Not a lot of space opera sci-fi shows come out in the streaming era. There was, however, a time when space operas absolutely dominated the genre and set an incredibly high bar for ambitious galactic worldbuilding and narratives spanning across the universe. Shows like Firefly, Babylon 5, and Battlestar Galactica truly gave a glimpse of how stories set in the stars could reflect humanity’s biggest questions.
Over a decade late to the party, Prime Video’s The Expanse eventually accommodated the same place as the genre classics. During the early years of its run, The Expanse gradually garnered a cult following with its compelling take on the original novels of the same name. Owing to this, it was later revived by Prime Video after Syfy canceled it.
In the years that followed, The Expanse only grew from strength to strength, allowing it to establish itself as a long-running sci-fi masterpiece. Even though The Expanse, too, could not conclusively reach the end of its source material’s story, it achieved some semblance of closure with its 6-season run. In hindsight, it is hard not to see how the Prime Video sci-fi show is still the gold standard for space operas.
The Expanse Stands Out As A Rare Prestige Space Opera In The Streaming Era
Prestige network sci-fi shows from the bygone golden eras were not built on algorithms. Instead, they took a slow, long-term approach towards building their worlds and intentionally took a while to find their feat. The Expanse is a rare series from the streaming era that adopts a similar approach. In season 1, it spends hours establishing the sheer logistics of its futuristic world.
From station politics on Ceres to detective noir investigation procedural work, it gradually walks through all the shades and aspects of its overarching story before fully revealing the bigger scope of its story. Compared to the latter seasons, even the displays of spectacle and high-concept ideas are relatively tame in The Expanse‘s opening arcs.
After significantly defying the norm in its early seasons, The Expanse even faced the threat of cancellation. While many factors contributed to this, one was its high production cost, which almost led to its doom.
Fortunately, Amazon gave The Expanse a second chance to finish what it started. When it returned, it surprisingly held on to the approach that initially helped it earn almost unanimous acclaim. As a result, it spent hours showing the conversations on the Rocinante while also highlighting the harsh realities of living in low gravity.
Even some of the most ambitious additions to the sci-fi genre these days only tackle one season at a time. With its original authors, Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck, actively involved in the writers’ room with showrunner Naren Shankar, The Expanse defied the norm and set its eyes on a multi-season arc, which eventually worked wonders for the Prime Video sci-fi series.
The Expanse Achieves A Rare Blend Of “Hard Sci-Fi” & “Space Opera”
Even some of the greatest space operas from the ’90s and early 2000s focus more on space-centric melodrama and less on hard sci-fi. They come off more as fantastical dramas that only adopt a tinge of sci-fi to drive their character-driven stories. While The Expanse, too, is heavily driven by its character beats, the show manages to balance them with compelling high-concept ideas.
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When The Expanse introduces highly speculative concepts and elements like the Epstein Drive and the strange Protomolecule, it arguably drifts more towards fantasy than sci-fi. However, even with these concepts, it always ensures that it does not push the suspension of disbelief too far.
The show achieves this by grounding these ideas in relatable human conflict and even portraying the Protomolecule as a reflection of the universe’s cosmic indifference towards humanity.
Prime Video’s The Expanse undoubtedly achieved greatness in its 6-season run. It would have had an even better reputation if it had completed its run and covered the entire span of its source material. However, even with an incomplete story, it remains one of the greatest space opera sci-fi shows of all time.
The Expanse is a sci-fi series set in the distant future where humanity has spread out across the solar system, but the alliances between the three most potent governing bodies have reached a state of cold war. A mixed-up crew finds themselves at the center of a dangerous intergalactic conspiracy that threatens to bring war to the colonized worlds.
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