David Goyer, an award-winning screenwriter known for the Dark Knight trilogy, dives into the challenges of adapting Isaac Asimov's Foundation series for television. He discusses the delicate balance between honoring the source material and creating visually engaging narratives. Goyer also explores the relationship between science and storytelling, emphasizing the importance of addressing contemporary themes while remaining faithful to the original's complexities. Moreover, he highlights the intricacies of character development in serialized formats and the expectations of devoted fan bases.
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Adapting Existing IP
Adapt pre-existing intellectual property (IP) for better chances of profit.
Original ideas are harder to sell, due to studios wanting pre-association for profits.
insights INSIGHT
Foundation's Origins and Evolution
Isaac Asimov's Foundation series began as short stories about a Galactic Empire's fall, predicted by psychohistory.
Asimov tied Foundation to his Robot series later, creating a unified Asimovian universe.
insights INSIGHT
Adapting Disconnected Stories
Asimov's Foundation stories were episodic and lacked continuous character arcs, posing an adaptation challenge.
David Goyer addressed this by creating the genetic dynasty of Cleons, embodying the Empire's resistance to change.
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This first volume of 'The Sandman' collects issues #1-20 and follows the story of Dream, also known as Morpheus, who is trapped by an occultist for 70 years. After his escape, Dream embarks on a quest to reclaim his lost objects of power, encountering characters like Lucifer, John Constantine, and an all-powerful madman. The series is a rich blend of modern and ancient mythology, seamlessly interweaving contemporary fiction, historical drama, and legend.
Foundation
Isaac Asimov
Foundation is the first book in Isaac Asimov's renowned Foundation series. It introduces Hari Seldon, a psychohistorian who predicts the imminent collapse of the Galactic Empire and the ensuing dark age. To mitigate this, Seldon establishes the Foundation, a group of scientists and scholars on the planet Terminus, aimed at preserving human knowledge and laying the groundwork for a new civilization. The book is a collection of interrelated short stories that follow the early history of the Foundation as it navigates various crises and challenges predicted by Seldon's psychohistory[1][3][4].
Science and storytelling have a long and tumultuous relationship. Scientists sometimes want stories to be just an advertisement for how awesome science is; storytellers sometimes want to use science for a few cheap thrills before abandoning it in the morning. But science is about ideas, and ideas can make for thrilling stories when done well. David Goyer is an accomplished screenwriter and director who has taken up a daunting task: adapting Isaac Asimov’s famous Foundation series for TV. (Available on Apple TV now.) We talk about the challenge of making a television version of a beloved series whose central character is a mathematician, and how science and storytelling relate to each other more generally.
David Goyer graduated from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. He has written stories or screenplays for a number of well-known films, including Dark City, Blade, the Dark Knight trilogy, Man of Steel, and Batman v Superman, as well as TV series such as FlashForward and Constantine. He has also directed and produced numerous films and shows. He has written novels, comic books, and video games such as Call of Duty: Black Ops. In addition to Foundation, he is currently working on a TV adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s Sandman graphic novels. Episodes of Foundation are released every Friday; the finale of the first season will be available Nov. 19.
Sean Carroll's Mindscape: Science, Society, Philosophy, Culture, Arts, and Ideas 
