Jared Harris will try to save the world again in Apple TV's Isaac Asimov adaptation
Jared Harris and Lee Pace know you have options when subscribing to streaming platforms, and they appreciate you choosing Apple TV, the future home of their new series, Foundation. Per TVLine, Harris and Pace will headline the upcoming adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s sci-fi novel (the first in a trilogy) from David S. Goyer, who serves as executive producer and showrunner on the 10-episode series. Foundation tells the story of a group of brilliant scholars and scientists who may very well be mankind’s last and only hope of salvation from the impending dissolution of the Galactic Empire, which has ruled for 12,000 years. The brightest minds in the Empire get together on a distant planet on the edge of the galaxy, where they form “The Foundation”—basically a sanctuary for the nerds that will save people from themselves.
Professional smarty-pants Jared Harris has been delightfully and extremely typecast as Hari Seldon, a brilliant scientist and creator of “psychohistory,” who sees the writing on the wall and sets about recruiting all the other smart people to save the Empire. (So it’s like Chernobyl but in space.) Lee Pace will play the role of Brother Day, the Emperor of the galaxy. The series was previously in the works at HBO with Westworld’s Jonathan Nolan. Here are some additional plot details, courtesy of the official synopsis for Asimov’s novel:
For twelve thousand years the Galactic Empire has ruled supreme. Now it is dying. Only Hari Seldon, creator of the revolutionary science of psychohistory, can see into the future—a dark age of ignorance, barbarism, and warfare that will last thirty thousand years. To preserve knowledge and save humanity, Seldon gathers the best minds in the Empire—both scientists and scholars—and brings them to a bleak planet at the edge of the galaxy to serve as a beacon of hope for future generations. He calls this sanctuary the Foundation.
But soon the fledgling Foundation finds itself at the mercy of corrupt warlords rising in the wake of the receding Empire. And mankind’s last best hope is faced with an agonizing choice: submit to the barbarians and live as slaves—or take a stand for freedom and risk total destruction.