'Foundation' builds Isaac Asimov's novels into a confounding Apple TV+ series

Apple TV+ makes one of the new TV season's biggest bets by turning writer/producer David S. Goyer loose on "Foundation," Isaac Asimov's sweeping and cerebral science fiction novels. The 10-episode first season looks appropriately epic but struggles to tame a centuries-spanning, complex plot that feels lost in space -- dazzling to look at and confounding to follow.

The sweeping nature of the narrative has invited comparisons to other adaptations of literary epics, among them "Dune" and "Game of Thrones." Yet "Foundation," for better and mostly worse, feels very much like its own unique challenge, and doesn't in this form conjure the sort of characters that the latter did to draw viewers, providing a rickety foundation in terms of becoming invested in this elaborate fantasy world.

First published in the 1950s, Asimov envisioned a world on the brink of annihilation, seeking to identify its foundational elements to leave as a road map for those who would eventually rise from the ashes.