Apple Releases First Trailer for Isaac Asimov’s Foundation

Today, during Apple’s WWDC Keynote presentation, the company unveiled the first trailer for Foundation, Apple TV+‘s adaptation of Isaac Asimov’s seminal sci-fi trilogy. The series stars Lee Pace (Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy) and Jared Harris (The Expanse, Chernobyl) in a future where man has turned the galaxy into its empire. When one man (Harris) prophesizes the empire’s fall, the emperor (Pace) seeks to silence him. The series is executive produced by David S. Goyer, David Ellison, Dana Goldberg, Marcy Ross, and Robyn Asimov. The series had to stop production due to the coronavirus pandemic, but it still plans to debut in 2021. Here’s the synopsis:

“Based on the award-winning novels by Isaac Asimov, Foundation chronicles a band of exiles on their monumental journey to save humanity and rebuild civilization amid the fall of the Galactic Empire.

“Foundation stars SAG Award-winner and Emmy-nominee Jared Harris as Hari Seldon; Lee Pace as Brother Day; Lou Llobell as Gaal; Leah Harvey as Salvor; Laura Birn as Demerzel; Terrence Mann as Brother Dusk; and Cassian Bilton as play Brother Dawn.

“Foundation is executive produced by Robyn Asimov, David S. Goyer, Josh Friedman, Cameron Welsh, David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Marcy Ross. The series is produced for Apple by Skydance Television.”

The original Foundation trilogy was first published as eight short stories in Astounding Magazine from 1942 to 1950. They first began appearing as fixup novels in 1951, with the publication of Foundation, made up of the first four short stories. The other four were split between 1952’s Foundation and Empire and 1953’s Second Foundation. Asimov returned to the world of Foundation in 1982 with the novel Foundation’s Edge. He followed that in 1986 with the sequel Foundation and Earth, and then the prequels Prelude to Foundation in 1988 and Forward the Foundation in 1993. These prequels connected Foundation to Asimov’s other sci-fi universes, those of the Galactic Empire series and the Robot series.

Pace’s previous television work includes starring roles on AMC’s Halt and Catch Fire and ABC’s Pushing Daisies. He’s also known to fans of Middle-earth for his role in The Hobbit film trilogy.

Harris has been twice nominated for an Emmy Award, once for Mad Men and once for Chernobyl. He’s also appeared in Carnival Row, The Terror, The Crown, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Lincoln, and Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows. His next film is Morbius, a part of Sony’s Marvel-adjacent Spider-Man universe.