The future is happening. Although the Season 1 finale of 3 Body Problem was confined to a contemporary timeline on Earth, this science fiction epic is about to jump centuries into the future and beyond. As of now, 3 Body Problem has been renewed, which seems to mean the entire story — spanning all three novels — will be fully realized in the daring Netflix series. For those who were nervous about the show getting an official renewal, that moment for worrying is over. And the biggest 3 Body storylines are now all going to happen.
In an announcement straight from Netflix, 3 Body has been renewed, which prompted showrunners David Benioff, D.B. Weiss, and Alexander Woo to issue the following statement:
“We’re thrilled that we get to tell this story through to its epic conclusion. Ever since we read the last page of Cixin Liu’s magnificent trilogy, we hoped we’d be able to bring the audience to the end of the universe with us. Here we go!”
The note that the the show will bring the audience to “the end of the universe,” is interesting, a mild spoiler for the conclusion of the third book in the trilogy. While you might think the 3 Body showrunners are talking about the end of the universe, in a kind of physical sense of a boundary, this also refers to the last day of everything. Yes, although the first novel, The Three-Body Problem takes place on a mostly contemporary Earth, the final book, does get us all the way to the end of time.
But, for Season 2, it’s unlikely that the show will get all the way to the end. Instead, the future-tense setting of the next installment of 3 Body Problem will almost certainly be 200 years in the future. In the book, Wallfacer Luo Ji hibernates for two centuries and has a confrontation with the Trisolorians in that timeframe. In the show, Saul (Jovan Adepo) is the stand-in for Luo Ji, meaning, he will certainly end up 200 years in the future, dealing with the San-Ti, possibly, in a graveyard.
That said, the finale of 3 Body Problem Season 1 used elements from the beginning of the final book. The brain of Will Downing (Alex Sharp) being put in a spacecraft, on a course for the San-Ti fleet, is something that unfolds in the third book. In short, Season 1 of 3 Body Problem adapted all of the first book, but took elements from the second and third novels, too, in order to set-up the future jumps that are coming.
So, now that Netflix is doing the whole story, Season 3 or Season 4 of the show will find itself at the end of time. But, before that, in Season 2, we’re going to the 23rd century, for sure.
