It’s not supposed to be. The books suggested that the trends of the galaxy don’t depend on the actions of individual people. Cultures would rise and fall regardless of any individual person’s ideas or choices. The appearance of a ‘crisis’ was simply the appearance of such, it was known to happen in advance, the outcome was predetermined, part of the Seldon Plan. It was kind of BS, because the Foundation was not trillions of people, and some of the outcomes sure seemed to rely on individual action, but it was the way the story was told.
It actually made the stories somewhat anticlimactic as it wasn’t ever the actions of ‘the hero’ that saved the day, it just happened because it was the inevitable result.
That’s a good analysis. The bulk analysis (psychohistory) can predict that avalanches will happen, including the distribution of frequency and size. But you need micro-analysis (chaos theory) to know which snowflake precipitates an avalanche at a particular time and size.
I think the Foundation stories - at least the very earliest ones - have probably had their underlying science most affected by chaos theory, out of all science fiction stories.
I remember also a throwaway line in one of H. Beam Piper’s Paratime stories about how, when the hero made a lateral timeline-to-timeline shift, the clouds in the sky didn’t change from one timeline to another - when, as we understand it today, that would soon be the most visible change between timelines.
Of course, once the Mule makes his appearance halfway through the series, the actions of a hero is what saves the Seldon Plan, not once but three times (Bayta Darrell, Bail Channis/an unnamed first speaker, and Preem Palver). Then, in the sequels, it’s Golan Trevize. The prequels (at least the two I’ve read) often have the fate of the galaxy resting on one person.
I suppose it could be argued that the demands of dramatic writing were what undid Asimov’s original conception of the Federation. So maybe I should be a little less uptight about some of the choices made by this adaptation.
Psychohistory can predict the grand sweep of the future but never nail it down to what one given person will do. That said, some people are certainly more central to what happens than others. Empire has more influence than, say, Joe Fry Cook.
Certainly, in the real world, we can find many examples where the actions of one person changed the course of history (e.g. Alexander the Great or even the sniper who refused to shoot an American general in the back and that general happened to be George Washington). Individuals really can change the course of history…sometimes in a moment. No reason why we would expect any different in the Foundation universe.
That analogy makes this storyline much more sensical, although I still quibble over the plodding pace of those scenes.
Well … yes to your first point, but we already have countless pieces of literature and TV that explore this supposition. I, for one, am itching to see what a faithful adaptation of the Seldon Plan to the silver screen would’ve been like, but unfortunately as Apple owns the intellectual property to the Foundation series now, there is little chance of this show being de-canonized and someone making a better version in the future.
Or Alexander Fleming. If Hari Seldon had published his psychohistory in 1927, it would have been completely and utterly wrong - because there’s no way he could have factored in a prediction that a mold exists that kills bacteria, and that someone would discover it next year; and without penicillin, the history and demographics of the 20th Century and later would have been utterly different.
You can’t predict new scientific discoveries, because if you know what they’ll be and what impact they’ll have, they’re not new discoveries.
In the sequel novels, the characters indeed reason out that psychohistory only works if the human race remains technologically stagnant, because the introduction of new tech would change the nature of human interaction. At the time the novels are set, it appears as if there’s simply nothing left to be discovered, and things like hyperspace travel and energy weapons are so old that their origins are lost to prehistory. R. Daneel was probably also acting behind the scenes to prevent any new innovations from spreading.
I agree you could not predict the specific technology advance, but I think you could predict (in the context of the psycohistory fictional device) general advance in human health and lowering the death rates and the various models could have step change occurring at various times or gradual improvements.
So… uh… Gaal can now magically sense the future? What? (and not in the pseudo-magical, we can upload your dying mind to a hologram lightyears away sense)
Well, at least they did a note that the future would have played out as seen if Hari did nothing, but he wanted to live to see it.
It did seem like another episode where nothing much happens. Hardin and captors find the mega ship, explore it, some people die. Medium Empire (aka, Brother Day) and Mother get into a little pissing contest. Small Empire (Brother Dawn) actually had the most interesting plotline - I did like the clones on standby.
Not to spoil the original book series, but while this indeed appears to be the theme of the Foundation series early on, things are revealed to be a little more complex when the matter of the Second Foundation comes up…
Again, while the show is touching on these themes out of order, this is pretty faithful to the books, in concept if not in detail
I for one am enjoying the show quite a bit. It helps that I read the Foundation series as a kid and never since then, it’s hitting all the notes I recognize and it has been long enough that the changes do not bother me
Between that and Salvor having precognition of coin tosses as well as being able to walk through the Vault force field unperturbed, the writers seem pretty intent on giving Gaal and Salvor almost Mary Sue-like powers to emphasize their roles as “Chosen Ones”. This is annoying enough by itself, but I find Gaal 10X worse because it feels like every other scene she’s either screaming at the screen or crying a river and it makes me want to put my fist through the TV during those times.
At least with the Emperors, they can more plausibly attribute their superpowers to technology or genetic enhancements. I rather enjoyed the not-so-passive aggressive standoff between Brother Day and the Luminist leader in the last episode. And I’m glad the show clearly explained why Raych had to kill Seldon, instead of vaguely poking at the edges of it for the next 10 or so episodes, like other shows might have done.
After finishing the first two books, Second Foundation has been sitting on my reading backburner for what seems like forever. Your post might just be the kick in the rear I need to finally start that book.
So it seems like they took everything I liked about Foundation and discarded it, at the same time giving more importance to the parts I didn’t like (everything after “Second Foundation”).
Taking the chance where they were at it to finish what “I Robot” started and finally getting enough RPM in ole Isaac’s tomb to power the East Coast.
I’m glad I stopped seeing this series when I did.
I’ve watched up to Episode 7, and not only have I decided to stop watching, I’m cancelling my Apple TV+ trial. Other than drawing a few names and the initial premise of psychohistory, it really has nothing to do with the Asimov novels, or indeed, any kind of interesting speculation about the nature of a galaxy wide political union fragmenting under the inertia of its own staid traditions. I was fully prepared that the show would not follow the novel dogmatically because most of the novels (especially Foundation) are basically two or three people in a room talking, and the inclusion of action scenes is almost obligatory to retain broad interest, but not only do the themes, such as they are, diverge wildly from Asimov’s work, the show is narratively badly constructed.
The worst was the conversation between “Salvor” and her father, where he’s telling her that the only reason he left Trantor was because he wanted to have sex with her mother, and predictably sacrificing himself for the cause in the next scene. This is the level of depth of the entire show, and it just is not interesting to watch despite the obviously expensive set design and lavish if nonsensical space imagery. They’ve also clearly tried to address potential complaints about Asimov’s misogyny by making nearly all of the significant characters female (except for the Emprie Bros, of course), but not giving them any distinguishing personalities or challenges not immediately overcome by Mary Sue-ing their way out of them. The character I’m most invested in is Hunger Games Elliria Sand, just because I can pick her out for carrying a bow and arrow and because she at least has an intelligible motivation for doing something, even if it is just blowing up Trantor.
One Zaphod Beeblebrox out of five Fugitive Galactic Presidents.
The concept but not in detail is part of the issue. It seems they are throwing everything against the wall and trying to see if anything comes from the patterns, even though it creates a mess. IIRC, Gaal’s powers seem to be a bit beyond Trevise’s - like in the whole I know I will die unless I hold up this glass right now sort of thing.
That’s fair enough, and if you’re looking for a faithful retelling or even reimagining I totally get why that would put you off, and I certainly don’t fault anyone for giving up on the show.
Starting to get on my nerves too. I find myself fast forwarding past the histrionics. I have no problem when this happens on occasion but this is annoying.
“It’s UNFAIR!” “Why me???” “I don’t want this!”
Over and over and over. Get a grip. Either be a part of saving the galaxy or step-off and go chill on some backwater planet. Stop the griping about it.
I think my issue with that is it is such a HUGE trope. Person plucked from obscurity, thrust into big events and then moaning ceaselessly about how they never wanted any of it and it all sucks.
Can’t a hero ever just embrace it? They can still have bad moments but have their eye on the ball and keep at it without much fuss.
At the risk of bringing up sex again — I agree with the consensus that it’s generally unnecessary — I wonder if a Cleonic/botanist hybrid may be in the offing somewhere down the line? I assume that the women in the Imperial brothel are sterilized in addition to having their memories wiped on a regular basis, but I got the impression in passing that staff positions such as Azura’s are hereditary, implying children. That would certainly provide an impetus for Dawn to bolt, since he seems genuinely attracted to her — probably yet another flaw from the Imperial POV since feelings for anyone might interfere with the need to eliminate them if need be.
In any case, I somehow doubt that Dawn’s anomalies are completely unknown to his “brothers” (witness Dusk’s body language when he confronts Dawn about missing dinner). If nothing else, the bearded snoop (do we know his name? the one who found the Ghillie raptors Dawn had discarded) has probably had his eye on him as a matter of course.
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