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

[IFR]

@Annara Snow

I feel like we've taken a bit of an unnecessary detour here.

At any rate, you were wondering about the reaction of those who had seen both Foundation and Dune, and I gave my impression.

From everything I've gathered from your comments, my feelings of Foundation are much in line with your feelings of Game of Thrones. Or how most people felt about Game of Thrones season 8. 

I don't want to make this thread about Game of Thrones; I'm simply using it as a reference point that is easily relatable to most people.

My feelings about Dune are much better. Dune has problems with how it's structure, but I otherwise found it to be very good.

[Caligula_K3]

I don't think I hate this show as much as some. Ultimately, I do think Foundation is unfilmable and that it's next to impossible to do it well - I see some of what they're going for as they adapt it, and there are some cool ideas. But I am continually bored by the show, the absence of Seldon/Jared Harris is getting to me, and I think I'm done with it.

 

[Lord Patrek]

Finally watched the 6th episode. Whoever said it was a solid episode??? Man, it felt like a 55-minute prostate exam.

[Scott_N]

13 hours ago, Annara Snow said:

Seeing Lee Pace in Pushing Daisies, Wonderfalls and in Halt and Catch Fire, I couldn't believe it was the same guy. I've seen him in several very different things and he is so good at becoming whichever character he plays, in spite of having a remarkable physicality and presence. That said, over the last decade he seems to have become a go-to-guy when casting directors are looking for someone to play powerful men with a commanding presence, in a somewhat threatening but sexy way - be it an Elven King, Galactic Emperor, or - well, Joe MacMillan didn't have power in that sense, but he made up for it with a powerful personality.

Fair enough. The dangers of drawing conclusions based on limited data.

[Ran]

Finally had a chance to watch the latest episode. I rather liked the turn with Brother Dawn, his being not just a bit different in personality but also genetically different with his color-blindness. The Gossamer Court was an intersting idea, though it reminds me vaguely of something else.

Terminus was ... fine. I'm less sure that there'll be a nexus between the Anacreon and Luminist storyline than I thought, as apparently this Invictus destroyer is itself a planet-killing ship and presumably is already loaded with planet killer missiles.

RIP Mayor Hardin. You were a real one. Back to making miniature furniture in the great beyond, I suppose.

Oh, and I feel Salvor basically flashing back to what Gaal witnessed makes it clearer she's her daughter. But now... now I'm wondering if they're going to throw a massive twist and make Salvor the Mule? I'm just thinking about what Salvador says to Raych -- we had speculated that the issue was that Seldon was bothered by the fact that he was becoming idolized and believed he needed to be off the board for the plan to work... but he tells Raych that he and Gaal staying together will ruin things instead. Was he concerned about the possibility that a child of theirs would destabilize everything? And did he not think about the fact that they'd already taken a zygote from her? Hrm...

 

Edited October 29, 2021 by Ran

[Ran]

The fact that this featurette was released two days ago makes it feel like Apple is scrambling to get people to understand what the show is, and/or they're hoping it pulls in attention as they show a bunch of stuff that give a Dune vibe to try and ride its coattails.

At the same time, though, a few glimpses of things to come. Pretty sure we see the controls of the Invictus a couple of times... and there's a rather intriguing scene of Brother Day apparently naked in a desert with skulls and bones all around him. Hmm... Luminist shenanigans? Real, or a dream?

[Werthead]

Today's episode was solid, despite some glaring Anacreonish stupidity (why kill the Empire captain literally after he opened the front door; might have there been more security systems he'd have been useful to negate?). T'Nia Miller is excellent as Halima, and her scene with Lee Pace was outstanding. The look on his face when he realised that she was for real and not just a political opportunist was priceless.

Interesting possibility that Gaal's psychic powers means that she will be a key founding member of the Second Foundation (and interestingly, Hari calls the Terminus faction "The First Foundation" for the first time), or maybe her and Raych's child (or great-great-grandson or whatever) will be the Mule?

What's the betting that Hugo faked his thruster malfunction and will be back next week?

[Rippounet]

Gods, this really isn't good.

It's not just that the show is a loose adaptation of the source material, it also manages to be bad on its own terms. It overly relies on the visuals and clichés to build itself. I could hear the cinema sins count in my head as I watched.

Ok, it's not entirely terrible. It remains visually stunning, and at least it's building something, which is more that can be said of many shows. The pace is still rather slow, but at least it's moving forward now. But gods, the clichés!

 

- Miracle survivor on a completely destroyed ship - bonus points for crawliing away from the bad guys.
- Moving exchange between a secondary character and the main character before they self-sacrifice.
- Wounding a hostage to show that the baddies are serious.
- Space jump - that, if you miss, you fall in space. Though of course, one of our heroes will prove that wrong in the next episode!
- Automated defenses... That actually hurt the hull of the ship? Not a cliché this one, just a bit ridiculous.
- Pointless execution of a potentially useful hostage to show that the baddies are serious.
- Instant repair of a 700-year-old ship by our heroes' team. How can "repairing" the hull of the Invictus have been both that easy and that quick?
- Life support on a 700-year-old ship is restored in a matter of seconds -and someone takes off their helmet immediately to look more badass.
- Sudden return of gravity means cadavers fall to the ground.
- Faulty hologram - that manages to repair itself and become the master of the ship (with a slight tinge of psychopathy?)..

And of course:

- Main character(s) trapped on a ship with the bad guys on a kamikaze mission to destroy an important location.
Well, at least, for this one, we don't actually know if our hero will save the day!
But why the fuck did they tell Hardin their plan?
All this makes the Anacreons cardboard villains. I mean, if you're going to take liberties with the source material, might as well not have bad guys straight from the 1950s, uh?

On the plus side, the Cleons' stories were mildly interesting. But the tight focus on four characters (well, possibly five if you count Seldon) to depict the fall of a gigantic intergalactic empire feels... cheap.

Edited October 29, 2021 by Rippounet

[Lord Patrek]

3 hours ago, Werthead said:

Today's episode was solid, despite some glaring Anacreonish stupidity (why kill the Empire captain literally after he opened the front door; might have there been more security systems he'd have been useful to negate?). T'Nia Miller is excellent as Halima, and her scene with Lee Pace was outstanding. The look on his face when he realised that she was for real and not just a political opportunist was priceless.

I know that you're not very demanding when it comes to tv shows (as opposed to how demanding you can be for novels), but how can you call this episode solid? It follows in the same somewhat boring and long-winded footsteps of its predecessors. Though they're supposed to build on one another, each new episode miserably fails to raise the bar in any way.

And the ridiculous plot holes! How in the hell can people know how operate and repair and reconfigure a 700-year-old ship?

Thankfully there's only one episode left. There's no way Goyer will get 80 episodes to tell this story. I'm pretty sure Foundation gets the axe after season 2, if not before.

It's sad. They have the budget and visually they knock it out of the park in each episode. Since it's impossible to follow the source material, they barely even tried. They pretty much had a clean slate and the sky was the limit. But they got crappy writers and the casting leaves a lot to be desired. At times, it looks like production didn't even try to come up with something good. 

[Werthead]

3 minutes ago, Lord Patrek said:

I know that you're not very demanding when it comes to tv shows (as opposed to how demanding you can be for novels), but how can you call this episode solid? It follows in the same somewhat boring and long-winded footsteps of its predecessors. Though they're supposed to build on one another, each new episode miserably fails to raise the bar in any way.

To this day I get hate mail for my review of the first season of The Magicians, so I don't think that's entirely true. To be fair, I have also been watching Apple's other SF TV series, Invasion, compared to which Foundation is moving like a whippet on crack.

It's solid in the sense that it is watchable, the actors are competent and several storylines are unfolding which are interesting though extremely far from flawless. The show also has a genuinely interesting visual style: it often looks like 1970s SF novel covers that have come to life. The stuff with the clone Emperors is quite interesting (though again, flawed in execution), to the point that I kind of wish they'd focused on that as its own thing in a totally original SF universe.

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And the ridiculous plot holes! How in the hell can people know how operate and repair and reconfigure a 700-year-old ship?

I think this was even mentioned in the novels: the Empire has been stagnating for centuries, if not millennia, and that has resulted in standardised controls, security protocols and technology, with major technological developments taking place extremely infrequently.

That may still be unconvincing, but that's an unconvincing failure of Asimov's (perennially overrated) novels rather than the show.

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Thankfully there's only one episode left. There's no way Goyer will get 80 episodes to tell this story. I'm pretty sure Foundation gets the axe after season 2, if not before.

There's three more episodes left. Season 1 is 10 episodes long, this was #7. The next three are called The Missing Piece, The First Crisis and The Leap, the latter rather dismayingly written by Goyer again (groan). Foundation finishes the same day The Wheel of Time starts.

[Lord Patrek]

Correct me if I'm wrong, for it's been over 30 years since I read Asimov's series, but the Invictus and the Anacreons plotlines were never in the books, right? Nor was there an instance when someone could play with 700-year-old tech?

Fuck me, 3 more??? I was willing to give the next one a go, just to finish the season. But 3 more? I'm not sure I can take that much punishment. Let's just say that the next one will have to be a lot better than everything we've seen thus far.

If being watchable makes it solid, we'll often disagree on the quality of tv shows/movies. I wholeheartedly agree that the visual style is incredible. Everything looks awesome, no question. The writing is atrocious and the play of the actors, minus good performances by a select few, is decidedly weak.

One thing I don't recall from the books: Were the Anacreons Indians as the name implies?

In any event, based on the 7 episodes we've seen so far, Foundation is a major disappointment. 

Edited October 30, 2021 by Lord Patrek

[Scott_N]

I, too, was somehow sure it was an eight episode season and was determined to see it through. Not sure I have the strength for another three.

[Clueless Northman]

11 hours ago, Lord Patrek said:

One thing I don't recall from the books: Were the Anacreons Indians as the name implies?

If the name implies anything, then Anaceron sector should be Greek. In the book, they were just a breakaway sector on the extreme fringe of the Empire, the biggest most powerful neighbour to Terminus system - though technologically backwards.

 

12 hours ago, Werthead said:

I think this was even mentioned in the novels: the Empire has been stagnating for centuries, if not millennia, and that has resulted in standardised controls, security protocols and technology, with major technological developments taking place extremely infrequently.

That may still be unconvincing, but that's an unconvincing failure of Asimov's (perennially overrated) novels rather than the show.

During most of mankind's history, it was perfectly realistic to use 700-y old technology, because it basically barely changed. We take the 20th century's rate of technological change and progress for granted, which is a stretch. For instance, cars didn't change that much between WWII and early 21th century, the recent major improvements are barely more than a decade old on most models (and automated driving is obviously be the biggest change around, but still very limited to a few cars).

[Annara Snow]

3 hours ago, Clueless Northman said:

If the name implies anything, then Anaceron sector should be Greek. In the book, they were just a breakaway sector on the extreme fringe of the Empire, the biggest most powerful neighbour to Terminus system - though technologically backwards.

 

During most of mankind's history, it was perfectly realistic to use 700-y old technology, because it basically barely changed. We take the 20th century's rate of technological change and progress for granted, which is a stretch. For instance, cars didn't change that much between WWII and early 21th century, the recent major improvements are barely more than a decade old on most models (and automated driving is obviously be the biggest change around, but still very limited to a few cars).

I've always found it interesting to compare how our present times (then 'the future') were imagined in, say, 1950s SciFi movies - the focus was on futuristic means of transportation (flying cars etc.) or travel to space, and, as it turns out, the 21st century is nothing like that. Means of transportation really haven't changed much over a century, the space race was only a thing during the Cold War when two superpowers were competing who gets to do what first and now no one really cares (except billionares who want to have fun) - but the information and communication technologies have been developing faster than most old SciFi works anticipated.

[Ran]

Have to say, Linda and I also thought this was quite the solid episode. They did more in the opening three minutes to establish just how much control the Empire has over higher technology (Imperial nanobots! Thespin space mining operations fell apart without Imperial tech!) then they did in the preceding six episodes, the show continues to be amazing visually (I seriously can't believe the things we're seeing on a TV show), the reveal that there are ready-made backups on hand in case a Cleon is killed or even damaged (can't allow them to be anything but perfect, of course, shades of the Byzantine empire and others). And we finally get a fairly full explanation of what happened to Hari and why. 

The weak spot kind of remains Salvor Hardin. Maybe, as some have speculated, Leah Harvey's performance has been constrained by having her do an American actress. But so far the character is pretty one-note, there's a sameness to everything that isn't appealing. Whatever it may be, I hope they sort that out as the series progresses, and I'm quite curious to see how the Invictus storyline goes. 

Spoiler

That featurette spoils the fact that Hugo is indeed not dead, as we see him apparently working the controls of the Invictus. It also revealed Cleon going through the Spiral, and not looking like he's doing too well. Will be curious to see if he'll actually end up dying or not.

 

Edited October 31, 2021 by Ran

[Lord Patrek]

4 hours ago, Ran said:

The weak spot kind of remains Salvor Hardin. Maybe, as some have speculated, Leah Harvey's performance has been constrained by having her do an American actress. But so far the character is pretty one-note, there's a sameness to everything that isn't appealing. Whatever it may be, I hope they sort that out as the series progresses, and I'm quite curious to see how the Invictus storyline goes. 

  Reveal hidden contents

That featurette spoils the fact that Hugo is indeed not dead, as we see him apparently working the controls of the Invictus. It also revealed Cleon going through the Spiral, and not looking like he's doing too well. Will be curious to see if he'll actually end up dying or not.

 

I agree with you, but I doubt it's just her accent. She's just a bad casting decision and can't pull it off. I checker her acting credits and haven't seen anything she was a part of in the past. Was she any good? Because based on Foundation, she is indeed one-note and flat. As mentioned upthread, to be fair the scripts don't particularly help her look good.

Visually, though, it is absolutely stunning. Especially given the fact that the series apparently cost 45M$ to produce. That adds up to 4.5M$ per episode, which isn't that much in 2021. If only the writing was half as good. . .

[SpaceChampion]

If it ends up two Cleons (Dawn and Day) die in the same time period it'll be interesting to see what consequences for the Empire that will have, such as accelerating the fall.  At the very least the paranoia level might increase, for Dusk at least.  And that could be very bad.

Edited October 31, 2021 by SpaceChampion

[Spockydog]

The actors playing Gaal and Salvor are the worst on the show, and the rest of the cast are pretty meh. The casting director has done a terrible job here. 

Edited October 31, 2021 by Spockydog

[Ran]

I like Lou Lobell as Gaal, at least so far, though she hasn't been given all that much to do in the grand scheme of things.

[David Selig]

The worst actor on the show is definitely Alfred Enoch (Raych), he's just laughably bad.