Death and the Maiden
- Episode aired Oct 22, 2021
- TV-14
- 55m
Brother Day meets Zephyr Halima-a would-be leader who opposes the Empire. Brother Dusk grows suspicious of Brother Dawn.Brother Day meets Zephyr Halima-a would-be leader who opposes the Empire. Brother Dusk grows suspicious of Brother Dawn.Brother Day meets Zephyr Halima-a would-be leader who opposes the Empire. Brother Dusk grows suspicious of Brother Dawn.
- Gaal Dornick
- (voice)
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe line "Hari said - he said an entire galaxy can pivot around the actions of an individual" is the exact opposite of the most fundamental principle of psychohistory, known as Seldon's First Theorem in the books this show takes it's name from. The same theorem also states that the population being analysed must be unaware of psychohistory in order that it's actions not be changed by that knowledge.
But it is accepted as possible that this may happen. It does happen later, in the second tale of Foundation and Empire. And individual choices matter throughout Second Foundation.
- Quotes
Zephyr Halima: As we celebrate Proxima Opal's passage to her next life, let us take a moment to be grateful for the Mother's gift. The gift of rebirth. There was a time, millennia ago, when our souls were like wax candles. They burned through once, and then they were snuffed out. But the Mother looked down and saw that this was insufficient. A single life in a single body, raised in a single world, such a soul had no foothold to climb from the trenches of ignorance, to grow into holiness. And so the Mother took that straight line of life and shaped it into a circle, bestowing upon us the gift of rebirth. But what does this gift mean? Some believe the purpose of reincarnation is to ascend to the highest planes of enlightenment. But we know better, don't we? For there is no end to this journey. For our capacity for growth is infinite. Even a soul that appeared holy 400 years ago would not be holy today. This is the Mother's lesson. As the galaxy changes, so must we. We must embrace the value of transformation, of evolution, of difference. The greatest failure of humanity, the greatest sin against the Mother, is stagnation. And so we rejoice, that Proxima Opal's soul will not stagnate and rust into corruption. We rejoice that her soul is not bound to a single, immutable body. We rejoice that her soul is an ever-transformative, evolving soul. Our lives in these bodies may be brief... but our souls are endless. And as we shape and sculpt our souls into a never-ending quest for holiness, remember this. This will not always be your life. But it is your life now. Your choice now. Your change now. Make it count! To the Mother!
I mean, seriously, what? What on earth was this episode? No, a movie or series does not need to faithfully follow the books on which it was based, in fact it usually is impossible to do well. And Foundation is particularly hard, spanning so many eons that they had no choice but to pad out the relatively short stories into half-seasons, or they'd have to replace the cast every 3 installments. So, the writers were more or less forced to adapt it into something else. That's fine.
The problem is that by now it is crystal clear that the writers not only lack a good understanding of the source material, they have no idea what to do with it either. The clever writing of Asimov has been turned into a string of cardboard characters and cinematic clichés. Like so many series, the writers lose themselves in lame subplots and action sequences while losing sight of the overarcing story, the story that made Foundation one of the all time SF greats. Such a wasted opportunity to create something epic, especially given that the production values of this series are great, and I think that at least with the visuals, they hit exactly the right note.
- Muxje
- Oct 25, 2021
Details
- Runtime55 minutes
- Color