With 30 of creator and writer David S. Goyer’s planned 80 episodes now complete with Foundation Season 3, we are Oliver-Twist like asking for more. The pacing issues seem to have been resolved and the show from its first episode, “A Song for the End of Everything”, which introduces the main players, moves smoothly to the mind-altering finale, “The Darkness.”
Foundation
Season 3
Episodes: 10
Runtime: 45– 69 minutes
Creators: David S. Goyer, Josh Friedman
Starring: Jared Harris, Lee Pace, Lou Llobell, Leah Harvey, Laura Birn, Terrence Mann, Cassian Bilton, Cherry Jones, Brandon P. Bell, Yootha Wong-Loi-Sing, Alexander Siddig, Pilou Asbæk, Synnøve Karlsen, Cody Fern, Troy Kotsur, Tómas Lemarquis
Storyline: It is 152 years since the Second Crisis and Gaal prepares for a confrontation with the enigmatic Mule while worlds fall all around them
Goyer, who wrote and directed “A Song for the End of Everything”, hits the ground running. Foundation, based on Isaac Asimov’s series of stories, tells the story of a millennia-spanning power struggle between three despotic clone rulers, collectively called Empire and the Foundation established by mathematician and psycho-historian Hari Seldon (Jared Harris) to preserve all knowledge and history.
In the 152 years since the Second Crisis, Empire has lost control of the outer reaches while the Foundation has gained 800 planets. Emperor Cleon’s clones, Dawn (Cassian Bilton), Day (Lee Pace) and Dusk (Terrence Mann) continue his 12,000 year rule. With 10 days left for Dawn’s ascension to Day, there are 10 days as well for Dusk to be reduced to “three kilograms of ash.”
Day has abjured his responsibilities and is living a hedonistic life with his lover and drug dealer, Song (Yootha Wong-Loi-Sing). Dawn and the major domo/robot Lady Demerzel (Laura Birn) present the council with a means to undermine the Foundation. When a powerful mentalic, The Mule, (Pilou Asbæk) takes over the independent pleasure planet of Kalgan, Gaal Dornick (Lou Llobell), Seldon’s protégée, awakes from cryo-sleep to the battle she has been dreaming of for the longest time.
Into this pot, stir in party people, Bayta (Synnøve Karlsen) and her husband, Toran (Cody Fern), a devoted balladeer, Magnifico Giganticus (Tómas Lemarquis), Demerzel’s disquieting confessions to Zephyr (Rebecca Ineson), a secret cult who believe the robots will return, Foundation’s ambassador, Quent’s (Cherry Jones) deepening feelings for Dusk, captain of information, Han Pritcher’s (Brandon P. Bell) disturbing discoveries, and Skirlet (Isla Gie), a child in thrall to the Mule, and you have the 10 action-packed episodes go by in a flash of exquisite light and sound.
Demerzel, the sole survivor of the Robot Wars is a towering, tragic figure of epic proportions as she moves in the maze looking at the golden apples fed by robots’ blood in the Wars. Programmed to serve Empire, she does so to its horrific end. Day’s comment that her chest is emptier than he thought is poignantly untrue. “I cannot weigh love against freedom,” Demerzel says, to which Day replies with a piercing clarity, “because freedom would win.”
For all the bloodshed and violence, the events of Foundation are powered by love. All who are turned by the Mule say, “I’ve never felt such love,” while Magnifico describes himself as “loyal as an ink stain, true as a scar.” The Mule is set upon their destructive course for love. The question that burns in their heart is why their parents chose the baby over them.
The action set pieces are magnificent as are the mind interrogations, and haunting destructions. The heart-breaking beauty of silent, glittering worlds, verdant vistas, and extraordinary beings, including the carcass of the kid goat that is Dusk’s last supper, is a weighty and tender marker of flawed perfection.
The final communiqué, and where it reaches, has opened the gateway to Season 4 which has already been renewed with Ian B. Goldberg and David Kob replacing Goyer as showrunners.
Foundation is currently streaming on Apple TV+
Published – September 16, 2025 02:44 pm IST
