The Expanse / Tropes N to Z

A - E | F - M | N - Z |

N

• Naïve Newcomer: Havelock, an Earther who's new to Ceres, plays The Watson for the first couple episodes.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast:
  • Fred Johnson is known as "The Butcher of Anderson Station", and Naomi is understandably leery of putting the crew in his hands.
  • Naming a ship Anubis (after the Egyptian god of embalming and the afterlife) seems like you want it to turn into a Ghost Ship.
  • Marasmus is a medical term for extreme malnutrition, making it a rather disturbing name for a ship delivering humanitarian aid.
• Never Give the Captain a Straight Answer: Alex gives Capt. McDowell the, "You gotta see this," version regarding the Distress Call in "Dulcinea". Since it's just one room over, McDowell doesn't even ask.
• Never Suicide: Unlike many examples, it's actually entirely plausible Frank DeGraaf would kill himself, but Avsarala doesn't believe it. She digs and finds hidden files in his home office, which provide the info she needs to finally understand the conspiracy.
• N.G.O. Superpower: With hundreds of subsidiaries, Mao-Kwikowski Mercantile is the largest corporation in the solar system, capable of financing all of The Conspiracy's protomolecule experiments, as well as a private fleet of stealth ships more advanced than anything Earth or Mars can field.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • Holden's broadcast implying Martian responsibility for the destruction of the Canterbury provides the OPA with fodder that provokes deadly riots on Ceres and nearly provokes an interplanetary war.
  • Drummer's decision to spare Marco Inaros when the Belters have him in an airlock. Inaros goes on to kill a lot of people, including Klaes Ashford, Fred Johnson, the Martian government, and billions of Earthers.
• Nice to the Waiter: When they first get to Tycho, Amos asks a prostitute how they're treated here on the station (He answers 'not bad', and that it's better than some other places he's heard about). Afterwards, Amos explains to Alex that you can tell a lot about a place by the way they treat their workers.
• Noble Bigot with a Badge: Zigzagged with Miller, who'll engage in bribery, Police Brutality, and threaten to have guys Thrown Out the Airlock, but also lets Diogo off with a warning after catching him siphoning the governor's water.
• Nobody Poops:
  • Averted in "Windmills" when Kenzo insists, "You tell whoever's in charge that I have valuable information... and Christ, I've had to pee for like two hours now," and the final scene opens with him following through on this need.
  • Averted again in "Safe" when Naomi says she has to pee while supervising the opening of the safe recovered from the Anubis, and Amos responds that the ability to pee at will is one of the perks of a vac-suit.
• No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Being a Good Samaritan in this show sucks.
  • Holden's decision to answer the Distress Call in the first episode leads to the Canterbury being Lured Into Atrap.
  • A crew of doctors decide to spearhead a humanitarian mission to Eros after the 'disaster', only be caught in the middle of the protomolecule conspiracy. They are Killed to Uphold the Masquerade, only for the masquerade to be broken anyway.
  • The husband-and-wife crew who run the Weeping Somnambulist try to deliver relief supplies to Ganymede after the battle, only to have their ship commandeered by Holden and Amos to sneak the Roci crew onto the station. In the ensuing chaos, the husband is killed when corrupt security staff on the station try to steal their cargo and ship.
• No MacGuffin, No Winner:
  • In "Safe", Mars figures out something is up on Phoebe Research Station, which someone has gone to conspicuous lengths to cleanse of any evidence. When an Earth ship tries to get there first and looks like they'll succeed, the Martian captain blows up the entire moon rather than let them secure it. This works out fine for the conspiracy, which wanted the evidence hidden.
  • Miller kills Dresden, keeping him from aiding anyone in gaining control of the protomolecule.
• Non-Action Guy: Shed Garvey, the Lovable Coward.
• No Name Given:
  • The Canterbury's original XO.
  • Avasarala's grandson is credited as "Avasarala's Grandson #1".
• No OSHA Compliance:
  • Many corporations and landlords cut corners anywhere they can, including life-support systems and safety equipment, resulting in very unsafe living and working conditions. As Holden notes in "Dulcinea", it's cheaper to settle with a bunch of widows than to overhaul the Canterbury.
  • Many poor Belter entrepreneurs can't afford these things for themselves either, resulting in sometimes even worse conditions on privately-owned ships.
• No-Paper Future: All personal and professional information and communication is stored on a network accessed by almost incorporeal hand terminals. Anything to be kept off the grid is kept in data chips. Purchases are all made either through electronic transfers or plastic coins. Justified beyond Earth (and perhaps there, too) by the obvious lack of trees. In such a world, it says a lot that Holden's parents keep actual printed books, and that Alex keeps a carbon-copy picture of his family and Miller keeps one of Julie Mao. Franklin De Graaf is positively quaint in his habit of taking notes in a little black notebook with a pencil^note The pencils themselves are data devices that track their user's strokes and the stored information can be read by pressing the pencils up against modern hand terminals.
• No Product Safety Standards:
  • Belters who were given cheap hormone boosters as children can have physical deformities as a result. Miller, for instance, has ridges at the top of his spine where the bones didn't fuse properly.
  • Many older Belters like Anderson Dawes have tell-tale scars around their necks where faulty EVA helmets caused electrical burns. Many younger Belters have similar marks tattooed on their necks as a way to show where they come from.
• No Range Like Point-Blank Range: 'CQB' (Close Quarters Battle) is the term for when ship-to-ship combat has gotten too close for the use of missiles. CQB combat tends to happen at distances of only a couple hundred meters, maybe about one kilometer at most, with both sides hammering each other with manually aimed gatling gun barrages.
• No-Respect Guy: Downplayed with Fred Johnson, who does command the respect of many but still struggles constantly with OPA members who resent him for being an Earther and The Butcher of Anderson Station.
• Not Even Bothering with the Accent: Unlike most Belters, Miller has a generic American accent and Naomi has a British accent ^note The actors were cast before the series had fully fleshed out the idea of a 'Belter accent', and it didn't become a Belter trademark until about halfway through the first season. Miller's accent is pointed out to be part of his overall effort to dress and act like an Earther, while Naomi engages in code switching.
• Nothing Personal: Amos tells Kenzo precisely this in "Windmills":
  Amos: I'm not gonna lie to you. Either way this plays out, you're dead, and I'm the one that's gonna bring you the good news. You're a loose end. It's nothing personal.
• No True Scotsman:
  • In "Godspeed", an OPA operative asks Miller, "How the hell you Belter, never done no space-walk ever?" He replies, "I'm more of a city Belter."
  • Alluded to in "Assured Destruction". When talking with the crew of the Roci, Avasarala keeps assuming that Naomi, as one of the "good" Belters, would not want to be associated with the OPA and seems to be completely unaware of of all the factionalism/infighting within the OPA.
• "Not So Different" Remark:
  • The Belter smuggler in "The Big Empty" points this out to Avasarala: "I'm just a citizen of the Belt. I work for the future of my people as you do for yours."
  • Amos says this to Miller after Holden banishes the latter from the Roci in "Static", but he also takes time to explain that he chooses to follow Holden because Holden is one of the few righteous people left.
  • Wei uses this to try and appeal to Amos, asking him to come over to her side because they're both killers motivated by pay. Unfortunately for her, she doesn't realize Amos is actually very very different.
• Not That Kind of Doctor: When Prax is patching up Amos's gunshot wound in "Caliban's War," Amos notes that the spray he's using doesn't hurt and asks if Prax is sure it's the antiseptic. Prax responds that no, he isn't sure, because his doctorate is in botany.
• Not the Fall That Kills You…:
  • Averted in "Delta-V": when the Ring stops a ship trying to fly through it, the pilot is liquefied by the sudden deceleration. Oddly, his clothing and the ship itself appear to be left undamaged.
  • Happens again in "Fallen World". When the ring's slow zone changes and stops every ship in the vicinity, hundreds are killed by the g-forces involved, and many more are injured.
• Nuclear Option:
  • Nuclear weapons in general are less taboo in space, and are used commonly in mining and standard ship-to-ship missile combat. The Colony Drop is implied to have superseded them for planetary damage and the psychological 'line' that the governments try not to cross.
  • The UN's only viable option for even attempting to stop Eros from colliding with Earth in "Home" is to launch half of Earth's nuclear arsenal against it, with the second half coming behind to attempt to reduce and sterilize the debris. These missiles are described as not being remotely similar to the 'small' mining nukes that are commonly used by Belters, but are so powerful that their only practical use is the destruction of a planet.
  • Mars maintains a network of cloaked satellite platforms containing their inter-planetary nukes which are in place for a theoretical first-strike attack on Earth. When UN forces manages to precisely locate these platforms for the first time, they launch a pre-emptive strike against the network in the hopes of eliminating the Martian ability to attack Earth itself. They do manage to destroy the platforms, but due to a mechanical fault that delays one of the coordinated attacks Mars is able to launch from one of the platforms before it is destroyed. This results in a strike in South America, with casualties in the millions.
• Number Two: Naomi to Holden.

O

• Odd Friendship: Between Joe Miller, a middle-aged, jaded member of the belt's corporate police force, and Diogo, the young, idealistic member of a revolutionary faction Miller has spent his career suppressing.
• Office Romance:
  • At the start of the series, betwen 2nd officer Holden and navigator Nygaard.
  • Builds between Holden and Naomi during Season 1. Notably, it's a large part of why Naomi insists on giving Holden extra time in his Race Against the Clock to get back to the ship in "Leviathan Wakes". It becomes official in the Season 2 premiere "Safe".
• Official Couple: Holden and Naomi.
• Off-the-Shelf FX:
  • The lights in mag boot heels are simply LEDs and reflective material taken from cheap slap bracelets.
  • Several of the weapons are airsoft replicas with nothing but some paint added, particularly the WE Glock 26 Advance and APS UAR.
  • Belter space helmets are Soviet GSh-4 flight helmets or their Chinese copies, the TK-1.
  • Earther space helmets, on the other hand, are modified full-face respirators used for commercial sandblasting and spray painting.
  • Many UNN awards seen on dress uniforms are slightly redressed miniature NYPD badges.
  • The machines that pin Drummer and Ashford in "Fallen World" are obviously palette swapped air seeder tanks, complete with loading augers and even slow-moving vehicle signs.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • The crew of the Donnager when they realize they've underestimated the stealth ships that have advanced torpedoes and railguns.
  • Holden and Naomi's reaction to the protomolecule on the Anubis waking up along with the reactor.
  • Holden's abrupt, "Don't touch anything," at the end of "Salvage" after seeing evidence of the protomolecule.
  • Holden's flat declaration that, "We're dead," after he and Miller are irradiated at the end of "Critical Mass".
  • Naomi, and then Miller and Diogo when they realize debris from the Marasmus is headed straight for the second of Eros where Miller and Diogo are working.
  • Ashford has this when he realizes that the protomolecule station has begun to consider humanity as a whole to be a potential threat when they detonate a nuclear weapon to try to get past the ring's interference.... and that it can easily destroy entire star systems.
• Old Cop, Young Cop: Miller's old and jaded, while his new partner Havelock is young and idealistic.
• Once More, with Clarity:
  • The series' very first scene is shown again, this time with additional material and context, at the beginning of "Critical Mass".
  • The end of "Paradigm Shift" has Bobbie Draper's squad witness their UN counterparts charging toward them and firing, followed by a communications blackout. Then we cut to her entire squad dead and Bobbie herself just barely alive with a humanoid monster staring down at her. The following episode is then devoted to her using drugs and hypnosis to give her clarity: The UN squad was actually being chased by something that wasn't wearing a vac-suit.
• One-Product Planet: The moon of Ganymede is a joint Martian/UN farm world, with domed cities devoted to crop production and massive orbital mirrors providing constant sunlight. When an incident there shuts down production, mass starvation becomes a very serious concerns and tensions skyrocket.
• One-Shot Character:
  • Jonathan Banks plays the XO of the Canterbury, who's ignominiously relieved of duty due to a terrible case of Space Madness in "Dulcinea" and not seen again.
  • Mateo, the Belter Asteroid Miner who goes on a Suicide Attack against the Martians who mistreat him.
  • Solomon Epstein, the Martian who would develop the eponymous "Epstein Drive" and is only seen in some flashbacks during "Paradigm Shift."
• One-Steve Limit: So far nobody shares a name.
• One-Woman Wail: The score of the full-length title sequence theme is built from this.
• One World Order:
  • The Earth is governed by the United Nations, which also has jurisdiction over Luna. The government seems to be a type of federal republic, with the Secretary-General serving as the elected executive office and the Security Council as the legislature.
  • Mars is governed by the Martian Congressional Republic, which runs on the parliamentary system and is headed by a Prime Minister.
• Only Electric Sheep Are Cheap: Maintaining actual livestock just isn't cost-effective out in the Belt, giving rise to Artificial Meat and Black Market Produce.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Praxidike "Prax" Meng.
• Opening Scroll: To establish the basic Worldbuilding of the series:
  "In the 23rd Century, humans have colonized the Solar System. The UN controls Earth. Mars is an independent military power. The Inner Planets depend on the resources of the Asteroid Belt. Belters live and work in space. In the Belt, air and water are more precious than gold. For decades, tensions have been rising. Earth, Mars, and the Belt are now on the brink of war. All it will take is a single spark."
• Open Secret: Holden's relationship with Ade Nygaard. Fraternization isn't allowed aboard the Canterbury, but Holden would find himself in a position requiring him to enforce the rules if he becomes the ship's XO.
• Open Sesame:
  • People's integrated domestic computers are locked to their voiceprints. Being a cop, Miller can spoof them with his hand terminal to gain access to their files, as he does in Julie Mao's apartment in "The Big Empty".
  • Conversed when Naomi says the Trope Namer as she hacks the Marasmus' airlock in "Godspeed".
• Organic Technology: The protomolecule is a biotechnological organism that is able to assimilate, alter and repurpose organic and inorganic material to whatever end its been programmed to achieve. It can build engines, Artificial Gravity generators, jamming systems, and even an entire wormhole gate entirely from its own material. It appears to be the foundation of virtually everything its creators built.
• Out-of-Clothes Experience: In "Dandelion Sky", Holden experiences a vision of a star exploding and he is completely naked even though he is wearing a space suit outside of the vision.
• Out of the Frying Pan: "Immolation" has everything come up pretty well for the heroes: the Earth conspiracy is exposed, Jules-Pierre Mao is captured, and Prax's daughter is rescued with the other children. Then things take a massive turn for the worse when the protomolecule on Venus launches a starship.
• Outside-Context Problem: The protomolecule is something out of speculative science fiction in a hard sci-fi setting. It doesn't behave by any known laws of physics, is capable of evolving given enough biomass to work with, and seems to have knowledge of technology far beyond humanity given its ability to move an entire asteroid with tremendous speed while generating Artificial Gravity and jamming radar. Holden actually Lampshades this in "The Monster And The Rocket";
  "When the European tall ships first arrived on the American continent, the natives couldn't see them. The sight was so completely outside of their experience, it just couldn't compute. So they didn't see."

P

• Paper-Thin Disguise: Tycho Station outfits Rocinante with a new paint job and some gas tanks to conceal her as a civilian tanker, but anyone who really looks will be able to tell she's actually a heavily-armed frigate. An interesting inversion, given that the literary inspiration was a plough horse pressed into becoming a warhorse.
• Parasitic Horror: In season 4, Holden and Amos are trapped on an alien planet with the other colonists and have sought refuge in the ancient artifacts. It later turns out that the water contains parasites which nestle inside their eyes, slowly causing them to go blind.
• Patriotic Fervor: Diogo tends to get really riled up over fighting against Earth and Mars.
• Percussive Maintenance:
  • Naomi has to give the Canterbury's elevator console a slap to make it work... in the midst of reminding Holden of the ship's need for a refit.
  • Holden uses this (with a health dose of Percussive Therapy) to fix their shuttle's transponder in "The Big Empty".
• Percussive Shutdown: In season 6, Holden deploys this method in order to shut down an engine strapped to an asteroid that he unwittingly started ignition of.
• Perma-Stubble: Holden, Miller, and Amos all have this.
• Persecution Flip: There's a vague bit of this when an Earther official on Ceres (who happens to be black) is certain it's Belters illegally siphoning water because, "the criminals here tend to be." As it happens he's correct, but Havelock also has a point when he notes Belters might appreciate the system more if they weren't so marginalized; after all, the official's upset his park has a large patch of dead grass while the punks stealing the water are shown drinking it still dark with mud.
• Person as Verb: In "Home", Naomi tells Miller, "Hey, don't get all Holden on me: weird and chatty under pressure." Holden himself just smiles.
• Pet the Dog:
  • Avasarala absolutely dotes on her grandson.
    Avasarala: How many times have I told you... this calls for tickling!
  • Amos grew up surrounded by prostitutes, so he goes out of his way to warn one about a potential patron packing a knife in "Rock Bottom".
• Pintsized Powerhouse: The stealth ships that attack the Donnager are only slightly larger than a corvette, yet extremely well-armed and maneuverable. They even have rail guns, which no other ship their size has. Six of them are able to overwhelm and board the Martian flagship Donnager at a loss of four ships before the Donnager's captain scuttles her own ship to prevent it from being taken, destroying the remaining stealth ships in the process.
• Pistol-Whipping: Miller does this a few times, including to the thug he captures on Eros in "Critical Mass".
• Planet of Hats:
  • Earth is a dying society that is trying to hold on as best it can. Other factions consider it to be a planet full of soft and pampered people looking for the next handout. The reality, however, is much more grim.
  • Mars is fiercely militaristic and almost completely united in the goal of terraforming their world and ultimately overtaking Earth as the dominant power in the Solar System.
  • The Belt (mainly seen through Ceres) is solely focused on survival and is dependent on Asteroid Mining and ship building as its major industries.
  • Ganymede is the "bread basket" of the system and is almost exclusively focused on agriculture in order to provide the Belt with food. It also possesses advanced genetics research labs as a result of needing to develop hardier and more productive plant strains.
• Planet Terra: Now that humanity has truly gone to space, people tend to use the proper name of Earth's moon (Luna) to distinguish it from other moons. Maps of the solar system also use the proper name of the Sun (Sol), but people still refer to it as "the Sun."
• Platonic Prostitution: Havelock pays for the time he spends with Gia even though she's teaching him about Belter language and culture rather than having sex with him. Cynic that he is, Miller disapproves and even accuses her of being a Honey Trap in "Back to the Butcher".
• Playing with Syringes: Dresden is introduced literally using syringes to collect samples of Mutagenic Goo, which are then injected into every occupant of Eros Station to spread The Virus.
• Point Defenseless:
  • Averted in general. Virtually all warships have point defense systems which prove capable of shooting down incoming missiles, so long as the number isn't too great. It's unarmed civilian ships which have to worry about such things.
  • Downplayed in the Donnager's confrontation with the stealth ships. They attempt to use point-defense against a missile barrage fired at the ship, and manage to take down most of the attacking missiles, but the torpedoes have Roboteching capability that allows them to outmaneuver the defenses and score hits anyway. That the missiles are better than what the crew of the Donny expected is one of the first hints that the conspiracy is bigger and better funded than anybody expected.
  • Earth has orbiting satellites designed to shoot down missiles. These get put to the test in Season 3, where they manage to destroy a large missile barrage heading toward the planet. However, one missile gets through thanks to the concentrated barrage being enough to overwhelm the defenses.
• Police Brutality: Of the Film Noir Wretched Hive type. Miller's no exception; his first act upon entering headquarters in "Dulcinea" is to slam an uncooperative suspect's head into the table at booking.
• Posthumous Character: Julie Mao ultimately turns out to be this.
• Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: While bonding with the Rocinante crew, Miller makes a quip about Teddy the Detector, a character used to teach Belter children about air filter safety. None of the crew have any idea what he's talking about and Naomi, herself a Belter, says that she must be too young to have been exposed to the character.
• Portal Network: In the Season 3 finale, once the protomolecule station is convinced humanity isn't a threat, it opens all the gates, totaling 1,300 star systems for humanity to explore.
• P.O.V. Cam: Several through Kenzo's bio-mechanical eye, which has a computer display and can capture and transmit images.
• Powered Armor: Certain Martian Marine Corps units are issued Goliath-class powered armor. By itself, the Martian suit is shown to be about as strong as a very physically fit individual, thus greatly magnifying the wearer's strength. The training exercise at the start of "Safe" also shows off some of its other goodies, like an Arm Cannon, immunity to bullets, and a guided missile launcher in the backplate. The suit is also shown to require constant maintenance and support staff are required to help a marine put it on. Marines on standby will wait around in their undersuits to save on time in case they are ordered into battle.
• The Power of Legacy: Mateo was actually rather drunk and abusive to Diogo and his Suicide by Cop with the Scipio Africanus was actually pretty pointless, but Diogo later lionizes him as "a hero who die fighting the Inners."
• Pragmatic Adaptation: In the novels, all native Belters — including Joe Miller and Naomi Nagata — are unnaturally tall and skinny. Early-Installment Weirdness has a bit character portrayed this way, but casting exclusively for this appearance would be very restrictive, and the CGI and amounts of makeup would eat up the budget, so the physical dimorphism ultimately takes a backseat to other visual and audible clues like tattoos, costuming, and Belter Creole.
• Precision F-Strike:
  • Avasarala's exclamation, "Shit!" in "Windmills" is a decent substitute.
  • When Admiral Nguyen ducks Avasarala's questions about Martian intentions by arguing the communications delay means they can't afford to wait in "Doors and Corners", Avasarala responds, "I know how the fucking thing works."
  • In "Static", when Johnson sends Avasarala the co-ordinates of a derelict stealth ship, her response is an awed "What the fuck is this?"
  • Amos' reaction to the Wham Shot of "Godspeed" is a disbelieving "What. the. fuck?"
  • Avasarala in "Paradigm Shift", when she threatens to tear apart the Mao family if they don't hand over Jules-Pierre:
    "And I can do it, because I'm the fucking hero who saved Mother Earth from the cataclysm Jules-Pierre Mao unleashed!"
  • In "Caliban's War", when the crew of the Rocinante realize that the protomolecule soldier is trying to get through to their reactor:
    Alex: If it breaks through the bulkhead—
    Amos: We're more or less fucked.
• Precursors: If Dresden is indeed right that the protomolecule was sent, then it must have been sent by a race of these. The Investigator confirms that another species was responsible for the prototmolecule, but now they're gone and their strange technology is all that remains.
• Present Company Excluded: "Screw the Inners and their magic Jell-O! No offence, Holden."
• Pretext for War: The destruction of the Canterbury very nearly becomes one until Avasarala is able to ease tensions by proving Mars had nothing to do with it.
• Prevent the War: Avasarala's overall quest, especially in "Remember the Cant", and ultimately her rationalization for the underhanded methods she resorts to in order to succeed.
• Previously on…: Helps with the Continuity Lockout. Season 2 even starts off with Miller adding an Opening Narration to fill in the uninitiated.
• Primal Fear: The lonely emptiness of space and the possibility of being consumed by The Virus are two major sources of tension in the story.
• Prison Episode:
  • "Remember the Cant" sees Holden's crew locked up and interrogated by the Martian Navy.
  • After Holden has his Out-of-Clothes Experience in the Slow Zone and is apprehended by MCR forces for the bombing he was framed for, he is placed in a holding cell (a repurposed livestock stall aboard the Behemoth). Ironically, he is just a couple meters away from Clarissa Mao, who was plotting to murder him and was herself responsible for the bombing.
• Private Military Contractors: The Rocinante crew, in a sense, since they're the only technically unaffiliated military-grade frigate in the system, though they've so far co-operated quite closely with Fred Johnson and the OPA.
• Protection Racket: Amos runs into a standard racket on his transport to Luna in the opening to season five. They come into the bunks and offer to sell "insurance" to the passengers, warning that you never know what might happen on a space flight. Amos' bunkmates were willing to pay, but Amos intervened and warned the racketeers off trying to extort anybody in his cabin.
• Punctuated Pounding: Bobbie Draper gives one to the MCRN chaplain in "Here There Be Dragons".
  Bobbie: WHAT! KILLED! MY! TEAM?!
• Put on a Bus:
  • Havelock doesn't appear again after Miller visits him in the hospital in "Back to the Butcher". Presumably he's still recovering.
  • Everyone else on Ceres, particularly Octavia Muss and Anderson Dawes, drops out of the story when Miller departs for Eros, though Dawes comes back by travelling to Tycho in Season 2. Since then, Dawes has only received brief mentions.
  • Avasarala sends her husband Arjun and the rest of her family away to Luna in "Leviathan Wakes" to protect them from her enemies. Arjun makes a comeback in season 4. He is presumed dead in season 5, along with countless other Earthers.
• Putting on the Reich: There's something vaguely Fascist or perhaps Soviet about the Martian uniforms with their stiff collars, blackish colour, and red epaulettes.
• A Pupil of Mine Until He Turned to Evil: Played With Errinwright and Avasarala both embrace an earth-first philosophy. Yet the lengths that Errinwright will go forces Avasarala to reconsider her philosophy.

Q

• Quality vs. Quantity: Errinwright and Avasarala discuss this in regards to a potential war between Earth and Mars. Errinwright is confident that their older, more numerous fleet is more than capable of handling the newer and slightly more advanced Martian fleet. Avasarala isn't convinced the conflict would be that simple.
• Quizzical Tilt: The man-imitating protomolecule spores give Kenzo one of these in "Leviathan Wakes".

R

• Race Against the Clock: Miller and Holden have a two-fold one in "Leviathan Wakes": make it back to the Rocinante before they die of radiation poisoning and before the ship leaves them behind.
• Race Lift:
  • Ade Tukunbo was Nigerian in the books; Ade Nygaard is white in the show. In doing so, the show avoids the "black dude dies first" implications of her being just a mauve shirt.
  • Errinwright has a darker skintone than Avasarala in the books, in the series, he hasn't.
  • In the books, Michael-Jon de Uturbé's skin color is described as "dark brown", in the series, his actor is white.
  • In the books, Avasarala and Alex are of Indian descent, in the series, they're played by actors of Iranian descent and thus have a lighter-colored skin than in the novels.
• Ragnarök Proofing: Radiocarbon analysis of the Precursor ruins on Ilus puts their age at 1.5 billion years at the very least, and aside from some hardy roots having grown into them here and there they're still intact and fully functional.
• Rail Gun: Standard armament for larger military spacecraft.
• Ramming Always Works: Portrayed semi-realistically in "Godspeed" when the protagonists launch the Generation Ship Nauvoo like a massive bullet to ram the protomolecule-infested Eros and Hurl It into the Sun. Since they're aiming for an astral body with a known orbit, all they have to do is crunch the numbers. Then the protomolecule stages a High-Speed Missile Dodge.
• Real Is Brown: Or in this case, muted blue-grey. Most scenes aboard ships or stations have a heavy blue filter. The main exceptions are the bright sunlight of Earth, the minimal light of exterior space, the pale yellow of industrial areas, and the vibrant red-brown of Ceres' market district.
• Reasonable Authority Figure:
  • As Deputy Undersecretary, Avasarala is two steps from the top job on Earth, Luna, and by extension the Belt, and her number one concern is maintaining peace and stability.
  • After it becomes clear Holden and his crew are not to blame for anything, Capt. Yao of the Donnager carefully listens to him and takes every available step to ensure he lives to Bring News Back.
  • OPA leader Fred Johnson is much more deliberate, diplomatic, and level-headed than most of the demagogues who form a vocal part of his organization. Oddly enough, he's also known as "The Butcher of Anderson Station".
  • Bobbie Draper's superior, Lieutenant Sutton, does his best to rein in her War Hawk desires, pointing out how useless a war with Earth would be, talking her down from her more bloodthirsty impulses.
  • UN Admiral Souther is a consistent voice of reason and forbearance, and in "Doors and Corners" he resigns command and accepts reassignment to Jupiter rather than carry out a direct order to deliberately escalate tensions with Mars.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Dawes gives one to Miller in "Rock Bottom", particularly pointing out that rather than The Dulcinea Effect, Julie Mao would hate Miller if they actually met.
• Reassigned to Antarctica:
  • Saturn is even colder and more isolated than Antarctica, but in Holden's case it's self-imposed and he was simply dishonorably discharged from the UNN.
  • Admiral Souther is reassigned to command the UN fleet around Jupiter in "Doors and Corners" after he refuses to play a part in Earth's brinksmanship with Mars.
  • After Nancy Gao is elected Secretary-General, she assigns Avasarala to Luna where she is responsible for fast-tracking emigration to exoplanets beyond the Ring Gates - a job antithetical to Avasarala's wariness of the dangers of doing so, and for which she lost the election ("because she thinks it's funnier than telling me to go fuck myself"). Her suspicions about Marco Inaros are rejected as paranoia.
• Rebel Leader: Fred Johnson and Anderson Dawes.
• Recursive Ammo:
  • Earth's Rail Gun Kill Sats fire shrapnel shells that can completely shred a vessel the size of a corvette.
  • Mars has planet killer ships as a first-strike/last-resort weapon which each carry ten missiles. Each missile is a MIRV warhead that breaks apart into a spread of twenty nukes that can blanket Earth if necessary.
• Recycled In Space: The Hardboiled Detective and the Knight Errant vs. the Eldritch Abomination IN SPACE!. Later seasons however, are more of a traditional Space Opera.
• Red Herring: Holden's crew identifies the module that put out the phony distress call in "Dulcinea" as Martian-made, but events in "Remember the Cant" prove the Martian government had nothing to do with it.
• Red Light District: Havelock is ambushed patrolling the Ceres 'Rosse Burt' (a Dutch term for such an area) where Gia works in "Remember the Cant". In season 2, Anderson Dawes builds rapport with Diogo Harari when he mentions that 'I grew up in the Rosse Burt as well'.
• Red Shirt: The Martian marines on the Donnager are one of the most obvious examples.
• Remember the Alamo: "Remember The Cant" becomes a rallying cry for Belters in the episode of the same name after Holden's transmission leads them to assume the Canterbury was blown up by Mars. The phrase is spray-painted in multiple places, often along with Holden's face, and it seems to be shaping him up into some sort of folk hero and fuelling further discontent between Belters and the Inner Planets.
• Renegade Splinter Faction: Each of the three main factions has these, to greater and lesser degrees:
  • Earth has the Protogen Corporation, which doesn't really care about Earth at all and was merely selling out to the highest bidder, as they are practically a fourth party non-government mega-corporation. Heck, Protogen outright turns on its UN allies in Season 2 and tried to sell out to rogue elements of the Martian government, only to then be browbeaten back into working for the UN. Presumably, the only reason Protogen didn't try to sell the proto-molecule to the OPA is because the Belters couldn't afford it.
  • The UN also features a cabal of hardliners led by Undersecretary Errinwright who conspire with Protogen in order to gain an advantage in their Space Cold War with Mars. While they initially seem to share the same goals as Protogen, they differ in that they are wholly dedicated to ensuring that Earth remains the dominant power in the solar system at all costs.
  • Similar to Earth, the Martian Congressional Republic also features hardliners who actively seek to escalate tensions between Earth and Mars. After learning about the proto-molecule, they gleefully allow Protogen to slaughter Martian marines in a test run of the hybrid weapons. After several seasons of subtle buildup and background references, in Season 5 they overtly break off from Mars to found the Laconia faction - absconding with a third of the MCRN's fleet (or rather, what remains after their losses in the recent war with Earth) to settle on a new colony world beyond the Ring.
  • A major issue with the OPA - which isn't really a unified organization so much as an idea/movement. Word of God compares them to real-life revolutionary movements like the Irish Republican Army - each terrorist cell claiming to be the "real" OPA, though they can occasionally be browbeaten together to act towards a unified goal. Fred Johnson's powerful faction based on Tycho Station is trying to establish the OPA as a legitimate government diplomatically recognized by Earth and Mars - and while Johnson would like to acquire long-range nuclear weapons and/or the proto-molecule, he only wants them as deterrents to establish balance of power. Other groups are outright terrorists carrying out targeted assassinations, such as the "Black Sky" cell, and the more extreme Ceres cell led by Anderson Dawes.
  • Marco Inaros's leads the 'Inaros faction' of the OPA, which transforms into the Free navy in season five. Inaros forces all the other factions to unite under the Free Navy through sheer ruthlessness, hostage-taking, and outright assassinating both Johnson and Dawes, to the point that by the season finale "OPA" and "Free Navy" are being used synonymously. They even enter into an alliance of convenience with Laconia, the hardliner Mars splinter faction. But then in Season 6, Inaros' growing instability leads to an Anti-Mutiny situation, with Johnson's former second in command Camina Drummer rallying a growing number of OPA ships as a splinter faction back from the Free Navy, and allying with the Earth-Mars joint fleet.
• Revealing Cover-Up: Franklin DeGraaf's "suicide" and the quick "disproving" of Fred Johnson's accusations provides Avasarala with the information she needs to deduce something's going on in the higher levels of power on Earth.
• Revenge Before Reason:
  • Holden has to be restrained from chasing after a ship that vastly out-guns his own in his blind rage and grief over the loss of the Canterbury.
  • This is what Holden thinks when Miller abruptly kills Dresden, but given Miller's prior Meaningful Look and later explanation, the actually reason was that he correctly deduced Dresden was trying to pull a Talking Your Way Out, which Holden and Johnson were falling for.
    Miller: I didn't kill him because he was crazy. I killed him because he was making sense.
• Revolvers Are Just Better: Even in the 23rd Century, Miller carries a six-shooter as befits a Hardboiled Detective.
• Right Hand of Doom: The highly antagonistic protomolecule hybrids have a lopsided body structure whose right arm is notably longer and stronger than the left. Their unevenly distributed body weight also gives them a creepy loping gait especially while running.
• Rightly Self-Righteous: Holden's not faultless, but everyone admits he's as close as it gets.
• Right Man in the Wrong Place: Holden and his crew manage to land themselves smack-dab in the middle of a vast conspiracy simply by virtue of being the ones who picked of a certain Distress Call, but damned if they aren't just what the solar system needs to deal with it.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge:
  • Holden's crew hold him back from one in "The Big Empty" because it would be a Suicide Mission.
  • Miller spends most of "Critical Mass" looking for anyone and anything to vent his grief and frustration on after finding Julie Mao's body.
• Roboteching: The Conspiracy's torpedoes are capable of this in their terminal phase, making them difficult for the Donnager's point defense to intercept.
• Rousing Speech: Drummer delivers a boasting one in "Intransigence", to drive up morale as the Behemoth prepares to pass through the Ring.
  We are the belt, we are strong, we are sharp and we don't feel fear. This moment belongs to us. Beltalowda! Beltalowda! Beltalowda!
• Ruder and Cruder: Downplayed; there was already a fair bit of profanity in the first three seasons, but the show's move to Amazon Prime allowed for the characters to swear much more often.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • The first real scene Anna and Errinwright are both featured in the same room together with Sorrento-Gillis has them seated on opposite sides of a table. While Anna is white clothes, Errinwright is dressed in all black while slouching. In a sense, Anna is the "angel on Sorrent-Gillis' shoulder" encouraging peace while Errinwright is the devil provoking war.
  • The vaguely anarchist "A"-like symbol used for the Outer Planets Alliance bears more than a few visual similarities to a rocket in flight.
• Running Gag: The crew's Insistent Terminology concerning the Tachi/Rocinante being "legitimate salvage" is mostly Played for Laughs and actually makes it all the way into Season 4 where it is included on their - finally official - ship plaque.
• Running the Blockade:
  • The Rocinante crew has to get past a heavily-patrolled Martian sector in "Windmills". Unlike many examples, a normal ship would probably just get a routine inspection, but since the Roci is actually a "salvaged" Martian naval frigate things are a little more interesting for them.
  • Starting in Season 4, the UNN, MCRN, and OPAN have set up a joint blockade around the Sol Ring to prevent would-be colonists from travelling through the gate system. The season opens with a group of Belter refugees desperately speeding through a fusilade of fire, with many of the ships being destroyed.

S

• Sacrificial Lion: Although the actor is credited as a main cast member throughout the first season, Shed Garvey is abruptly killed by a rail gun round in "CQB".
• Sanity Slippage:
  • Holden notes in "Dulcinea" that the Canterbury's XO had been talking to his plants for months prior to his final breakdown.
  • Miller doesn't take Julie's death at all well, going on a minor rampage during which he starts hallucinating an Imaginary Friend.
• Satellite Character: Arjun isn't a political force of any kind, just Chrisjen Avasarala's loving and supportive husband.
• Saying Too Much: During an inquiry on the Ganymede incident, Draper is brought in to give a fabricated account of what happened to avoid a war. Under grilling from Avasarala, she blurts out that the aggressor wasn't wearing a vac-suit, at which point her superiors steer her back to the official line.
• Scars Are Forever: Not in the 23rd Century due to medical advances, but Miller surmises in "The Big Empty" that Julie Mao maintains one on her face as a "badge of defiant against everything she's supposed to be."
• Scenery Porn: Season 4 utilizes many lingering wide shots of British Columbia's natural beauty.
• Schizo Tech: Holographic displays and voice commands are mundane throughout the system so Earth's ambassador to Mars stands out with his use of pencils and notepads. The pencils turn out to be recording devices that store the user's every stroke and can interface with other pieces of technology.
• Scienceville: Justified in the case of Mars. When it was still a colony of Earth, a disproportionate number of scientists were sent to Mars to expedite the terraforming efforts in an attempt to alleviate Earth's Overpopulation Crisis. When Mars seceded, those scientist paused the terraforming efforts and dedicated themselves to military applications, quickly building a fleet that is technologically advanced enough to go toe-to-toe with the UNN's own fleet despite Earth's massive advantage in manpower and resources.
• Sci-Fi Writers Have No Sense of Scale: The series is called "The Expanse", so this is generally averted or at least downplayed. In "Dulcinea" for instance, two days is considered, "Not far out of our way," and that only gets Canterbury within 50,000 kilometers, a distance easily within reach of their "leaky lifeboat." Inter-planetary communication also consists of sending video messages back and forth rather than real-time conversation due to the immense distances. That said, visuals are sometimes configured so that several objects travelling together that could easily be many, many miles apart are shown tightly grouped to fit on the screen together.
• Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right!:
  • Holden believes in doing this at every opportunity.
  • Admiral Souther resigns command of the UN Navy rather than take part in a deliberate escalation of tensions with Mars.
• Screw the Money, I Have Rules!: When demanding that Jules-Pierre Mao be brought to justice, Avasarala points out that she cannot be bought like some politicians, and in the time it would take Mao to force her out of office, she will ruin his life and the lives of his family.
• Screw This, I'm Out of Here!: Kenzo makes a run for it just as the black ops team strikes at Holden's crew.
• Screw Politeness, I'm a Senior!: Downplayed compared to the novels, but Avasarala still gets in a few barbs when it comes to telling people what she really thinks.
• Secret Test of Character: When Amos has a tense reunion with on old friend from Earth who has become a crime lord, the friend places a gun on the table between them and then, later in the conversation, turns his back. Amos immediately realizes that he's being tested and calls out the ruse.
• Self-Destruct Mechanism: At the end of "CQB", Captain Yao activates the Donnager's to destroy the ships attacking her vessel, allowing Holden and his crew to escape with proof of the attack.
• Sequel Hook: The series ends up having two of these:
  • Season 3 ends with the Portal Network opened to humanity, but something is living inside the network and was responsible for destroying the protomolecule civilization. For added bonus points, this was also precisely when Sy Fy decided to cancel the series outright, leaving it a potentially unresolved cliffhanger. Thankfully not the case as Amazon picked it up shortly after.
  • Season 6, and thus the entire series finale, resolved most of its story arcs regarding Earth, Mars, the Belt and the entire mess Marco Inaros caused. However, trouble is quickly brewing on Laconia: Duarte has the Protomolecule and Paolo Cortazar, there are the native "strange dogs" bringing the dead back to life, and as the end credits show, Duarte has clearly activated something in Laconia's orbit in his quest to "kill gods." The cast and crew have been incredibly coy regarding a Sequel Series, going only so far as to call season 6 a "pause", while Alcon have been busy pumping out Expanded Universe media.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: Miller clears the way in "Leviathan Wakes" by inciting a fight between two groups of CPM mooks by stoking the Belters (correct) belief that they are about to be left behind.
• Settling the Frontier: Humanity is the process of filling up the solar system. The books mention a settlement as far out as a moon of Uranus.
• Sex God: According to Ade, Holden is "entirely too good" at sex.
• Sexposition: Not verbally, but Holden and Ade's Zero-G Spot introduction helps establish that spaceships only have gravity when the engines are providing thrust.
• Shame If Something Happened:
  • Fred Johnson uses this threat more subtly but no less palpably than usual in "CQB" when the Mormon Church expresses discomfort with leaving him in charge of building the LDSS Nauvoo because of his OPA affiliations. Johnson simply reminds their representative that the most skilled workers in the Belt are also OPA-affiliated, and therefore removing him would deprive them of quality of work on a ship that has to function flawlessly for a very long time.
  • In "Rock Bottom", Avasarala threatens a former intelligence operative who's transitioned to corporate espionage that if he doesn't lend her his operative on Tycho Station his son won't be getting paroled any time soon.
  • When Amos runs into a gang running a Protection Racket on a Belter shuttle, they offer to sell "travel insurance". The racketeer is very quick to say it's completely up to them to buy or not, but warns that you never know what could happen on a long journey.
• Shaped Like Itself: According to Naomi, their ladar system says the thing on the Scopuli that looks like a big hole in the side... is a big hole in the side.
• Sherlock Scan:
  • Fred Johnson uses this to see through Holden's bluff of having a squad of pissed off Martian marines on the Rocinante.
  • Amos notices Kenzo's restlessness and the suspicious bystanders in the lobby of the Blue Falcon Hotel. As such, he already has his hand on his gun when Kenzo runs for it and a gunfight breaks out.
• Shining City: New York City, or at least Manhattan, has become slightly more crystalline, as befits the capital of The Federation (or The Empire depending on your viewpoint).
• Shirtless Scene:
  • Steven Strait (Holden) gets one in "Dulcinea".
  • Wes Chatham gets one in "Caliban's War", when a very reluctant Prax patches up Amos' gunshot wounds to his best ability.
• Shoot the Dog:
  • Anderson Dawes' Backstory involved killing his ill sister Athena to save the rest of his family.
  • Amos kills Sematimba when he pulls a gun on Naomi in an attempt to force her to take off without Holden and Miller.
  • Holden reluctantly blows up a ship full of Good Samaritans because allowing them to expose what happened on Eros could potentially lead to the entire solar system being infected by the protomolecule.
• Shout-Out: Has its own page.
• Shown Their Work:
  • The show loves to demonstrate the hard sci-fi limits of the setting, such as showing how the Coriolis effect changes how things flow and fall on Belter stations. The show is also quite meticulous in depicting gravity in space travel.
  • Watch closely whenever point-defense cannons fire on screen and you'll notice flames shooting out of the back of the barrel cluster in sync with the bullets bursting from the muzzles. Yes, these guns actually have small reverse-mounted thrusters to counteract their recoil, helping to keep them stable and accurate in zero-G.
  • The huge purplish muzzle flash emitted by railguns is not just for show. Real-life concepts for using railguns in space consider injecting hydrogen between the rails during the firing sequence, which would get ionized by the discharge and provide some additional oomph to the projectile. Additionally, the process would absorb a good deal of heat from the rails, keeping them cool(er).
  • Some of the wall markings on the ships are real-world ratings. Example: In "Caliban's War", inside the elevator of Mao’s ship, there’s the marking “ISO K9.” ISO is the “International Standards Organization,” which is a real world repository for engineering standards. K9 is a reference to ISO 2531 K9, which is a classifier for water-proofed structures. This means the elevator is sealed against potential flooding, if a waterline breaks.
  • In "Caliban's War" Holden is pinned against a wall by a cargo container. Amos explains that the longer he remains there with his broken leg compressed, potassium will keep building up in his blood until it reaches lethally toxic levels. This is a real medical problem known as "crush syndrome".
• Side Effects Include...: In "Leviathan Wakes" Miller and Holden keep pumping painkillers into their bodies to help keep them functional while they are slowly dying from a massive radiation dose. At one point Miller asks what effects overdosing on this stuff has, and Holden reads from a product information slip: "Possible anxiety, skin rash... sudden death." An unusually ironic example of this trope.
• Sigil Spam:
  • The OPA display their monogram on passages all over Ceres and tattoo it on their arms, chests, and even faces.
  • The Martian Navy have plastered their MCRN logo all over the Tachi, right down to the coffee cups.
• Signature Headgear: Miller's trademark fedora, which he wears as part of his persona of the Hardboiled Detective. It gets him a lot of hate from Belters who see it as an Earther affectation, as nobody wears hats in the belt since there's no weather to keep off your head.
• Sinking Ship Scenario: Holden's crew face this in " The Big Empty".
• Sir Swears-a-Lot: Downplayed from the books, but Avasarala still gets away with as much as she can for a basic-cable TV show. Her dialogue is substantially less restrained on the home media releases, since SyFy had to mute her occasionally during the live broadcasts in seasons 1 to 3.
• Sleeping with the Boss: Played for Laughs when Holden and Ade joke about this during their sex scene introduction.
  Ade: You're entirely too good at that.
  Holden: I told you, I've got no power to get you promoted on this ship.
  Ade: Well, then I take it back.
• Sleeves Are for Wimps: Amos is the only crew-member to always keep the sleeves of his coveralls rolled up.
• Sliding Scale of Adaptation Modification: Pragmatic Adaptation. The broad strokes of the storylines from book to show are generally similar, but the show often takes different routes to get to the same destination, often to suit the medium of television.
• Sliding Scale of Continuity: A solid 5. Every episode is a direct continuation of the one that came before it.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism Versus Cynicism: Mixed to leaning towards cynical, with the future being a pretty Crapsack World regardless of where you're living throughout the Solar System.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: Very often between Avasarala and Cotyar, who are both very snarky and are very Vitriolic Best Buds. It gets even better when you add the also-snarky Bobbie to the mix:
  Bobbie has just suggested that they escape Mao's goons trying to kill them by climbing up an elevator shaft
  Avasarala: That is not going to work.
  Bobbie: [Beat] Right. You'd never make that climb.
  Avasarala: Jesus Christ, not because I'm old! [Cotyar]'s been shot!
  Cotyar: Plus, she's really old.
• Soapbox Sadie:
  • A male example in the OPA agitator on Ceres. No matter what's happening in the solar system, he'll tell you all about how it's a conspiracy against the Belt. For instance, he insists Canterbury was destroyed by the Inner Planets exclusively to deprive Ceres of water when in reality that was at best an intended assumption.
  • Miller initially pegs Julie Mao as one of these before his investigation proves she really means it.
    Miller: Students, with big ideas and big mouths.
• Soapbox Square: The Epic Tracking Establishing Shot for Ceres station features a voice-over on the plight of the Belt that's eventually revealed to be an OPA agitator speaking in one of these in the slum at the very bottom of the colony.
• Social Darwinist: Captain McDowell literally proposes letting "the good god Darwin" sort out the Scopuli rather than answer the Distress Call. Admittedly he was also suspecting it to be a trap set by pirates to lure in prey. He's half right.
• The Sociopath:
  • Amos is basically a functional one, but he's self-aware about it and compensates by following ethical people, using them as his aftermarket moral compass.
    Amos: Ask me whether or not I should rip your helmet off and kick you off this bucket and I can't give you a reason why I should or shouldn't except, 'Naomi wouldn't like it.'
  • Also, Dresden. What else can you call someone who only sees the For Science! potential of thousands and thousands of people to an Eldritch Abomination.
  • The Conspiracy had this trait medically induced in all its employees on Thoth Station to ensure they'd have no qualms about their Mad Doctoring.
  • Adolphus Murtry in season 4. Amos even tells him that they're pretty much the same. The difference is that Amos doesn't lie. Murtry has no problem with lying to get his way.
• Sociopathic Soldier: Type 1s (i.e. Jingos) are everywhere on all sides, but particularly in the Martian military. The two primary traits of MCRN Marines are being aggressively stupid and stupidly aggressive, and will almost invariably make any situation worse when they're introduced into it.
• Son of a Whore: In a conversation with Prax, Amos strongly hints that he was this, and was likely also a child prostitute.
• Soundtrack Dissonance:
  • "Tighten Up" by The Black Keys plays during the ice mining hand injury scene in "Dulcinea".
  • The epic gunfight in the Blue Falcon lobby is set to smooth jazz from the hotel's speaker system.
• Space Battle:
  • In "CQB", the Donnager is attacked by six of The Conspiracy's stealth ships, destroying several before being boarded and forced to self-destruct to avoid capture and take the rest with it.
  • In "Doors and Corners", the Rocinante and the OPA launch a joint attack on Thoth Station, which is protected by one of The Conspiracy's stealth ships. After some tricky maneuvering, the Roci manages to take out the stealth ship and the station's only gun turret, allowing the OPA to land a Boarding Pod and take control of the station.
• Space Cold War:
  • Between Earth/Luna and Mars, with the Belt adding its own third-party pressure. Avasarala even calls it one in "The Big Empty". It goes hot in Season 3.
  • Exploited by Naomi, who sends a sample of the protomolecule to Fred Johnson so that the Belt can have can have an equal seat at the table with Earth and Mars.
• Space Cossacks: While native Belters are physically incapable of living anywhere else, Earthers and Martians who move permanently to the Belt are often this, especially those living in the cold, unforgiving Saturn. Holden in particular left Earth because, "Everything I loved was dying," and he has little-to-no interest in returning.
• Space Friction: Averted, inertia is explicitly described as being in effect and all ships are shown needed to use thrust to decelerate. The actual deceleration is often not depicted on-screen to keep the story moving, but ships are always shown approaching their destination engines-first at the end of their deceleration.
• Space Is an Ocean: A standard depiction, the terminology for spaceships and militaries are are all naval-descendants. The militaries use Naval ranks, heavily-trafficked areas are described as "shipping lanes", station access areas are "docks", etc. Mars is even described as an 'island' when the cold war between the UN and MCRN looks like it is about to become hot.
• Space Is Noisy:
  • Explosions, ship engines, weapons, etc. are all portrayed making noise in the vacuum. This is implied to be a meta-inclusion for the presentation to the TV audience, since characters never indicate that they can hear these space noises.
  • Averted when characters need to actually react to/interact with supposed noise in space, as the show specifically establishes the medium of vibration. Holden and Naomi put their helmets together so the sound will carry through the contact, and Draper later does the same with her team on Ganymede. When the Roci crew board a disabled Martian ship, they feel the banging through the walls.
• Space Madness: The Canterbury's XO comes down with a case in the first episode, necessitating his replacement by Holden, who notes the guy had already been talking to his plants for months.
  XO: Jimmy boy, you know what I just can't figure out? We make it all this way, so far out into the darkness... Why couldn't we have brought more light?
• Space Marine: The UNN and MCRN have marine detachments aboard their ships.
• Space Navy: The UNN and MCRN for the Solar System's two major factions. MCRN ships have "NAVY" prominently emblazoned on their sides. The UNN is shown to still be using anchors in its crest.
• Space People: Native Belters are physically incapable of living on Earth without heavy amounts of therapy and drugs. This is exploited by Earthers in "Dulcinea", where simply exposing a Belter to Earth's gravity is used as Cold-Blooded Torture.
• Space Pirates: A notable concern for regular cargo haulers. There's even a corporate protocol for such cases: give up the cargo and negotiate a ransom for any captured crew. Captain Yao of MCRN Donnager also mentions three years of combat experience hunting them.
• Spaceship Slingshot Stunt:
  • Deconstructed by being shown literally as a stunt by adrenaline jockeys looking to set records, and the first contestant we actually see on-screen makes a minor miscalculation and burns up in Jupiter's atmosphere. "Slingshot Clubs" get together to watch these pilots' exploits and make extravagant and illegal bets about their chances of success.
  • In Season 2, Alex plots an elaborate slingshot course around Jupiter's moon to be able to go from Cyllene to Ganymede without firing the Rocinante's engines. It goes well until he unexpectedly comes across a MCRN destroyer and he has to quickly abort the maneuver to avoid detection.
  • Mid-Season 3, a slingshot jockey attempts to "thread the needle" through the Protomolecule Ring, only for its defenses to stop his ship dead and reduce him to Ludicrous Gibs.
• Space Station: Tycho Station is the main construction hub in the Belt, and home to OPA leader Fred Johnson. Other smaller stations are also mentioned, particularly Anderson Station, which was destroyed 11 years before the start of the series.
• Space Suits Are SCUBA Gear: The helmets worn by the crew of the Rocinante in Season One are connected to a "breather" backpack by a corrugated rubber hose, of the sort used by old-fashioned SCUBA sets. MCRN suits have the backpack but no visible connection to the helmet.
• Space Trucker: Although Canterbury has more the feel of a cargo ship, Holden and his crew start out as these in the business of hauling ice from Saturn's orbit back to Ceres, a vital but not very glamorous job.
• Sparing Them the Dirty Work: When Prax finds the doctor who kidnapped his daughter and performed deadly experiments on other children, he sends his daughter away to confront the doctor alone. Before he can pull the trigger, though, he's stopped by Amos, who tells Prax he's "not that guy". After Prax leaves, Amos coldly turns to the doctor and tells him, "I am that guy."
• Speak Ill of the Dead: Johnson has no illusions whatsoever about what kind of person Miller was after the latter performs a Heroic Sacrifice, calling the belated "a pain-in-the-ass, suicidal ex-cop".
• Speculative Fiction LGBT: Earth, the Belt, and probably Mars, all have much more open and tolerant attitudes towards sexuality in the 23rd century.
  • Holden is the product of a group marriage of five men and three women who are all his genetic parents due to DNA splicing, which is apparently not particularly unusual, although a full genetic mix is implied to be pricey. In this case, it was done because the donors wanted to get around the law and keep their land, which they could do through a joint heir. The series doesn't elaborate on whether they really are actually polyamorous, or if it's just another means of avoiding having their property seized.^note In the novels, Holden's parents consist of a monogamous heterosexual couple, a monogamous homosexual couple, and a polyamorous foursome with no romantic overlap of the three groups. The books also specify that having more than two genetic parents like this is "uncommon" due to being expensive, but happens often enough that his parents group-marriage' isn't socially frowned upon either.
  • Earth's ambassador to Mars is openly married to another man, which is treated as unremarkable. Reverend Dr. Anna Volvodov is a Methodist pastor who is lovingly married to another woman, they even have a daughter who is genetically theirs.
  • In a list of personal ads Miller peruses during his investigation on Ceres, about half of those who appear are listed as pansexual.
  • In Season 5, Drummer's new crew are also her polygamous, polyamorous marriage partners, all of them pansexual (nicknamed by fans "the poly-am Belter-fam"). This isn't particularly unusual in the Belt either.
• Spy Speak:
  • The data broker Julie Mao dealt with on Ceres set up their meeting via a dating site using the phrase, "I'll be your Sherpa". Miller eventually figures out that to access the guy's shop, you go to a certain shop and ask for a sherpa.
  • The Rocinante crew avoid inspection by a Martian patrol by pretending to be a special ops team using the code-words "ubiquitous", "mendacious", and "polyglottal". Working on past experience, Alex also throws in "donkey balls", just in case.
• The Squadette: Naomi is initially the only woman on the Rocinate, and serves as The Lancer to Holden.
• Standard Establishing Spaceship Shot: Writer Hawk Ostby says they chose to open the series on Julie Mao in the storage locker specifically to kick off the series by subverting this trope.
• Standard Human Spaceship: Most ships seen on the show feature brick-like designs in order to maximize interior space and because aerodynamics are not a concern. Even atmospheric shuttles lack aerodynamic designs as they're only meant to go straight up and down.
• Standardized Space Views: Locations beyond Earth tend to get these as their Establishing Shot.
• Standard Starship Scuffle: MCRN Donnager goes up against six stealth ships. Each side tries to overwhelm the other with torpedo barrages before using rail guns for close quarters battle. The battle climaxes when one of the stealth ships is able to come in close and send boarding parties aboard the Donnager.
• Stealth in Space:
  • Ships can mask themselves from RADAR and LIDAR by shadowing behind a celestial body or making themselves seem like part of the landscape by getting as close as possible to the surface of one and holding still.
  • The Martians are said to possess advanced stealth technology that is primarily used to build space versions of real life intercontinental ballistic missile submarines. That said, the Rocinante (originally a Martian frigate) can't actually hide from other ships, so it's disguised as a gas freighter in the second half of Season 1.
  • The stealth ships that destroyed the Canterbury and the Donnager are revealed to belong to a fourth, unknown faction in the solar system. These ships are slightly larger than a frigate, possess a dark color scheme, and seem to be shaped in a way to deflect other ships' tracking systems. They are also heavily armed for ships of their size, equipped with torpedoes, gatling guns (for point defense), and rail guns.
  • Averted in "Doors and Corners" where getting close enough to actually engage and deploy Boarding Pods with any hope of success is a crucial problem the OPA faces in storming Thoth Station.
  • In a rather impressive example, the protomolecule somehow manages to render the whole of Eros invisible to radar.
• Sticky Shoes: Magnetic boots are common since the only artificial gravity requires either constant thrust or a rotating section.
• Still Wearing the Old Colors:
  • After the survivors of the Canterbury get picked up by a Martian battleship, Alex adopts a Martian uniform since he used to serve as a pilot in the Martian military before he shipped out on the Cant.
  • Holden continues wearing his Pur'n'Kleen t-shirt up through the third season.
• Stock Scream: A stock crying baby is used during the aftermath of the faulty air filters in "Dulcinea".
• Storming the Castle: The Rocinante crew join with Miller and the OPA to assault Thoth Station in "Doors and Corners".
• Street Smart: Joe Miller. It comes with the territory of a Hardboiled Detective and makes him a real Foil for James Holden.
• Stress Vomit: There isn't any turbulence yet since they're still attached to the main ship, so Miller's Vomit Indiscretion Shot on the Boarding Pod in "Doors and Corners" has to be this.
• Stunned Silence: After Shed is decapitated.
• Subspace Ansible:
  • There is no such thing in this universe. Communication over long distances is hampered by minutes-long signal delays. In military situations, commanders gripe that the telemetry they receive is minutes-old and that their units could be wiped out at that very moment and they'll only find out after the fact. Even communication between Earth and Luna is subject to a three second delay and Chrisjen and Arjun end up talking over each other because they keep forgetting to take the delay into account.
  • Played straight by the protomolecule, which can communicate with all other parts of itself over interplanetary distances with zero delay. The only issue seems to be signal degredation over greater distances.
• Sufficiently Advanced Alien: The protomolecule, and the aliens who created it, were so advanced that everything they built routinely violates all known laws of physics. The human organizations are just scrambling to get a basic understanding of what they are dealing with, let alone actually using it in any manner.
• Suicide Attack:
  • Captain Yao describes the six ships attacking the Donnager in "CQB" as doing this, but they turn out to be far more powerful than she imagined.
  • Mateo, a Belter Asteroid Miner who's been pushed around one time too many flies his ship straight at the Martians who screwed him over. Unfortunately for him, he's nowhere near as well-armed as the stealth ships who attacked the Donnager.
    Mateo: A man's got to stand up!
• Super-Soldier: After Eros, The Conspiracy is able to refine the protomolecule and use it to create hybrids which can survive in hard vacuum and take out an entire squad of Martian marines. And this is only the prototype.
• Surprisingly Sudden Death: In the fifth season finale, Alex is revealed to have died off-screen from a brain aneurysm with absolutely no foreshadowing. This was apparently a last-minute decision due to off-screen issues with the actor.
• Surveillance Drone: Often seen floating around Earth and Ceres.
• The Syndicate: Anderson Dawes essentially represents this side of the OPA, controlling labour and policing on Ceres, while Fred Johnson represents more the La Résistance trying to become an independent government side of the organization, though the two sides do collaborate when it's beneficial.
• Synchronization: All the samples of the protomolecule communicate with each other instantly over intra-solar distances.
• Synthetic Plague: The protomolecule evolves by absorbing humans and is being experimented with by a faction from Earth for unknown reasons. Dresden also implies it may have been sent to the solar system on purpose.

T

• Take a Third Option: Instead of allowing Earth an easy victory or starting a shooting war by fighting over it, the Martians instead opt to destroy Phoebe station completely.
• Taking You with Me: The Donnager takes the attacking ships down with it when it self-destructs.
• Tattoo as Character Type:
  • Many Belters have cultural ones, including stylized ring with an off-center gap around their neck in imitation of the burn-scars left by faulty connection collars of older space suits.
  • OPA members often sport these to declare their overall membership and individual faction. These are usually highly visible, often on the face or neck, with the more villainous members doubling as Tattooed Crooks.
    Miller: Boss let you wear your colors out in the open like that?
    Worker: Boss has one just like it.
  • Amos has a couple on his arms, as befits a tough-guy mechanic.
• Tattooed Crook: Most Belters have tattoos, helping to characterize them as the low-class, low-status society of the solar system.
• Team Mom: Alex provides a male example at the end of "Safe", when he forces the crew to sit down to eat together and fusses over them in an attempt to lighten the mood and get everyone to pull together again in the aftermath of Eros.
• Talking the Monster to Death: In "Home", Miller is able to convince Julie Mao, whose consciousness has been fused with the protomolecule, into diverting it away from Earth and into Venus.
• Tears of Blood: Anderson Dawes says he suffered these from crying so hard over the death of his little sister.
• The Teaser: The first few minutes of the series give us just the briefest glimpse of the protomolecule.
• Terraform: Mars is still in the process of this. It is estimated that they will be finished in a hundred years. This is part of the reason that the Martians hate the Earthers so much; under the original plan it would have been finished already, but the project ground to a halt after Earth blockaded water resources as part of a diplomatic incident. As a result, they were forced to put so many resources into the military to defend against Earth that the project is 100 years behind schedule. An older Martian mentions that he fears the project will never be completed since the current generation of Martians were born and raised under domes and don't have the same yearning for oceans and clear skies that their earth-born parents had. Also, the ring gates bring countless habitable worlds within reach, rendering an extended terraforming effort obsolete.
• Tested on Humans: Dresden is fascinated by the protomolecule's effects on humans and proceeds to inject it into everyone on Eros under the guise of a treatment for radiation.
• There Are Two Kinds of People in the World: According to Amos in "Paradigm Shift", there are actually three kinds of people in the world — bad people, people you follow, and people you protect.
• Time for Plan B:
  • When Rocinante is flagged for a very unwanted inspection in "Windmills", Naomi and Alex scramble to unlock the correct Spy Speak to call them off while Amos calmly heads down to the weapons-locker to prepare Plan B: trying to shoot anyone who comes through the airlock.
  • Late in Season 3, Holden's Plan B for yet another dire situation is "make sure Plan A works".
• Time Skip: "Delva-V" moves the timeline forward by about six months, during which the UN-MCR war has ended with a cease-fire, the OPA has reorganized into a true Belter state (albeit a fragile one), and the Roci crew have become celebrities across the system.
• Title Drop:
  • Miller cautions his Boarding Party that "Doors and Corners" are where they'll get ambushed in the episode of that name.
  • Fred Johnson wishes everyone "Godspeed," in the episode of the same name.
• Title In: Establishing Shots for locations are usually accompanied by these, such as: "CERES_STATION: U.N. Protectorate / In the Asteroid Belt". A few characters like Avasrala, Errinwright, and DeGraaf also get Boss Subtitles with their name and position.
• Title Sequence: A fully-fledged Artistic Title of a flyby tracing the colonization of the solar system. Much of season 1 uses a much simpler Title-Only Opening of the Title Card laid over a stylized solar system.
• That One Case: Searching for Julie Mao quickly becomes this for Miller, especially when he keeps it up on his own time after Captain Shaddid calls it closed.
• That's an Order!: Holden pulls this to try to pursue the ship that destroyed the Canterbury, but the rest of the crew refuse and explain to him how stupid that order is.
• Think Happy Thoughts: Naomi encourages Miller to do this in "Home", but he just grumbles.
• Third Line, Some Waiting:
  • In Season 1, Holden and Miller's stories get the most focus, with others fitting in around the edges. Avasrala's plot is mostly a Government Procedural about uncovering The Conspiracy.
  • Until the Ganymede incident, Bobby Draper and her marines just pop in every episode or two to give a Martian reaction to Earth's actions.
• Thrown Out the Airlock:
  • Tormented by the thought of the children who nearly died because he took a bribe from a corrupt landlord who cheaped out on air filters, Miller threatens the landlord with this trope in "Dulcinea".
    Miller: Air is good, don't you think? Air is nice. Keep those filters clean, asshole.
  • The Asteroid Miner Mateo launches his nephew Diogo out in an EVA suit before taking his ship on a Suicide Attack against the Martians who screwed him over. A weird case in that Mateo actually expects this to save his nephew, reasoning that someone will pick him up. He's right, too; Diogo shows up in the second season, perfectly healthy.
  • Miller nearly suffers this in "Rock Bottom", but Octavia rescues him.
  • Fred Johnson spaces an unruly OPA member who doesn't want to play ball, preferring to stick to pointless terrorist attacks rather than fight a bigger enemy. It got all the other OPA members to fall in line.
  • Amos claims in "Godspeed" that "Med bays in pirate ships are usually just open airlocks."
  • In "Pyre", a refugee transport carrying survivors from Ganymede has all the Inners moved to the airlock under the guise of having them moved to another ship, then flushes them as retaliation for Earth and Mars wrecking Ganymede.
  • Marco is threatened with this in season 4, but is charismatic enough to talk the OPA faction leaders into sparing his life in exchange for a hefty bribe and promise to restrict his piracy.
  • Happens to Ashford in the season 4 finale, courtesy of Marco. He doesn't try to beg for his life and instead spends his last moments covertly sending a message so his death isn't in vain.
• To Absent Friends:
  • Holden and Naomi share in the irreverent sort of this in "Rock Bottom":
    Holden: To Shed: always generous, thoughtful... sometimes a whiny little prick. [laughs] We're gonna miss you, pal, wherever you are... I hope no one there needs medical attention. [laughs again]
  • The crew toasts Miller after his sacrifice in "Home".
• Together in Death: In "Home", Miller stays with Julie as she sends Eros crashing into Venus, deliberately removing his suit and infecting himself by kissing her just before impact.
• Too Good to Be True: After Fred Johnson's Can't Stop the Signal moment in "Critical Mass", Avasarala is given evidence he's lying and is really behind everything, which she immediately senses is bullshit because of this trope and because she herself found evidence identical to Johnson's, but she has to play along until she's in a better position.
• Token Evil Teammate:
  • Amos, to some degree, since he's basically a high-functioning sociopath who's always there to propose that Murder Is the Best Solution.
  • Holden starts to see Miller as this in "Static" after he kills Dresden, and so banishes him from the Roci, though he still agrees to collaborate on Miller's plan to deal with Eros in "Godspeed".
  • Subverted with Kenzo, who gets enough dialogue and development that he could become this until he willingly guides a black ops team to the Roci crew and consequently has his rescue request rejected by Holden.
• Too Dumb to Live: The slingshot jockey Manéo Jung-Espinoza in Season 3 decides to make a name for himself by slingshotting himself through the alien ring that showed up six months ago. It earns him a very messy death by extreme deceleration.
• Too Much Alike: Miller finds a message from Julie Mao to her father Calling the Old Man Out by claiming this is why they never got along.
• Torture Cellar: The UN has one where Avasarala interrogates a Belter smuggler.
• Torture Is Ineffective: Avasarala learns more (though still practically nothing) from a Belter prisoner through a civilized interview than she does through gravity torture, and the same prisoner ultimately uses gravity itself as his Cyanide Pill simply to avoid further torture.
• Torture Technician: The UN employs these, though so far they've simply hung a Belter on some hooks to suffer from Earth's gravity.
• Trademark Favorite Food:
  • Holden loves real coffee.
  • Downplayed from the novels, but Avasarala still has her pistachios in a couple scenes.
• Transformation Horror: At the beginning of "Critical Mass", the audience is subjected to Julie Mao being slowly mutated and consumed after being infected by the protomolecule.
• Transparent Tech: People have transparent mobile devices. The show runners refer to them as "hand terminals," in that rather than being powerful mobile computers themselves, they are relatively dumb interfaces to more powerful devices nearby.
• Tribal Face Paint: The OPA, rather than being a unified organization, is actually a loose conglomeration of groups that are almost tribal in nature. Some of these tribes use unique facial tattoos as a way to show allegiance.
• Trojan Horse: Marco rigs the Chetzemoka with proximity sensors designed to trigger a reactor overload the moment any ship docks, while broadcasting a simulated distress call from Naomi to the Rocinante, hoping they'd be the first to take the bait. Naomi managing to get herself on-board before it's launched throws a wrench in that plan.
• Turn in Your Badge: Miller is fired after his persistent investigation into Julie Mao becomes politically sensitive.
• Two-Keyed Lock:
  • The Self-Destruct Mechanism on the Donnager requires thumbprints from both Captain Yao and one of her lieutenants.
  • Earth's interplanetary nuclear arsenal is locked behind one of these, with the keys in the hands of the Secretary-General and Undersecretary-General.

U

• Underestimating Badassery: The captain and crew of the MCRN Donnager treat an attack by a group of small ships to be the equivalent of the attackers committing Suicide by Cop. Then they get a Oh, Crap! moment as they realize just how technically advanced the attackers are and the Donnager starts taking serious damage. The captain eventually self-destructs the Donnager before it can be captured.
• Underground City: Many Belter colonies are built this way in order maximize available space and harness Centrifugal Gravity, so that "down" is actually toward the surface.
• United Nations Is a Superpower: The UN has taken over as the government of Earth. The government seems to be a type of federal republic, with the Secretary-General serving as the elected executive office and the Security Council as the legislature.
• United Space of America: Earth is governed by the United nations, whose government structure is more similar to the USA than to the UN's real-life makeup. The Secretary-General of the United Nations is a popularly-elected executive leader, and the security detail that protects them is called the "Secret Service" and the spaceplane s/he flies in is referred to as "UN One".
• The Unmasqued World: The existence of the protomolecule finally goes public at the beginning of Season 3, right before the UN formally declares war on Mars.
• Unnaturally Blue Lighting:
  • Used to great effect around the protomolecule Meat Moss, which pulses with bluish-white electric jolts.
  • Also used in a Real Is Brown sense to lend a cold artificial feel to spaceship and space station interiors.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Julie Mao had no way of knowing it, but by getting infected and travelling to Eros she brought the protomolecule right back into the hands of the same conspirators she'd hoped to keep it away from and the same station they'd already planned to infect with it.
• Used Future:
  • Belter ships and technology generally fit this trope to a T, with some ships basically held together with duct tape. The Canterbury has instruments in need of Percussive Maintenance and stowaway rats out past Saturn.
  • In terms of appearance, UN and Martian ships generally avert this, with Martian ones embodying a clean yet utilitarian aesthetic. In-universe, much of the UN fleet is implied to be this, as even their latest ship classes are decades older than many of their Martian counterparts.
• Useless Spleen: Amos quips, "There goes my spleen," as the Rocinante performs a high-g burn that will eventually kill the crew if they keep it up in "Home".
• Utopia Justifies the Means: In "Doors and Corners", Dresden speaks very movingly of the wonders humanity might accomplish if they can master the protomolecule, but unfortunately his plans to achieve this involve merciless mass murder.

V

• Villain Has a Point: Invoked by Miller, regarding Dresden.
  "I didn't shoot him because he was crazy. I shot him because he was making sense.
• Virgin-Shaming: Downplayed. Miller hassles Diogo this way only in response to Diogo's claim that space-walking (which Miller hates) is Better than Sex. Likewise, he offers, "Hey kid, go get laid, will you?" as his parting advice, but since Diogo is Just a Kid with too much Patriotic Fervor it's more about telling him to live for something more than dying for a cause.
• The Virus: The protomolecule is a glowing, blue, crystalline virus that can infect living tissue, feeds on most forms of energy, and seems to adapt as it grows. When Julie Mao discovers it infesting the Anubis, she deemed it necessary to completely power down the ship and vent every deck just to slow it down. When it's released on Eros, the mass of people it absorbs allows it to mimic human form through bio-luminescent spores, and was purposely delivered on such a massive scale because its creators are trying to make it evolve.
• Visionary Villain: The Conspiracy behind the protomolecule has grand designs:
  • They started researching it because they discovered that Phoebe was in fact an extrasolar object that would have hit Earth two billion years in the past. The only reason humanity exists is because Phoebe was caught by Saturn's gravity — the interstellar equivalent of a Pocket Protector.
    Dresden: Without this work, humanity will be left unarmed, ignorant, vulnerable, to an enemy who's already fired the first shot.
  • Their chief researcher is an Evilutionary Biologist who seems even more interested in it because it's Imported Alien Phlebotinum; Just Think of the Potential!!
    Dresden: We become our own gods. Imagine human beings able to live in hard vacuum without a suit, or under the crushing atmosphere of a gas giant. Or able to hibernate long enough to travel to the stars.
• Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Julie Mao after she was infected by the protomolecule and Miller after he got radiation sickness from being exposed to radioactive radiation used to provide the protomolecule in the bodies of the infected with energy.

W

• Walk and Talk: Holden, Naomi, and Amos have a long one in "Dulcinea" that carries them from the galley to the bridge of the Canterbury.
• Wall of Weapons:
  • The XO of the Canterbury has a weapons locker filled with four pistols and three rifles, some of them quite antique for the 23rd Century.
  • The Rocinante has an entire deck devoted to the airlock and a locker room for Space Marine weapons and gear.
• The War of Earthly Aggression: The Martians have already declared independance, and the OPA is looking to follow suit in the not-too-distant future.
• Warfare Regression: Downplayed, but the lack of Subspace Ansibles makes it so that most space-faring navies must depend primarily on the actions of individual captains and "on-site" admirals rather than the command centers of Earth and Mars, in effect loosely mimicking the age of naval warfare before the dawn of mass communication and radio technology.
• War Hawk:
  • Admiral Nguyen plays this role as a Foil to Admiral Souther's dove in The War Room of the UN in "Doors and Corners".
  • Bobby Draper seems to be one, even proposing: "You said our job is to prevent a war with Earth. Ever wonder if we've got it backwards? Maybe we can't have the dream of Mars until we've had that war." That being said, she loses this aspect of her personality after being thrown into her first real firefight on Ganymede.
• War Is Hell: More or less played straight, but it's actually ultimately closer to "War Is Pointless" in terms of execution. Many characters point out that despite hostilities between the many factions war doesn't benefit anyone. That makes it all the more concerning that someone is clearly trying to start a war.
• The War Room: The UN begins deciding interplanetary strategic matters in one of these in Season 2, rather than just Errinwright's office like in Season 1.
• The Watson: Miller's partner Havelock, a newly-arrived Earther, needs a lot of things in the Belt explained to him, and if they aren't explained at least viewer doesn't feel alone in their confusion.
• We All Die Someday: A Belter thug declares this during a standoff with Miller before being called off by Anderson Dawes.
• We ARE Struggling Together: The Belt would be a lot better off if its factions weren't competing against each other. Fred Johnson is a pure pragmatist, Anderson Dawes is more radical and willing to screw over Johnson if he thinks it will benefit him, and Holden is an idealist who doesn't care for either side and has only marginally more appreciation for Johnson's tactics (Dawes he hates with a passion). Amusingly, Avasarala in "Assured Destruction" talks about the OPA as if they're some sort of monolithic entity that has every Belter under their heel, showcasing just how out of touch the Inners really are concerning the Belters.
• We Hardly Knew Ye:
  • Ade Nygaard and Captain McDowell are nuked in the very first episode.
  • Shed Garvey gets decapitated by a railgun before the crew even make it to the Rocinante.
  • Julie Mao gets consumed and assimilated by the protomolecule.
  • Sematimba doesn't make it off Eros Station alive.
• We Used to Be Friends: Subverted with Miller and Sematimba, who still are friends in the present day, and Miller doesn't even resent Sematimba's attempt to abandon him on Eros. In fact, he even holds a brief grudge against Amos for killing Sematimba to stop him from forcing Naomi to take off.
• Weaponized Exhaust:
  • An unintentional example. When the Nauvoo is launched, the heat from its massive engines superheats the scaffolding behind it and a few of the automated tugs used to orient it are vaporized as they return to base.
  • In the Season 2 finale, the Rocinante's main engine is used to fry the protomolecule soldier.
  • In season 5, Alex performs an emergency core dump in the Razorback, venting the reaction mass out through the thruster as an improvised flare to destroy an incoming missile.
• Weird Moon: While debating an attack on the Martian moon Deimos, Avasarala cites the importance of Earth's own moon in their cultural psyche. Errinwright points out that Deimos is different because it's so small that it's really just a bright dot in the Martian sky, but the Martians certainly don't see it that way.
  Sa'id: They ruined our goddamn sky.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist:
  • Chrisjen Avasarala has nothing but Earth's best interests at heart, but as such has doesn't hesitate to resort to threats, torture, or even utterly ruining the life of a personal friend in order to fulfill her objectives.
  • Dr. Antony Dresden is willing to commit any number of atrocities to further his research on the protomolecule, but he honestly believes that research will benefit humanity, especially if whatever sent it eventually shows up.
  • Though regarded as a terrorist by Mars and Earth (and even by some other Belters), Anderson Dawes is very sincere in his ambition to create a "Belt for Belters."
  • Fred Johnson certainly has shades of this as well after having been radicalized by previous events he was held responsible for.
• Well-Trained, but Inexperienced: Captain Yao of the Donnager explains that most of her crew hasn't seen actual combat, instead working through simulations and training to prepare for their war with Earth. This leaves the crew just a little less competent than they could be when they are attacked by the stealth ships of the conspiracy whose equipment is better than what they practiced against in the simulations.
• We Need a Distraction: Anderson Dawes escapes with Cortazar by having Diogo fly off in his ship so the Rocinante will give chase, while Dawes and his men escape in a smaller shuttle during the commotion.
• We Will Have Perfect Health in the Future: Zigzagged Trope.
  • It is indicated that the average human lifespan for Earth residents has been bumped up to 130^note The oldest ever person that we have reliable documentation for lived to 122, and it's mentioned that the colonized Mars is even longer. However, on the space colonies in the Asteroid Belt the average lifespan is just 60-something, and environmental factors like low oxygen or growing up in micro-gravity cause notable physical, mental, and emotional disabilities. There are also signs of mutation/evolution, and most Belters have bones which are far more fragile than the human norm due their development being altered by a life spent in low gravity, meaning that they can't really survive on Earth anymore, or even a planet with more than a fraction of Earth's gravity.
  • As impressive as the long lifespan on Earth may be, when we get a look at what the living conditions on Earth are like in the slums of an overpopulated city, it's not pretty. While the government sees a necessary need to support much of the population with a basic wage regardless of whether they're working or not (because there simply isn't enough work on Earth to go around), and makes at least some effort to get medical and possibly recreational drugs to the population, that doesn't mean the actual quality of life is anything to be envied. Bobbie stumbles into a slum close to the headquarters of Earth's world government and finds horrifying living conditions, that medications can be cut off or altered by the government at any time regardless of an individual's need, and that access to safe food and water is in short supply. A friendly local named Nico who helps her indicated that during the worst of the summer heat, people in the shanty town inevitably have to resort to drinking sewer water just to attempt to survive, and he requests her bone density pills in exchange for his help so he can trade them for medications the locals will actually need and might not otherwise be able to get.
• Wham Episode:
  • "CQB" has some amazing ship-to-ship and squad-to-squad combat and an out-of-nowhere Character Death.
  • "Salvage" features the true Reveal of the protomolecule, and Julie Mao finally makes an appearance.
  • "Critical Mass" and "Leviathan Wakes" answer the Driving Questions about the Canterbury and Julie Mao, and reveals the monstrous things The Conspiracy is capable of.
  • "Godspeed" and "Home" are based on the climax of the first novel, and as such are packed with Wham Shots, Wham Lines, and Reveals.
  • "Immolation". Mei and the other children are rescued, The Conspiracy is finally brought down for good, and the protomolecule births an Eldritch Abomination on Venus which flies off to parts unknown.
  • "Abbadon's Gate". All ships are convinced/forced to shut down their reactor core. That reassures the station they are not hostile, releasing the ships and reopening all 1300 remaining ring gates into habitable systems. Holden is certain this is the start of a new bloody gold rush.
  • "Guagamela". Three asteroids hit Earth, killing Gao and trapping Amos in the underground prison where Clarissa is being held. Fred Johnson is assassinated by Sakai^note Which is especially shocking since Fred survives this incident in the books, who steals his protomolecule sample. The Martian parliament is bombed. Marco makes a public broadcast announcing the formation of the Free Navy and threatening to use the protomolecule against Earth or Mars if they dispute the Belt's right to control the outer planets and the worlds beyond the Ring.
• Wham Line:
  • From "Critical Mass": "They^note the stealth ships that destroyed the Canterbury and the Donnager were built by Earth!"
  • From "Godspeed": "The Nauvoo didn't move; Eros did."
  • From "Home":
    • "Eros has changed trajectory again, and it's accelerating. It's now on a direct collision course with Earth.
    • "Holden, we just lost radar-lock on Eros; the whole damn station just vanished!"
  • From "Caliban's War" (the very last line of Season 2, in fact): "I gave the protomolecule to Fred Johnson."
• Wham Shot:
  • Shed's decapitated body in "CQB".
  • The P.O.V. Cam of Kenzo's Electronic Eyes spying on Holden and Naomi in "Rock Bottom".
  • The discovery of Julie Mao's dead body, ravaged by the protomolecule, at the very end of "Salvage".
  • When the Nauvoo sails right by Eros instead of colliding as intended in "Godspeed" because the protomolecule moved Eros to Dodge the Bullet.
  • "Paradigm Shift" has a wounded Bobbie Draper glimpsing a protomolecule-human hybrid on Ganymede.
  • The inner refugees getting Thrown Out the Airlock in "Pyre".
  • "The Weeping Somnambulist" has the UN survey Venus to see the wreckage of Eros, and there's two lifeforms down there.
  • "The Monster And The Rocket" has the Rocinante and the Sonambulist successfully rescuing 52 refugees from Ganymede... except that a protomolecule soldier managed to tear into the Rocinante's airlock, likely in the confusion when the Karakum's remains fell.
  • "Abbadon's Gate". Once the Station has released all of the ships, everyone is seen staring in awe at something. This turns out to be footage of the Ring Gates reopening around the station. All 1300 remaining ones.
• What the Hell Is That Accent?: Belters evoke this trope with a very strange accent that doesn't quite match any real-life language or region, crossing over with a Constructed Language. Real-life reviews have alternately described it as sounding like Afrikaans, Chinese, Eastern European, and Caribbean.
• Whodunnit: Who destroyed the Canterbury?
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Miller hates space. So does Avasarala, for that matter. Additionally, Holden gains an understandable phobia of virtually anything having to do with the protomolecule.
• Wicked Cultured: Anderson Dawes shows off this side of the OPA in his soft-spoken, articulate conversations with Miller. He even reminds other Belters that, "We are not animals," in his introduction before inviting Miller to join him at a nearby cafe.
• Won't Do Your Dirty Work: In Season 5, Marco tells Filip and Cyn to space Naomi as punishment for her work against them. Cyn furiously refuses, an extreme rarity since Cyn regards Marco as a visionary and generally goes along with Marco's orders, even when he doesn't like or understand them.
  Marco: Space her.
  Cyn: [Stares at Marco in disbelief] What?
  Marco: You heard me. We treated her with respect. And she betrayed us, gave aid to our enemies, tried to take my life!
  Cyn: I know, but... it's Naomi.
  Marco: You will do what I tell you to!
  Cyn: DO IT YOURSELF! If it has to be done you can do it. I'm not going to let Filip be part of this. Unless you think you can make me, hmm? Maybe I finally got old enough, huh?
• The Worf Effect: The Martian Congressional Republic Navy is constantly referenced as being the best there is. However, they get their asses kicked an awful lot in order to show that the other faction is that much better.
• Working the Same Case: Miller quickly discovers Julie Mao was part of the crew of the Scopuli—the same ship used to lure in the Canterbury. From there, Miller and Holden's plotlines progress in tandem until they run into each other at the Blue Falcon Hotel on Eros in "Salvage".
• Worldbuilding: Of course, particularly regarding Ceres (and by extension the rest of the Belt).
• World-Wrecking Wave: The protagonists have to deal with not one but two in succession in Season 4. Shortly after Holden's and the Investigator's meddling with the Protomolecule ruins on Ilum awakens the dormant alien technology, a giant fusion reactor on the other side of the planet goes critical and explodes with a blast of 50 exajoules^note that's roughly 12 gigatons of TNT, or 920,000 times Hiroshima. This unleashes a shockwave with 200 KPH winds that reaches the settlement a few hours later, followed by a massive tsunami after another couple of hours that floods a third of the continent.
• Would Hurt a Child:
  • Fred Johnson earned his epithet "The Butcher of Anderson Station" for resolving a Belter mutiny by using the Nuclear Option on them and their children. In actuality, Johnson hadn't been told they had surrendered, hence why he resigned and joined the OPA.
  • On Ganymede, Dr Strickland and The Conspiracy use children to create protomolecule-human hybrid soldiers.
• Wouldn't Hurt a Child: In "Dulcinea", Miller is fine taking a bribe to forgo a safety inspection, but when several children are among the tenants who nearly die as a result, Miller nearly has the landlord Thrown Out the Airlock.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: The Distress Call in "Dulcinea" turns out to be a trap.
• Wrench Wench: Naomi has multiple engineering degrees and other characters regularly rely on her mechanical expertise. She's even aggravated by how well Rocinante's automated engineering system works because, "There's nothing to fix!"
• Wretched Hive:
  • Ceres' slummy innermost districts, where Miller cautions Havelock that, "People get killed for a wrong look around here."
  • Eros is a crime-ridden asteroid, said to be the murder capital of the Belt, whose "police force" is a private firm that makes Star Helix look downright friendly. The conspirators wind up feeding its entire population to the protomolecule because, in Miller's words, they "don't consider these people as human". We do, however, see that many inhabitants are just regular people trying to make a living, and want nothing to do with the violence that ravages their home.

X

• Xtreme Kool Letterz: The Canterbury is owned by the Pur' N' Kleen Water Company.

Y

• You Are a Credit to Your Race: Defied. Serge tries to invoke this when speaking of the late Fred Johnson. Drummer isn't having it.
  Serge: I heard he was a good man...for an Earther.
  Drummer: He was a good man. Period.
• You Are in Command Now: Holden clutches the executive officer badge he intended to refuse as if accepting this responsibility in "The Big Empty".
• You Can't Go Home Again:
  • Holden and the other shuttle crew watch their ship, the Canterbury, get nuked in the pilot episode.
  • On a macro level, the Belters. As the smuggler in "The Big Empty" so elegantly put it, "You see my body which can no longer survive on the very planet that bore my great-grandmother. Earth has created a race of exiles out in space who have no homes to return to."
  • Directly invoked by Miller in the aptly-named "Home" when he tells Julie Mao, who's unknowingly piloting Eros, that she can't return to Earth or she'll kill everyone on the planet via Colony Drop.
  • Bobbie Draper presumes this to be the case after defecting to Earth, knowing the Martians will never forgive her for it. This one is ultimately averted: once her role in uncovering the Protogen conspiracy becomes public knowledge, she's allowed to return to Mars and even rejoin the MMC.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
  • Julie Mao was abandoned by Anderson Dawes after the Scopuli mission failed.
  • Once the gang members hired as security for an experiment on Eros have done their part, their employers try to ditch them. Holden and Miller, having stumbled upon it, incite them to violence and use the confusion to get past.
• Your Head Asplode: In "CQB", Shed is caught in the path of a railgun round and his head is just gone.
• You No Take Candle: Justified with Belter Creole, which can sound like this since it's a mix of languages of which English is only one, much like the examples in RealLife.
• Your Terrorists Are Our Freedom Fighters:
  • The OPA claims to fight for the Belters, but Earth considers them simply a terrorist group.
  • In later seasons as the OPA moves more towards being a legitimate, mainstream governement, Marco Inaro's Free Navy fills this role, launching asteroid strikes at earth and claiming full jurisdiction over the ring gates.
• You Wouldn't Believe Me If I Told You: When discussing their options in "Back to the Butcher", Holden points out to his crew that they're now the Sole Survivors of two mysterious attacks, and even he wouldn't believe their story if he hadn't been there.
  Holden: We look like terrorists.

Z

• Zero-G Spot:
  • Holden and Ade are introduced this way. They come thudding to the floor when the thrusters cut in.
  • Lauter, Holden and Naomi are shown shagging on the spaceship, too.

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