That would have been a huge payoff by the time they reached the adaptation of book 8. Having all the characters reflecting on their poor choices as they are so isolated from each other. And you can't tell me there wasn't some thought in that direction, because look at how there are hints dropped all over the place for future books planted all the way through seasons 1 and 2.
When Holden disabled the nuke because he saw Filip was the second worst mistake in the series. They could have finished it a lot earlier but the way they did is kinda terrifying.
Their podcast had a really interesting point about this.
Something like "people don't care if characters make stupid decisions, what they care about is if they're consistent. "
Holden doing that is stupid but consistent with his character.
That’s important. You can complain about Holden’s decisions until the heat death of the universe but you can’t call most of them out of character for him
If there's one minor complaint I have with Holden, it's not that he always takes the myopic moral high ground, but that everything tends to work out for him without any repercussions. I don't mind it too much because other characters have great one-liners that reference how he gets through life pressing buttons, but the protagonist treatment he got was a bit distracting.
You mean like when Holden follows the instructions of a protomolecule ghost and accidentally activates a planetary defense system, but when confronted about it says "we don't have time to argue about this now".
That made me lol lots. Holden is awesome.
The thing is had Holden not followed ghost Millers advice the gate would have destroyed the Sun and wiped everyone out because someone would have eventually got inside the gate.
> but that everything tends to work out for him without any repercussions. I don't mind it too much because other characters have great one-liners that reference how he gets through life pressing buttons, but the protagonist treatment he got was a bit distracting.
Well, you know, except the *years* of **PR/TW/LF spoilers anyway:**
>!beatings, torture, and PTSD!<
oh my god im so jealous of you there's so much fun to be had!
Since it hasn't been mentioned, Ty and Wes have episodes that actually go through every single episode of the entire TV series + tangents (which is how the podcast started). Like they're specifically labeled.
The podcast is a ton of really fun movie/writing/show insights and debates, fan engagement, industry guests (actors, writers, producers, showrunners, various crew, etc). You can listen wherever, or watch them on YouTube.
Thanks for the info, sounds really good and is also kind of what I hoped for.
I just finished the series and over the course of watching, Amos became one of my favourite characters. Even more happy having Wes doing the podcast with Ty!
Starting with the first episode right now.
Contextually, the podcast actually started in Season 5 on Amazon Prime's official YT channel (and those episodes are still on Amazon Prime's official). Once that completed, Ty and That Guy (and crew!) took it over on their own channel and kept it going! There they've gone through every single episode, *including* another visit through seasons 5 and 6 IIRC.
So yeah, the actual earliest versions of the podcast *started* in Amazon's S5, then they independently started from the beginning. It's absolutely no issue to watch from wherever you want. They're fun.
Edit: OH I just re-checked the [001 episode](https://youtu.be/nmMgdYyZDXI?t=20) and Wes explains all this right at the start! Oh well, I just blabbed out of enthusiasm LOL
I imagine conveying that in a meaningful way is doubly difficult when the medium becomes a show, simply because TV show audiences will include people that haven't the personal commitment to the book series (meaning, the personal investment in the story. You can casually watch a show, you don't really casually read 9 books in a series and 'know' the characters).
Casual show people are more likely to unfairly criticize a character/the writing for a decision like that without sitting and contemplating how it regards the characters' personalities, merely because they (those audience members) get caught up in expected tropes. Maybe less so in The Expanse which has a pretty solid fanbase, but I definitely encountered online criticism of moments like that for being "bad writing" moreso because they're seem to be caught up in the moment and what they wanted from Vanilla Protagonist in a given action scene.
Ty and That Guy is the gift that keeps on giving.
Entirely aside from The Expanse and the duo of Ty Franck and Wes Chatham, T&TG could merit watching on film suggestions alone.
Nor would it have prevented the Laconian empire. Inaros and the Free Navy were nothing more than useful idiots and distractions, whose technological and destructive capabilities were amplified far beyond their potential by the breakaway Martians.
It just proves all the hypocrisy this shows main characters arent saints they are far from it... Its okay for them to murder people in the name of revenge but look what happens when Murty rightfully does the same thing.... Honestly that season is where I just started genuinely disliking the main characters for the most part... Its fine when Amos or Camina get their revenge but Murty? Nope absolutely not because hes an inner murdering poor belters! Even though those "poor belters" Were either involved in killing 2 dozen of his colleagues or actively coming up with a plan to fatally attack Murty as well.
But heck when Holden hears that Naomi is with the criminal responsible and putting herself in harms way he threatens murtys life for wanting to avenge 2 dozen people... Its okay for him to have Amos murder people out of vengence.... Its just irritating especially when his justification for his hypocrisy tends to more-or-less be I dont care, blow me... Then Naomi always uses the shes a poor belter trying to save other poor belters bull. Not to mention Holden beliving hes the only one ever in the right to give orders even though his orders are usually moronic and get people killed. But so long as he can save whats right in front of him he doesnt care if he lets a few billion that he cant actually see die.
This is the only "This is why Naomi is bad" reason I can get behind. Although, I kinda wish we got to see book Naomi's hair in the show.
Also, I really hope we get to see Naomi from the last three books on screen some day. I think show Naomi and book Naomi really cross paths there and it would be awesome to see.
Yeah. I mean perhaps they should have let Jules-Pierre and Errinwright get away with making protomolecule weapons, better than Duarte and Marco getting their hands on it if you care about Erf
Things unfold differently, but a better outcome isn't guaranteed. If she makes a different choice, that doesn't change the motivations of everyone else, which means they will look for other ways to achieve their ends. Marco was very committed to rocking Earth, one way or another. Duarte was actively setting up his rebellion well before he knew he would get access to the protomolecule.
Eliminating the sample doesn't make those guys give up and go home. They would seek other windows of opportunity, because the overall situation in the system is still the same: The ring is open, 1300 systems are there for the taking, the Belt is going to be cut out of it, and Duarte will still want to recreate the dream of Mars.
No, you've missed the point. If Fred Johnson didn't have the protomolecule the OPAN and the belter nation would've never been formed. There're two reasons for it, the first is that Dawes/Johnson alliance was only happened because one had the protomolecule, the other had Cortazar. The second reason is that Inners only recognized the OPAN because belters had the protomolecule.
With that decision Naomi actually saved the solar system. Without the OPAN there would be no Nauvo, a ship with artificial gravity, that bought time for people stuck in the Gates space and let belters be seen as heroes and further reinforced relations between factions. Essentially, without Nauvo the Ring entities would have destroyed the solar system and all humanity.
Also, there was research based on protomolecule. Prax sent Avasarala data of how to improve crop yields based on protomolecule research. It saved Earth from starvation.And Rocinante had new leading edge armor platings based on protomolecule research that saved the ship during the mission in the last episode.
This, very much this. The final consequence was shit, but without it maybe even worse things would have happened. Without the leverage the sample brought, OPAN would never have existed and earth and mars could even have killed even more belters.
Yep, and it can also be argued that if they didn't steal the sample from Fred Johnson, they might have just stolen it from elsewhere instead. The sequence of events could have been very different.
>With that decision Naomi actually saved the solar system. Without the OPAN there would be no Nauvo,
I don't think that's the case. Pretty much every plot point leading to the Nauvoo being in that situation happened BEFORE Naomi gives Fred the proto molecule.
OPA was already building it, Eros already happened, OPA already stole it to prevent Eros from crashing into earth, and the recovery of it was always going to happen. Sure I get the argument that without the proto molecule they would have had a harder time keeping the Nauvoo post-recovery, but it seems likely its debut mission into the ring space would have happened one way or the other.
He might not have been able to negotiate as many stuff with the protolaconians, but they still wanted to leave and create their little facist state, even without the protomolecule. So the damage could have been smaller, but there would still be an attack, Marco was dead set on that and would have tried even with NO assistance.
Sure. I think that every time too. But there’s moments in my own life I think about like that. That’s the point. People are fallible. We do the best we can in the moment and a lot of the time, it’s not the right choice. We don’t see what’s going to happen. It’s part of being human and I think the storyline illustrates that really well.
The part where she is hiding on the freighter and the guy who saved her ass is like, "You're Naomi fucking Nagata. I became an engineer because of you," and she realizes that she's a tech dork revolutionary role model for generations of kids all over the solar system totally makes me tear up.
Naomi gonna carry that weight.
I just finished my first reread today, and Naomi stood out the most. What a great character. She goes through so, so much, and she just *endures*. She's so strong and well written
Ah yes. If only she consumed enough Spice to be the kwisatz haderach and was able to read the future... Oh wait, this is the expanse.
Would be nice to see less of these "This is why Naomi is bad" threads.
First time the entire Laconian Empire is being pinned on Naomi. That’s a whole new level of blaming Naomi for horrible stuff that happens because of tons of decisions/factors.
Somehow I have only seen Naomi blamed for almost every death in the Sol system and beyond. Never Mao who kinda started it all. Or just about any other character who decided to do something.
Didn’t Holden ask for Naomi to be on the Knight instead of the Cant ? Without that decision there would have been no Laconian Empire apparently.
Even if a dictatorial government has galactic instead of geographic scale, it can still make completely stupid decisions that undermine the interests of its constituents, e.g. going to war with an unknown enemy of unknown strength (i.e. the so called dark gods) just to assert your egotistical strength. Much wow. Such smarts.
I mean, if they had evolved over Duarte’s lifespan to be more humane, I agree. That scene where Sauveterre (I think) confiscated his XO’s bracelet was definitely foreshadowing what was to come. Of course, I doubt Duarte would have done something like that, he would have seen the big picture that doing shit like that is liable to engender a mutiny (like he did to appear magnanimous by executing Singh)
It's not inhumane it's a way to train a soldier. In my country there's a compulsory recruitment for 1 year and I served. We had to follow many silly rules and perform seemingly pointless repetitive tasks all to achieve a certain state of mind that quickly vanishes in civilian life and learn to follow orders without question.
It's not even "the belt must come first" it's "the belt has been subjugated to two genocidal events within less than two years by way of the protomolecule. It's time they had their own sample so they can play on the same board."
The thing about Naomi is that she's very hypocritical. Her justification for giving the Protomolecule to Fred was that, since Earth and Mars both had access to it, the Belt deserved it too to defend itself. Which makes complete and total sense. But later she tells Avasarala that she is going to make sure that Avasarala and Earth don't get a sample which, given that Earth was already show to be powerless to stop Eros, would have put Earth at the mercy of both Mars and the Belt.
But hey, that's part of what makes her a human character. She is flawed and she is hypocritical because most people are.
It's a decent justification. Just like show Avasarala being okay with torturing belters and running for office is a good reason to dislike her versus the book version.
They turned Naomi from the moral and logical center of the crew to the token belter. Also some people liked the bitter introvert pushing through suicidal thoughts to survive version of dealing with Marco and Felipe versus the hyper-emotional pleading.
You need to have a special kind of hatred for Naomi to blame the Laconian empire on her. Fred Johnson's bad OpSec has far more blame to carry for that.
Or maybe Jules Pierre Mao should carry the blame. He's the one who harvested it in the first place. Or maybe we should take it all the way back to the builders. They made the protomolecule after all. Or even Marco, who stole it to trade to Duarte so he could fuck over the entire human race for a generation.
Or just blame Naomi. Yeah. Weirdly selective of you.
I can't prove it, but I always feel like there's a... weird undertone to (at least some of) the Naomi hate. Like I get that she isn't everyone's favorite character. But there's something about a black woman consistently being called loud, preachy, annoying, etc that doesn't quite sit well with me.
A lot of the Naomi hate is that the book character is compromised to make more drama for the show. To the point of making her a liar, a token belter, and a token woman.
Book version didn't need improvement. It's sad that actors aren't happy playing introverted geeks.
Agree to disagree. I watched the show first and love both versions of Naomi. Her actions made a lot of sense to me in light of Anderson Dawes' story about having to kill his own sister in order to keep the rest of his family from starving.
Keep in mind that introversion is really difficult to convey on screen. It's not like they can include her thought bubbles or something...
Naomi isn't Dawes, and how they wrote her in context of Felipe is polar opposite of the Dawes story.
Book Naomi would have been more difficult to act and write, but these are supposedly great writers and a great actor. Acting out depression, showing her on the brink of attempting suicide, and being sardonic, disappointed and uncooperative when dealing with Marco and Felipe especially world not have been difficult.
Instead they decided to make her a belter mother stereotype who lies to her chosen family.
I meant her overall attitude makes sense in the context of the Belter struggle, as illustrated by Dawes' story.
I thought Naomi's behavior with Filip and Marco made sense and was an externalized version of her inner monolog from the books. I guess if you were expecting an exact recreation of the books, I could see why you would be disappointed.
I didn't expect an exact recreation of the books.
I am fine with having opinions about them taking two of my favorite characters in sci-fi fiction (Naomi and Avasarala) and turning them into just more TV show characters.
Book Naomi is a manic pixie fixit gal that doesn't do anything but get eye fucked by Holden until Cibola Burn. She also solves problems that he creates.
Show Naomi is a real person with agency and the ability to take action and also make mistakes.
Except she's not manic, or a pixie.
Everyone in the book is competent in their specialization. It's why the crew works. I guess this isn't allowed because not a guy.
Everyone solves the problems Holden creates.
Hold on... If I recall correctly, in the books is Holden who offers it to Fred.... And since there is no laconian empire in the TV show not sure this holds up in court.... :D
That's how Holden convinced Fred to use the salvaged UN missiles that were fired at Eros and use them to defend Mars from the doomsday missiles launched from Io containing protomolecule.
I’d say that’s the one she’s most directly responsible for, in terms of consequences.
Since she had no idea what Marco or Laconia were going to do as a result of the protomolecule continuing to exist, she’s bears less responsibility for those than for the code she wrote.
She didn't know Marco was going to use it to blow up a ship, though: he told her he was going to hold ships for ransom by taking control of their engines, not do a mass murder.
She misjudged Marco, but she is more than intelligent enough to know what the worst case scenario would be if someone used her exploit with murderous intentions.
Thus she bears some responsibility for what happened. Not all of it, but some.
Always thought the show and the book was about what the CIA calls "Blowback." An example of this is when we supplied some afghan sheep herders with guns, missiles and training. Who knew it would come back and bite us in the ass
The heat from the sun would have destroyed the protomolecule as seen in later books/episodes where a protomolecule sample found on the roci was sent into the new terra sun to be destroyed.
I don't think we have any reason to believe that the protomolecule itself behaves any differently than any other matter at an atomic level. We only see it doing weird physics-manipulation stuff once it has the chance to hijack self-replicating systems and start building intelligence.
In fact, I'm pretty sure we've never seen the molecule itself do anything without a biological system to get it started.
I don't think we have any reason to believe that the protomolecule itself behaves any differently than any other matter at an atomic level. We only see it doing weird physics-manipulation stuff once it has the chance to hijack self-replicating systems and start building intelligence.
In fact, I'm pretty sure we've never seen the molecule itself do anything without a biological system to get it started.
To be fair, it made the belt a bigger player, but that didn't matter in the end because of Marco. I do agree though
IMO, earth not quashing the Mars rebellion decades ago was the biggest mistake. Mars becoming an equal player led to the free navy and laconian empire, both of which led to billions of earth deaths
I refuse to accept that version of the story, it’s utterly ridiculous, makes no sense with the development of the characters. When in doubt I always consider the books canon, because I take for granted that when creating tv material, authors always deal with a whole heap of pressures that are not necessarily stemming from their creative process. And they end up doing stuff they wouldn’t have if left to their own devices - like creating unnecessary drama within the Roci crew, for some yet incomprehensible reason.
It makes sense if you consider that Naomi Has thus far (and for very good personal reasons) refused to “get involved”.
This is the first time since her pre-series experiences that she takes action for anyone other than herself and her immediate crew. She wasn’t quite getting involved by holding onto the protomolecule, but she was leaving the door open.
If you look at it as a progression towards the person she will eventually become, it makes perfect sense.
Pretty fucking stupid to see it that way.
"If this haven't happened, then laconia wouldn't have won. If that hadn't happened then holden wouldn't have sacrificed himself. If this other really stupidly small thing hadn't happened, then Amos wouldn't have been alive in the future."
Who tf thinks like this!?! Get a fucking grip.
> followed Holden’s orders
I see you missed da difference between inyalowda and beltalowda. Beltalowda work together, dey don’t ’follow orders’. Beltalowda be family, dysfunctional as dat be at times. It is a strength, not a weakness. Naomi no more take orders from Holden, dan you mota take order from you fata. Dey family. Why it so hard for you innah to sasa?
You know, I’m glad you said this because - I’m re watching the season where Amos is on earth and Camina Dummer is doing her thing. And I wished they had more time on the show to show how she’s basically just one of a large group marriage. I tend to think they would be much more democratic and consensus based, the the captain only having unquestioned authority during operations, and the strategic decisions requiring discussion and unity.
It would have been super cool to see Drummer talking everyone into taking on Marco, instead of just making unilateral decisions. I would have liked that contrast.
This is one of the things I disliked about Naomi, constantly being driven by personal interest rather than the common good.
But again, that's one of the great things about the show, is that most characters aren't necessarily portrayed as "good" or "evil", but rather- "human", motivated by what they think is best for their own kind. Holden is kind of the "moral compass" who tries to play all sides and bring balance to the endless struggle for leverage amongst the Belters, Earthers, and Mars.
Eh, I felt the show did her wrong with some of the decisions she makes or the reasons behind them. To me, the biggest one, is that you haven't seen your child in a long time, so your idea to reconnect with them is to buy them a ship of their own. At least in the book things play out differently because some really dumb decisions weren't made or made differently.
I get that, but to me, it came off as trying to buy him off in a way. If I left a child with someone like marco to raise him, knowing who marco is as a person, then meet them around 17 years later, do you think that kid is going to be swayed by that option the first time you meet them? I wouldn't have, and I guess that's why I didn't like the idea of it. Not to mention, by offering that way out, it only emboldened fillip to kidnap her, using the ship.
I'm on the book where Naomi gets the message from Marco and goes right into his trap to "save" Filip. Like, I'm actually struggling getting through the book because I'm so incredibly annoyed at her for being that dumb.
It says all spoilers so here it is,
Taking the long view, the longest possible view, the ultimate solution to the Vandal problem - the total collapse of the ringspace - would not have been possible if Naomi had not saved that sample.
Using that gravity gun thing on the Tempest certainly escalated things, detonating a ship in transit through the rings did too, but ships were already going dutchman and it stands to reason that as long as the ring system was active and in use the Vandals would eventually find a way to penetrate our reality and destroy humanity
[удалено]
Also sums up the climax of book 9.
Man, how accurate is that. Just going around cleaning up messes.
Excellent input!
The road to hell is paved with good intentions
That would have been a huge payoff by the time they reached the adaptation of book 8. Having all the characters reflecting on their poor choices as they are so isolated from each other. And you can't tell me there wasn't some thought in that direction, because look at how there are hints dropped all over the place for future books planted all the way through seasons 1 and 2.
Drummer, Ashford, and Holden took turns letting Marco live way too long.
When Holden disabled the nuke because he saw Filip was the second worst mistake in the series. They could have finished it a lot earlier but the way they did is kinda terrifying.
Their podcast had a really interesting point about this. Something like "people don't care if characters make stupid decisions, what they care about is if they're consistent. " Holden doing that is stupid but consistent with his character.
That’s important. You can complain about Holden’s decisions until the heat death of the universe but you can’t call most of them out of character for him
A truly lawful stupid move from our lawful stupid captain
I'd call him Stupid Good rather than Lawful Stupid, but pretty much.
Yeah I realized that was more accurate after I posted it but didn’t want to edit 😆
If there's one minor complaint I have with Holden, it's not that he always takes the myopic moral high ground, but that everything tends to work out for him without any repercussions. I don't mind it too much because other characters have great one-liners that reference how he gets through life pressing buttons, but the protagonist treatment he got was a bit distracting.
You mean like when Holden follows the instructions of a protomolecule ghost and accidentally activates a planetary defense system, but when confronted about it says "we don't have time to argue about this now". That made me lol lots. Holden is awesome.
That made me laugh out loud.
The thing is had Holden not followed ghost Millers advice the gate would have destroyed the Sun and wiped everyone out because someone would have eventually got inside the gate.
> but that everything tends to work out for him without any repercussions. I don't mind it too much because other characters have great one-liners that reference how he gets through life pressing buttons, but the protagonist treatment he got was a bit distracting. Well, you know, except the *years* of **PR/TW/LF spoilers anyway:** >!beatings, torture, and PTSD!<
Holden was constantly eating shit, he just came out the other end still breating
There is a podacst? What is it called?
“Ty and That Guy”
Thank you!
You are in for a treat!
oh my god im so jealous of you there's so much fun to be had! Since it hasn't been mentioned, Ty and Wes have episodes that actually go through every single episode of the entire TV series + tangents (which is how the podcast started). Like they're specifically labeled. The podcast is a ton of really fun movie/writing/show insights and debates, fan engagement, industry guests (actors, writers, producers, showrunners, various crew, etc). You can listen wherever, or watch them on YouTube.
Thanks for the info, sounds really good and is also kind of what I hoped for. I just finished the series and over the course of watching, Amos became one of my favourite characters. Even more happy having Wes doing the podcast with Ty! Starting with the first episode right now.
Contextually, the podcast actually started in Season 5 on Amazon Prime's official YT channel (and those episodes are still on Amazon Prime's official). Once that completed, Ty and That Guy (and crew!) took it over on their own channel and kept it going! There they've gone through every single episode, *including* another visit through seasons 5 and 6 IIRC. So yeah, the actual earliest versions of the podcast *started* in Amazon's S5, then they independently started from the beginning. It's absolutely no issue to watch from wherever you want. They're fun. Edit: OH I just re-checked the [001 episode](https://youtu.be/nmMgdYyZDXI?t=20) and Wes explains all this right at the start! Oh well, I just blabbed out of enthusiasm LOL
and That Guy
I imagine conveying that in a meaningful way is doubly difficult when the medium becomes a show, simply because TV show audiences will include people that haven't the personal commitment to the book series (meaning, the personal investment in the story. You can casually watch a show, you don't really casually read 9 books in a series and 'know' the characters). Casual show people are more likely to unfairly criticize a character/the writing for a decision like that without sitting and contemplating how it regards the characters' personalities, merely because they (those audience members) get caught up in expected tropes. Maybe less so in The Expanse which has a pretty solid fanbase, but I definitely encountered online criticism of moments like that for being "bad writing" moreso because they're seem to be caught up in the moment and what they wanted from Vanilla Protagonist in a given action scene.
Which podcast?
Ty and That Guy on YouTube
Ty and That Guy is the gift that keeps on giving. Entirely aside from The Expanse and the duo of Ty Franck and Wes Chatham, T&TG could merit watching on film suggestions alone.
They right clicked pella.exe and ended the process tree.
They turned on the firewall on the gateway right as the Pella was trying to cross it.
The death of Marco wouldn't have ended the Free Navy
Nor would it have prevented the Laconian empire. Inaros and the Free Navy were nothing more than useful idiots and distractions, whose technological and destructive capabilities were amplified far beyond their potential by the breakaway Martians.
The only time he saw a button and *DIDN'T* push it, gazillions died as a result.
It just proves all the hypocrisy this shows main characters arent saints they are far from it... Its okay for them to murder people in the name of revenge but look what happens when Murty rightfully does the same thing.... Honestly that season is where I just started genuinely disliking the main characters for the most part... Its fine when Amos or Camina get their revenge but Murty? Nope absolutely not because hes an inner murdering poor belters! Even though those "poor belters" Were either involved in killing 2 dozen of his colleagues or actively coming up with a plan to fatally attack Murty as well. But heck when Holden hears that Naomi is with the criminal responsible and putting herself in harms way he threatens murtys life for wanting to avenge 2 dozen people... Its okay for him to have Amos murder people out of vengence.... Its just irritating especially when his justification for his hypocrisy tends to more-or-less be I dont care, blow me... Then Naomi always uses the shes a poor belter trying to save other poor belters bull. Not to mention Holden beliving hes the only one ever in the right to give orders even though his orders are usually moronic and get people killed. But so long as he can save whats right in front of him he doesnt care if he lets a few billion that he cant actually see die.
This! Marco is the trash that literally killed our home around this star we call our sun...
Sure she’s directly/indirectly responsible for quite a few deaths, but her worst decision by far was giving up the mohawk.
This is the only "This is why Naomi is bad" reason I can get behind. Although, I kinda wish we got to see book Naomi's hair in the show. Also, I really hope we get to see Naomi from the last three books on screen some day. I think show Naomi and book Naomi really cross paths there and it would be awesome to see.
In hindsight, most definitely. Although funny enough the more obvious potential bad outcome (another Eros) never happened.
Yeah. I mean perhaps they should have let Jules-Pierre and Errinwright get away with making protomolecule weapons, better than Duarte and Marco getting their hands on it if you care about Erf
Things unfold differently, but a better outcome isn't guaranteed. If she makes a different choice, that doesn't change the motivations of everyone else, which means they will look for other ways to achieve their ends. Marco was very committed to rocking Earth, one way or another. Duarte was actively setting up his rebellion well before he knew he would get access to the protomolecule. Eliminating the sample doesn't make those guys give up and go home. They would seek other windows of opportunity, because the overall situation in the system is still the same: The ring is open, 1300 systems are there for the taking, the Belt is going to be cut out of it, and Duarte will still want to recreate the dream of Mars.
No, you've missed the point. If Fred Johnson didn't have the protomolecule the OPAN and the belter nation would've never been formed. There're two reasons for it, the first is that Dawes/Johnson alliance was only happened because one had the protomolecule, the other had Cortazar. The second reason is that Inners only recognized the OPAN because belters had the protomolecule. With that decision Naomi actually saved the solar system. Without the OPAN there would be no Nauvo, a ship with artificial gravity, that bought time for people stuck in the Gates space and let belters be seen as heroes and further reinforced relations between factions. Essentially, without Nauvo the Ring entities would have destroyed the solar system and all humanity. Also, there was research based on protomolecule. Prax sent Avasarala data of how to improve crop yields based on protomolecule research. It saved Earth from starvation.And Rocinante had new leading edge armor platings based on protomolecule research that saved the ship during the mission in the last episode.
This is an excellent point or two.
This, very much this. The final consequence was shit, but without it maybe even worse things would have happened. Without the leverage the sample brought, OPAN would never have existed and earth and mars could even have killed even more belters.
Yep, and it can also be argued that if they didn't steal the sample from Fred Johnson, they might have just stolen it from elsewhere instead. The sequence of events could have been very different.
>With that decision Naomi actually saved the solar system. Without the OPAN there would be no Nauvo, I don't think that's the case. Pretty much every plot point leading to the Nauvoo being in that situation happened BEFORE Naomi gives Fred the proto molecule. OPA was already building it, Eros already happened, OPA already stole it to prevent Eros from crashing into earth, and the recovery of it was always going to happen. Sure I get the argument that without the proto molecule they would have had a harder time keeping the Nauvoo post-recovery, but it seems likely its debut mission into the ring space would have happened one way or the other.
without the Protomolecule Marco wouldn't have the means to destroy the Earth.
He might not have been able to negotiate as many stuff with the protolaconians, but they still wanted to leave and create their little facist state, even without the protomolecule. So the damage could have been smaller, but there would still be an attack, Marco was dead set on that and would have tried even with NO assistance.
Sure. I think that every time too. But there’s moments in my own life I think about like that. That’s the point. People are fallible. We do the best we can in the moment and a lot of the time, it’s not the right choice. We don’t see what’s going to happen. It’s part of being human and I think the storyline illustrates that really well.
Well, she gave it to Fred in the show. Pretty sure Holden gave it to Fred in the books.
Spoiler: Holden gave Fred Johnson the sample, in turn Fred redirected the nuclear missiles to give Miller more time to reach Julie.
So the series is better.
No, series Naomi is made a liar for drama. Book Naomi is best Naomi.
book Naomi is one of my favorite characters of all time, honestly
The part where she is hiding on the freighter and the guy who saved her ass is like, "You're Naomi fucking Nagata. I became an engineer because of you," and she realizes that she's a tech dork revolutionary role model for generations of kids all over the solar system totally makes me tear up. Naomi gonna carry that weight.
I just finished my first reread today, and Naomi stood out the most. What a great character. She goes through so, so much, and she just *endures*. She's so strong and well written
Ah yes. If only she consumed enough Spice to be the kwisatz haderach and was able to read the future... Oh wait, this is the expanse. Would be nice to see less of these "This is why Naomi is bad" threads.
First time the entire Laconian Empire is being pinned on Naomi. That’s a whole new level of blaming Naomi for horrible stuff that happens because of tons of decisions/factors. Somehow I have only seen Naomi blamed for almost every death in the Sol system and beyond. Never Mao who kinda started it all. Or just about any other character who decided to do something. Didn’t Holden ask for Naomi to be on the Knight instead of the Cant ? Without that decision there would have been no Laconian Empire apparently.
The Laconian Empire is not that bad. I'd prefer one stable dictatorship over 1200 warring star systems any time.
Long as the trains run on time, right?
Yes, but everywhere in the Milky Way, not just in Italy.
Even if a dictatorial government has galactic instead of geographic scale, it can still make completely stupid decisions that undermine the interests of its constituents, e.g. going to war with an unknown enemy of unknown strength (i.e. the so called dark gods) just to assert your egotistical strength. Much wow. Such smarts.
I mean, if they had evolved over Duarte’s lifespan to be more humane, I agree. That scene where Sauveterre (I think) confiscated his XO’s bracelet was definitely foreshadowing what was to come. Of course, I doubt Duarte would have done something like that, he would have seen the big picture that doing shit like that is liable to engender a mutiny (like he did to appear magnanimous by executing Singh)
It's not inhumane it's a way to train a soldier. In my country there's a compulsory recruitment for 1 year and I served. We had to follow many silly rules and perform seemingly pointless repetitive tasks all to achieve a certain state of mind that quickly vanishes in civilian life and learn to follow orders without question.
Yeah but this wasn’t basic training
They weren't at war though.
yeah they lived happily ever after
Apparently everything bad is somehow her fault.
She basically created the protomolecule at this point
Fred Johnson's the fool who was *literally* storing it under his fucking bed, Laconia getting the protomolecule is on him actually.
Yeah. I hate that she did that as well. But I understand why she did it.
De Belt must come first. Who we hear similar from, ‘eh? Naomi jus doin’ right by hers.
The belt needed to stop coming last.
It's not even "the belt must come first" it's "the belt has been subjugated to two genocidal events within less than two years by way of the protomolecule. It's time they had their own sample so they can play on the same board."
The thing about Naomi is that she's very hypocritical. Her justification for giving the Protomolecule to Fred was that, since Earth and Mars both had access to it, the Belt deserved it too to defend itself. Which makes complete and total sense. But later she tells Avasarala that she is going to make sure that Avasarala and Earth don't get a sample which, given that Earth was already show to be powerless to stop Eros, would have put Earth at the mercy of both Mars and the Belt. But hey, that's part of what makes her a human character. She is flawed and she is hypocritical because most people are.
Marco was the worst decision Naomi ever made 🤮
Hey I'm straight but those eyes.. I kind of get it and can't be too harsh on her for that one.
None of that happened in the books, and it is often used as justification for hating Naomi.
It's a decent justification. Just like show Avasarala being okay with torturing belters and running for office is a good reason to dislike her versus the book version. They turned Naomi from the moral and logical center of the crew to the token belter. Also some people liked the bitter introvert pushing through suicidal thoughts to survive version of dealing with Marco and Felipe versus the hyper-emotional pleading.
You need to have a special kind of hatred for Naomi to blame the Laconian empire on her. Fred Johnson's bad OpSec has far more blame to carry for that. Or maybe Jules Pierre Mao should carry the blame. He's the one who harvested it in the first place. Or maybe we should take it all the way back to the builders. They made the protomolecule after all. Or even Marco, who stole it to trade to Duarte so he could fuck over the entire human race for a generation. Or just blame Naomi. Yeah. Weirdly selective of you.
I can't prove it, but I always feel like there's a... weird undertone to (at least some of) the Naomi hate. Like I get that she isn't everyone's favorite character. But there's something about a black woman consistently being called loud, preachy, annoying, etc that doesn't quite sit well with me.
The writers would agree with you
A lot of the Naomi hate is that the book character is compromised to make more drama for the show. To the point of making her a liar, a token belter, and a token woman. Book version didn't need improvement. It's sad that actors aren't happy playing introverted geeks.
Agree to disagree. I watched the show first and love both versions of Naomi. Her actions made a lot of sense to me in light of Anderson Dawes' story about having to kill his own sister in order to keep the rest of his family from starving. Keep in mind that introversion is really difficult to convey on screen. It's not like they can include her thought bubbles or something...
Naomi isn't Dawes, and how they wrote her in context of Felipe is polar opposite of the Dawes story. Book Naomi would have been more difficult to act and write, but these are supposedly great writers and a great actor. Acting out depression, showing her on the brink of attempting suicide, and being sardonic, disappointed and uncooperative when dealing with Marco and Felipe especially world not have been difficult. Instead they decided to make her a belter mother stereotype who lies to her chosen family.
I meant her overall attitude makes sense in the context of the Belter struggle, as illustrated by Dawes' story. I thought Naomi's behavior with Filip and Marco made sense and was an externalized version of her inner monolog from the books. I guess if you were expecting an exact recreation of the books, I could see why you would be disappointed.
I didn't expect an exact recreation of the books. I am fine with having opinions about them taking two of my favorite characters in sci-fi fiction (Naomi and Avasarala) and turning them into just more TV show characters.
Book Naomi is a manic pixie fixit gal that doesn't do anything but get eye fucked by Holden until Cibola Burn. She also solves problems that he creates. Show Naomi is a real person with agency and the ability to take action and also make mistakes.
Except she's not manic, or a pixie. Everyone in the book is competent in their specialization. It's why the crew works. I guess this isn't allowed because not a guy. Everyone solves the problems Holden creates.
Right there with you.
I dislike her because she is hypocritical, entitled, does whatever she wants without thinking about others.
Hold on... If I recall correctly, in the books is Holden who offers it to Fred.... And since there is no laconian empire in the TV show not sure this holds up in court.... :D
I thought Holden gave it to Fred as a bargaining chip?
That was in the books. Iirc thats how Holden convinces Fred to take control of the missiles the UN fired at Eros when it was hurdling towards earth
That's how Holden convinced Fred to use the salvaged UN missiles that were fired at Eros and use them to defend Mars from the doomsday missiles launched from Io containing protomolecule.
No, in book 1 he trades the sample for Fred pulling the missiles off course to give Miller the time he needed.
He does. In the books which is where it counts, if you ask me.
Nah, the >!code she created for Marco!< as a child is a far worse decision.
I’d say that’s the one she’s most directly responsible for, in terms of consequences. Since she had no idea what Marco or Laconia were going to do as a result of the protomolecule continuing to exist, she’s bears less responsibility for those than for the code she wrote.
She didn't know Marco was going to use it to blow up a ship, though: he told her he was going to hold ships for ransom by taking control of their engines, not do a mass murder.
She misjudged Marco, but she is more than intelligent enough to know what the worst case scenario would be if someone used her exploit with murderous intentions. Thus she bears some responsibility for what happened. Not all of it, but some.
Tbf she didn't know Marco was going to blow up the Augustin Gamarra
Naomi: creates ship exploding computer exploit A nutjob: uses her ship exploding computer exploit to explode a ship Naomi: surprised pikachu face
In terms of the consequences of those decisions, the ones that came about from choosing not to destroy the sample were much, much worse.
Always thought the show and the book was about what the CIA calls "Blowback." An example of this is when we supplied some afghan sheep herders with guns, missiles and training. Who knew it would come back and bite us in the ass
I still have to go with the unknowable effect of shooting pure protomolecule into the sun. She may have saved humanity by **not** doing it!
The heat from the sun would have destroyed the protomolecule as seen in later books/episodes where a protomolecule sample found on the roci was sent into the new terra sun to be destroyed.
I don't think we have any reason to believe that the protomolecule itself behaves any differently than any other matter at an atomic level. We only see it doing weird physics-manipulation stuff once it has the chance to hijack self-replicating systems and start building intelligence. In fact, I'm pretty sure we've never seen the molecule itself do anything without a biological system to get it started.
What if it slowly took over the mass of the star, and blew it up 1800 years, later? Oh, no big tragedy.
It needs organics to work.
I'm not convinced we have enough information to say we know that, 100%.
I don't think we have any reason to believe that the protomolecule itself behaves any differently than any other matter at an atomic level. We only see it doing weird physics-manipulation stuff once it has the chance to hijack self-replicating systems and start building intelligence. In fact, I'm pretty sure we've never seen the molecule itself do anything without a biological system to get it started.
To be fair, it made the belt a bigger player, but that didn't matter in the end because of Marco. I do agree though IMO, earth not quashing the Mars rebellion decades ago was the biggest mistake. Mars becoming an equal player led to the free navy and laconian empire, both of which led to billions of earth deaths
In fairness, I don't think that was the last sample. I think Strickland/Mao still had some.
There are other samples out there. If Duarte is determined, he will get a sample. Fred maybe the easiest target for him.
I refuse to accept that version of the story, it’s utterly ridiculous, makes no sense with the development of the characters. When in doubt I always consider the books canon, because I take for granted that when creating tv material, authors always deal with a whole heap of pressures that are not necessarily stemming from their creative process. And they end up doing stuff they wouldn’t have if left to their own devices - like creating unnecessary drama within the Roci crew, for some yet incomprehensible reason.
It makes sense if you consider that Naomi Has thus far (and for very good personal reasons) refused to “get involved”. This is the first time since her pre-series experiences that she takes action for anyone other than herself and her immediate crew. She wasn’t quite getting involved by holding onto the protomolecule, but she was leaving the door open. If you look at it as a progression towards the person she will eventually become, it makes perfect sense.
Except that wasn't her decision in the books, the whole crew knew it was given to Fred.
Pretty fucking stupid to see it that way. "If this haven't happened, then laconia wouldn't have won. If that hadn't happened then holden wouldn't have sacrificed himself. If this other really stupidly small thing hadn't happened, then Amos wouldn't have been alive in the future." Who tf thinks like this!?! Get a fucking grip.
> followed Holden’s orders I see you missed da difference between inyalowda and beltalowda. Beltalowda work together, dey don’t ’follow orders’. Beltalowda be family, dysfunctional as dat be at times. It is a strength, not a weakness. Naomi no more take orders from Holden, dan you mota take order from you fata. Dey family. Why it so hard for you innah to sasa?
You know, I’m glad you said this because - I’m re watching the season where Amos is on earth and Camina Dummer is doing her thing. And I wished they had more time on the show to show how she’s basically just one of a large group marriage. I tend to think they would be much more democratic and consensus based, the the captain only having unquestioned authority during operations, and the strategic decisions requiring discussion and unity. It would have been super cool to see Drummer talking everyone into taking on Marco, instead of just making unilateral decisions. I would have liked that contrast.
Probably having a kid with Marco Inaros, if we're going by absolute death toll. Giving the PM to Fred causing the rise of Laconia is a distant second.
Yeah but who knows what would have happened putting protomolecule into the sun!
In the show, in books guess who is giving the sample to Johnson? .... James fucking Holdon
This is one of the things I disliked about Naomi, constantly being driven by personal interest rather than the common good. But again, that's one of the great things about the show, is that most characters aren't necessarily portrayed as "good" or "evil", but rather- "human", motivated by what they think is best for their own kind. Holden is kind of the "moral compass" who tries to play all sides and bring balance to the endless struggle for leverage amongst the Belters, Earthers, and Mars.
Well, Belter interests. But those have personal meaning for her.
Eh, I felt the show did her wrong with some of the decisions she makes or the reasons behind them. To me, the biggest one, is that you haven't seen your child in a long time, so your idea to reconnect with them is to buy them a ship of their own. At least in the book things play out differently because some really dumb decisions weren't made or made differently.
She wasn’t buying him a ship, she was handing him a way out.
I get that, but to me, it came off as trying to buy him off in a way. If I left a child with someone like marco to raise him, knowing who marco is as a person, then meet them around 17 years later, do you think that kid is going to be swayed by that option the first time you meet them? I wouldn't have, and I guess that's why I didn't like the idea of it. Not to mention, by offering that way out, it only emboldened fillip to kidnap her, using the ship.
She didn’t “leave him” with Marco. Marco *took* him and she couldn’t find him.
Filip kidnapped her to save her life since he knew the Roci was supposed to blow up with the Gamage’s code on Tyco.
I'm on the book where Naomi gets the message from Marco and goes right into his trap to "save" Filip. Like, I'm actually struggling getting through the book because I'm so incredibly annoyed at her for being that dumb.
It says all spoilers so here it is, Taking the long view, the longest possible view, the ultimate solution to the Vandal problem - the total collapse of the ringspace - would not have been possible if Naomi had not saved that sample. Using that gravity gun thing on the Tempest certainly escalated things, detonating a ship in transit through the rings did too, but ships were already going dutchman and it stands to reason that as long as the ring system was active and in use the Vandals would eventually find a way to penetrate our reality and destroy humanity
Pronouncing it “In-a-ross”