The episode opens with Saul going to Vera Ye’s house and visiting her mother. He shares a theory with Ye that the blinking stars were a deep fake. Which is interesting considering he saw it with his own eyes. We cut to Auggie who is at work, testing something new. Her countdown is now down to 9 minutes and counting. After a successful test, Auggie becomes startled as she sees her time running out. She orders that her company stop development immediately. She frantically escapes the building, sees her countdown approaching zero, and it suddenly fades away. She was able to make it stop by shutting down her work, just like Tatiana said. Clarence is there and makes himself known to her. At first, Auggie wants no part, but then he asks her if she wants to know why the stars flickered for her. Now he’s got her attention.
Flashback to Inner Mongolia, China, 1968. Ye needs to get in contact with an American scientist named Dr. Peterson. She also expresses the belief that there must be other intelligent life out there in the universe. She hears back from Dr. Peterson and his findings help her realize something. Ye argues that they could use the sun to amplify their radio waves out to the universe. She claims this would be their best chance at interstellar communication. Her superiors reject her idea as it is seen as too radical. During the next transmission signal test, Ye sneaks her way to point the satellite at the sun without permission. The transmission goes through without anybody knowing.
Back in the present day, Clarence tells Auggie about Mike Evans, who owns the biggest private oil company on the planet. Clarence shows Auggie the security footage from the night she interacted with Tatiana, but Tatiana is nowhere to be found. It looks like Auggie is talking to herself. Clarence tells her that someone may have scrubbed the footage, but there’s no trace of that which is odd. He also tells her about the other scientists who have seen the countdown. How some of them died like Vera, and others survived like Auggie.
Jin is sitting in her house and becomes tempted to try the video game again. She enters the game, and this time two characters walk up to her. One calls himself The Count of The West and the other is a young girl called The Follower. Jin must choose a name for her character and she picks Copernicus. The Count explains that he is taking her to see the emperor, and he must decide if the next era is a chaotic era or a stable one. The catch is, if he chooses wrong the entire civilization would be destroyed. Jin asks how this is possible, but just before The Count has a chance to explain, the sun starts coming up and they all must find shade. Jin, The Count, and The Follower all huddle together behind a big rock. As the sun continues to rise their cover fades. The Count pushes The Follower out into the sun. She begs him not to abandon her, but he ignores her. She shrivels up and seemingly dies. However, the Count begins to explain that she is not dead, just dehydrated. The way to revive her is by rehydrating her, but they cannot since this civilization is going through a chaotic era.
After this, Jack comes over and Jin explains the game to him and he tries it. In the game, a woman approaches Jack and says he doesn’t belong and slices his throat. Jack takes the mask off, startled. He insists on playing again. He enters the game and is immediately killed again. Jin tries the game this time and we cut to her phone and then to Clarence, who is listening in on her and Jack’s conversation.
Saul sleeps outside of Auggie’s house after a night out and a ton of missed calls from her. Auggie explains to him that she is probably going to get fired after shutting down the project. She is upset at Saul for not being there for her.
Jack returns to his house and a package is waiting for him. It’s the video game helmet, and Jack immediately puts it on. This time his time in the game is similar to Jin’s. The Count and The Follower go up to him, but Jack thinks he is going to get attacked again so he punches him a few times. In the next scene, Jack is sitting outside with Will. Will reveals to him that he has Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer. Jack is determined that this isn’t the end for Will and he’s not going to let Will give up. Will seems happy that Jack cares this deeply about him.
We cut back to Jin who’s in her game. The Count begins his prediction. Jin recognizes what he is doing and argues to the Emperor that it’s not scientific, it doesn’t follow any of the laws of physics. The emperor appears to have no idea what Jin is talking about. The Count interrupts to give his prediction. He says the chaos era will last 8 more days, and then they will enjoy a stable era of 63 years. The Count tells Jin to put her hand on the ground. She has the ability to speed up time by doing this. She skips 8 days, to the beginning of the stable era, and the mass rehydration can begin. We see a sequence of people coming back to life as they are tossed into the water, including the follower. She and Jin reunite and hug as she thanks Jin for not abandoning her.
Jin points up into the sky, and The Count realizes he may have been wrong with his prediction. Jin makes her way to The follower, to try and save her, but is too late. The girl freezes up and seemingly dies. A guide comes to her and tells her that while she didn’t save this civilization, she did establish that science is greater than mysticism. In level 2 she must use science to save another civilization.
Clarence meets with Thomas Wade and finds out about a signal in 1977 that looked like an attempt at interstellar communication. He says it was an attempt by “little green men” and they don’t know what the signal says because nobody has been able to decode it, except for one observatory in Northeast China. Then, Thomas inquires about Mike Evans again. That’s when Clarence implies that Mike was the one.
This is when we flashback to China, in 1977. Young Ye comes across an American man. He is trying to save the lives of a bird species. She explains that they want to build a radio lab there, but he doesn’t want them to destroy an ecosystem. Ye speaks to him about how she believes in preserving the environment too. They properly introduce each other, she as Ye Wenjie, and him as Mike Evans. She says she will try to stop them.
The man Ye is working with offers her a chance at revenge, against the girl that killed her father at the beginning of the show. Ye shows up, wanting her to repent, but she shares that she had her arm cut off against her will after it was infected when she was a child. Ye says she was just a child when she killed her father. The girl refuses to repent, claiming “No one repents.”
Ye is listening to the radio waves when she hears a transmission, perhaps the one Clarence was referring to. It says “Do not answer” three times. The message goes as follows: “I am a pacifist in this world. You are lucky that I am the first to receive your message. I am warning you: do not answer. If you respond, we will come. Your world will be conquered. Do not answer.” Ye ignores their warning and begins aiming the satellite. She is typing out her message. Her message reads: “Come, we cannot save ourselves. I will help you conquer this world.” She hovers her finger over the button to send it, and she presses it.
Episode 2 was riveting, exciting, and gripping. 3 Body Problem did an excellent job of progressing the plot, expanding on our main characters, and hooking the audience in. There is so much going on in this series but they’ve managed to balance it all very well. Nothing is confusing and that’s due to the sharp writing. The performances from the core cast members complement that sharp writing. This all makes for a top-tier Science-Fiction show audiences have been craving.
Rating: 9/10