Apple's TV show based on Asimov's FOUNDATION, starring Jared Harris

[Spockydog]

5 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Did it seem odd to anyone else that the Ancreons were flying interstellar spacecraft but their weapons were bows?

Totally. Unless they've got some Hawkeye level of technology. Only thing I saw was sticks and feathers.

ETA: Okay. Just seen Wert's post. 

Edited October 2, 2021 by Spockydog

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

1 hour ago, Spockydog said:

Totally. Unless they've got some Hawkeye level of technology. Only thing I saw was sticks and feathers.

ETA: Okay. Just seen Wert's post. 

I’m glad I’m not the only one who thought those were the folks on the ships.  

[Spockydog]

13 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I’m glad I’m not the only one who thought those were the folks on the ships.  

Maybe that's what we were supposed to think. Personally, I thought they were an advance party. 

[David Selig]

3 hours ago, Winterfell is Burning said:

I disagree (in part) with you here. First of all, hyperspace is not teleportation, we see in the latter books that trips even in the most modern of the ships can last weeks, if not months, which is, well, the distance from Rome or Constantinople to the edges of the empire.

I haven't reread most of the series in a long time, but I recently reread the first few short stories which made up the first novel. Right at the start of the first one it's stated "Through hyper-space, that unimaginable region that was neither space nor time, matter nor energy, something nor nothing, one could traverse the length of the Galaxy in the interval between two neighboring instants of time". IIRC after that this is sometimes ignored or downright retconned later on, and the way hyperjumps work is described pretty inconsistently, but still the tech is there for instantaneous travel through the whole galaxy, at least in some circumstances.

Also, even if travel usually takes weeks for whatever reason, the communication between worlds is always instantaneous thanks to "hyperwaves". This alone should serve as a great equaliser in the differences between the planets regardless of their location.

Quote

Second, I hope I don't have to tell you why suggesting that a Russian Jew that flew from America in the 20's would be writing a pro-authoritarianism story in 1942 is absurd.

It's also pretty clear in the story most of the problems are caused by the Empire itself, and the idea of the Foundation is not to impose a dictatorship or control people's lives, but rather have a central authority that can preserve history, culture, science and keep some standards, as well as to stop or mitigate conflicts. One only has to look to Europe during early modern age and compare it with the European Union today to see what's preferable. It's pretty clear either Asimov nor Seldon ever intended to have the Foundation controlling people's ordinary lives, sending them to jail for dissent, etc.

The premise of the series is that without a single centralized authority ruling the whole galaxy with a population numbering in quadrillion there would be a widespread barbarism, misery, suffering and a long Dark Age.  How is that not pro-authoritarianism?

Seldon's plan was for a formation of a Second Galactic Empire. Not a Galactic Republic or 1000 smaller republics.  And when people in-story talk about the problems in the Empire, it's almost always with the caveat that it wasn't that way in the good old days when the Empire was in its prime and the emperors controlled the whole galaxy. Demerzel in the prequels states explicitly that the Empire is a force for good and better than the alternatives and this is clearly presented as the correct view.

Spoiler

And then there is the Second Foundation and their literal mind control, which is presented mostly positively. The end (another Galactic empire) justifying the means (mind controller puppet masters ruling from the shadows).

 

Edited October 3, 2021 by David Selig

[Winterfell is Burning]

Regarding hyperspace (also communication)- I'm referring mostly with what I had in mind, which I guess it's in the latter books- to be honest, since I've read then one after the other, it kinda blurs whether inconsistency it might have between the books in that regard.

Also, while it's pretty clear Asimov presents the Empire existing as a good thing, I don't think you can interpret by any means as a support for authoritarianism anymore than one can equate support of the US existing rather than splitting in two, like in the Civil War, or in 50 states or even more. as a good thing. The advantages are obvious, and in those kinds of distances and after thousands of years, at one point two distant worlds with no contact might as well become alien worlds entirely (a point it is made with Solaria).

Moreover, the Foundation is pretty much the opposite of what an authoritarian government would be- an emphasis on science and logic rather than religion or superstition and on peace rather than violence, no cults of personality, no interest in people's personal affairs, no profit motive, etc. It's, to put it mildly, a really big stretch to equate that with support of a fascist-type government (and not even taking into account the real world circumstances of the time).

Regarding the fact he shows no plan of becoming a Galactic Republic, there's a model of government going for more than 30000 years, that just can't be changed drastically or fast. Since Asimov read The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, he was certainly familiar with the failed attempts of introducing new systems, like the Tetrarchy, or attempting to go back to old ones, like Julian the Apostate attempts of going back to a pagan Citizen-Emperor model (both of them far less radical changes than going back to the Republic).

[Loge]

If I recall correctly, FTL travel is a series of "jumps", which require some preparation. You assess your current position, then do some complicated math, perform the jump, which will (hopefully) get you close to the expected position. Then you repeat the whole thing. The distance you can cover with a single jump is limited by the precision of the math. Doing a very long jump runs the risk of ending up inside a star.

 

On the second foundation with its telepathic capabilities: If they could steer the Galaxy along the Seldon plan, shouldn't they have been able to take over and save the empire? The whole thing doesn't make much sense to me.

[Winterfell is Burning]

No one on the Foundation had Mule-like levels, plus they weren't just trying to replace the Empire, but make something greater and more sustainable. And at that point the collapse was inevitable anyway.

[Annara Snow]

21 hours ago, karaddin said:

You're right, he's played by the actor who gets credited as Brother Day so I mixed it up, but at that point he would still be Brother Dawn.

I'm getting really confused now. You said Brother Day destroyed the mural. We only saw a teenage Cleon the 14th/Brother Dawn (played by Cassian Bilton, who debuted in episode 3 and in that scene, in fact) order the destruction of the mural, 17 years into the future from the previous scenes (so, he should be the baby that was born just before the death scene of Brother Dusk/Brother Darkness).

Edited October 3, 2021 by Annara Snow

[karaddin]

2 hours ago, Annara Snow said:

I'm getting really confused now. You said Brother Day destroyed the mural. We only saw a teenage Cleon the 14th/Brother Dawn (played by Caspian Bilton, who debuted in episode 3 and in that scene, in fact) order the destruction of the mural, 17 years into the future from the previous scenes (so, he should be the baby that was born just before the death scene of Brother Dusk/Brother Darkness).

Yeah I actually saw a YouTube video with him and realized I was completely wrong lol. Sorry about that. I guess I'll give him props for channeling the same energy, which is what I'd say was one of the stand out things with the performance so far - Lee Pace is absolutely selling me that he could be the kind of dangerous and ruthless man that could found a dynasty like that.

[Werthead]

The three clone brothers thing is confusing, which may overcome the interesting idea behind it. The Lee Pace we saw in Episodes 1/2 is the young Terrance Mann in Episode 3, whilst the old Terrance Man in Episode 3 is the young Terrance Mann we saw from Episode 1/2, and the little kid in Episode 1/2 is Lee in Episode 3.

They've now introduced Cassian Bilton as a fourth intermediate stage which is adding to the confusion (especially since the jump from the little kid who seemed to be about 10 in Episode 1/2 to the 42-year-old Lee Pace in Episode 3 feels a bit of a stretch, though I think they did try to age down Pace a bit).

Edited October 3, 2021 by Werthead

[karaddin]

Yeah, that's what got me - I assumed they weren't introducing a 4th actor for the trio. I followed the Terrance Man change well enough because it included some personality signifiers as well at the dinner scene where the other two first came in.

[Ran]

On 10/3/2021 at 4:47 AM, Winterfell is Burning said:

Regarding hyperspace (also communication)- I'm referring mostly with what I had in mind, which I guess it's in the latter books- to be honest, since I've read then one after the other, it kinda blurs whether inconsistency it might have between the books in that regard.

I think @Loge is right about how the jump drives work in Asimov's books. A jump is indeed an instantaneous teleportation and in theory you can jump from one galaxy to another, millions of light years apart, in one go. But... because of the dangers of masses with gravity throwing off the calculations as to where you'll actually end up, you generally have to do a lot of smaller jumps, with day-long (or longer) pauses between jumps to make fresh calculations for the next jump. In Foundation's Edge someone's invented a computerized system that can calculate all the jumps so that you can do them in succession -- 30 jumps that took 30 days now take 30 minutes instead.

I'm not bothered by the fact that the Empire contains wildly different cultures and languages. Many worlds were settled long before the Empire was formed, and went on to colonize their own worlds, etc. There would have been periods where some colony worlds didn't have much contact with some other elsewhere in the galaxy, and things would naturally change.  

I mostly liked the third episode, especially the Emperor Cleon matter -- it's a genuinely cool idea, and Linda and I had no problem keeping track of the various Cleons as it told us what time frame we were looking at each time (though I wish they'd just give us the GE or FE dates rather than just saying 'x years after event y'). That said, the Terminus section afterward was ... very frustrating, given how the second episode ended. It's absurd for them to hide their hand so thoroughly. The barest reference to it is  a of mention  Seldon's funeral.

(Are we to take it that Salvor Hardin is Gaal's daughter? The harvesting of zygotes and embryos by the Foundation doesn't necessarily mean that they were planning to hand them back to precisely to the people who created them, and in any case Gaal and Raych are not around, seemingly.) 

Finally, re: Ancreon and bows, I feel like it's not greatly different than Klingons and their bat'leth -- ancient weaponry that are carried out of tradition more than need, and this was apparently being done by the leader of the Ancreon force whereas we see her underlings all have rifles of some sort. So a status thing, maybe. Or perhaps because they believe that animals should be hunted with traditional weapons, that's why she had a bow when she was shooting the bishop's ... claw? Forget what they said they're called, but anyways, that could be another reason.

 

Edited October 4, 2021 by Ran

[SpaceChampion]

16 hours ago, karaddin said:

Yeah, that's what got me - I assumed they weren't introducing a 4th actor for the trio. I followed the Terrance Man change well enough because it included some personality signifiers as well at the dinner scene where the other two first came in.

Tatiany Maslany could have pulled off all three ages of clones by herself, amirite?

[karaddin]

2 hours ago, SpaceChampion said:

Tatiany Maslany could have pulled off all three ages of clones by herself, amirite?

I don't know what you're talking about, Orphan Black clearly cloned her a bunch of times just for the sake of television. It really was a heavy commitment to making it work!

[Annara Snow]

On 10/3/2021 at 6:30 PM, Werthead said:

The three clone brothers thing is confusing, which may overcome the interesting idea behind it. The Lee Pace we saw in Episodes 1/2 is the young Terrance Mann in Episode 3, whilst the old Terrance Man in Episode 3 is the young Terrance Mann we saw from Episode 1/2, and the little kid in Episode 1/2 is Lee in Episode 3.

They've now introduced Cassian Bilton as a fourth intermediate stage which is adding to the confusion (especially since the jump from the little kid who seemed to be about 10 in Episode 1/2 to the 42-year-old Lee Pace in Episode 3 feels a bit of a stretch, though I think they did try to age down Pace a bit).

Lee Pace's Cleon the 13th in episode 3 was presumably supposed to be about 30. 

Cassian Bilton is playing a 17-year old Cleon the 14th.

Technically, there are at least 5 people playing Cleons, if you count the baby. And of course they were going to use different actors for child Cleon and teenage Cleon, there is no makeup in the world that can make a 10 year old look 17 or vice versa... and Lee Pace can pass as a 30 year old but sure as hell not as a teenager. (Plus, we're obviously next gonna see this new bratty who-needs-tradition Dawn aka 14 interact with the new nicer Day aka 13, so Cassian Bilton will probably be appearing again.)

Edited October 5, 2021 by Annara Snow

[karaddin]

50 minutes ago, Annara Snow said:

Lee Pace's Cleon the 13th in episode 3 was presumably supposed to be about 30. 

Cassian Bilton is playing a 17-year old Cleon the 14th.

Technically, there are at least 5 people playing Cleons, if you count the baby. And of course they were going to use different actors for child Cleon and teenage Cleon, there is no makeup in the world that can make a 10 year old look 17 or vice versa... and Lee Pace can pass as a 30 year old but sure as hell not as a teenager. (Plus, we're obviously next gonna see this new bratty who-needs-tradition Dawn aka 14 interact with the new nicer Day aka 13, so Cassian Bilton will probably be appearing again.)

Yeah it all made perfect sense once I realised my mistake, it just caught my subconscious assumptions and made me look foolish. And I refuse to count the baby, he doesn't have any acting chops yet

[mormont]

6 hours ago, Annara Snow said:

Lee Pace can pass as a 30 year old

Maybe he can, but he certainly didn't in that episode.

[Spockydog]

What is the Star Bridge? Is it some sort of teleporter? 

Edited October 5, 2021 by Spockydog

[David Selig]

44 minutes ago, Spockydog said:

What is the Star Bridge? Is it some sort of teleporter? 

I think it's supposed to be a space elevator.

[Spockydog]

1 minute ago, David Selig said:

I think it's supposed to be a space elevator.

Ah, okay. Thanks.