When you've spent hours writing a lot of code, and you figure out that most of it doesn't work they way you'd though together with the rest of the code base, so you revert most of it and are left with a small chunk of useful stuff ...
@tmr232@jwildeboer Yes, I like that they establish the scale of the story right away. The big risk here is to mess up the scale of time when focusing on individual characters, but the way Foundation handles this is brilliant.
First things first - I enjoyed it. It is produced well and (mostly) works.
But, even having only faint memories of what happens in the books, I could tell they changed a lot.
I don't mind the changes too much, as the season did work. But I can't help but wonder how it'll all come together.
One of the things I remember most from the books is the technological prowess of the Second Foundation. /
@veronica@jwildeboer / And with the tech they have here - I don't know how they can make it work. Sure, they had to modernize, and the new vault fits better in today's sci-fi atmosphere than the original would. But at the same time it feels inconsistent. All those quantum projections things... How do you top that with nuclear power?
Additionally, the final scene was... definitely a scene. /
@veronica@jwildeboer / As for the Empire plotline - I really enjoyed it. Sure, some parts were obvious, but it culminated in a really satisfying way (bar the makeup removal scene).
Seeing the character growth, seeing something better emerging, only to shatter it so brutally moments later, was really well done. A wonderful "proof" that change cannot happen.
I think I'll take a short break before season 2, wait for it to be out in its entirety.
@tmr232@jwildeboer I'm up to speed on season 2 now, but I won't say anything other than you'll have to see for yourself 😊
I haven't read the books, so I have no baggage there. I did buy a copy though, but I usually don't enjoy classic sci-fi as much as the more recent iteration of the genre, which is why I've mostly avoided the classics. I'll probably read it still.
@tmr232@jwildeboer I don't know how to classify Asimov since I've read none, but I generally find the tech dominance to be the most unappealing. I prefer character driven story telling, and more recent work has a lot more of that.
Also, the older classics are mostly written by men, for men, in an era when everything was about men, and it shows. I'm not saying it's bad literature, I just don't find it very appealing when there are so much good stuff to read.
@veronica@jwildeboer I sometimes enjoy tech-driven or characters-as-extras plots. Especially if the books are on the shorter side.
But the straight-white-men for straight-white-men part is indeed hard to look past in many stories.
Quite a few books now that I dropped as soon as the first female "character" was introduced.
@jwildeboer@veronica Yes, that is a really nice change, and those characters also carry a lot of the plot.
I was initially worried that the changes in the adaptation would throw me off, but they make for a really good show.
But the issue you mention is a primary reason why I rarely find classic Sci-Fi appealing. The characters are often boring to me when they are so narrow in identity. It actually does matter a great deal when none of the characters appeal to me.
I have read the first chapter of Foundation at least, and found Asimov's Gaal to be very uninteresting.
@veronica@jwildeboer Ah, yes. I did not think of that point - well fleshed out characters do tend to be a rare commodity with older works in the genre.
I am currently going through some old sci-fi books (someone on the street got rid of so many books!) and while the plots may be interesting, there aren't any notable characters in them.
@tmr232@jwildeboer That's my main issue with Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy too. I only made it through the first book, and I found it mind-numbingly boring. It's all tech and all the characters are merely extras.
@tmr232@jwildeboer Now, Alastair Reynolds is a different case. He has a lot of tech and physics, and his characters aren't always very deep. But his universes are fantastic, and his characters and tech are delightfully weird and twisted, and quite diverse.
@tmr232@jwildeboer The Revelation Space series is great. It's built on the universe he created for his early short stories and novellas that got him the publishing contract. The second novel is the best, Chasm City. It's sort of disconnected from book one and three.
I also enjoyed the Blue Remembered Earth trilogy.
I've more or less read everything he's published. Some of it twice. He's very much into the technology goes evil/bad Sci-Fi trope.
@tmr232@jwildeboer The order of publication of the original 5 is, if I recall correctly:
Revelation Space
Chasm City
Redemption Ark
Absolution Gap
The Prefect
Book 1, 3 and 4 are a trilogy on their own with the same characters.
2 and 5 are independent, but both set mostly at or on the planet Yellowstone from the story of the other three, but 2 and 5 are at different time periods.
In later years he wrote sequels to both 4 and 5 as well, so the whole thing is a bit of a mess 😅
It feels like it deviates from the book a lot more than the first season. I can hardly recognize the events as they unfold.
It's been a while since I read the books... But I distinctly remember both Second Foundation and Mentalics being very big reveals. So I am somewhat bothered by the changes surrounding that.
But... I may be wrong about the books as well...
@veronica@jwildeboer enjoying the show so far, as still trying to form an opinion.
I'm not sure where things are going, so I'm waiting for things to unfold a bit more.
@veronica@jwildeboer
OK, so I finished the show.
And... I still don't know what I think.
I enjoyed the show for its own merits, but due the time since I read the books, and the changes they made - I really don't know how it sits with the things I do remember. So I guess I'll have to wait and see how things come together.
I really appreciate the fact that they made changes, as we discussed before. I remember the books feeling somewhat distant and impartial. Which I enjoyed -
in the books, but I don't think it would've worked as a show.
This took on a far more personal approach to the story. It's great, and impactful, but I really don't know where things are going.
I have some gripes with the show: one is that the vault feels too powerful; the other is that I did not enjoy the Tellem arc; but assuming the rest will play out well - they are minor.
And the Demerzel finale is so strong. I absolutely love what they did with her character. Pulling so much emotion from a character that is portrayed as so cold and calculating. Fantastic work.
@jwildeboer@tmr232 Now I'm trying to get a hold of the collectors edition of the three main novels. Found three copies in stores in the country, but all are far away. Trying to get one of them to ship it. 😁
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