It's taken a big step up from season one. And season one was good...

Agreed. For those that have been debating watching it - this is a really, really good show. It's very rare to find something this good and it not be a premium channel like HBO, etc.

Great show. I've read all the books and at first I didn't like the actors playing Holden, Amos, and Noami. (Holden and Naomi are supposed to be in their early to mid thirties at the start of the series and Amos is supposed to be a giant, the Rock type guy) but the show has done a great job so far and I've grown to like Amos in particular.

This show has potential to blow Battlestar Galactica out of the water, and that is high praise.

As an aside: Guys, please support this show by watching it. It's physics are as close as we can get to modern physics. There are no mcguffins, no handwaving in this show and it has fantastic drama. Watch it and spread the word to your friends.

Doing my best. I both record and watch the show live as it airs. I talk about it a lot with friends and co-workers. They're all intrigued, but I think too many of them don't like that the show isn't readily available on any of the main subscription streaming services. I bring up the fact that Amazon Prime has Season 1, and then they go, "Okay, I'll put it on my watch list and go with it that way" rather than giving the show the boost it needs through at least watching it on syfy.com

I don't want to see this thing get Caprica'd. Syfy has cancelled struggling shows before, and they could absolutely do it again to this one even though the quality is off-the-scale for anything they've ever broadcasted, and that includes BSG. Would Netflix or HBO or some other network pick it back up after it got cancelled? Possibly, and that would I think solve the problem of not enough people watching it.

Let's see if Syfy picks up Season 3. I'm quite hopeful.

It just blows my mind that people will watch hot garbage like The Magicians but won't tune into this. It's one of the best shows on television. Not just on syfy.

Unfortunately it's the most expensive program the network has ever produced.

I don't see why people are complaining about people not watching this show. People rave about it.

The second season has surpassed the first pretty quickly, imo. Really enjoying it.

This is like Firefly, but better.

This is pretty spot on. I just finished season 1. I generally don't like series/movies that are based on books as much as the novels but this is an exception. A few character ages are a little off but not by too much. Hopefully it gets picked up for season 3. Ratings are down but overall its still one of syfy's better rated shows.

Read The Lost Fleet series by Jack Campbell if you like realistic physics in your sci-fi. Fleets spend days traveling towards each other then shoot and pass in less than an eye blink. Cool stuff. Not terribly demanding but a page turner.

I'm really enjoying this season. Way better than season 1.

Renewed for 13 episodes in 2018!

(still 5 to go this year)

Thank God. I was worried there for a second when ratings looked kinda iffy

This show... it's like a serialized novel. It's so damned good, but I almost need a little time to digest between episodes. The visuals can be truly stunning though. The blood snowflakes on Ganymede. The scene with Miller on Eros when he gives in to the protomolecule. The show is definitely a slow burn, but damn it's good. I think it will be recognized posthumously as a great show. I just hope it gets to see it's way to the end.

Agree with all this.

If I were a wealthy man, I wouldn't be wealthy long. I would fund this show if it were to be cancelled. I love it that much.

It's amazing how little actually happens this season, but how engaging the show still is. It does small moments better than anything I can remember. Naomi's whole bit on saving 52 last night was just great. And it's one of the first shows ever where I don't fast forward through the political bullshit. Shohreh Aghdashloo is just perfect in her role, especially now that she's spitting out "****"s left and right, like Avasarala does in the books.

I won't go into spoilers, since I don't know who's read the books, but next season should just be crazy good...

With some emphasis on "crazy".

RT had it at 77% fresh after last season, which is good. It's at 94% for season 2. Which reflects my own feelings on the show: it's really found its footing this year. There's a confidence to it that wasn't quite there yet last year, especially early on. It's just nails now.

Yep, this is one of the best shows on a non-premium channel (non-HBO, Cinemax, etc) that has ever aired, IMO.

I started watching this show last season based on recommendations here. I had never heard of it prior to that. It did take me a bit to get into it because it seemed kind of chaotic at first. I'm glad I stuck with it, though, as it's now one of my favorite shows. The character development has been very well done and I think that has been just as important as the story.

This ****ing show. Holy shit it's so ****ing good.

I read Leviathan Wakes, but didn't read the other books. Then I heard SyFy was going to turn this into a TV series. I just figured I'd get the story through the TV series.

But damn, I don't want to wait for 2018. People who have read all the books... do you think I should crack open Caliban's War and read on? Or would you probably recommend just waiting until the end?

Good grief. The Ganymede evacuation scene toward end of "The Monster and the Rocket" had me teary eyed when the belters had to choose their 52 and the one guy gave Naomi his spot.

If you're worried about spoiling anything new, then I wouldn't. Just going off memory, I'd say there's maybe half of Caliban's War left to cover on TV.

Finished watching Season 2 last night. God I love this show.

I'm really torn now as to whether I should read the books or not. While I want to know what's going to happen, I'd hate to ruin the show by knowing in advance what's going to happen, like most of GoT.

Dammit.

:banghead:

These guys write MUCH faster than GRRM. Read the books. The first three were excellent. I still need to read the next few.

EDIT:

Want to see how much NOT like GRRM these guys are? Check out the dates on each book.

Leviathan Wakes (June 15, 2011)
Caliban's War (June 26, 2012)
Abaddon's Gate (June 4, 2013)
Cibola Burn, (June 5, 2014)
Nemesis Games (June 2, 2015)
Babylon's Ashes (December 6, 2016)

**** GRRM for poisoning people's minds against picking up a new series.

Yes. Most definitely. I plan on rereading the first 3 and finally finishing the series this fall.

I just ordered the first three. :thumb:

Cool. I'm excited to re-read them!

Started reading the first book. I'm only about 60 pages in, but damn, it's great. Beautifully written. Even though I know what's ultimately going to happen, I'm into it. Enjoying the little differences between the book and the show as well, and the lavish, but not overbearing, details that really make the story come alive.

You'll probably find that reading is going to change your perspective on certain characters and locations. In a good way. Some stuff you just can't do on a TV budget...

I have noticed after 100 or so pages that the characters in the show are more, for lack of a better word, severe, than in the book. The show seems to put more hard edges on characters and their relationships with others than the book does. I guess that's mainly done for dramatic effect.

I'm glad I watched the show first - otherwise, it might well have annoyed me.

Yeah. It took some getting used to.

Also you already know some things about the main characters' backgrounds that don't show up at all in print for another 3 or 4 books. But most of that makes sense for tv.

This book just gets better and better. I'm about halfway through it now.

I was a little confused at first because Miller seemed so much more confident and competent in his job and abilities in the book than the show. The way that was all kicked to the curb was brutal, and the reader experiences it the way he does as a POV character.

Best thing I've read in years.

Speaking of Syfy shows, Season 3 of Dark Matter starts tomorrow night. :thumb:

I really lost a lot of sleep from these books which are like crack. The worst was when I hit the point in the first book with Eros and maybe got an hour or two of sleep before work.

Just finished the first book. On to the second one tomorrow. :thumb:

At what point do the books pass beyond what's been in the show so far?

Season 2 ends somewhere in the middle of Caliban's War. Been a few year's since I read it, so not sure exactly how far through it gets.

I'm about a quarter of the way through Caliban now. Overall the main story is the same, but the details are starting to diverge a great deal. They definitely mixed shit up to introduce key characters early, which is understandable when you realize the necessities involved in creating an episodic show.

But I'm fine with that. Keeps me on my toes. These books are wonderful.

Since it's been a while for me, I don't notice a lot of the differences. I'd like to finish the reading the series, but I think I'm going to wait until the show is over.

There was a lot of shit in the show that just seems like filler now. The show delved deeper into Bobbi's relationship with her squad before the Ganymede incident. The book introduced her on Ganymede right before it happened. Also, in the show Prax evacuated Ganymede and then returned - there was one really ****ed up scene where the OPA guys spaced everybody who was from Earth or Mars, including his female friend, while he watched in horror. In the book, he meets up with Holden on the moon and never left. The couple running the freighter that they hijack so they can land isn't in the book, either; they were provided with a freighter by the OPA.

I guess those scenes do fill in some background on how the various groups feel about each other, but it seems a few lines of dialogue could have sufficed. Again, the needs of a series with budget constraints may have forced them to add shit and draw out the story. That makes perfect sense. And of course the show is so well done that I don't really mind it.

Bobbie wasn't even in Book 2 either. I'm pretty sure she got introduced in book 3.

She wasn't in the first neither was the old Indian lady. They're both introduced early in the second book. I'm reading it right now.

Think you have that backwards.

The delimma of read the books first vs the show sucks when there is a good adapatation like this since either way you are probably ruining the key plot surprises that make it great. Said earlier Game of Thrones was the other great example. I started enjoying GoT more when I didn't now what was going to hapen once I passed the books.

I read all of the expanse books like crack and the show is still differing enough to be fun. Since I don't have the other perspective I'm biased to suggest just reading all of the books now. I enjoyed all of the additional depth they added.

I'm at the point of no return right now - a little more than midway through the second book. They just spaced the monster from the Roci and Bobbi and the old Indian lady (not even going to try to remember how to spell that name) are headed out into space, so other than the yacht escape, I'm pretty much at the end of Season 2 now. I assume it's only a matter of time before the principals all meet up.

I'm reading through these at a faster pace than I did the GOT books, and enjoying them more. These guys are much better writers than Martin.

Also, I really like the old Indian lady - she reminds me of a female version of one of my old bosses. He was a nasty, foul-mouthed old ****, too, but in retrospect the best boss I ever had. :D Prax is starting to grate on my nerves a bit, though. Hope he either grows a pair soon or gets whacked.

Oh yeah there was no way I'd have had the willpower to stop at that point you are. One of the things that made these books so quickly consumable was mostly a lack of deadspots with jumping around with the character narratives that are not as interesting. Definitely had my favorites but don't remember oh damn not back to this guy again.

Also interesting as you already noticed it's two authors. Can't think of any others like that and don't notice at all while reading.

Think there used to be a sifi book thread around here that deserves bumping if only for self interest of giving me stuff to read.

Oh, I have no intention of stopping. I'm going to order the remaining books today.

And somebody previously mentioned the two authors sharing the pen name in an earlier thread. I don't understand that - if I wrote something this good, I'd damn sure want my real name prominently displayed on it.

About 20 pages from being done with the second book. I can't remember the last time I read so much so quickly. I'll wrap up two tonight. On to three tomorrow.

I should probably pace myself - seven doesn't come out until December. :D

I'm nearly done with the third book. A weaker offering than the first two, and I haven't torn through it like I did those.

A bit off topic from The Expanse, but you should try reading We Are Legion (We are Bob) if you feel like reading something a bit more light-hearted in the sci-fi genre. If you enjoy audiobooks, then you should really listen to it. Ray Porter narrates and he is incredibly talented.

I second this recommendation. The audiobooks have been highly entertaining.

Finally...

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There's nothing quite like leaving fans in the dark on a release date when they're expecting it around the same time it's been premiering each year, only to say, "Oh, yeah... it's coming back in less than 2 months by the way and the finale will bleed into the summer, when people don't watch TV."

I ****ing love this show, but Syfy is doing a shitty job of getting other people to like it. And more than ever, the network needs VIEWERS on this show in order to keep their dream alive. Good reviews aren't going to keep it alive forever.

Hey, I'm just glad I've got a date to look forward to now. :rockon:

I love this show, but i wait til it hits amazon prime to watch it. Syfy needs to have some option other than cable.

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Back Wednesday night, so if you want to binge seasons 1 and 2 on prime, now's the time.

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Yeah, this shit is gonna be good.

I tried talking it up to people. I have no idea how to get this thing's ratings up, but I'm under no delusion that if the numbers don't support the show, SyFy won't bring it back for season 4.

Was it me or was there about double the normal amount of commercials? I recorded it and started about 20 minutes late so I could FF through them but JFC it seemed like this show was about half commercials.

With that said, I thought it was a great start to the season.

After recently posting that I wait for this to hit Amazon Prime, ATT brought fiber to my neighborhood and hooked me up with the goods. It was kinda satisfying to finally tell Cox to **** off completely.

Love this show.

Goddammit I forgot it was on. :cuss:

Watching now, but I have to suffer through the ****ing commercials.

That won't happen again. :grr:

Seemed a little slow but that might've been my mood.

The razorback was ****ing awesome, though. Way cooler than I ever imagined.

"Everyone's a winner on Eros" pops into my head semi regularly and I get sad.

I'm considering purchasing each episode on Amazon as they release. Just under $40 for the season doesn't feel too painful. Normally I would torrent that shit, but I want to reward this show. Also, I just purchased an HD projector that should arrive today. I'm pretty stoked to watch this show on a 10' screen (limited by room size).

Re-dubbing cuss words has aggravated me more than the commercial breaks.

The cussing thing's starting to get on my nerves. They've allowed it on other shows, even went so far as running an ad campaign leading into the latest season of the Magicians centered around how all the '****s' wouldn't be bleeped. I just don't get it. Maybe it's related to the advertisers.

Speaking of that, maybe I'm just used to watching on Prime, but goddamn it seems like there's a lot of commercial breaks.

That said, it's a good season so far.

These first 3 episodes have been fantastic! So far it's shaping up to be the best season yet. I really hope it doesn't get cancelled because its a great show.

I have never understood the obsession of some with allowing(or not) of cuss words. I'm older now - ancient actually - and I use very few cuss words so their absence doesn't bother me. However, I do remember my time in the service and I used words that would make a sailor blush. So when I hear a cuss word it seldom bothers me. I'm fine either way; it doesn't affect my enjoyment of the show.
I must add that I watched "The Magicians" this season and the girl who played Margo was absolutely hilarious. Her usage of cuss words was marvelous indeed. :D

The language is an integral part of Avasarala's character in the books. That's mostly why it bugs me. Either cut it completely or leave it alone. Covering it up with badly dubbed 'freak's is dumb.

Yeah, I wish they'd just bleep out the words rather than dub some stupid shit in its place. :shake:

Wasn't expecting to see the body laid out by the kid. Holy shit!

That was pretty trippy. Plus the way Mao saw it sprawled across the floor and had a change of heart like "OK, never mind, resume the experiments!!"

Another 'Holy Shit, did not see that coming" episode. Gonna be harder than ever to put the Genie back in the bottle.

****ing SyFy morons. Not bringing it back for season 4.

Apparently it's being shopped around. Hope Netflix picks it up

WTF

I didn't know that. ****ing idiots.

Unfortunately it's the best show on TV that nobody is watching. Can't account for taste I guess. Peopt watch hot garbage like The magicians, but the expanse is just too...grown up, I guess. Save us Amazon. Please.


Bad day for me, Brooklyn 9-9 and Lucifer cancelled as well.

99 rescued by NBC. They said they regret ever selling it to FOX.

It would definitely be a better show without the network TV bullshit. It's a high quality show with great source material - almost sounds like a no-brainer for them to take it in.