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“Foundation” discussion thread
- Thread starter Smartwatchlover
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No, it was deliberate. "Their" in this case being a possessive linking Americans' "confusing England with Britain" with Americans' "confusing Ireland with Britain". Should have used more words to make it clearer.
I watched the first episode. Meh. No point to the time jumping around. Alexander Siddig as the prosecutor was wasted.
Still not something that will get me to subscribe to Apple TV.
Still not something that will get me to subscribe to Apple TV.
I haven't read the books, and after the first half hour I started to enjoy the series. I am worried that the deeper I get into it the more confused I will be, like what happened after the end of the second episode. If I get too confused I may drop the series. Hopefully it doesn't come to that though.
That’s an interesting point. Perhaps it would have lend itself better to a documentary-style adaptation.
shouldn't it be "Their confusion with England and Britain" then?
(I'm not a native speaker, so I'm honestly curious and just trying to understand and learn)
Don’t get me wrong: overall the show is pretty enjoyable and some sceneries/locations are really great.
What I miss here is a decent level of adherence to the books: there are parts which are completely out of the original story, like the one related to the death of Hari Seldon, or the mass execution ordered by Cleon in response of the terror attack on Trantor.
Hari Seldon never left Trantor after revealing the plan to create the Foundation on Terminus and of course was never killed but died for natural reasons.
Cleon was never “cloned” and to be honest played a marginal role in the whole story.
So, long story short: nice to watch but only loosely based on the Asimov’s books. That’s it.
Last note: I really hope in future they will show the story of the young Seldon, including his amazing wife Dors Venabili, by far my preferred female character in the whole story.
What I miss here is a decent level of adherence to the books: there are parts which are completely out of the original story, like the one related to the death of Hari Seldon, or the mass execution ordered by Cleon in response of the terror attack on Trantor.
Hari Seldon never left Trantor after revealing the plan to create the Foundation on Terminus and of course was never killed but died for natural reasons.
Cleon was never “cloned” and to be honest played a marginal role in the whole story.
So, long story short: nice to watch but only loosely based on the Asimov’s books. That’s it.
Last note: I really hope in future they will show the story of the young Seldon, including his amazing wife Dors Venabili, by far my preferred female character in the whole story.
Yes. I wasn't using enough words. To a native speaker it might (or not) have been clear. It was me trying to write what I would have said instead of writing the correct grammar.
What are they ? Annotated comments to explain as the plot develops ? Not sure there is a "Foundation" reader but if you want to read through the Wikipedia entries for the seven Foundation novels then you will get a sense of the whole series. As it seems to be turning out you won't get too many spoilers as the TV series is adding it's own flesh onto Asimov's bones of the story (at least for the first book). e.g. I wasn't expecting Seldon to be murdered by his own adopted son.
Frankly, I think it lends itself better to, you know, a novel. The problem with trying to turn "hard SF" into TV or movies is that the content is more suited to an art-house audience, while the setting demands a blockbuster action movie budget... which means they end up dumbing down all the exposition and detail that make a hard SF book.
You can do a low-budget SF movie that just features characters having discussions (which is more or less what the first book of Foundation is) - The Man From Earth is about the only example I can think of, but honestly the dialogue and characterisation in that was way better than Asimov could write... and it is unlikely to be a huge commercial success.
As I've said before - if someone wanted to make an Asimov movie/TV show, the Elijah Bailey books would be far better materials because (a) IMHO they're just better stories than Foundation and (b) they're basically by-the-book murder mysteries, and Hollywood's grandma handed down the recipe for those. Think Inspector Morse or Colombo... in spaace!
...which opens the whole can of worms of whether Asimov himself did right in retconning the original Foundation trilogy the way the prequels and sequels did. I think it rather undermines the whole thrust of Foundation to have the whole story be a failed scheme by 20,000 year old telepathic robot that only makes any sense because they had to try and work within the three laws. (don't reveal unless you've read the prequel/sequel books).
Agree. Lots of good material in the first two books. Also there is a chapter by chapter plot to follow that should make for an easier TV adaptation.
IMO the last two books are pretty much a waste of time. The first two are really worth it.
Keep it that way and give the show a chance to stand on its own - its those of us that have read the books that are most likely to be disappointed with the show.
I take your point, but think you may have missed mine. Modern (pseudo-) documentaries use VO narration with compelling visuals to move a story along. I believe that could have worked better for the Foundation saga, although it would have reduced its ability to compete with GoT/MCU.
Agreed. Although I'm not so sure those stories would survive Hollywood's "art-by-committee" approach, much less the diversity and inclusion police.
I'm assuming this is Marvel Cinematic Universe. I had to Google ( didn't know either ) lol.
This show is….kind of super boring. Exposition non stop. The behavior of the emperor undermines the whole premise. If he can have his orders instantly carried out why would bureaucratic inertia destroy the emperor. He could possibly turn things around (as several absolute monarchs have done).
The clone emperor is a world breaking innovation to help the passing of time be acceptable but it causes so many issues.
It’s pretty but it’s not good. But that’s in part because the early books are super boring as well.
The clone emperor is a world breaking innovation to help the passing of time be acceptable but it causes so many issues.
It’s pretty but it’s not good. But that’s in part because the early books are super boring as well.
There are a lot more sportsball fans than SF fans. Nearly every man on the street can tell you the difference between American football and British football, but very few could tell you the difference between science fiction and sci-fi.
I find it amusing that Star Trek has the magic “universal translator” which can render any language into perfect, lip-synched English — except for Klingonese, which cannot be translated and always requires subtitles. That might be why the proposed “Klingon Empire” spin-off never made it out of development hell.