The Expanse (Seasons 1 and 2)

Title: The Expanse (Season 1: 2015, Season 2: 2017)
Developed by: Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby
Network: Netflix (Syfy)

The Expanse is a space opera series based on the book series of the same name by Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, and one of the few things I'll review on here (other than Iain M Banks' Use of Weapons) that I unreservedly like. It's engaging, it's refreshing, it feels genuinely new the way the sixth Star Trek, the second Battlestar Galactica or the third Stargate series never will.

It's got a slightly harder real-world science feel, though interplanetary travel still happens at the speed of the plot but LOOK HUSH YOU NEVER MIND, and vastly harder real-word politics as the solar system is divided between Earth and Mars, with natives from the asteroid belt and Jovian moons called Belters caught in the middle.

It's one of the few properties to get gritty/grimdark RIGHT. Game of Thrones and its imitators would have you believe that the black hats always win, the white ones lose, or if they do by some miracle not cock up everything irretrievably, it's by learning how to be arseholes.

But that's just as simplistic as the space operas and fantasies that grimdark has shivved on its way to the throne of popular culture. What the Expanse does is understand that reality is messy, people are messy, and if you want to be really gritty you've got to reflect that.

The characters are screwed up, sometimes trying to do the right thing, not always quite succeeding. Thomas Jane is an early standout as Joe Miller, a crooked cop assigned to track down a rich man's rebellious daughter, who gradually grows a conscience and a cause.

The pacing is a little odd, I'll give you that. The real climax from the first book takes place in the middle of season 2. Season 1 just kind of, like, abruptly ends, a bit like this se

The only genuine downside here is that it's so good, watching this show has kind of spoiled me on Star Trek Discovery, shining a spotlight on how cartoonish ST:D's attempts at seriousness are and how overly-reliant on cheap, unearned twists it is.