That’s an interesting point, and I agree they could use this to lead into future storylines as you say (I also haven’t finished the season to see how well they do this). But I didn’t really get that sense from the novella itself. Maybe I missed the subtext, but I came away from the novella with the impression that it was a story about Bobbie’s nephew (and a little bit of Bobbie), not a bigger commentary on Martian society. I’ll be happy if the showrunners can expand that to Mars as a whole.
Uh… spoilers?!?
Great, now I know what’s coming for that one. I thought we agreed no open spoilers until after December 20?
I get that they want to keep the actress employed and under contract, and no doubt Frankie Adams wants the work and paycheck.
But that’s kind of a theme of The Expanse. They’re telling the big stories by telling the smaller stories of people caught up in things they don’t fully understand*. And it’s small stories within small stories. We have the small story of the four crew of the Roci being caught up in the big story of Earth vs. Mars, but then there’s things like the smaller story of the relief ship the Roci Crew commandeered to land on Ganymede, where the lives of that other crew were irretrievably screwed up by their brief interaction with the Big Damn Heroes. The point is that the Big Story is just the accumulation of all the little stories, and no one every really knows all of what’s going on. Not even Avasarala, who so far has spent most of the episodes I’ve seen literally asking Holden to tell her what the fuck is going on!
*Have you read The Churn? If not, you should. Everyone should.
IIRC, Book 4 is pretty disliked by the fandom (the slowness of the plot being the main issue). Book 5 is considered to be better. Though Book 6 is also considered weak.
So I’d imagine Season 5 should be better than Season 4.
I’m so sorry!
I did, and I thought it was great for filling out Amos’ backstory and giving a sense for how things worked on Earth. This was a perfect example of a novella that complements the full novels. In fact, every other one of the novellas did this well.
I’m sure their intention with Gods of Risk was to do the same, but it just didn’t do that for me. I didn’t feel I knew Bobbie as a character any better after reading it, and I didn’t feel like I knew much about Martian society. I fully admit that might just be me - maybe I read it to quickly. But it’s definitely at the bottom of my list by a longshot.
If it helps, knowing there’s a plot twist like that actually makes me interested in watching that now - but that’s a happy circumstance. Not all spoilers work out like that.
I’ve seen just first episode this sunday (I totally forgot about the schedule of releasing seasons) and was overexcited to watch it at last. I’m that type of person that prefers to consume the story slowly, piece by piece, though I was curious what do people saying about it… and was confused. I’m glad that regarding my curiosity, any spoilers could spoil the story for me. XD Or is it just my brain that resists to get all that stuff?
The characterization of Amos was absolutely superb this season. He continues to be the best character on the show, IMO.
I’ve always seen him as reptilian–a sociopath utterly free of empathy. In the books, it is even more clear, as he explicitly has to attempt to emulate what Holden would probably do in any given situation as a substitute for actually understanding morality and–you know–not killing everyone and everything he sees.
There’s a bit more to Amos than the amoral sociopath. He does have an intense loyalty and desire to please the small number of people that he makes attachments with. I think of him more like a pitbull that was rescued from a dog fighting ring as a puppy.
When he finishes a murder rampage, he has the satisfied look of a dog that finally caught the squirrel. Then he looks back at his “pack” looking for approval. “I killed them all and it was the best time ever! Did I do good?”
All incredibly well acted by Wes Chatham. Without the unsettling mix of affect and facial expressions, the Amos could easily turn into a Shoot Guy Sidekick stock character.
Agreed – but he does understand right from wrong to some degree, even if he doesn’t “feel” it. He emulates/follows Holdan and Naomi because he wants to do the right thing, he just doesn’t think he’s able to do so on his own.
I get the impression that Amos has experienced negative side effects from NOT doing what society considers the right thing (hence, he did not want to return to Earth and is evasive about his past) and is now trying to do the right thing because of such basic desires like not wanting to be locked up in a cage for life, being free to enjoy himself, and so on. But he doesn’t have an intuitive sense of right and wrong and is trying to use reason and logic to get there, and also attaching himself to people he respects who seem to get the whole morality thing.
We see this when he was talking about killing Melba/Clarissa back in series three. When Dr. Volovodov objects you can almost see Amos trying to analyze why she would object to something so (to Amos) self-evidently sensible as killing a dangerous enemy and he decides it’s because getting shot is painful. So he offers to jigger the autodoc and kill her with a drug overdose and tries to sell that idea by saying it would be painless. Amos isn’t a mindless killer, I don’t think he gets off on it, he doesn’t seek out opportunities to kill people but he has absolutely no moral impediment to killing others.
He’s neither bad nor good, he really is amoral. Not in the sense he’s running amok and committing mayhem, but because he lacks the moral inhibitions other people do. If he had no reason to kill someone he won’t, but if he decides that’s the best course of action for a situation that’s what he’ll do (absent Naomi or Holden telling him no) without hesitation or qualm.
Which makes him fascinating as a character and someone who would be scary to meet in real life.
I finished S4 yesterday. I liked it a lot, though not as much as last season. Keeping the Rocinante crew on the one planet was a bit of a disappointment after the promise of the hundreds of rings opening at the end of S3.
I did like that the aliens and their tech are still very much a mystery, though we are learning more about them.
I didn’t mind the Bobbie storyline. I found those interludes a nice break from the Ilius plot. Likewise with scenes of Drummer and Ashford (RIP). I’m sorry to see David Strathairn go.
I didn’t care much for the election story on Earth. I get what they were trying to show, but it felt a bit out of character for Avasarala to not be more self-aware. It kind of diminished the character for me.
I loved Amos this season. I was sorry he had to shoot whatshername. I wonder if that will have repercussions for his psyche.
Another subplot not from the book.
Finished S4 and enjoyed it a lot, although to me The Expanse was at it’s peak in the first few episodes of S1 before the protomolecule and all that mess. I still enjoyed the displays of physics in S4, like when the lady was blown out of the ship and Naomi had to retrieve her, or how the orbits of the ships were decaying and had to be corrected.
After finishing season 4 I tried to go back and rewatch season one, and I quit on eppy 3. I just really hated pretty much everyone from season one and two, other than Avasarala. I don’t remember when Drummer first appeared, but I’ve always liked her, too. I didn’t really start liking the show until season 3.
I did like this season though. Seeing the creepy dr from Torchwood again, was fun.
I was sad that Anna wasn’t included. I kept hoping Avasarala was going to hire her to be her speechwriter, but nope. Amos vs Burn Gorman’s character was fun to watch. On reddit everyone was complaining about the actor change for Avasarala’s husband, but I thought he was fine, and didn’t even remember he was a different actor. The political arc was my favorite part, along with Drummer’s storyline. I didn’t really mind Bobby. I don’t usually like her, but I liked seeing more of Mars.
Finished S4 last week and loved it. I’m a bit surprised at some of the negative opinions about this season but everyone is entitled to a wrong opinion winky-winky
For the book series, this was the last book I really enjoyed like the first books. From this book on the story lost a lot of interest for me for reasons I won’t list to avoid spoilers.
Spoiler Free-ish Spoiler Post
Marco’s plan and the outcome of that plan was interesting but by and large I found the Marcos, Filip, and Naomi storyline to be just uninteresting and dull. I would have preferred they played out the same larger plan and outcome but removed the entire entanglement of Naomi and her son as major points of the story. I’m worried I will not have as much interest during S5 of the TV show if it is as central of a component of the season/book.
Of course out of these events you get the rise of a new power dynamic that I also found far less interesting and overall not the direction I thought the books were going to go.
As for the things I liked…
[ul]
[li]I think the producers and writers have continued to do an admirable job of following the books accurately. Yes, for creative or whatever reasons they have slide some things around introducing elements/characters earlier or later or even creating minor storylines that do not follow the books. Even when doing so they have not hurt the larger narrative of The Expanse as written in the books.[/li][li]The production values seemed to have been maintained with the move to Amazon. Granted much of the story does take place on a planet this time but overall I felt the look and feel of the show remained at the same high level.[/li][li]I was so happy to see Miller again. Thomas Jane has done a fantastic job with that character. The one line about 100K voices finally getting rest (paraphrasing badly) was delivered with such impact and sorrow.[/li][li]I do not like Naomi’s haircut. Other than that, again the actress did a great job conveying the impact of an open sky to someone who has spent their entire life in space on either ships or stations.[/li][li]I was not familiar with Burn Goldman and when I saw the trailers he did not match what I had in my head for Murty based upon the books. He nailed it, far superior to the books in my opinion.[/li][li]And Amos… I mean… every scene is pure gold but the final scene and the “Thank you” and that grin. Is it normal to be both terrified of Amos and cheering him on at the same time?[/li][/ul]
[quote=“MeanJoe, post:58, topic:841317”]
[li]I was not familiar with Burn Goldman and when I saw the trailers he did not match what I had in my head for Murty based upon the books. He nailed it, far superior to the books in my opinion.[/li][/QUOTE]
I first encountered Mr. Gorman in Torchwood. The cast of that show was exceptional and Mr. Gorman still stood out. His ability to convey so much in so little time is amazing, and he manages to make the complexity of characters seem not just plausible but natural. His Owen Harper was mostly loathsome, self-contradicted as hell and utterly compelling. His Adolphus Murtry was similarly complex: driven, self-aware, cruel when he can get away with it but not otherwise, which somehow inspires crazy loyalty in his subordinates, etc.
TL; DR: Aye: Burn Gorman is a fantastic actor & I look forward to seeing him in a great many things in the coming decades.
I will have to look into Torchwood. Arguably it has been awhile since I read Cibola Burns but my recollection of my impression at the time was Murty as the fairly one-dimensional killer with corporate authority bad guy. Burn Goldman definitely brought more nuance to the character and all though he was a killer with corporate authority/cover for his actions, there were some underlying motivations that existed and added depth.