“The Foundation” by Isaac Asimov is a legendary science fiction work, which largely became the foundation for the well-known and popular films “Star Wars”, “Star Trek” and many other NF films and TV shows. For a long time, The Founding did not give in to direct film adaptation, just as George Martin’s series of fantasy novels of the 90s, A Song of Ice and Flame, did not adapt (later it was still possible to make the series Game of Thrones).
According to "Basis" it is extremely difficult to write a script: the events in the book have evolved over the centuries, the characters are constantly changing, and the text itself consists mostly of dialogues - there are few direct actions there. Another difficulty is that many of the plot lines of the Foundation are already borrowed for Star Wars, and continue to be borrowed in the new series of this saga.
But now the rumors were confirmed that another attempt at film adaptation went into production. In June 2017, the Hollywood edition of Deadline
wrote that Skydance Television had redeemed the rights to the screen version of the Founding trilogy - and is about to release a lengthy television series based on this work. It has now become known that
Apple has joined the project, which recently started promoting its own video content.
David Goyer (Ghost Rider, Blade, Dark Knight, and many other Batman films) and Josh Friedman (War of the Worlds, Avatar 2, Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, future "Terminator: Reboot").
The plot "Foundations" presents a rich ground for the development of storylines - there is enough material for many seasons. The complexity of the work is both a challenge and a huge creative field for the authors of the script, as in the case of The Song of Ice and Flame by Martin.
The cycle "Foundation" consists of seven novels. Originally it consisted of three books - this trilogy is considered canonical and is most appreciated by science fiction connoisseurs. Later, four more books were written, two of which precede the chronology of the world being described. In 1966, the trilogy was honored with a special “Hugo” award as “The Best Fantastic Series of All Time”. The series was included by readers of the Locus magazine in the top ten best science fiction novels of all time. During his career, a writer born in the Gomel province received six Hugo awards, two Nebula and three Locus magazine awards.
The plot of the "Foundation" begins in the Galactic Empire - a super-state covering the entire Milky Way. Mathematician Gary Seldon created a new science of psychohistory, which statistically describes the behavior of people and predicts their future historical evolution. Using the formulas, Seldon calculated the inevitable fall of the Empire, the advent of the Dark Ages — and the vectors of further events that will occur with a high degree of probability if certain key actions are taken in the future.
The mathematician calculated what actions should be taken to revive civilization after the Dark Ages and to save the accumulated knowledge. To implement the plan, he created the Foundation - an organization that must, at certain moments, carry out the instructions written down by Seldon for centuries to come. After each crisis stage, the followers included another entry with a Seldon hologram in which he accurately predicted the course of events.
Initially, Seldon’s plan envisioned writing the Galactic Encyclopedia to preserve the knowledge of the galaxy sliding into ignorance. This would create a second empire in the shortest possible time. But the current emperor did not support the plan of the scientist - and exiled him and supporters to the poor planet Terminus on the edge of the Galaxy, which Seldon envisioned as the most likely scenario. After the collapse of the Galactic Empire in the following centuries, the Foundation began to gradually implement the plan calculated by Seldon using nuclear energy, high technology and diplomacy. Gradually, the Foundation seized power in the surrounding area and expanded its influence.
In later novels, the world from the Foundation trilogy is associated with other cycles of works about the Tranor Empire and about positron robots. The unified cycle “Foundation Universe” covers the history of mankind for more than 20,000 years and includes 14 novels and several dozen stories.
For decades, attempts have been made to film the saga, but they can be considered unsuccessful. In November 2014,
it was announced plans for HBO to film the book cycle. Writer and producer Jonathan Nolan, but it seems that he did not cope with the task, postponed or refused to write the script.
Let's hope that the studio Skydance Television with the help of Apple still bring this project to the end.