The Three-Adaptation Problem
Political and Sex-based Adaptation Choices
Simon Berger @unsplash
***No Hard Spoilers Beyond S1 of the Netflix or Chinese Series***
Cixin Liu’s work Remembrance of Earth’s Past has finally been adapted to series form. Actually, in multiple series. Here I will synthesize the choices of three adaptations. The first is the English translation of Remembrance of Earth’s Past. The second is the Chinese Three-Body series. Lastly, Netflix’s 3 Body Problem. I’ve never read the books in the original Chinese, so there I will be drawing from the claims of others.
How the Chinese show Three-Body and the Netflix series 3 Body Problem are different and similar are very interesting from numerous angles. I will show each adaptation choice that responds to political or sex-based issues. I don’t want to comment if these adaptation choices are morally correct but generally point to why I think the edits were made, and what impact this had on the overall quality of the adaptation.
Political Outlook
Obviously, there have been political issues in China. How critical these issues are framed and examined differs between Chinese and Western adaptations. The English translation, Netflix’s 3 Body Problem, and the Chinese Three-Body series cast these issues through different lenses. Recently, some Chinese…
