The fight against the San-Ti begins in the 3 Body Problem episode 5, "Judgement Day."
Recruitment
Wade (Liam Cunningham) finds Raj (Saamer Usmani) on his ship. It's his first command and Raj makes it clear he's not interested in being recruited for MI-5, but Wade says he's not part of MI-5; Wade needs him to help defend far more than the country.
Clarence (Benedict Wong) asks Wenjie (Rosalind Chao) how she knows the aliens coming are "nice." He wants to know about the reply she got and why she replied to the San-Ti listener who warned their civilization would be doomed if she responded. She did it because people are no longer able to solve their own problems.
Auggie (Eiza González) looks out the window at the guards posted outside the country house where she and Jin (Jess Hong) are hiding. Auggie cautions her friend about taking too much medication for anxiety. She wonders where Raj is and why he isn’t there protecting them. Auggie feels trapped and doesn't want to be a "puppet" anymore. She's curious how long Wade's people will keep them there. Jin doesn't feel like she knows who to trust anymore.
ClarenceWenjie's story checks out and she's cooperated thus far, but he wants to know why? Wenjie says the Lord allowed her to be captured so what she knows has no value anymore. All she knows is that "they are coming." Clarence asks how Evans (Jonathan Pryce) factors into this, and whether he's Vera's father. Wenjie says Evans was never a father to her and she protected her daughter from him. Clarence knows she gave the helmet to Jin on purpose, and that it wasn't Vera's. Why? He brings up how long it takes to send a message to space but Evans is on his boat talking to people. She reminds him the San-Ti are much more advanced.
Later, Wade praises Clarence's meeting with Wenjie and says they need to gather data on the San-Ti, which means getting to Judgement Day and stealing the data. The problem is how many people are on the ship and how the data could be damaged. Clarence tells him the ship is heading for the Panama Canal soon.
Evans and Felix (John Dagleish) walk on the deck of Judgement Day. Felix notes that people are anxious and upset about the raid in England. Evans lies, claiming the raid happened because the Lord wanted it to, which means it's part of the Lord's plan. Evans returns to his office and gets on the radio, begging for them to answer him.
Clarence arrives at the safehouse and tells Auggie he needs her to resume production on the nanofibers. It's the only way to help them to stop the people who killed Jack (John Bradley). Together they go to the office as Clarence's men stand guard around the building. She needs a drink so he offers her his flask. After taking a long swig of his cheap whiskey, she gets to work. Auggie brings the system back online, but this time there aren't any numbers in her line of sight, which makes her curious. "I think the Lord stopped protecting its flock," Clarence guesses.
Wade meets with Raj and the group of soldiers hand-picked to go on this mission. Auggie and Clarence watch, asking why Wade picked Jin's boyfriend for the mission.
Panama
Saul (Jovan Adepo) and Jack's lawyer show up on the beach where Will (Alex Sharp) is getting high. The lawyer says Jack left him half of his fortune. It's a lot of money, but Will doesn't react. After the lawyer leaves, Will asks if Saul wants the money but Saul says Jack would have wanted him to spend it trying to find the best doctors. Will says he doesn't want to spend his remaining time being poked and prodded, rather he wants to look at the sky and eat good food.
In Culebra Cut, Panama, Raj's team sets up their operation using Auggie's nanofibers. Wade says this will all go down in 26 hours. Wade asks Auggie privately to double-check Raj's work. She asks if they can warn the Panamanians about the attack, but he reminds her that protecting a few people from their mission is less worrisome than aliens coming to their planet. He then tells Raj he doesn't trust Auggie and orders him to triple-check her work.
That night, Auggie and Raj eat dinner, she asks how many people are on Judgement Day. She accuses him of wanting to kill people without knowing who they are or why they have to die. She's not military, but this is a full scale attack. When she asks what he thinks is happening, he says they are at war.
Wade watches as a cruise ship passes through the canal. He gives an order to start the mission, and two pillars rise out of the water as the Judgement Day approaches. Auggie watches Wade and Raj, they're watching her, too.
On the ship, children eat their lunches while Felix studies his myriad computer screens. Evan looks at the microphone and is perplexed by the silence. The ship starts to pass through the channel. Raj says the fibers aren't working, but Auggie says they are. A man onboard the ship notices his water hose stops working and sees the hose has been cut. Soon he splits in half, too, as everything on the top deck suddenly splits in half, including a helicopter. Evans runs into the hall and sees a woman being cut in half.
Sophons
From the control room, Auggie and Raj watch the horror taking place on the ship.
Evans runs into Felix's office and takes a computer chip but doesn't tell his friend what's going on so he's quickly cut to pieces as Evans runs away. Evans gets to the engine room and realizes he's doomed, so he holds the computer chip close and accepts his fate.
The ship is in ribbons thanks to the nanofibers. Wade and Raj watch as it falls to pieces and helicopters put the fires out. Wade congratulates Auggie, who looks like she's about to be sick.
When Auggie gets to the site, she's overcome by the enormity of what she's seeing. Raj approaches as she stares in horror at the severed leg of a doll. The crews work through the night until the soldiers find Evans. Raj and Wade study the body before Wade dives in, searching for something. When he finds it, he realizes their operation is a success.
Two weeks later, Clarence paces as the team still tries to crack the chip. At the rate they're going it will take centuries to get in. But as they're talking, the chip suddenly opens. Clarence realizes the San-Ti wanted them to see it. The amount of data is more than anyone has ever seen.
Wade, meanwhile, describes the horror of the Judgement Day being torn apart to a silent Wenjie. "Sorry for your loss," he says casually as he keeps asking why the San-Ti would allow them to see the data. He presents a recording from the ship between Evans and their Lord. He leaves her to listen to it as Evans talks about humanity's inclination to lie when needed. Wenjie is horrified when she hears the voice say that they cannot co-exist.
Jin tries to call Raj and gets frustrated when he doesn't answer. She goes to the door to take a walk and finds Wade there. Wade mentions Raj and says after Raj's last mission, he needs someone who can understand higher dimensions. That's her.
In the office, Wade and Clarence show Jin the file. She thinks it's another level of the game, so they put the helmets on. The meet up with the game host AI. She tells them her people are doomed because the San-Ti won't arrive for another 400 years and by the time they get there, Earth will have developed enough to destroy them. "This isn't a conquest, it's a funeral procession." She says they have a plan to destroy Earth's science using a sentient sophon system. She explains the science of it and in the game they see the sophon system take over the world. The sophons have already been sent to Earth, to the research centers where the brightest scientists work. They'll have control of everything, just as they did with Vera and Auggie.
In London, Auggie is walking on the street when suddenly everyone stops and looks at their phones. It happens all over the world, on all of the screens. A message comes through: "You are bugs."
Everyone sees it, from Wade and Jin to Will and Saul to Wenjie. The sky is covered by the advanced AI system sent from the San-Ti. Wade and Jin rush to the roof, where Raj is already watching everything. A giant eye forms, and out in the middle of a small town Tatiana (Marlo Kelly) is there. She looks up into the sky and the AI system is reflected in her eyes.
The complete first season of 3 Body Problem is available to stream on Netflix now.
