David Goyer adapting Asimov's Foundation books for Apple+ (Previously: Jonathan Nolan adapting Asimov's Foundation books for HBO)

HMMMM.

hard to imagine any sci-fi classic that would be more boring to watch onscreen. these books are quite literally action-free.

aren't they mostly about math?

i actually read at least 4 or 5 of them when i was 10 or 11, but i can barely remember anything about them.

i love these books to a ridiculous degree but i don't think they would make particularly good movies.

There's an amazing twist with the Mule at the end of book 2, if i recall, so definitely think this could be compelling.

Well, the original involves empires, and this is HBO, so no doubt they'll find ways to write in intrigue and boobs

they span thousands (millions?) of years, have no central characters... this is a stupid idea

xp

long (reallllly long) expository sections in place of characters interacting

they probably were just like "game of thrones in spaaaaaace" and HBO said go for it. (not that they are really similar, just "beloved book series")

"And what are your credentials?"

"I just cowrote a big space movie with my brother! With emotion! Which I will bring to this adaptation!"

"Uh...okay."

yeah i reread them last year and once the mule enters the picture the whole thing becomes way more gripping. the problem i've always had recommending them to people is that the first book is by far the worst, but asimov was like 21 when he started writing them so watching him gradually become a better writer is fascinating in and of itself. also some surprisingly strong and interesting female characters in the second and third books, along with some of the weirdest and most convoluted plots i can remember in any classic SF stuff.

there is a lot of intrigue, but it's all so divorced from, like, actual humans - the Mule is good but so much of the series is this giant abstraction

the later foundation books are mostly really terrible but iirc the very last one asimov wrote right before he died, about the early life of hari seldon, is pretty good.

j.d. otm that the first three books get better as they go

love love love second foundation so much

don't think they would make good movies, though

pretty much because of what was said upthread re: giant abstraction

"Ars has confirmed not only that Foundation was in development, but it has now been given a full series order—meaning we're definitely going to see it." #AsimovFTW https://t.co/YnzcjTcQZx

— Ars Technica (@arstechnica) August 29, 2018

It’s probably going to look amazing and it’s definitely going to be better than that insipid Star Trek revive that was only watched by people who write nerd tv recaps for their side gig

Discovery was pretty good. Definitely wouldn't call it insipid.

It wasn’t. You should.

Took forever but some actual news (also, on Apple+ TV now):

https://deadline.com/2019/10/foundation-lee-pace-jared-harris-cast-star-in-apple-series-based-on-isaac-asimovs-sci-fi-classic-1202765708/

Lee Pace (Halt and Catch Fire) and Jared Harris (Chernobyl) have been tapped as leads in Foundation, Apple TV+’s upcoming drama series based on Isaac Asimov’s science fiction novel trilogy.

Harris as Seldon, Pace as the Emperor "Brother Day" which...what?

happy 100th, isaac

Y'all saw that a black woman was cast as Salvor Hardin, right? The furious nerd tears are going to be so delicious.

after the racist "joke" Asimov aimed at Samuel Delaney when he won a slew of awards and the repeated, documented sexual harassment and assault Asimov was known to engage in.... good

Love Lee Pace, love Harris, and especially love the books but I can't see this series keeping the spirit of the books while staying watchable

Well we got a sort-of trailer:

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

Hm hm hm, maybe. But per Eliza's post there a few back, all the better that the main figures aren't ALL white dudes...even with Goyer Goyering, though, so we'll see. If anything this seems more like a riff on the core story, and I'm not sure still what the whole 'Brother Day' thing is w/r/t the Empire, especially since there are two other characters called "Brother Dawn" and "Brother Dusk."

My thing is he is somehow the worse Nolan

Looks like that Nolan's not actually involved now, though, just Goyer and others. Should update the subject line.

It’d be nice if Goyer has figured out how to write a single woman by this point

not as in uncoupled, but (1) character who is a woman

That's a claim:

"Foundation" writer and showrunner David Goyer is ambitiously hoping to tell Isaac Asimov's science-fiction story over the course of eighty hours.

Well, anyway, it's almost here. Goyer interview has this bit:

“The book series itself makes these massive leaps forward in time, and particularly the first book is very ontological,” Goyer said. “Very few characters continue from one story to the next. My very first meeting at Apple, I said to them, ‘Guys, time is a character. You’re just going to have to embrace that.’ We do time jumps. We’re going to jump forward. We’re going to jump backwards. Sometimes we’re going to tell two parallel storylines that are operating at different times. We just have to embrace it. It would be insanity not to embrace it. And fortunately, everyone embraced it.”

Which, honestly, I have no problem with -- would actually explain some of the trailers we've seen.

It’d be nice if Goyer has figured out how to write a single woman by this point

Annnnnnd maybe he hasn't but:

“In this case, because Asimov wasn’t alive, I was talking to his estate, to his daughter, and I said, I want to make sure that I’ve identified the core ingredients that make Foundation, Foundation. Fortunately, they said, yeah, we feel like you’ve zeroed in on the most important elements. And because we’re adapting it now, over 70 years after Asimov first wrote it—you know, it was a metaphorical story back in the post-World War II environment—some of the events, some of the things that we’re interrogating, we’re going to have to change because we’re speaking to an audience of today and not an audience post-World War II.”

The first big, important change: diversifying the characters. “Because there are virtually no female characters in the first book, I said to the Asimov estate, ‘How would you how would you feel if we gender-flipped a couple of the characters?’ And they said, ‘We love it. We think Asimov himself would have completely embraced that,’” Goyer said.

Not that that gets him automatic points for trying for any number of reasons, but I guess we'll see.

Asimov well known for completely embracing female convention goers

Ugh

Of the Big Three, I sort only have time for Arthur C. Clarke these days, but would watch this, especially for Jared Harris.

Asimov’s son a piece of work too, but maybe shouldn’t go there.

I remember reading something Fred Pohl said about Asimov’s behavior. Actually I met both of them and for some reason liked Pohl a lot better than Asimov.

Lee Pace says things. Apparently the future is we're all dominated by endless Lee Pace clones, and I fail to see the problem.

https://gizmodo.com/foundations-lee-pace-i-love-science-fiction-1847708416

So this thread then? Albums covers that depict the artists hanging out with their clones

i like this? not terribly fast-moving, but i'm okay with that. not sure i believe the lead actress is 26

lose the voiceovers tho

Saw the first episode and was honestly most intrigued by how they were trying to solve the problem of 'things which everyone now knows from what's come after/ripped it off so how do we do it differently?' eg making Trantor not quite Coruscant, trying to figure out a new way to do faster than light speed, etc. Lee Pace perfectly cast of course.

I was amused by the entire imperial library being smaller than big city central libraries I've known. Though maybe the rest of it goes eight miles deep or something.

Enjoying this so far, I was wondering if the 80 hours idea is for real? I'm only two episodes in and they've gone quite a ways into Asimov's story already.

Well yes and no, in terms of the original stories they’ve essentially only done the very first, the rest is stuff drawn out from the prequels, most of which I’d forgotten about, or wholly invented.

So, at this rate, if the show gets canned at the end of S3 they'll probably have done most of the book series before they start making stuff up.

Perhaps? They're definitely tempting fate a bit with that initial voiceover going all in on naming Hober Mallow and the Mule. The fact that they're leaning into the robot stuff early, again not surprising given the prequel books, but also I think they figured there was more potential for actual drama beyond stories that mostly could be filmed as stage plays with people batting ideas back and forth.

Further elaborating a bit but again I am amused but not surprised at how thoroughly it's repurposing just about everything from a ton of filmed SF of recent years. Inevitable Galactica vibes on this colonist ship, the floating particle stuff reminds me of Krypton from Man of Steel, lots of anime vibes from spaceships in general, etc. etc. Arguably the basic story is just a gloss over the rest. That said, again given the plainness of that basic story stylistically, seeing them tackle questions of design, costume, etc. in particular is of interest since there's no real guide and I've kinda been pleasantly surprised -- it'll be interesting to contrast that against the designs in the new Dune.

i haven't read these books in well over 35 years so looking forward to watching this series without that baggage

Ha, same, pretty much.

xp this was season two. stop posting from the future

Like, I’m down for believing mathematics can predict a lot of stuff about the progress of civilization but the explicitness of psychohistory - even with the caveat that it can’t predict individual action, only mass population action - is a little tougher for me to buy.

It still bugs me that they keep saying that about specific individuals yet Hari keeps zeroing in on “outliers” whose specific actions derail his plans.

iirc In the books Psychohistory predicted everything basically right up until the Mule arrived, and that was because he was a mutant? The show already has a planet full of mutants.

I've been wondering how the books and series compare, anyone care to summarize the differences?

the major difference is that the books were actually collections of short stories, and each story was set in a different time had no characters from the previous stories, other than H.Selden's hologram.

they took a few ideas from the books (psychohistory, crises, mentalics, Foundation spreading influence through different ways like religion and trade) and character names and basically made up a brand new story/characters from it. the best thing by far about the books is the ideas, not Asimov's writing or characters or stories, so they're taking the right approach. loved season 2 btw, might be my favorite show running now

Yeah by essentially leaning into space opera more than the actual stories did (and matching that with some really impressive sense of design and how technology could work), they cracked a code very well.

Speaking of space opera, that last episode battle reminded me a lot of that uh more popular space opera

i kinda disagree - some of the "best ideas" of the books seem like they were imported without retaining the most interesting parts. the Mule, for instance (though i am certain there's a "twist" planned there, i love the way Asimov chose to tell his story: as a kid i was genuinely flabbergasted by it.) or Seldon's simulacrum; I always thought there was a profound lesson in the programmed piece of software that increasingly grows out of sync with reality. best laid plans...

but then i'm among that minority that despises the slow shift of all television into action film

No I actually agree with you re: the Mule and was a little disappointed myself. Not every change they've made has been for the better, certainly.
But they've taken a different introduction to the Mule and I'll stay open to what they do with that story. In general, I think the books get better as they go and could be adapted to TV with less changes, but they've committed to the remix approach that lets them keep some actors/locations from season to season, which is its own thing and might have been necessary from a budget or sellability standpoint

While we're on the subject, another change I'm not crazy about is Seldon's direct involvement in so many events, the "thumb on the scale" as they describe it, which imo goes against the spirit of psychohistory. May have preferred them to give Seldon a reduced role as he has in the books if Jared Harris wasn't such a captivating actor

Heh I think we're saying the same thing about Seldon

ya - they were right to draw out the theme of the books of whether history is a story of individual actors or of movements, but mostly that theme feels like lip-service: by focusing so much on Seldon, Salvor, Day, etc, it kind of eliminates the question. it's boring imo to experience history as the psychodrama of a few immortal action heroes.

Nice interview with Goyer on the season

https://decider.com/2023/10/25/foundation-david-s-goyer-interview/

Hey, we got good news:

https://www.apple.com/tv-pr/news/2023/12/apple-tv-renews-global-hit-epic-sci-fi-saga-foundation-for-season-three/

I’d have been extremely irritated if they didn’t!

We got Preem Palver

Meantime, hmm, but guess we'll see what results.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/foundation-david-s-goyer-steps-down-showrunner-season-3-1235834630/

This is the part that I'm actually concerned about the most: given the general excellence of the visual effects in combination with the design, it would hurt if that was cut back some.

Sources say Goyer and executives at the show’s production company, Skydance, clashed over the budget for the upcoming season. TV budgets are under scrutiny across the industry as streamers right-size their slates with an eye toward boosting profitability.

Yeah losing Goyer as well as budget is a pretty bad sign. Visual effects are a big part of the show's appeal

Looks like we get season 3 trailer tomorrow…

And here we go.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bMCpnEi4k0

Looks like those budget concerns we talked about previously aren't as much of one now! And boy are we getting big space opera beats with this one.

Plus an official description of the season, which I will spoiler-proof for those wanting to go in cold:

“Set 152 years after the events of season two, the Foundation has become increasingly established far beyond its humble beginnings while the Cleonic Dynasty’s Empire has dwindled. As both of these galactic powers forge an uneasy alliance, a threat to the entire galaxy appears in the fearsome form of a warlord known as ‘The Mule’ whose sights are set on ruling the universe by use of physical and military force, as well as mind control. It’s anyone’s guess who will win, who will lose, who will live and who will die as Hari Seldon, Gaal Dornick, the Cleons, and Demerzel play a potentially deadly game of intergalactic chess.”

New cast members: Cherry Jones, Brandon P. Bell, Synnøve Karlsen, Cody Fern, Tómas Lemarquis, Alexander Siddig, and Troy Kotsur, plus Pilou Asbæk as the Mule, which is a recast from Mikael Persbrandt in the couple of brief scenes from last season.

Anyway, as always, please enjoy some Lee Pace:

https://gizmodo.com/app/uploads/2025/05/Foundation_302_LeePace-1.jpg

Exciting! Now weighing whether or not to do a rewatch of the first two seasons before this starts. I rewatched s1 before s2 and it really helped.

I've gathered that season 4 has already got a commitment, though it will be the first without Goyer as full showrunner. And the new showrunner was the one behind Fear the Walking Dead? Hm.

Nice trailer. yes, doesn't seem like they skimped on budget here

Hell yeah to this, for sure. It's like the opposite of _Andor_ in terms of gritty sf vs. space opera and both goddamn work.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C53xEOdxz70

Hmm, interesting bit from Goyer here re: where things might go next.

“I don’t want to give away too much, but I will say that moving from season three to season four is the first time we do not jump forward centuries,” Goyer said of Foundation. (The show’s third season does indeed pick up 152 years after season two, as the season two finale had promised.) “So in a way, one might think of season three and season four as one sort of 20-episode season.”

(To my mind this all makes sense since they're already bringing in Preem Palver as a character and while everything's been generally loose as an adaptation, this all feels like an extended mashup of the Mule/Second Foundation stories at play -- and you might as well have a cliffhanger or two, as those stories allowed for. If he's still thinking eight seasons as a whole somehow, presumably Foundation's Edge for five? Maybe?)

Wow, I can’t imagine a show of this expense and narrative density is going to last 8 seasons

Well it might not! Goyer has been quoted as saying that was his goal, but that he had 'off ramp' ideas for two, four and six seasons if they faced the ax at those points. The fourth season hasn't been officially announced yet but it sounds like he's pretty confident there, and if that turns out to be the final one, I might not entirely mind since the feeling is almost like that would indirectly cover the original three books/collections. (Edge and Foundation and Earth are...things.)

And off and running with the first episode of the new season. Really enjoy how each season allows for a combination of resetting things with the actors continuing through and introducing a clutch of solid new casting choices, especially the unfamiliar-to-me ones (but it's great seeing Alexander Siddiq in anything), as well as setting the parameters anew re what names and characters are kept but how the overall situation is revamped. (Pretty hilarious how the whole Mule/clown thing is set up and then immediately settled.) Also kinda awesome getting both a quick Ralph Ineson cameo and then later in the episode his daughter Rebecca turns out to have a continuing role in the season. Plus, damn, still looks absolutely fantastic in terms of design, effects, etc.

Goyer is also involved in Murderbot. I wonder if the two shows share sets or anything like that.

If they’re both filmed in Prague…?

The birthplace of the robot

iirc murderbot is filmed in toronto

Just caught up with the first episode. Such a good looking show and great to get to spend more time in this universe with these characters.

I wish I’d done a rewatch of s2 just to remember some of the finer details. But yeah I’m very happy to be back in this world. This show doesn’t always work but I appreciate its ambition. It has a whole vibe that is very much its own thing, not aesthetically indebted to any particular predecessor show or film.

I kinda like how Gaal wasn't really there at all for the first episode beyond the v.o. and the very last moment -- just a handy setting of the stage.

Last couple of episodes have been VERY interesting in terms of building out 'now' from the past few years in the show's timeline. I also have a bit of a theory, and this gets deep into "I've known the stories now for over forty years" territory so stay away unless that describes you as well:

So as noted earlier: it seemed like we had dispensed with the whole Mule/jester deal in the initial episode, and the whole setup even from last season is that the Mule is meant to be this terrifying warlord figure. Further, we've had enough scenes now with the Mule pulling the mindgames and things that, okay, that must be him. But THEN in last week's episode we've got good ol' Magnifico Giganticus separately rocking his visi-sonor -- I rather liked that setup -- and the whole 'the Mule treats me bad' and Bayta ends up taking him along vibes all from the original story. So now I'm wondering what kind of threaded needle they're setting up for both the people who haven't read the books and those who have and already know the answer there, because what's happening in the stories doesn't QUITE seem like the answer they're doing here. My big guess is the 'Mule' of the series is somehow a total headfake and M.G. is using him as cover somehow, but that's going to require a lot more explanations as we go. Which they might be able to pull off! Alternately the production could be trying to hoodwink everybody and M.G. is just more of a willing follower to the 'real' Mule acting as if he's a put upon servant so he can help the Mule fuck over people more effectively. We'll see!

I am still baffled by the selective specificity of Seldon’s psychohistory. I love the overall scope of the show but whenever he says things like “you weren’t supposed to survive” or whatever—predicting down to the fate of a specific individual—it shakes me out of the show.

agreed

i've only watched the first two of s03, but i find the show gorgeous and basically nonsensical. psychohistory could not possibly have accounted for the mule, nor could gaal have been prepared to meet the aftermath

they're completely making shit up as they go along imo

which i'm not necessarily against -- they left the text behind years ago -- but i'm unimpressed with the replacement

the show went off a cliff for me when Gaal started having mystical visions, but whatever it's still pretty good.

I'm only two eps in as well, but I'm really enjoying the wtf-ness of it all. Lee Pace as a shirtless brooding stoner is great. And I'm really loving Euron Greyjoy's take on The Mule, his scenes have been brutal. Also loved the speeder bike shadow chase, feels like the production values went up a bit this season.

I'd figured we'd have heard something more about that version of Dawn who escaped at the end of last season. I thought he would have fathered a non-clone bloodline that would have claim to the throne, setting off civil wars in the empire. But maybe the clones are sterile?

Could be!

This latest episode today was really good -- extremely tense ending!

enjoying this! very good episode

Yeah, ramped up the soap part of space opera just enough but made it work. Also I'm now dimly seeing more how they can hold to certain key beats from the original stories if they choose to, but I'm still waiting for things to play out to be sure. These last two episodes will be kinda insane.

the hologram Seldon stuck with the first Foundation doing his “oh, that’s excellent. also, what exactly is ‘the Mule’?” bit from last week had me laughing