Amazon's 'The Expanse' revival is coming this year, and critics have compared the sci-fi series to 'Game of Thrones'
- Amazon will debut its revival of "The Expanse" this year, and all three previous seasons will be available to stream on February 8.
- Syfy canceled the show in May, but Amazon quickly saved it after fan outcry.
- The show's third season had a 100% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics have compared it to "Game of Thrones."
When Syfy canceled "The Expanse" in May, Amazon swooped in soon after to save the critically acclaimed science-fiction series.
The show's third season, which aired on Syfy last year, will be available on Amazon on February 8. The first and second seasons are already available in the US, so viewers can catch up before the fourth season premieres exclusively on Amazon Prime Video this year. The first three seasons will be available for international audiences on February 8.
Syfy canceled "The Expanse" due to declining ratings, but fans quickly called for the show's revival. A Change.org petition asking Netflix or Amazon to save the show gained nearly 139,000 signatures.
Amazon picked up the show after "Game of Thrones" author George R.R. Martin, and other notable personalities, sent an email to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos pleading for the show to be brought back.
Syfy described "The Expanse" like this: "Hundreds of years in the future, humans have colonized the solar system. The U.N. controls Earth. Mars is an independent military power. The planets rely on the resources of the Asteroid Belt, where air and water are more precious than gold. For decades, tensions have been rising between these three places. Earth, Mars and the Belt are now on the brink of war. And all it will take is a single spark."
"The Expanse" has an overall 90% Rotten Tomatoes critic score, and its third season had a perfect 100% critic score.
"'The Expanse' isn't perfect television, but entering Season 3 it is confident in the story it's telling and, more importantly, the kind of stories it wants to tell," Liz Shannon Miller wrote for Indiewire. "The intra-solar-system politics serve, by and large, as background for the more human tales, brought to the forefront by so many scenes which are just about people trying to help other people get by in an unforgiving universe."
The Ringer's Mile Surrey said that "The Expanse" is better than all of the current sci-fi shows on TV - including "Westworld," "Stranger Things," and "Star Trek: Discovery" - and compared it to "Game of Thrones."
"'The Expanse' has a surprising amount in common with 'Game of Thrones' beyond both shows' wide-ranging political conflicts and supernatural forces that could wipe out all of humanity," Surrey wrote. "Like 'Thrones,' 'The Expanse' has packed its universe with detail, and has done so with subtlety."