The Decline and Fall of the Galactic Empire

This article contains spoilers through the first season of Foundation.

Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series is perhaps the definitive expression of mid-century American liberalism. Certainly nothing from the academy can approach its popular influence. When David S. Goyer—the mastermind behind Apple’s extravagant TV adaptation, which wraps up its first season today—declared Foundation “the greatest science-fiction work ever written,” he was not indulging in prerelease hyperbole so much as reciting the official record. The Hugo Awards voted Foundation as the field’s Best All-Time Series in 1966, and no Worldcon has dared to revisit the verdict since. Liberal economists adore it, weirdo tech billionaires are entranced by it, and legions of 13-year-old nerds succumb to its ultra-rationalist siren every year.

But these took roughly 80 years to receive the big-budget visual treatment they deserve for a reason. is a grand sci-fi adventure, sure, but it’s better understood as a work of political theory—a young American’s dialogue with the Enlightenment historian Edward Gibbon about the promise and peril of empire. To its credit, Apple’s new series embraces the philosophical ambition of Asimov’s masterpiece. But in updating for the 21st century, Goyer has produced a near-comprehensive repudiation of his source material. This is a show not about space or