Alas, history often forgets that a fifth character survives the Canterbury’s decimation: Shed Garvey.
Most significantly,killing Shed spells out very clearly from the start thatThe Expansewill pull no punches.
Major characters will die, and the coming conflict is a high-stakes slug-fest where nobody is ever really safe.
The tactic works, largely becauseThe Expanse’s opening episodes never treat Shed like a redshirt.
The audience is invited to invest in Shed, become attached to him, even.
Then the character is ruthlessly taken away in a split-second due to pure dumb luck.
Custom image by Ana Nieves
Shed Garvey is also, in truth, too nice to survive.
Of all the Canterbury stragglers, Shed seems the most normal by far.
The Expanse season 6 brought the live-action Amazon series to a dramatic close.
The Expanse is a sci-fi series set in the distant future where humanity has spread out across the solar system, but the alliances between the three most potent governing bodies have reached a state of the cold war. In the series, a mixed crew finds themselves at the center of a dangerous intergalactic conspiracy that threatens to bring war to the colonized worlds.
But why did the story end here, with 3 books still to adapt?
In a practical sense,Shed would have filled a role that the Rocinante always lacked: a medic.
Shed could have brought a very different vibe to the Rocinante.
Shed also would have been the best-placed member of the Rocinante crew to studyThe Expanse’s Protomolecule.
A second way Shed’s survival rewritesThe Expanseis through his impact on the main cast’s chemistry.
Instead, the fallen hero is denied such a privilege.
