3 ms·

> The show feels like the creators read the back of the book and nothing else. To me it looks like the creators have a pretty deep understanding of the book. I

> The show feels like the creators read the back of the book and nothing else. To me it looks like the creators have a pretty deep understanding of the book. I have a good memory of the book and there are a lot of subtle references. What is frustrating is the choices and twist they make. Like presenting everything as pseudo magical and religious. My hope is that they are bold in the narration and mixing elements from much later in the books, setting things up for big reveals in future seasons (e.g hard to tell without spoiling but like Gaal setting things up for things that only are revealed in the third book that could explain the pseudo magic).

scrumper 5y ago
> Like presenting everything as pseudo magical and religious I'm not sure they're so wrong with that. In the books, Hari Seldon understands his math and so does Gaal, but nobody else can. Same in the show. His line in the colony ship in the show, something about "following me on what's little more than a prayer", is spot on. I think the show has done a fairly good job of playing with the discomfort I felt reading Foundation: that so much has to be taken on faith by so many people. It doesn't really matter whether your prophet got his revelation through a dream, pulling some rocks from a bag, or a few nights of multidimensional calculus; it's all opaque to the followers who just have to believe. The rest of the additions and changes seem to make sense given the medium. Clone emperors: super great, and helped by the best acting in the show. I'd bet Asimov had something similar in mind (he named them "Cleon" in the books too, surely a clue in that anagram.) Even the time-jump with the cryo pod helps to ameliorate one of the issues I had with the books, which was the brief time we got to hang out with some interesting characters before a few centuries passed. The plot with Dornick's boyfriend on the colony ship was a good addition too, albeit quite well telegraphed. Space 9/11 was totally necessary for a TV adaptation, you can't show a couple of potholes in the highway roads and expect anyone to get "society collapses" from it. I'm with the consensus on Hardin though. Space marine chosen one was not where I thought that character would end up. The actor playing her mom would've been better as Salvor, with her daughter being a destabilizing influence for her to try and keep leashed up (and maybe ultimately use, reluctantly, as her "last resort.")
rsynnott 5y ago
> Like presenting everything as pseudo magical and religious. That doesn't seem all that inconsistent with the source material; Seldon _is_ effectively treated as a religious figure almost from the start (and of course the psychohistory _is_ on the face of it more magic than science).

scrumper 5y ago

> Like presenting everything as pseudo magical and religious I'm not sure they're so wrong with that. In the books, Hari Seldon understands his math and so does Gaal, but nobody else can. Same in the show. His line in the colony ship in the show, something about "following me on what's little more than a prayer", is spot on. I think the show has done a fairly good job of playing with the discomfort I felt reading Foundation: that so much has to be taken on faith by so many people. It doesn't really matter whether your prophet got his revelation through a dream, pulling some rocks from a bag, or a few nights of multidimensional calculus; it's all opaque to the followers who just have to believe. The rest of the additions and changes seem to make sense given the medium. Clone emperors: super great, and helped by the best acting in the show. I'd bet Asimov had something similar in mind (he named them "Cleon" in the books too, surely a clue in that anagram.) Even the time-jump with the cryo pod helps to ameliorate one of the issues I had with the books, which was the brief time we got to hang out with some interesting characters before a few centuries passed. The plot with Dornick's boyfriend on the colony ship was a good addition too, albeit quite well telegraphed. Space 9/11 was totally necessary for a TV adaptation, you can't show a couple of potholes in the highway roads and expect anyone to get "society collapses" from it. I'm with the consensus on Hardin though. Space marine chosen one was not where I thought that character would end up. The actor playing her mom would've been better as Salvor, with her daughter being a destabilizing influence for her to try and keep leashed up (and maybe ultimately use, reluctantly, as her "last resort.")

rsynnott 5y ago

> Like presenting everything as pseudo magical and religious. That doesn't seem all that inconsistent with the source material; Seldon _is_ effectively treated as a religious figure almost from the start (and of course the psychohistory _is_ on the face of it more magic than science).