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Non spoiler question. I'm just starting leviathan wakes and enjoying it but I'm curious about something. Belters are humans born in microgravity and are culturally distinct enough in that regard to differentiate themselves from inner planet terrestrial types. What about outer planet inhabitants living on the gas giant moons, though? Are they still considered Belters?
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Feb 18, 2017 18:19
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| # ¿ Apr 28, 2024 04:39 |
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Finished Leviathan Wakes. Pretty fun read overall. Towards the end it did feel like they were breaking some of their rules though, especially regarding lag time with communication. Matter of fact the book doesn't really do a good job of showing the passage of time. The pacing is so fast that everything feels pretty instantaneous rather than the weeks and months at play. Plus I read it in about four sittings which is fast for me and probably had some effect on it. Pretty interesting in how dry and distant the book presents the massive solar system changing events. It's clearly interested in big picture stuff but retaining its tight focus POV. Also the protomolecule reminded me of The Master from Fallout.
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Feb 24, 2017 08:26
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So if Belters find it almost always fatal to enter a gravity well like a planet, how do they survive the same g forces that an Inner takes? The focus drugs can only do so much, and a Belter frame looks much more fragile than an Inner's.
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Feb 25, 2017 04:50
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Watched the first episode of the series. I take it that the stuff happening on Earth is from Caliban's War, or another book? Really surprised at how close the adaptation is sticking to the plot of the original, with only a few things (like Holden being on the Cant before Naomi and not being an XO already) being noticeable changes. The casting is also pretty drat good, for the most part. Miller and Alex look just like I thought they would, if a little younger. Holden looks like a grizzled Jay Baruchel. The only two I wasn't quite sold on were Ade and McDowell. McDowell I always thought of looking a bit like McCallister from The Simpsons, except Belter skinny, and I'm pretty sure Ade was black and part NIgerian. Guess they didn't want to mix her up with Naomi, who looks the part, but could stand to be about a foot taller. Oh, and whatever they thought they were doing with Havelock. As for the Belters, I like how they've explained that not all Belters are super tall in the show to justify using actors instead of combing the world for basketball players wanting to be actors. With a definite date set in the 23rd Century, it makes sense that there hasn't quite been a total physiological conversion like in the book, which has no determined dates relative to modern day.
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Feb 25, 2017 20:00
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I find the show refreshingly slower paced. The plot races so fast in the book that it felt like major developments got truncated and condensed to almost nothing. No time for reactions because you're onto the next incident so fast. I also like how they expanded a whole lot on the Donnager sequence, interrogating everyone and trying to pin Naomi as an OPA sleeper agent to cover Mars's rear end.
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Feb 27, 2017 19:03
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You can tell when a good series makes you pay attention to the details when they accidentally mix things up. I'm so used to ships generating gs through thrust that I'm noticing when the show forgets. EDIT: And I'm also the idiot who forgot magnetic boots. I also like how everyone treats holden like poo poo. He's kind of an impulsive jackass. EDIT AGAIN: Hah! Adam Jensen is a really terrible spy. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 01:25 on Mar 1, 2017 |
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Feb 28, 2017 05:25
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I just realized that the Black Keys song in episode 1 was being sung In belter creole. That's cool
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Mar 20, 2017 17:21
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So I've started Caliban's War. Awfully similar setup to hostilities as Leviathan Wakes. One thing I'm really appreciating so far is that as much as the earth/Martian conflicts are caused by a third party, that doesn't immediately end the hostilities between the planets once the culprits are caught. Once a war starts it can be very hard to end and the fact that The Expanse books address this is very refreshing. That being said, one is an anomaly, two is a trend, so I am worried that each book might start to follow a pattern of "evil experiment by dumbasses starts a war, Holden and friends get involved and save the universe"
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May 20, 2017 19:36
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drat does Season 2's opener get the attack on Spin Station right.
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May 23, 2017 20:45
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PriorMarcus posted:It absolutely nails the Rocci side of it and then falls apart the second they enter it. It's terrible from there onwards. True enough. It hits the story beats, but that was one dingy looking protogen lab.
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May 23, 2017 21:52
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Man I want a Diogo pov chapter where he just rants in incomprehensible belter creole.
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May 24, 2017 07:01
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So the protomolecule is basically an alien bio weapon/terraformer/teleporter, I take it? Target an earth like planet, wipe out its population and then use its biomass plus radiation to build a giant fuckoff Stargate to their central hub?
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May 26, 2017 18:44
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Well I'm just going off of the spoilers in the thread and how far into Caliban's War I am. I also finished season 2, which I thought was really well done overall, though I did notice some distinct changes. For one thin Nguyen is pretty much absent and his role and Erinwright's seem to have been condensed into one, and a few scenes are shifted around. But I really like the show's expansion on certain subjects like the availability of the protomolecule to all three factions, or turning Amos into a more overt but still well meaning sociopath. Best scene was Alex chilling on the Roci slinging back beers in zero g.
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May 26, 2017 21:54
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Platystemon posted:The protomolecule is a metaphor for the plants/animals/microbiota that Europeans brought to the New World that made the place more habitable for them but hosed over all the natives. Alex: "Didn't all those natives die, though, Holden?"
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May 26, 2017 22:57
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Does it ever come up in the books how strong earthers can be in .3G environments? Now clearly after spending extended time in lower gravity there will be side effects, but I'm wondering if the books ever present some John carter of Mars levels of strength disparity.
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Jul 30, 2017 07:03
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A straight up ground war would be nearly as suicidal for the belt and Mars against earth as a rock throwing space war.
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Jul 31, 2017 18:21
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Are the novellas and short stories available in print or are they only e books?
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Aug 6, 2017 22:34
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Finished calibans war. Not as overall good as leviathan wakes and I think it spends a bit too long hitting certain plot points but I enjoyed it. Finale felt rushed but the denouement was well done to wrap things up. Bobbie is great and avasarala may as well be renamed queen bitch of the universe. I did find the Martians willingly giving holden a crapload of munitions and a gatling gun a bit of a stretch even if chrisjen and Bobbie negotiated an alliance.
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Aug 8, 2017 06:21
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Oh don't get me wrong, avasarala owns, but man she is a mean bastard when she wants to be.
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Aug 25, 2017 21:55
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I watched Star Trek Discovery last week and three guest stars from The Expanse were all stuck on a prisoner shuttle. At least none of them died horribly like they all did on The expanse.
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Oct 7, 2017 17:35
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Nah, I like that they keep arguing over it. I got a chuckle out of Elias Toufexis being a grammar nazi on the correct pronunciation of Anubis, and then Amos just gives him a look and he shuts up. Holden is a bit underwhelming for me, mostly because the guy playing him reminds me of Jay Baruchel too much if Baruchel tried to sound hardcore. The guy playing Alex is the best, though.
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Oct 7, 2017 18:04
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A thirty year time jump? I hope that some orphan finds the rocinante in a junk yard and then holden and Amos show up to help the plucky new crew battle against the Free Order Navy who have a new plan of throwing a planet at earth instead of asteroids. And it's led by marco's grandson.
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Nov 22, 2017 02:21
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So how exactly does one battleship wipe out an entire solar system's defense force?
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Dec 13, 2017 07:39
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I dunno, I don't mind the protomolecule reality warping stuff too much, but the real meat for me is the interplay between the various factions and the repeated idea that going to war is a very bad thing that will only end in everyone losing. Even the whole Free Navy war with its insane bodycount I could get behind because while Marco was obnoxiously persistent, he never felt like an insurmountable threat, and there was a way out, even if it did result in Earth and Mars throwing everything they had into the fight to get there. The Laconians taking a 30 year time jump to essentially make The Expanse equivalent of Star Wars's First Order superweapons and mega ships just feels a bit cheap to me. I mean, I still enjoy it, but just handing someone a superweapon like that to justify a 30 year timeskip is disappointing. On a somewhat related note, I've been curious about books similar to The Expanse with a few caveats. The Expanse is a setting that tries to answer the question of how humanity will adapt to live in the Solar System without wonder technology to make everyone's lives happy. Pre-protomolecule, the biggest advance in allowing the colonization efforts is the Epstein drive, but that hardly makes the setting a utopia. Even with the galaxy ripe for colonization, we bring all our problems with us as we go into space. My question is: Are there any books or franchises that address similar themes of human hardship, while being set in a post-scarcity society? Material needs are eliminated for the vast majority of people, but human fallibility persists, leading to conflicts that, rather than being fought over resources or territory, are instead fought on ideological grounds? Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 05:14 on Dec 14, 2017 |
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Dec 14, 2017 05:06
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I think the authors kind of forgot the characters' ages after working with younger versions of them on the TV show.
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Dec 15, 2017 23:12
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acumen posted:The plot in Nemesis Games/Babylon's Ashes is a pretty easy out to end the series on if it has begun to fade in popularity and they could condense the contents of Cibola Burn or omit them entirely if they need to. After that if there's a sudden resurgence in popularity, netflix buyout, or "remake"/refunding of the series they could go and film the final trilogy. The authors have stated they didn't write the books with the tv series in mind but it really appears otherwise. They've just been really good at adapting. They built the books with the setting in mind first, and things flow naturally from there. It was meant to be an RPG setting at the beginning IIRC.
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Mar 26, 2018 20:32
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So today at work I recommended this book to a mother buying SF novels for her fourteen year old son. She said he'd tried to read Dune but couldn't get into it, but I figured if the kid could hanlde reading Frank Herbert then Leviathan Wakes isn't too explicit with its sexuality or violence, right? I mean, it's there and there's the exploding vomit zombies, but it's not really gratuitous in the way someone like George R.R. Martin writes. I'm just hoping I made a decent call and I'm not going to get some moral guardian mother pouncing on me because I suggested a book to her teenager where two adults have sex.
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Apr 1, 2018 06:50
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Well I started them off with Leviathan Wakes, which does have protomolecule tendrils blasting out of everoy orifice in Julie's body. And it has Naomi and Holden's relationship getting blown wide open by Amos shouting "Your banging the first mate!" I suppose it's not so bad. I read A Clockwork Orange when I was fifteen and that has straight up child rape in it.
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Apr 2, 2018 15:31
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This is also a setting where commercial space suits used to be so bad the seals would burn your neck. You'd think in the next two hundred years we'd be able to make better eva suits than what we have now, not worse ones.
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Apr 4, 2018 18:18
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This isn't really Expanse related outside of the concept of simulating gravitational force. In The Expanse, gravity in zero G is simulated using thrust, with ships built vertically and using a ship's thrust to create the force needed to allow people to stand upright. Otherwise, it is simulated by spin, making stations into large centrifuge drums and then walking around the inside wall. So I was doing a writing project about a spaceship that can land on a surface but doesn't use artificial gravity to create an up and down when in vacuum. I was wondering if some people here who have a better understanding of physics than I do could help me. Basically my idea was that a centrifuge drum would be placed inside the ship for the inhabitants, but on a smaller scale than a giant O'Neil cylinder. However, instead of using the entire interior wall of the drum as a walking surface (being way too small for that to be feasible), I was thinking about throwing some deck plating down on the "bottom" of the drum to work as a floor, and then have a counterweight on the "ceiling" of the drum so that when the drum is spinning, it doesn't throw all the weight to one side. When the ship is on a planet, the drum stops spinning and sits with its floor and ceiling in the right space. I'm sure I've screwed up something with this theory so I wonder if anyone here who knows better could point out some flaws with my plan.
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Apr 25, 2018 22:45
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Toxic Fart Syndrome posted:Why not just build it vertically, ala Expanse, and have it land upright, ala SpaceX? No real reason not to, but I was just wondering if my idea would work or not. Basically my whole concept is about using orbital rings to slingshot ships from one planet to another, and then when they "land", they move off the main launch rings onto the orbital tethers, which act as elevator lifts down to the surface. Spin gravity in vacuum but also able to land on its side and still have an up and down. Obviously nothing I just wrote invalidates building vertically, aside from desired aesthetics. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 22:57 on Apr 25, 2018 |
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Apr 25, 2018 22:54
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Could it work with a narrow floor plate and then use the dead space between the counterweight and the standing surface as storage? Or maybe scrap the spinning cylinder altogether and have two standing areas on opposite ends of a central axle which spins within a stationary drum? Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 23:05 on Apr 25, 2018 |
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Apr 25, 2018 23:02
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a foolish pianist posted:It's possible, but your interior space would be a really tall, very narrow room, and if anyone threw anything past the halfway point, it'd fall 'upwards' to the ceiling and get stuck there. Maybe make the central axle hollow, throw a ladder inside it that travels the spine of the ship, with hatches that open up to leading to spokes with ladders traveling down to either counterweight. And then still use the dead space that isn't spinning for secured cargo. Or maybe I could say gently caress it and build a flying skyscraper with a rocket attached to its rear end.
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Apr 25, 2018 23:17
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Well like I said propulsion would primarily be the slingshot from an orbital ring, so they wouldn't need to constantly burn with thrusters except on launches or slowdown. And during these periods the counterweights could stop spinning and people could strap into chairs built into the walls or secured to the floor.
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Apr 25, 2018 23:31
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ATP_Power posted:One option could be a deployable carousel type of pseudogravity like Peter Watts used in Echopraxia: About as realistic as "car culture" in space actually is. Highly customized personal homes/vehicles that flaunt practicality in favour of style. While I love the expanse and it's dedication to thinking out how the physics work without compromising on story, I'd like to write from a more post-scarcity SF scenario. It's not a matter of what is the most practical way to do something so much as it's a matter of "we have the means to make it this way so why not go all in?" It's already a setting where planets have concentric rings used to catapult ships at other worlds.
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Apr 27, 2018 01:07
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That's a really good website and I've been trolling through it for ideas. I think my best bet to go with a form over function ship design would be to keep my centrifuge idea but make the counterweights on a gimbal system so they'll orient to the direction of the thrust.
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Apr 27, 2018 06:24
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I'm up to episode 3 of season 3, and so far I'm really enjoying the additions they've made to the story, as well as dropping the "we put up a GoFundMe page to find Mei" plotline. It's also pretty amusing watching them censor out Avasarala's potty mouth by saying "freaking" all the time for the TV broadcast standards. It's about as convincing as Sigourney Weaver saying "screw that!" in Galaxy Quest.
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May 5, 2018 04:32
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Well she won't have to worry about the show freaking her out much longer considering SyFy just shitcanned it.
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May 11, 2018 21:03
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Give up on series and embrace standalonees.
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May 22, 2018 05:10
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So I'm starting into Abandons Gate and I'm a little confused as to why Anna thinks keeping nami on Europa will turn her into a Belter. That sort of genetic change can really only happen over generations. Anna and Nono are both earthers, so unless nami's sperm donor was a Belter there's little chance of her growing up into a long boned belter herself, especially considering she still got the bone density treatments like all newborns. The most likely scenario is that if nami stayed in space she would be somewhat lanky but still an earthers build and without resistance training and prolonged exposure to gravity, she'd have a bit more difficult time adapting to one g.
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May 23, 2018 22:21
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