The Expanse is pulling off something amazing . It ’s showing a solar - system - all-encompassing conflict through the experience of just the characters we ’re follow . It ’s a really rugged rope to take the air , and they ’re doing it wonderfully .
Spoilers for “ Remember the Ca nt ” keep up .
In the book , I was most interested in what was happening with survivors of the Ca nt . The Expanse has made that story less interesting to me than Ceres or Earth , mayhap because they ’re adding a lot more there that ’s raw , possibly because Thomas Jane and Shohreh Aghdashloo are giving their roles a lot of dimensions that are n’t quite as obvious with the Ca nt gang .
“ recall the Ca nt ” picks off where the episode two end , and there ’s no interrogation that Holden ’s content made it out . His accusation of Mars destroying the Ca nt is being play everywhere , all the time . On Ceres , that means that the station ( which is run by Earthers and has some Earther inhabitants ) is boiling over with resentment from the Belters and their sympathies to the radical OPA , which means that we get to watch Thomas Jane as Detective Miller toy off of Jared Harris as the local OPA loss leader , Anderson Dawes . It ’s scenes like this which make see The Expanse a great experience .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24oveRABSRw
I ’m also go to call out the manner the show used Miller ’s spouse , the Earther Havelock . In the books , he ’s basically a nonentity who leaves the post when things get tough . While the direction the show focalize on him this episode — showing him lead to a harlot to determine the Belter language , play a prank on the captain — was a fairly obvious build - up to his death at Belter hand , it still work . Just saying thing are bad does n’t really work unless we actually see characters we have a go at it moved .
On Earth , Avasarala is also investigating what happened to the Ca nt . It would be so easy to reverse this character into just a government look that gives the audience piles of exposition . In this shell , that Mars took stocktaking of all their arm and technology hubs to make certain nothing went missing . Which means they did n’t give it to the Belters and they ’re not mould together .
In the handwriting of The Expanse , her discovery and reveal of that information does avert a warfare . But it also number at the cost of put down her recollective - term friendship with the Martian embassador . Their net talk of the town is heartbreaking .
And on the Donnager , the ship ’s crew is doing a decorous business of turning the Ca nt subsister against each other . Alex gets his old Martian Navy uniform back . They tell everyone Naomi is OPA . Holden was kicked out of the navy . Shed falsify his aesculapian credentials to head for the hills a drug dealer who wanted to drink down him . And … no one know anything about Amos , other than he ’s patriotic to Naomi . They ’re all at each other ’s throat in no time , just so the Donnager skipper can tell Holden to take back his content and say that OPA factor Naomi destroyed the Ca nt . Which she did n’t .
As always , the way The Expanse mixes action — the bacchanalia on Ceres , for good example — with the slow burn reveals-—Avasarala ’s manipulations on earthly concern — makes for engage observance . So does the balanced way everyone ’s approached . Mars may not have destroyed the Ca nt , but they are ruthless in how they treat the five survivors . Havelock ’s death , simply because he was an Earther , is horrifying . But it ’s also clean the Belters have been naughtily treat for a very long time . Plus , there ’s a mystery ship on the Donnager ’s tail . And playscript readers acknowledge what that means .
Top image via Syfy .
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