now because all our best people left...

I don't see it.

Our people left (starved), in droves during a preindustrial period.


Could we, cut off from trading partners, survive as a tech hub if we reduced our population to 1.5million again rapidly?
An Ireland where not being a tech hub equals death

beauf

Deleted User wrote: »

Our people left (starved), in droves during a preindustrial period.


Could we, cut off from trading partners, survive as a tech hub if we reduced our population to 1.5million again rapidly?
An Ireland where not being a tech hub equals death

I was more thinking of the emigration, in the 90's and 80s, even 2000s.
Our continued focus on education, etc.
Even its completely over stated compared to other countries.

correct horse battery staple

The Mars dynamic is similar to what happened in America during the westward expansion, people were flooding into Midwest to pursue their dreams and escape overcrowded old world (Europe back then didn’t have agri tech to support much larger populations, and of course constant wars didn’t make for nice place)

But the gold was found in west, and it was mostly those in middle who got pulled west, the country to this day has majority of population not living in middle but sticking coasts

Other good sci-fi books that explore this dynamic would be Commonwealth Saga (gates to new planets) and Long Earth (parallel universe earths)

beauf

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

The Mars dynamic is similar to what happened in America during the westward expansion, people were flooding into Midwest to pursue their dreams and escape overcrowded old world (Europe back then didn’t have agri tech to support much larger populations, and of course constant wars didn’t make for nice place)

But the gold was found in west, and it was mostly those in middle who got pulled west, the country to this day has majority of population not living in middle but sticking coasts

Other good sci-fi books that explore this dynamic would be Commonwealth Saga (gates to new planets) and Long Earth (parallel universe earths)

Good tip thanks.

Did the east or the europe collapse? Did their culture change because so many left. (I'm going to ignore the US fascination with Cowboys).

pixelburp

beauf wrote: »

Good tip thanks.

Did the east or the europe collapse? Did their culture change because so many left. (I'm going to ignore the US fascination with Cowboys).

I don't think any earth culture really digs into a single project as much as Mars does though. Even grand projects like the Pyramids pale in comparison. Wish I had the pertinent pages in the books to hand, as the writers did a great job selling this idea of an entire planet existing for the single purpose of terraforming its surface. A collosal undertaking that relied on a population that was much higher skilled than Earth's (IIRC most on earth don't have jobs and live on universal income), so would struggle to replace skills if they upped and left for the Gates.

Wait, I think we've been here already lol

breezy1985

correct horse battery staple wrote: »

The Mars dynamic is similar to what happened in America during the westward expansion, people were flooding into Midwest to pursue their dreams and escape overcrowded old world (Europe back then didn’t have agri tech to support much larger populations, and of course constant wars didn’t make for nice place)

But the gold was found in west, and it was mostly those in middle who got pulled west, the country to this day has majority of population not living in middle but sticking coasts

Other good sci-fi books that explore this dynamic would be Commonwealth Saga (gates to new planets) and Long Earth (parallel universe earths)

Hello Mr. Murtry glad to have you on Boards.ie

beauf

pixelburp wrote: »

...

Wait, I think we've been here already lol

Exactly.

my experience of the books, (Just finished the first one), is they fill in a lot of the back story of why people do what they do in the expanse.
Much of which is implied or never explained in the TV show. So I'm sure it will add a lot more weight to the story in the TV show.

correct horse battery staple

beauf wrote: »

Good tip thanks.

Did the east or the europe collapse? Did their culture change because so many left. (I'm going to ignore the US fascination with Cowboys).

Mars

didn’t collapse in books

, they lost a chunk of comparatively small (to earth) population to colonies

and a third of the fleet

from what I remember, more like a severe depression, definitely not Irish famine scale or billions that die on earth due to the rocks falling we seen. Gates did put a pressure on their ideology, someone mentioned Soviet Union falling apart its quite apt imho, Russia is still there just much more diminished by any measure (population, economy, prestige etc)

beauf

Maybe you should put spoilers around that??????

Icyseanfitz

Anyone got any recommendations for a series similar to the expanse? I particularly like the hard sci fi, near future, first contact, mystery of an old advanced civilization, ship of interesting people.

Simi

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

Anyone got any recommendations for a series similar to the expanse? I particularly like the hard sci fi, near future, first contact, ship of interesting people.

Battlestar Galactica (much darker in tone), and Firefly are probably the most similar. Stargate Universe maybe?

There's nothing quite like it really. It's by far the best space faring show of the last decade.

Icyseanfitz

Simi wrote: »

Battlestar Galactica (much darker in tone), and Firefly are probably the most similar. Stargate Universe maybe?

There's nothing quite like it really. It's by far the best space faring show of the last decade.

Any books that are similar?

pixelburp

Far thee warned: Firefly is not that similar to Expanse, in the sense that while both follow the underdogs or downtrodden in a galactic civilisation, the tone in Firely was consistently sarcastic and flippant in the manner of Joss Whedon at his best / worst (Delete where applicable)

LLewellen Farquarson

My votes for Battlestar Galactica as well.
Be warned, there are 10 seasons, plus a movie length episode and a few specials.
But the story arc and themes are brilliant and engaging.
My wife even got hooked on it, and she isn't into scifi.

bennyineire

LLewellen Farquarson wrote: »

My votes for Battlestar Galactica as well.
Be warned, there are 10 seasons, plus a movie length episode and a few specials.
But the story arc and themes are brilliant and engaging.
My wife even got hooked on it, and she isn't into scifi.

Yep same as my wife, It is a class show with so many plot twists over the whole series