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Title: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Lucas on June 23, 2020, 01:56:47 PM
Teaser:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgbPSA94Rqg
------

I wasn't aware this was in the making: I know that, over the years, some writers and directors juggled around the idea of finally adapting it to the small/big screen but to no avail.

"Foundation" for me is so much more than a series of books: it's definitely one of the more significant reading experiences of my life (maybe the MOST significant when it comes to novels, at least). From Hari Seldon (perfect casting choice, there, IMO) to Hober Mallow, Bel Riose, the Mule, Daneel Olivaw....they're all so imprinted and dear to my heart that I already find it difficult to digest how "clean" everything look versus the "raw" style of Asimov work, which is obviously rooted in that pre-moon landing, golden age era of sci-fi novels.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Reg on June 23, 2020, 03:12:26 PM
I won't miss this one. Foundation was one of the first science fiction books I ever read (if not the first). I think it'd be best if they stopped the series at the third book (Second Foundation). After that they could do a Caves of Steel series to introduce R Daneel Olivaw. Then they'd have all the right parts to do the more modern Foundation sequels if they want.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 23, 2020, 03:25:34 PM
I will watch it. I'm not sure if I can think of a book series that more thrilled me as a teenager and more disappointed me on a reread as an adult. There's a fundamental storytelling problem that is hard to overcome and Asimov himself knew it (hence the Mule and the Second Foundation and then the really weak later books).

Edit:

Never mind, David Goyer is the principal. I'm out.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Soln on June 23, 2020, 10:39:02 PM
But Jared Harris


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Surlyboi on June 24, 2020, 01:11:03 AM
While you're subscribed to AppleTV+ for this, catch For All Mankind, See and Little America as well.

No, I'm not getting paid for the plugs outside of my stock options.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: slog on June 24, 2020, 04:38:30 AM
This looks pretty awful.  The Foundation series just doesn't translate to TV unless you completely tear up the original story and just keep the title for marketing like they did for World War Z.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Reg on June 24, 2020, 05:22:18 AM
I'm assuming all of that trailer was scenes from Trantor. If the later stories look like that then they've definitely fucked up.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Teleku on June 24, 2020, 07:09:30 AM
This looks pretty awful.  The Foundation series just doesn't translate to TV unless you completely tear up the original story and just keep the title for marketing like they did for World War Z.
Err, why would you say that?  I can easily see them translating the first few books into good stuff.  Going too far away from the original story is actually the thing I worry most about them fucking up.
I'm assuming all of that trailer was scenes from Trantor. If the later stories look like that then they've definitely fucked up.
It seemed pretty obvious to me all the city shots and major buildings were meant to be Trantor, and the wild outdoor stuff likely Terminus.  It was just a lot of short little clips though, so not much to go on, but I didn't see anything that seemed out of place in all that.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: slog on June 25, 2020, 12:26:18 PM
This looks pretty awful.  The Foundation series just doesn't translate to TV unless you completely tear up the original story and just keep the title for marketing like they did for World War Z.
Err, why would you say that?  I can easily see them translating the first few books into good stuff.  Going too far away from the original story is actually the thing I worry most about them fucking up.


Granted it's been 30 years since I've read the books, but the Foundation short stories were not a great setting for an action movie or TV Show.  They were about how inaction was key. 


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 25, 2020, 03:09:13 PM
I think that's kind of right and why it's really not a very good series in retrospect, especially for adaptation in another medium.

In a funny way, it's an anti-tragedy. In a Shakespearean tragedy, you go in knowing: everything is going to turn out the worse for nearly everybody and it will be because the protagonist has a fundamental flaw that he just cannot overcome even if we are in tension hoping he will. In a Greek tragedy, even worse: the protagonist will know what the tragic outcome is and struggle to avoid it, to no avail.

In Foundation, the prime mover of the overall story sees a tragedy coming, envisions a way to shorten the suffering involved, sets a clockwork plan in motion, and succeeds by the end of the first section of the first book. By the middle of the first book, we have affirmation that he has in fact succeeded--that the likeable, talented character we get to know wins out not because he is likeable and talented but because he is the beneficiary of a plan set in motion before he ever showed up. By the end of the first part of the second book, we learn that even a talented and rather sympathetic antagonist has no chance against the plan. It's all set.

Then the Mule shows up and contingency re-enters the story. It's like the third act of a tragedy: maybe Oedipus will beat the prediction! He seems pretty happy in his new marriage! Maybe Macbeth will actually win out! He's a pretty good king, fuck that Macduff guy. Maybe Hamlet will stop whining and rip his uncle a new asshole!

Here it's "maybe the Plan can be beaten!" I kind of suspect most people are really rooting for the Mule, honestly--both because he actually has some sympathetic pathos to him (he's like an incel, almost) and because at least he adds some dramatic tension back into a story that has lost it. But the Mule also reveals that the only actual protagonist of the whole trilogy is the Seldon Plan. Not Seldon, not any character, but the Plan. It's like rooting for a blueprint or for a Soviet ministry to meet its five-year quota on wheat production. When the Second Foundation wins it's really kind of depressing. It's not even clear what kind of future stable empire Seldon hoped they'd make such that it's something we should root for--an empire controlled by a hidden cabal of telepaths who crush any threat to stability? Wow, sign me up, I hope they win.

Asimov tried to walk some of this back in the later books--he tried to make an actual moral debate about the Plan, he tried to explain why the galaxy is devoid of any other intelligent life, and eventually he tried to make Seldon himself a more conflicted figure with a connection to his Baley and Olivaw books. (I assume this series is not going to even try to make Seldon influenced by an ancient telepathic robot, but we'll see.)


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 25, 2020, 04:46:06 PM
Huh, they are actually going to have R. Daneel Olivaw as a character (in his guise as Demerzel). That seems like a big mistake, but who knows.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Typhon on June 25, 2020, 05:11:23 PM
Everyone Many here are saying they are excited for this story, but my vague memory was that the original protagonist comes up with magic science that he uses to create an unstoppable plan and tedium ensues.  I found it unbelievable, joyless and, well, tedious.

I thought maybe I read it too young, or maybe reading it after all the Niven stuff, which I really liked, made me an unsympathetic audience.

Reading your synopsis makes me laugh and realize, "nope!, I'm just not a fan".  Can't hold a candle to Childhood's End, but I guess that is just too strange to make a movie about?  Or maybe all the Rapture cults make that untouchable.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 25, 2020, 05:23:23 PM
There is actually a pretty decent adaptation of Childhood's End that aired on SYFY in the US that tries to deal with some of the challenges the original content presents

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4146128/


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Surlyboi on June 25, 2020, 09:34:34 PM
That Childhood's End adaption was indeed solid.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on June 25, 2020, 10:11:32 PM
Never a big Asimov fan, but it is definitely time for a Bester-sance.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Teleku on June 25, 2020, 11:18:51 PM
Interesting!  I guess maybe I'm in the minority here.  I loved the entire plan aspect of the story, and enjoyed watching it unfold story by story.  Each individual story itself (Beyond the very first 1 or 2) basically played out like a Star Wars space adventure.  The super advanced foundation running into issues as they try to stay hidden and guide a collapsing civilization behind the scenes like the Illuminati.  I liked following how the empire collapsed, the stages it went through, and the ways foundation interacted with it.  The Mule was actually the part I hated the most.  I didn't want somebody fucking up the plan and making random pointless story shit, I wanted to see the clean evolution of galactic civilization from collapse to rebirth!

Mind you, I never actually read the last book or two (And I recall being told they weren't great), but it's not hard for me to imagine they could make a fun TV show about space Illuminati manipulating an empire as it goes through epic changes.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: lamaros on June 25, 2020, 11:35:24 PM
I stopped watched the trailer after it turned into sucking Apple's dick about 10 seconds in. I'm sure it's really relevant to the show and the show will be amazing, though.

I have nothing to contribute here.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 26, 2020, 09:03:11 AM
I think at a minimum to increase some sense of dramatic tension, they've got to have the Second Foundation in view from the beginning.

You'd think maybe the Mule too but the problem with introducing him from the outset is then you completely wreck the big surprise about who he actually is, plus of course this is a story that takes place over centuries, so you really can't have him in the early years of Terminus.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Reg on June 26, 2020, 09:49:10 AM
Doing any of those things would stray so far from the books that I'd hate it. I mean Terminus existed for hundreds of years before the Mule or Second Foundation even became issues. And the Second Foundation didn't have mind control powers at the very beginning either.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 26, 2020, 10:37:32 AM
Well, they sort of did, if you've read the sequels Asimov wrote much later that were intended to deal with the weakness of the original trilogy and to unite Asimov's Robot books with the Foundation books--we end up finding out that the Second Foundation's purpose from the beginning was to learn and reproduce Olivaw's ability to read and influence thoughts, and that Seldon saw from the outset that psychohistory would absolutely have to have some mechanism to provide adjustments and course corrections to the Seldon Plan and that only some form of secret and telepathic group could really do that.

I do think that even when the dust settles after those books, Asimov (and through him Seldon) never really supply any vision of a *good society* other than a good society is politically stable and at the largest scales possible. It's not at all clear that the First Galactic Empire even at its height is a particularly "good" society for many of its members--indeed for some worlds, it's always been a cruel kind of tyrannical overlord. Seldon never really imagines that he's improving on that, just reproducing it. It's as if a philosopher in the reign of Claudius or Nero looked ahead and said, "Rome will last 400 years or so and then the Western Empire will fall, and it will be a thousand years after that before the West rises to power again, I want that to happen faster" without paying much attention to whether the Roman Empire is a particularly good society or without addressing whether the rise of Western Europe whenever it is will be a good thing either.

I think that's all down to Asimov's basic weaknesses as a writer--his stuff lacks a kind of emotional richness, for the most part. Over time the most sophisticated thing he did in that way was the relationship between Elijah Baley and Gladia. His characters are sometimes memorable; the formalism of his plots and his plotting concepts are often really good. But there's a soul missing in a lot of it.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Hoax on June 26, 2020, 02:42:16 PM
Interesting!  I guess maybe I'm in the minority here.  I loved the entire plan aspect of the story, and enjoyed watching it unfold story by story.  Each individual story itself (Beyond the very first 1 or 2) basically played out like a Star Wars space adventure.  The super advanced foundation running into issues as they try to stay hidden and guide a collapsing civilization behind the scenes like the Illuminati.  I liked following how the empire collapsed, the stages it went through, and the ways foundation interacted with it.  The Mule was actually the part I hated the most.  I didn't want somebody fucking up the plan and making random pointless story shit, I wanted to see the clean evolution of galactic civilization from collapse to rebirth!

Mind you, I never actually read the last book or two (And I recall being told they weren't great), but it's not hard for me to imagine they could make a fun TV show about space Illuminati manipulating an empire as it goes through epic changes.

There's a reason you work for the government dude. Just saying.

I felt the same, I hated the Mule but I also got pretty bored pretty quickly at an age where I was reading things so fast it was hard to get bored probably for some of the reasons Khaldun is saying.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 26, 2020, 04:34:04 PM
Yeah, once the Mule v. several sets of antagonists starts rolling along I was like, "I have no side in this", because again, the only real character is Seldon's Plan and it's hard to see why it would be better if the Plan wins vs. the Mule ruling the Galaxy as a warlord.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Teleku on June 27, 2020, 05:52:51 AM
I think at a minimum to increase some sense of dramatic tension, they've got to have the Second Foundation in view from the beginning.

You'd think maybe the Mule too but the problem with introducing him from the outset is then you completely wreck the big surprise about who he actually is, plus of course this is a story that takes place over centuries, so you really can't have him in the early years of Terminus.
Ehhh, this would ruin a lot of the potential dramatic arcs I think.  You have two major oh shit moments in the first books.  The mule wrecking "the plan", and then "oh shit, another foundation out there doing its thing."  Those are two things they can reorder and use for dramatic effect very effectively in the series.  Second Foundation being a thing should be held back as a season ending cliffhanger/reveal as 'First' Foundation gets fucked.  They should actually work to keep the overall plot as isolated as possible, each episode opening up an other layer, as both the viewers and the characters of the era desperately try to figure out whats going on.

And while I'm loath to ever encourage heavy adaptation of a book, it may be needed in this case.  A lot of the complaints you guys mention can again be mitigated by playing up the aspect of a secret advanced civilization trying to manipulate space barbarians though the ages.  It's sort of like taking all the Star Trek Prime Directive episodes, and tweaking them.  You absolutely are fucking with civilizations, but you still want to hide the fact you're doing it at all costs, and it's for their own good.  Lots of room for space adventure and pew pew instead of just dry theoretical plotting.  That alone is a fun basis for any sci-fi series, let alone one with so many books to draw from like Foundation.

But as Hoax says, I work for the man, so maybe I'm more sympathetic to a group of smart people smacking dumber people until they get better.   :why_so_serious:


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 27, 2020, 06:36:13 AM
Except ultimately the secret advanced civilization fucking over the barbarians is doing it because of a plan they can't control and aren't responsible for. There is a fun scene, I admit, in the first book where Seldon's holoimage appears for the first time and the Foundation folks find out that they are destined to always win, and then that plays out a few more times where it's on the edge of the Foundation being basically a kind of religious civilization that just so happens to actually have God on its side. But it also means that the likeable Foundation leaders we meet who are protagonists in some sense are by their own admission completely unimportant and have nothing to do with how events unfold. It's as if the Enterprise shows up, Kirk does some Shatner-speaking and bangs a green-skinned lady, and then Spock informs the locals on the planet below that will be joining the Federation no matter what because it's been predicted and it turns out Spock is completely right and it doesn't really matter what the Enterprise does or doesn't do. It doesn't even matter if people know there IS a Plan, they can't stop it. Funny or interesting once, but not for very long. Even Asimov knew that, hence the introduction of the Mule and the reintroduction of the possibility that the Plan can be defeated.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Raph on June 30, 2020, 04:22:27 PM
Based on the trailer, this looks to me like it's is adapting Prelude to Foundation first.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on June 30, 2020, 04:23:38 PM
Seems like they're going to use some of it, since they've cast Demerzel/Olivaw.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on September 27, 2021, 10:45:21 PM
Exists.

It's slow. It's beautiful. Reviewers are also finding it boring.

Me, I give the first two episodes a thumbs up. Sometimes among the spaceships I thought I was watching The Expanse, sometimes it felt a bit Star Wars. Best part was the brand new actor Lou Llobell who plays Gaal. Worst part was the overacting of Lee Pace who plays Brother Day (middle-aged Cleon 1 clone). Every effects artist and set designer attached to this project had a field day. The costume designers mistakenly thought they were just as good as those guys and totally overdid it.

It's something I'll watch all of.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Endie on September 28, 2021, 03:27:01 AM
I'm storing this up until I'm on holiday in ten days, but I'm really looking forward to it. The plan for eight series of ten episodes delights me.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Samwise on September 28, 2021, 07:45:42 AM
I'm watching this not having read the books, AMA.  Two episodes in, so far I'm entertained but also occasionally confused.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: slog on September 28, 2021, 07:54:31 AM
I'm watching this not having read the books, AMA.  Two episodes in, so far I'm entertained but also occasionally confused.

Are you guys actually paying for HBO plus to watch it?  Is that service worth it?


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Chimpy on September 28, 2021, 07:58:44 AM
First episode was very good, second was a bit meh at times.

Overall looks pretty. I thought the costume design was actually kinda cool, they actually did a decent job of making the materials/designs look actually alien instead of your typical sci-fi "lets just add weird pieces of extra fabric to a robe, or some goofy armor plates to things" method of showing alien garb.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Trippy on September 28, 2021, 09:24:33 AM
I'm watching this not having read the books, AMA.  Two episodes in, so far I'm entertained but also occasionally confused.
Are you guys actually paying for HBO plus to watch it?  Is that service worth it?
It’s $5 a month and also included in their more expensive Apple One bundled services but a lot of people have access to it for free for 3 months or more via Apple devices purchases. It’s light on original content right now, similar to Netflix in their early original content days, but they are trying for quality over quantity.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Samwise on September 28, 2021, 10:10:05 AM
Yeah, we started a free trial so we could check out Ted Lasso (which is also pretty good btw).  We'll probably keep paying the $5 a month -- I'm generally willing to pay that much if a service has at least one good show on it.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on September 28, 2021, 11:42:49 PM
Are you guys actually paying for HBO plus to watch it?  Is that service worth it?

For me it's on Apple TV+ (Apple's streaming service, which I've never bothered with before). I'm not an Apple user, but there's a one-week free trial and then it's about A$8 per month.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Surlyboi on September 29, 2021, 09:06:54 PM
Yeah, we started a free trial so we could check out Ted Lasso (which is also pretty good btw).  We'll probably keep paying the $5 a month -- I'm generally willing to pay that much if a service has at least one good show on it.

Watch See, and For All Mankind as well. The first seasons of both are a bit rocky but the second seasons are a definite improvement.

This is... not the books. And I'm ok with that. The books would can't be made into a series. This is a nice compromise and it may get more people to read the books like the Expanse got me to read Leviathan's Wake.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on September 30, 2021, 10:52:31 AM
I think they'll be pretty disappointed if they read the books. I just re-read them again this past summer and they really have not held up well.

(The Caves of Steel and the later Baley/Olivaw books are still pretty good, and the stories in I, Robot are as good as they ever were, meaning that the clunkers are still clunkers and the great stories are great.)


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Surlyboi on September 30, 2021, 06:44:16 PM
The newcomers will hate the books. A few will find some weird-ass fascination with them. The neckbeards will rage at the differences.  The insecure morons will complain about how “woke” it is and the world will keep on turning. I’m just glad we’re putting it on screen.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Endie on October 01, 2021, 03:22:36 AM
I will be disappointed if they don't retain Asimov's coal-powered spaceships.  I want to finally see on the screen the chief engineer shouting at the captain that he can't give him any more power because they're stoking as hard as they can, while grimy men, stripped to the waist, shovel away like Stakhanovites in the background.

Edit: I know that some people argue that their societies are coal-powered but actually they have leftover ships using nuclear power but that just leaves me picturing them kicking a reactor whose fuel rods failed centuries ago.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: slog on November 15, 2021, 07:58:18 AM
How is this turning out? 


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on November 15, 2021, 07:17:03 PM
I'm watching and I like it. I don't think I've read the books (though I did read some Asimov 33 years ago - a year where I lived in the school library's sci-fi section). I'm told it's not really like the books.

The first five episodes or so were full of slow, lavish world-building (worthy of the budget), with a little action. Since then there's been more intensity and some cliffhangers.

They've apparently made a lot of changes with race and gender and to me that really works in the show's favour, rather than seeming forced. I look forward to it each Friday.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Chimpy on November 15, 2021, 07:35:54 PM
The books never really mention race in particular. But they were a mega-sausage fest. I am not sure there even was a single female main character in any of the books.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on November 15, 2021, 07:43:11 PM
Zippo. Closest you get is Bayta, who (kind of) foils the Mule.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Setanta on November 15, 2021, 11:17:37 PM
Isn't Gaia female from Foundation and Earth? It's been so long since I've read the books.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Johny Cee on November 16, 2021, 06:48:29 AM
The books never really mention race in particular. But they were a mega-sausage fest. I am not sure there even was a single female main character in any of the books.

I mean..  Asimov thought women were for groping, not for talking and actually doing shit.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on November 16, 2021, 07:23:57 AM
Not even an exaggeration that. He got a public rep for being pretty gross back when people generally did not talk about that kind of thing and he didn't even seem particularly embarrassed about it.

Gaia is female, in the sequels, but that was written way later when Asimov was getting a bit sensitive about the constant knock that he absolutely couldn't write women. And of course Gaia is there in part for potential sexual gratification (and if I remember right, says as much).

Gladia in the later sequel to the Olivaw-Baley books is actually written fairly well.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Teleku on November 24, 2021, 08:34:01 AM
Zippo. Closest you get is Bayta, who (kind of) foils the Mule.

Err, that's not 'closest'.  She is the full POV character for that entire story/era who drives the plot.  Probably one of the most important main character of that book.

But yes, it was very male dominated and I'm fine with them gender switching for whatever.  Having said that, I'm annoyed they went out of there way to keep the main girl characters alive to the next century instead of wiping the cast and starting again like you'd expect.  Especially fucking Gaal Dornick.  All she did for 10 episodes straight was scream and cry pathetically about whatever bad situation she was in.  Every fucking episode.  Was so ready for her to be killed off by time, or somebody just strangling her, but nooooo!

So I overall liked this for the first half.  Even though almost none of this was in the books, the world building was great, character setup for the imperials and various factions engaging, ect.  But then the foundation plot line shifted to the half assed event horizon story, and everything that lead up to it and after was pretty cliche.  Still some good stuff, but a lot of eye rolling from me.  And the small scale of cast for such big events made the last few episodes feel like a very high produced Star Trek episode, not to mention the dialog and resolution.  Probably not going to bother to stick around for whatever comes next unless reviews are great.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Raguel on November 24, 2021, 01:12:25 PM

But yes, it was very male dominated and I'm fine with them gender switching for whatever.  Having said that, I'm annoyed they went out of there way to keep the main girl characters alive to the next century instead of wiping the cast and starting again like you'd expect.  Especially fucking Gaal Dornick. 

If you think about it, all the main characters were done this way (one's a robot, 3 are clones, another AI as opposed to a recording). I think they just didn't trust a general audience would stay engaged if all of the main characters in the first season didn't come back for a second season.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on November 24, 2021, 02:21:06 PM
Thought this was pretty good right up to the last 2 episodes which I thought were terrible.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on November 24, 2021, 03:13:24 PM
There's a good analysis of this series in the Atlantic that gets at some things that I couldn't clearly articulate myself--basically that Asimov never even bothers to explain why Seldon's vision of a shorter interval of 'barbarism' before the revival of empire is one we're supposed to root for at all, but that Goyer walks away from that because times have changed without providing a substitute reason to root for the Foundation. The point about the change to Hardin's character is especially good. Sure, he's a boring Heinlein-esque smartass negotiator in the original books, but that's a big relief from him being Zapp Branigan as an alternative.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/foundation-tv-series-books-empire/620750/


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Raguel on November 24, 2021, 09:41:07 PM
There's a good analysis of this series in the Atlantic that gets at some things that I couldn't clearly articulate myself--basically that Asimov never even bothers to explain why Seldon's vision of a shorter interval of 'barbarism' before the revival of empire is one we're supposed to root for at all, but that Goyer walks away from that because times have changed without providing a substitute reason to root for the Foundation. The point about the change to Hardin's character is especially good. Sure, he's a boring Heinlein-esque smartass negotiator in the original books, but that's a big relief from him being Zapp Branigan as an alternative.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/foundation-tv-series-books-empire/620750/

It's been awhile since I've read the books but this seems on point. I just have a minor quibble re: the heroes being nerds. I can only really remember Hardin and in my mind he led a coup against the nerds. He understood people way too much to be a true nerd, but maybe that's just my bias.

I really wanted to like this series. I realize they needed to make some changes from the original (it's really just a bunch of dudes talking in various rooms: all the action takes place offstage), but I can't help but think they missed the plot.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Endie on November 25, 2021, 02:20:55 AM
There's a good analysis of this series in the Atlantic that gets at some things that I couldn't clearly articulate myself--basically that Asimov never even bothers to explain why Seldon's vision of a shorter interval of 'barbarism' before the revival of empire is one we're supposed to root for at all, but that Goyer walks away from that because times have changed without providing a substitute reason to root for the Foundation. The point about the change to Hardin's character is especially good. Sure, he's a boring Heinlein-esque smartass negotiator in the original books, but that's a big relief from him being Zapp Branigan as an alternative.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/foundation-tv-series-books-empire/620750/

That's not what that article says. He makes clear that Asimov does explain why the restoration of the Empire is a good thing. The critique is of the lazy approach of the show-runner for the TV series, who adopts the acceptable modern take of "Empires are necessarily bad: look how evil they are" but then plots a series around characters trying to restore it:

Quote
"Asimov’s Galactic Empire, despite its flaws, is the greatest incubator of art and knowledge the universe has ever known. Goyer’s is just a brutal autocracy. Who cares if it is destroyed? Why would anyone want to make another one?"

To Asimov, the problem with the Empire was not its nature, but that it has declined and failed to serve its purpose of securing peace, stability and a bedrock upon which art and science can grow.  But Goyer was incapable of the nuance of taking that approach, balancing it with a post-colonial analysis and exploring the complexity of the moral questions that arose. Which is a shame, because that sort of use of a fictional frame to explore current problems is the excitement of so much speculative fiction.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on November 25, 2021, 09:53:11 AM
I don't agree with the author that Asimov explains in any kind of detailed or specified way--and if you read it carefully, the author's article acknowledges that it's implicit (it's why he makes such a big deal of the Cold War context). Seldon offers only a very few reasons why he wants a galactic state to rise again as quickly as possible--he largely treats it as self-evident. The character of 'barbarism' is laid out in the first book in the Foundation's first encounters with local enemies (as the author of the article notes). When Bel Riose shows up in the second book, he hardly bothers to explain why he thinks the Empire is worth defending--it just is. Nobody in Second Foundation has anything to say about what they're ultimately trying to build. If you can find a detailed passage in Foundation where Seldon explains specifically, with details, why the Empire is a great thing and why he wants to revive it as fast as possible, say where. "Because art and science" is pretty vague; in Foundation and Empire we even hear from a person whose complaint against the Empire was that it brutally destroyed the art and science of his own world (and not because it was in decline).

In the not-great-sequels, Foundation and Second Foundation set out to convince Trevize that the future is best guided by one of the two of them, which I think is Asimov acknowledging that he needed to say *something*, but it's pretty weak tea. Trevize decides for Gaia, ostensibly because he finds the arguments so weak and Gaia's plan is slow and reversible if it's a mistake. We find out at the very end that Daneel wanted it that way because a human galaxy needed to get ready for invasion by alien galaxies, which is pretty fucking stupid, imho.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Endie on November 25, 2021, 03:06:53 PM


That's cool. Your previous post explicitly said that the author of that article did echo your opinion, and I pointed out that it didn't.

That doesn't require me to search the books to argue with you on your interpretation. Just to point out that the article said the opposite of what you stated. Which I did.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Teleku on November 25, 2021, 06:56:10 PM
Yeah, I felt the entire point of the article was that the TV series skipped a reason why the empire needed to be preserved, unlike the books.

But without going back to reread it right now (it's been awhile), it seemed pretty straight forward.  Especially considering how much it's based on the fall of the Roman Empire.  If the empire disintegrates as it is right now, it will lead to mass civil war that will wipe out a significant amount of the galaxies population, and reduce math/science/art/standards of living/civilization back to the brutal primitive days for thousands of years.  I think most people would generally consider that 'bad', something to be avoided.  So the plan is just a relatively short bit of that (only a thousand years) before a new empire can quickly refill the power vacuum and reestablish the Pax Romana, so that everybody can live in peace.

Of course that might be a controversial take now I guess, but I'd honestly like to see them be brave enough to just run with the general premise of a benevolent empire ruling everybody as the best option.  Certainly would break with all the standard tropes from Hollywood.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on November 26, 2021, 10:51:03 AM
Except that even in Asimov's original trilogy, it's plain that it's not best for everybody. Seldon himself acknowledges that it's been falling apart for a long time; in Foundation and Empire we learn about one planet where a rebellion led to an entire city dying from an atomic weapons attack intended to punish the rebels. It isn't until Second Foundation that we see that the Seldon Plan intends to stabilize the future empire with a secret clique of telepathic rulers--basically Plato's philsopher-kings--but even in Second Foundation we find out that they're not moral paragons themselves (a long-time rejoinder to Plato). In the sequels, Asimov opens that up even more--it's no longer clear that either Foundation will provide an answer to the problem of internal instability in a galaxy-wide empire.

But basically, yeah, I think the author of the article is right that Asimov was just assuming that Cold War American readers would vibe with the assumption that a galactic empire would encourage peace, stability, science and art in keeping with the 1960s understanding of the blessings of the Pax Americana. But Asimov doesn't say it explicitly and it seems evident to me that this is a basically dumb and unconvincing assumption in the books much as it has been in the real world. Not just for the US in  the Cold War--the entire idea of the "Dark Ages" after the fall of the Western Roman Empire has been thoroughly rubbished by historians.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Endie on November 26, 2021, 02:03:54 PM
I enjoyed this article - https://lawliberty.org/book-review/foundation-dark-future/ - which explores the Foundation books as a reflection of Asimov's own journey from a celebration of rationalism and positivism to dubious and fantastical mysticism.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on November 27, 2021, 07:55:15 PM
I enjoyed this series as a big-budget sci-fi hit that sometimes really gave me what I was looking for: all the scenes involving spaceships, and the convincing environments of each planet. Much of the drama was forgettable, but I didn't really mind. I thought the actors playing Salvor Hardin and Gaal Dornick were great and really made these revised characters their own. For the budget it all could have been much better, but it was a decent watch while waiting for the final season of The Expanse.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on August 25, 2023, 12:26:46 AM
This is GREAT now. It's slow, epic storytelling, but it's really gone there. Just watched season 2 episode 7 and it was firing on all cylinders.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on August 25, 2023, 12:32:22 PM
I just can't get engaged with it.  This last ep was better than most of this season and it is well made (with some good acting) but I honestly can't figure out what the actually driving plot/conflict is and what the motivations are for most of the characters. They just sort of go different places and do various things for no real reason.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on August 25, 2023, 02:55:22 PM
Sort of like the books. Or when they do things with good reasons, they're generally doomed to have it not work out as expected.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on August 27, 2023, 07:34:46 PM
... but I honestly can't figure out what the actually driving plot/conflict is and what the motivations are for most of the characters. They just sort of go different places and do various things for no real reason.

Surely the plot is that Hari Seldon is trying to establish the Foundation to limit losses to humanity (lives and culture) from the forecast disastrous age that would follow the inevitable (says psychohistory) impending demise of the Cleonic dynasty. Meanwhile the Cleonic Dynasty sees Seldon's Foundation as a threat.

I have not read the books, but I have read the following huge spoiler.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Khaldun on August 28, 2023, 06:27:36 AM
In the books, that's Asimov's attempt to link his early robot stories with his Foundation work--the telepathic robot Giskard in conversation with R. Daneel Olivaw, who partnered with a human detective in two early Asimov novels,  reason  their way to a "Zeroth Law" since they can see human thoughts and realizes that there are times where a robot obeying the Three Laws must act on behalf of all humanity rather than individual humans. Giskard's positronic brain breaks down but his dying gift to Daneel makes Daneel telepathic; he then works to further develop his understanding of the collective needs and welfare of humanity. He's still around in the time of Foundation and helps plant the idea of psychohistory in Seldon--and to develop the telepathic power of the Second Foundation.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on August 28, 2023, 03:59:39 PM
It is the overall central conflict that defines the narrative I guess, but the actual mechanics of what is means or who is doing what to further or hinder it just aren't there.  It's like they want it to be a puzzle box show but the puzzle is just one color and the pieces are just squares.

The characters are also all over the place between being overpowered and useless depending on what is needed for whatever mini-arc (that doesn't go anywhere) they are doing at the moment.

Also, annoys me they hired Holt McCallany for a lousy two scenes just to kill him for no reason.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on September 07, 2023, 09:53:01 PM
Last couple of episodes have been pretty good even though the show still completely fizzles whenever it cuts to Gayle/Salvor/Wish.com Apocalypse.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Samwise on September 07, 2023, 11:33:30 PM
I love how Cleon I turned out to be an even bigger asshole than I'd ever dreamed.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on September 09, 2023, 11:43:19 AM
I love how Cleon I turned out to be an even bigger asshole than I'd ever dreamed.

Ha, yes. Loved the latest episode.

Demerzel: "You're a sperm led by its waving flagellum, mistaking its random motion for complexity."


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Abagadro on September 15, 2023, 11:04:45 AM
Finale was a bit meh with a couple of good bits. Some of it made zero sense, but whatever.


Title: Re: Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" (2021 - Apple TV)
Post by: Tale on September 16, 2023, 02:53:39 PM
I continued to enjoy it immensely. Great season.