David S. Goyer speaks to EW about adapting Isaac Asimov’s influential books for the first time.
Welcome toFoundation, Apple’s biggest, most ambitious TV series to date.
Set during the reign of a Galactic Empire (see theStar Warsinfluence?
Lee Pace in ‘Foundation’.apple tv+
“He was wondering why this terrible thing happened with the Holocaust.
If we look back through history, could we have prevented it from happening?
There were a lot of antecedents leading up to the Holocaust going back generations and generations.
Jared Harris in ‘Foundation.'.apple tv+
Asimov responded to the idea of, how do we prevent these things from happening again?
Humanity seems like it keeps falling into the same trap.”
“I can’t be the first one who wanted to see my youngest self,” he says.
Leah Harvey in ‘Foundation’.Apple tv+
This is Brother Dusk, a member of the Cleon Genetic Dynasty, the previously mentioned Galactic Empire.
The Imperium began with Emperor Cleon, and since then it’s been ruled by clones of himself.
“There’s three of them at different ages,” Goyer says.
Leah Harvey on the poster for ‘Foundation.'.apple tv+
“They raise each other,” he continues.
“They call each other brothers, but they’re not exactly brothers.
They relate to one another as father and grandfather, but they’re not exactly that.
There’s reassurance in that, but they also hate each other because of it.
They’re all living in the shadow of the first.”
“He’s the smartest person in the galaxy, except possibly for Gaal.”
(More on her in a moment.)
“No one understands his mathematics.
They know he’s really smart, but they don’t know whether he’s lying or not.
And that’s what makes the empire really nervous,” Goyer elaborates.
“That’s why they reach out to Gaal.”
She’s the only other person who’s able understand the psychohistory Hari is talking about.
It’s going to be their grandchildren and their great-grandchildren.
How does he venture to get people on board to build something that’ll be beyond their lifetime?
Don’t blame the messenger,’ which of course everyone wants to do."
“The irony is they are not new upheavals.
An optimist would say, ‘Hey, the cycles happened before.
Can we learn anything from it?’
In a way, that’s what the show’s about.”
“No one knows where it came from.
All we know is that Salvor has a very special relationship to the Vault.”
Played by Leah Harvey, Salvor is the only person who’s able to approach the object.
But for some reason, Salvor Hardin can walk through the null field.
She can touch the Vault.
“I was determined that we really went to these places,” he says.
“It’s a show I wanted to be very textural.
The proof is in the pudding.
The shoot was incredibly arduous.
It’s like, “ifStar Warswere made by Terrence Malick,” he adds.
“My producer hated me when we were in the Canary Islands.
We shot at magic hour almost every single day.
I think you feel that.
I think you feel it in your bones.”
