MIDNIGHT REVIEWS 3 Body Problem Episode Four
Midnight Reviews features reviews and thought pieces written and edited by a parent, at night, after bedtime.
3 Body Problem Episode 4: ‘Our Lord’
Series created by: David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, Alexander Woo
Featuring: Benedict Wong, Eiza Gonzalez, Jovan Adepo
Synopsis: Jin (Jess Hong) is invited to a major summit where she can gather more information about the aliens that’re on their way to Earth, as long as she can keep her cool after events from episode three. She is enlisted by Da Shi (Wong) to try and collect this information.
Review: After much sneaking and conniving, episode four of 3 Body Problem finally combines Jin and Da Shi. What should on paper be an interesting combination, as well as an interesting question (how can you trust the people who’ve been diligently spying on you?) What arrives, regrettably, is quite bland.
It’s still clear that the makers of 3 Body Problem have got a problem with exposition. Perhaps I’ve got a bee in my bonnet, or maybe it’s as bad as I think it is. But I have read better-delivered character information in stories written by eight-year olds who have twenty minutes before break time.
Something else that on paper should be quite interesting is Benedict Wong’s Da Shi. Here, we see him in his home life and it’s a compelling decision that they’ve made this almost more frustrating than his work life. It’s not so much the conversation he has with his son (which is fascinating in and of itself), it’s the small moments between the things that’re said. Wong and Aidan Cheng as his son Reg deliver this scene so well it’s by far the most memorable from the episode.
It’s a shame that the character-focused material has to make room for the shiny stuff.
A part of the show that could’ve been its own series of short films is Mike Evans’ (Jonathan Pryce) conversations with the aliens, still light years away from Earth but keen to soak up as much knowledge as possible. This episode’s tête-à- tête gris revolves around the darkly comic idea that the aliens have no idea what a lie is. Evans has to take them through it as if talking to a young child. Along the way, he clumsily explains the differences between a lie and a story, as of course a fiction story itself is a kind of lie.
The idea that things in later episodes are going to be out of control due to how an old man explained what a fairy tale is funny and dramatic in equal parts. It will hopefully lead to something stimulating down the line. Because unfortunately, 3 Body Problem is starting to feel samey having only just reached the halfway point. Is this because of how Netflix released the episodes? Watching episode after episode, streaming a show until the eyeballs bleed and the bum is numb, runs the risk of inoculating viewers to the show itself.
Has somehow managed to twist itself back to front and inside out.
Destroyer of Worlds, the contrivance-heavy third episode, bleeds into this instalment with a key reveal to the alien cult relying on dumb decisions being made by competent people. I’m certainly not one who expects every character to get every decision right, every time, but this seemed a stretch. This scene is the perfect metaphor for Our Lord. Any scene that relies on bells and whistles ends up feeling quite ordinary. At no point does the heartrate go up, unlike during the character-related interactions earlier on.
Four episodes in and anything more than an ‘okay’ besides episode two is also a stretch. It’s a shame that the character-focused material has to make room for the shiny stuff, as if viewers need aliens and cults in order to get through the slog of two best friends trying to overcome cancer, a pair of friends that can’t admit they both know one has feelings for the other, or a guy who’s battling the discovery that his life’s work seems all for nought. These are the scenes that mesmerise and anything else, the spying, the gun fights, even the aliens, seems superfluous. 3 Body Problem has somehow managed to twist itself back to front and inside out.
3 Body Problem is available to stream on Netflix.
Matthew D. Smith likes to overshare his views on movies whenever and wherever he can. Indulge him, and follow him on Twitter: https://twitter.com/Smith_M_D
