Foundation (Asimov via Apple)

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

Don't know if this already has a thread - but the show is enjoyable.  Thankfully it's been a few decades since I read the books - so I am not bothered by any departure from cannon - but it is a cool adaptation. 

The two female leads do a good job and the characters playing Empire pull off the role. 

I'm only through the first season - but I found it binge-worthy 

 

 

[Superfluous J]

It was fine, mostly, other than completely throwing away the core concept of the series (that you cannot predict exactly what someone will do any better than you can predict what an atom in a gas cloud will do, but you can predict what a society will do in a similar way that we came up with the gas laws).

Big spoiler for the final episode below.

Spoiler

I mean. You're telling me Hari Seldon used MATH to predict where this ancient space ship would be decades in the future, AND exactly how multiple people who weren't even born yet would act to get it right where it was needed? That's like using the gas laws to predict when your aunt's going to show up for Christmas dinner.

 

Edited December 9, 2023 by Superfluous J

[Kerbart]

12 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

Thankfully it's been a few decades since I read the books - so I am not bothered by any departure from cannon - but it is a cool adaptation.

It's not bad but as you said, it's a pretty far departure from the books, and mightily confusing if you are (too?) familiar with the books. That threw me off too much to enjoy it the way I should have enjoyed it. I don't think a TV show needs to follow the book to the letter—The Expanse is a great example where not doing so really makes the show better than it would have been otherwise, not in the least because it benefits from actors outshining their roles—but I feel they did it to a point where it should have been named The Gaal Dornik Chronicles or something along those lines.

One thing I realized from the show is how badly Foundation aged over the years. It's still one of SF's great epics, but it is so embedded in the 1950s that it's getting painful.

6 minutes ago, Superfluous J said:

That's like using the gas laws to predict when your aunt's going to show up for Christmas dinner.

4:23 PM and don't tell me it's 4:21 PM because your watch is running 2 minutes slow that day.

Edited December 9, 2023 by Kerbart
Fixed typos. Don't get old, kids.

[Nuke]

its watchable. but i read the foundation trilogy in anticipation for the show, and im wondering if they read the same book i did. 

[Kerbart]

38 minutes ago, Nuke said:

its watchable. but i read the foundation trilogy in anticipation for the show, and im wondering if they read the same book i did. 

The issue with any of those epic SF/Fantasy classic is always "how on earth are you going to put that on a screen?" There's a reason why Jackson's release of Lord of the Rings (as a nine hour release) was so amazing since it did such a good job in showing all those "impossible to film" scenes. Or why the current release of Dune is heralded. A large part of the initial attraction to a movie or TV-show is generally knowing it is a famous book and how on earth are they going to accurately depict THAT?!.

And then you discover that Apple, for Foundation used this approach:

[Nuke]

it took 3 attempts but they finally got dune to work. 

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

1 hour ago, Nuke said:

it took 3 attempts but they finally got dune to work. 

And I'm hearing that the second installment will be quite good.

...possibly good enough for my spouse to actually enjoy!

2 hours ago, Kerbart said:

so embedded in the 1950s that it's getting painful.

I got bored last winter and started digging through this box of old paperbacks in my basement; books I've had (and kept because I loved them) going all the way back to the 70s and 80s.  That's ownership; most are reprints of classics, with some like the Julian May (Many Colored Land) series being 'new' when I was reading them.

 

There's a lot in there that did not age well.

3 hours ago, Kerbart said:

The Gaal Dornik Chronicles

I'm actually okay with that; my daughter is the only one in the family that really enjoys SF... and she enjoyed watching the show.

Plus - I can talk math with her!

Edited December 9, 2023 by JoeSchmuckatelli