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Although Amazon has had some success doing what everyone else does and extending Philip K. Dick's work with The Man in the High Castle, Asimov famously quoted t
by technofiend 8y ago
Although Amazon has had some success doing what everyone else does and extending Philip K. Dick's work with The Man in the High Castle, Asimov famously quoted that most of his action happens offstage. [1] So it remains to be seen if Apple can rework Foundation's action enough to keep viewers engaged without tweaking the material so much it's unrecognizable to True Fans (TM).
I'm not saying video can't be compelling when much is implied; Jaws is famous for suspension building as a happy accident from the shark robot's unreliability. But Foundation is a quarter million words and modern audiences do IMHO expect engaging and visual story telling.
[1] https://archive.org/stream/AsimovTheFoundation_201705/Asimov_the_foundation_djvu.txt https://archive.org/stream/AsimovTheFoundation_201705/Asimov...
I read it with mounting uneasiness. I kept waiting for something to happen, and nothing ever did. All
three volumes, all the nearly quarter of a million words, consisted of thoughts and of conversations. No
action. No physical suspense.
What was all the fuss about, then? Why did everyone want more of that stuff? - To be sure, I couldn't
help but notice that I was turning the pages eagerly, and that I was upset when I finished the book, and
that I wanted more, but I was the author, for goodness' sake. You couldn't go by me.
I was on the edge of deciding it was all a terrible mistake and of insisting on giving back the money,
when (quite by accident, I swear) I came across some sentences by science-fiction writer and critic, James Gunn, who, in connection with the Foundation series, said, "Action and romance have little to do
with the success of the Trilogy - virtually all the action takes place offstage, and the romance is almost
invisible - but the stories provide a detective- story fascination with the permutations and reversals of
ideas."