Netflix sci-fi series 3 Body Problem begins with the Chinese Cultural Revolution of the 1960s.
Here’s what you should probably know about it.
This article contains spoilers for3 Body Problemepisode 1.
Netflixhas relentlessly promoted its latest big budget series,3 Body Problem, as a science fiction epic.
Imagine their surprise then when episode 1 Countdown opens with the text Beijing, Tsinghua University, 1966.
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Root out the bugs!
Sweep away all monsters and demons!
the teenagers cry as they raise their little red books to the heavens.
One man onstage tearfully confesses he is a counterrevolutionary and tearfully begs to be rehabilitated.
When he is carried off, Ye Wenjies own father is brought out.
A professor of physics, Ye Zhetai is challenged to denounce the theory of relativity as American imperialism.
He refuses to refute the science even when his wife is summoned onstage to beg for forgiveness.
What viewers witness in this moment is an example of what went down during the Chinese Cultural Revolution.
In other ways, however, he was not.
We think it would and were here to help with that mission.
But first: a word of warning.
It is in no way a scholarly examination of Chinese history.
For all of its recorded history up to that point, China was ruled by monarchial dynastic families.
Though these were all distinct dynasties Tang, Yuan, Ming, Han, etc.
Things fell apart thanks to two unlikely bedfellows: Chinese nationalists and Chinese communists.
That attempt was ultimately not successful.
From 1927 through 1949, the nationalists and the communists were embroiled in a bitter civil war.
The communists were ultimately victorious and Chairman Mao Zedong established the Peoples Republic of China in 1949.
The nationalists retreated to the island of Taiwan where they established the Republic of China.
Mao Zedong planned to accomplish this by using sheer man power rather than Western machinery and capital expenditure.
Small communities were expected to begin developing steel in backyard furnaces in addition to their farming duties.
The program was repealed by 1960.
What Was the Chinese Cultural Revolution?
Young people in China were tremendously disillusioned with the state of their country.
So Mao began a propaganda campaign to tear down the last vestiges of Imperial China and preserve communist ideology.
The disaffected students reveled in the opportunity to let out their frustration with the bourgeoisie adults in their lives.
When Mao died in 1976, the Cultural Revolution effectively came to a close.
Those 10 years of Cultural Revolution still loom large for many though.
And as well come to see throughout3 Body Problem, they loom particularly large for Ye Wenjie.
All eight episodes of 3 Body Problem are available to stream on Netflix now.
