Topics:
- Reading Schedule
- Reflection
- One of the Characters most likely miller
- socio-economic lens
- interview
The reason why I chose this novel is because I have seen the show adaptation three times. The show is called The Expanse, and it is currently my favourite show of all time. I wanted to see the differences between the two mediums. As to why I liked the show, I love sci-fi shows and movies; it is my favourite genre. What is different about The Expanse is that the show takes place in approximately 200 years from now. Humanity has colonized the solar system but it not like star trek where there is no realism. This show is for the most part, physically accurate, and has realistic conflicts that are similar in ones in our history. At the beginning of the book, I have learned that Detective Miller is a good detective, but also detective that dives too deep into a case and has some internal conflict. Miller is a Belter; people who live in the asteroid belt and are oppressed by the richer nations of Mars and Earth. He works for an Earth company that manages the security of his home, Ceres Station. He feels conflicted with the fact that he is working for the same people who brought his people to poverty. Miller’s detective skills are exceptional. He was trying to find the other main character, James Holden, and his crew after they supposedly escaped the destruction of two spaceships. He was able to distill that they travelled to the backwater Station of Eros and he found them at a very specific hotel deep in the station. On his search for Holden and his crew, he takes a wild guess and ventures to Eros to find Holden, “‘I hope I’m right about this,’ he said to Julie. ‘If Holden’s not there, I’m gonna feel pretty stupid.’ In his mind, she smiled ruefully Life is a risk, she said” (Corey 211). Miller kept seeing hallucinations of the girl he was tasked to find, and ultimately shut down. His wife left him years ago and he was been alone since. He wants something more to do with his life so he continues to try to find the girl to make him feel fulfilled. “In his mind, she held him, her body against his in a way that was more comforting than erotic. Consoling. Forgiving. This was why he had searched for her. Julie had become the part of him that was capable of human feeling.” (Corey 285)
In the second half of the book, Detective Miller has shown that he is a rational being. The good of the solar system is more important than telling everyone the truth. He has a pessimistic view of the system and is able to realize that some things needs to be killed and some things need to be hidden from the general public. During his fight with holden, he says “‘Let me finish! And now you find some data that implicates Earth. First thing you do is blab it to the universe, so that Mars and the Belt drag Earth into this thing, making the largest war of all time even bigger. Are you seeing a pattern here?’” (Corey 328). Miller went from a person that would not sacrifice himself to one that ended up saving Earth from extinction by caring for a girl he searched the entire asteroid belt for; a girl that he does not know. In the story, Miller, “rocked her gently, like he had Candace on a sleepy Sunday morning, back when she’d still been his wife, back in some distant, near-forgotten lifetime.” (Corey 543) During** multiple incidents caused Miller to think about who he is and who he was a person. Part of Miller’s mind—the part that was still a cop and not a soldier—twitched at that. They were civilians. Killing them was, at the very least, bad form. But then Julie whispered in the back of his mind, No one here is innocent, and he had to agree” (Corey 405)
The universe of The Expanse is divided by three groups of people who not only hate each other, but have their own economic and social situations. There is an established hierarchy between the inner planets, Earth and Mars, and the Belters. The asteroid belt is rich in resources that the inners need. In the story, Earth has its security force, Star Helix, control the largest asteroid in the belt, Ceres. This creates a system where Belters are subordinate to inners. Belters are the laborers who were robbed of economic freedom. (quote about stopping shipments). The inners charge heavy fees to Belters for them to dock their ships at stations. A rising movement called the OPA (Outer Planets Alliance) started because of unfair treatment of Belters.
Belters are seen as sub-human to inners. They are considerably taller because of the low gravity environment they live in. Many are malnourished because much food is sent to the inner planets. In the story, there is this alien substance called the protomolecule that feeds off of a lot of mass. It was originally meant to go to Earth billions of years ago. Scientists unleashed it on Eros station which housed one and a half million Belters. The people were nothing but biomass to Inners.
There are some characters who break the social order. The daughter of the one of the richest men in the galaxy, Julie Mao, decided to leave her riches to go join the Belters even though she is from Earth. Fred Johnson, a commander in the United Nations Navy, joined the Belters and became one of the leaders of the OPA. Miller says that the true conflict is not between inners and belters, but, “the people who thought it was a good idea to kill people who looked or acted differently against the people who didn’t” (Corey 382)
The one-sided war between Mars and the Belt, Earth destroying Deimos (moon of mars), and the genocide of people on Eros could only happened because of the safeguarding of information. Information, regardless of how truthful it is, can be used as a weapon to get sides to fight against each other. The Earth-based company Protogen destroyed the Canterbury ice hauler, and the Donnager battleship to make a smokescreen around what they were doing with the alien substances. Companies like the Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile bypass law and control politicians. REWRITE THIS GARBAGE