There is a sequence in Netflix‘s 3 Body problem That repeatedly made me scream out loud in horror, even though I already knew exactly what was about to happen since I read Liu Cixin’s original book years ago. Of course, I’m talking about what happens halfway 3 Body problem Episode 5 “Judgment Day”, which demonstrates, along with the bloody ending of Episode 3, that the former game of Thrones showrunners, current 3 Body problem Co-creators and episode writers David Benioff and DB Weiss still have what it takes to thrill audiences with shocking kills and surprisingly timed horror.
**Spoilers for 3 Body problem Episode 5 “Judgment Day”, now available on Netflix**
Halfway 3 Body problem In episode 5, “Judgment Day,” Thomas Wade (Liam Cunningham) and Raj Varma (Saamer Usmani) use innovative nanotechnology developed by Auggie Salazar (Eiza González) to attack Judgment Day, the floating fortress that Mike Evans (Jonathan Pryce) uses to keep in contact with the San-Ti (or Trisolarians, as the alien race is known in the English translation of Ken Liu’s book). As we learned last week, civilians devoted to Evans and Ye Wenjie’s (Rosalind Chao) cult live on the ship, including children. While Liu’s version of The three body problem describes what happens next: its scientist protagonist cleverly installs his ultra-thin and unimaginably strong nanowire technology on both sides of the Panama Canal to destroy the ship as it passes, only 3 Body problem it forces us to see the horrific human cost. The result is a harrowing sequence of true horror with tons of blood, guts, and horrible children’s screams.
(Last time I felt so scared watching something only to be even more horrified by the adaptation’s version of events? Uh, a little moment called the Red Wedding in game of Thronesfriends!)
When Jugo Mobile participated in a press roundtable with 3 Body problem Co-showrunners David Benioff, DB Weiss and Alexander Woo, Benioff explained how they pulled off the terrifying sequence.
“I think when you see something on a screen, it’s going to be more horrible in the book,” Benioff said. “You’re reading these descriptions, but you don’t see blood. “You’re not seeing a group of kids running away, you’re not seeing kids’ backpacks breaking in half.”
“One of our favorite shots in the whole sequence is seeing the paper paws fluttering down, which isn’t gory at all, but it conveys a lot.”
Benioff explained that it was important for them to “convey the horror” of what was happening on board. Doomsday forcing the audience to confront the atrocities our heroes were willing to commit and whether humanity was worth saving.
“It’s a huge scene that’s supposed to be memorable in part because these are supposedly the good guys, right? “Humanity is fighting those who are allied with an alien force coming to invade our planet, and yet they are perfectly willing to destroy a ship containing a thousand people, many of whom are innocent children,” Benioff said. “And may the repercussions of that continue throughout the season.”
Benioff is referring to the fact that of all the Oxford Five, Auggie soon seems the most disillusioned with helping Wade protect humanity from the San-Ti. Although Will Downing (Alex Sharp) briefly convinces her to help her friend Jin Cheng (Jess Hong) bring her ambitious Project Ladder to life, Auggie ultimately refuses to allow her scientific advances to be co-opted for military use. or even commercial. The season ends with him breaking away from Wade’s shadowy organization, sharing his patents with the world and embedding himself in poor communities to use his technology to help people on the ground.
Benioff joked that he, Weiss and Woo hope to follow Auggie’s evolution in this regard “ideally in later seasons.”
“Auggie, who is a witness to this, is completely devastated by the fact that she was complicit in the murder of innocent people,” he said.
As for how to bring this atrocity to life, Benioff admitted that they had “got into the nitty-gritty of exactly how much they want to show and how much blood.” He attributed the success of the sequence to the episode’s director Minkie Spiro, “who did an incredible job with it,” and production designer Deborah Riley.
“I think about all those meetings we had in the hallways of the ship… going back and forth,” Benioff said. “We installed these LED strips that replicated the speed of the cables, you know, as the ship goes by. Like how the cables come and having to figure out how to cut everything because every meter, about every 3 feet, there is a nanofiber that cuts everything, whether it’s a human being or a sign on the wall or the trays in the cafeteria. , anything.”
“It was an incredible amount of prep work and then an incredible amount of post work by the VFX team. And you know, the joy of making a television show is the collaboration with all these talented people who are really good at their jobs. And for us, our job is just to try to tell them what we’re looking for, and often they come up with something much better than what we had in mind.”
It probably goes without saying that if Benioff, Weiss, and Woo wanted us to feel the full horror of what Auggie had done, and why he might go on a different journey than his fellow Oxford Five survivors in the future, it’s mission accomplished.
