In The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha, “Rocinante” was the name given to Quixote’s horse.
The expanse holden full#
In the current episode, Holden is in full command of his shipmates aboard the newly christened, former Mars warship, The Rocinante. This message fueled the unrest in the Asteroid Belt and brought the struggle of the exploited Belters into the conflict between the solar system’s superpowers.
That moment occurred before being captured by the Martians when he broadcasted a video message charging them with the nuclear destruction of the Canterbury. In The Expanse, James Holden has undergone the transformation from nihilist to rebel over the course of six episodes that saw widespread death and destruction –all witnessed by himself and his ship-hopping crew. Their nihilism comes off piercingly early on but eventually evolves into rebellion. Like Caulfield, he is a character of contradiction and this contradiction is crucial in establishing an arc for these characters. Like Holden Caulfield, James Holden is an underachiever and uses this as an excuse to not accept leadership or responsibility. Her death drove him further into despair while his cynicism for his situation and the circumstances for those around him grew. While Holden initially comes off as the careless everyman whose only aim is to find a decent cup of coffee in the void of the Asteroid Belt, we do see him attempt to force longevity with the Canterbury ’s navigator –who he had maintained a sexual relationship with.
After seeing the previous occupier of that position lose himself in the nothingness of deep space, he himself cannot accept any other fate in what he perceives as a meaningless existence.
When Holden is offered a promotion to second-in-command of the now-destroyed Canterbury, he denies it. We see this trait early on in The Expanse when introduced to James Holden, a seemingly everyday ice hauler carrying on day-to-day without any direction or purpose.