Who are the San Ti? What happened to the Trisolarans?

Today, Netflix dropped the first season of 3 Body Problem, a new sci-fi show from Alexander Woo, David Benioff and Dan Weiss, the latter two of whom created Game of Thrones for HBO. The new show is very different from the old one — it's set in modern times rather than medieval times and swaps White Walkers for extraterrestrials — but it still has an epic scope, and it's challenging in ways you don't often see on mainstream TV.

Those who have read the source material, the Remembrance of Earth's Past novel trilogy by Liu Cixin, will notice plentiful changes. While the bones of the story remain intact, a lot of the characters have been shifted around. Wang Miao, a nanotech researcher from the first book, has been replaced by a character named Auggie Salazar, who serves much the same function. The character of Yun Tianming from the third book, Death's End, is replaced by a new character named Will Downing. The integrity of the story remains the same but many of the names and faces are switched around.

And some of them are switched in interesting ways. Take the extraterrestrials at the center of the story. In the English translation of Liu Cixin's books, the aliens are called the Trisolarans, a reference to the fact that the live on a world with three suns. On the show, they're called the San Ti; we're told that, in Chinese, "san ti ren" means "three-body people," another reference to the three suns.

"San Ti" is the name of the aliens in the original Chinese version of the novels. Netflix has carried that over to the show.

Who is Clarence? What happened to Da Shi?

Other name changes are more curious. Take the cast of Da Shi, the detective character from the original Three-Body Problem novel. In the show, he's played by actor Benedict Wong, but he's never actually called "Da Shi." His boss Thomas Wade always calls him "Clarence."

This one is confusing, because in the press packet that Netflix gave out for the show, they refer to Wong's character as "Da Shi." And Wong talks about it directly.

Benedict Wong (pronouns: he/his) is Da Shi. An intelligence officer with an unorthodox style of
tradecraft. Da Shi investigates the ongoing mysterious deaths within the scientific community. My character’s name is Da Shi, which means 'envoy, ambassador, diplomat, or the bearer,' and Da Shi himself embodies these qualities in his role as a counter-terrorism operative," he says. "Da Shi is a flawed anti-hero with a genuine care for the greater good, making him the human aspect of the story."

So if his name is Da Shi, why is he only ever called "Clarence" on the show? Maybe "Da Shi" is really his name but Thomas Wade just calls him something else? Maybe they decided to change the character's name in the edit? I honestly don't know.

Oddities aside, 3 Body Problem is a solid show that hopefully finds an audience. You can watch all eight episodes from the first season on Netflix now.

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