3 Body Problem Bosses Break Down The Horrific Boat Scene

Warning: The following contains spoilers from 3 Body Problem Season 1.

If you've finished 3 Body Problem Season 1 then you will immediately recognize anyone referencing "the boat scene." It is the turning point for the entire season, one of the most anticipated scenes from Liu Cixin's novels, and one of the most complex and horrifying sequences in the Netflix show.

The boat scene takes place in Episode 5, "Judgment Day," after Wade (Liam Cunningham) finds out that Michael Evans (Jonathan Pryce) has kept a record of every interaction with the aliens coming to invade Earth, the San-Ti, since Wenjie (Zine Tseng) contacted them in the 1960s. He believes that having those communications is the key to helping humans prepare for the San-Ti invasion, but he also knows that Evans will have the hard drive saved in the most secure part of the Judgment Day battleship. It'll be moved or taken off the boat if his team tries to go aboard without Evans knowing.

So Wade turns to Auggie (Eiza Gonzalez) and asks to use her nanofiber technology to create a battleship-destroying weapon. As Judgment Day sails through the Panama Canal, Auggie's nanofibers cut through the ship — and its residents — at every three feet until the entire boat collapses into deli slices on the bank. Wade and his people then go through the rubble to find Evans' remains and the hard drive.

It's a terrifying, nonstop sequence that bounces between the boat being annihilated by seemingly invisible fibers and Wade, Auggie, and Raj (Saamer Usmani) orchestrating the attack.

"Even in the novels, it is described in very vivid detail. It is the most memorable thing for most people who read the books. The challenge here was that we needed to at least meet, if not exceed, people’s imaginations when they read the book," executive producer Alexander Woo explained during a roundtable interview with multiple outlets including GameSpot. "[We wanted] to give them everything that sequence implies. The logistical side took up probably more hours of blood and sweat per frame than any other sequence in the show."

Woo and his co-creators D.B. Weiss and David Benioff explained how they tackled bringing the scene to television. Even before they could dive into the logistics of filming the scene, they had to create an understanding of Auggie's technology that kept viewers engaged until the massive set piece took place.

"One thing we had to figure out was making sure you knew what was going on during it, so that you didn’t need it explained to you in the moment because explaining about nanofibers slicing things is going to kill the buzz of the sequence, to say the least," Weiss explained during the same interview. "Storywise, there was a challenge of sneaking things onto the board in the episodes that preceded Episode 5 in a way that were dramatic and interesting in their own right--and gave you, without knowing it, a sort of tutorial in what was going to happen on the boat."

When it came to actually filming the scene, every production team on the series was involved. Lines were drawn on the wall of the ship set so actors and camera people would know where the fibers would be slicing everything. Then there were dozens of meetings about what during the sequence would be filmed practically, what would be done with visual effects, and what would be a combination of both.

"Obviously, the people are real right up until the moment when they get turned into deli slices. That stuff needed to be handed off from practical people looking afraid to the visual effects of people getting chopped into pieces and falling to the ground," Weiss continued. "It was really fun, in a gruesome sort of way. There were really funny production meetings about which department was going to do which thing and how they were all going to get stitched together. It took a lot of thinking on the part of every person… All the practical effects people and everyone work[ed] together in unison and on the same page to make it happen exactly when it needed to happen."

The scene's purpose was not just to showcase the impressive production and visual effects team on 3 Body Problem. It is a major turning point in the season as Auggie realizes just how far Wade is willing to go to prepare for the San-Ti, and how she wants no part of it. She is ill over helping Wade murder thousands of people for the sake of one hard drive, and it shows viewers how high the stakes are for the potential invasion. The creators wanted to make sure the audience understood every player's position as the boat and its riders were cut into pieces.

"The other thing that was important to us was the moral question of what’s happening in that sequence where our extensible good guys are killing thousands of people for some potential greater good down the line. For that to work, we had to lay some groundwork early on to have those characters be people you understand and care about," Woo elaborated. "It was important to see Auggie’s reaction to what her technology that she was developing for good, to see what it’s now done. We needed to see Raj, who signed on not knowing what it was going to be and to see Wade, who I think was pretty happy with how things turned out."

The executive producer said pulling off that narrative weight wasn't on the behind-the-scenes team, but everyone in front of the camera pulling the strings within the story.

"Even though that’s not as much the technological whiz-bang, that relied on our actors to convey the emotional heft of what was happening, which makes that sequence all the more memorable," Woo said.

3 Body Problem Season 1 is now streaming on Netflix. For more, be sure to read our breakdown of what really happened to Wenjie in the finale.