The Expanse is an adaptation of a series of novels by James S. A. Corey, the pen name of the two authors who co-write the book series.
This series adheres to the books quite well, though it isn't one-novel-per-episode, more like one novel per season.
All of that aside, this is an excellent series. The characters are believable in their setting of a mostly-corporate-controlled future. The pacing is a bit iffy in the first few episodes, but by and large it isn't a problem and it does get better a few episodes in.
The setting is this:
There's Earth, whose government is torn with some seeking to control or best the government of Mars and the emerging government of the Belt.
There's Mars, who consider themselves pretty autonomous (and they are), and who are bent upon a generations-long project to terraform Mars so that men don't have to live under domes.
There's the Belt, which basically includes people in the asteroid belt and beyond.
If that amount of political upheaval isn't enough, something new is coming...
Let me just say this: read the books instead, but watch the show immediately afterwards? The production was beset by issues, dropped by SyFy and picked up by Amazon, then a key actor committed assault and the show was diverged to adapt for his absence, and when the Amazon bucks ran out the last season collapsed without delivering. The source material is great, vast geopolitical space opera with a micro lens through political intrigue, detective stories and the established trope of a tiny ship's crew falling in over their heads. Besides the production issues, I found that while the rest of the cast was excellent, Holden's character was played poorly, and his development didn't really come across without knowledge of the books. While the plot suffers from the production constraints, the story still feels exciting and it's fun to puzzle out which patois the Belter lingo is borrowing from at any given time. I can only wish they had a few more seasons to work with, but that's television as a medium...
