Asimov Adaptations

[lsgreg]

I have seen two adaptations of his classic robot novels and they were underwhelming to say the least. They were okay for popcorn movies, but they really didn't capture the true essence of the books they were based. Were there any I have missed? I saw Noah Antwiler review a VHS game from the 80s based on his robot novels and he admitted it was not bad considering the budget. They have done the Dune book twice and even went into the next two books in the second miniseries, why can't someone take a stab at his Foundation Series?

[Rocketboy1313]

I just finished listening to the first "Foundation" book on Audible and I have no idea how or why it would be made into a movie or show.
It is a series of short episodes in a multi-century thought experiment. There are cool things in it, but I cannot imagine people watching this story which is dry, technical, and sexless (at least the first book).

[lsgreg]

Yes, the first one is kinda a collections of his novellas. Preludes to the foundations might be a better starting off point since they are more action oriented.

[The Romulan Republic]

I actually admire I, Robot, the film. Its not a great classic or anything, but it was an entertaining and reasonably clever and well-put together science fiction action film/detective story, if taken on its own merits as a film. Nearly all complaints about it (besides occasional grumbling over the product placement) seem to boil down to "Its different from the book", which says little about its actual quality as a film.

To their credit, as well, the film makers were quite forthright about it not being closely based on the book- I believe its listed in the credits as "suggested by", rather than "based on" the Asimov book, and I recall reading somewhere that it was seen as a sort of prequel to the collection of short stories in the book.

Though, while I'm not very familiar with the book, their are still a number of connections to the source material I think (mainly the character of Doctor Calvin and the plot being based off of the Three Laws, I believe).

As to Foundation, I would love a good Foundation adaptation, and I'd love it if someone had the guts to do it (weather or not they closely followed the books) while keeping with the more political/psychological focus of the books, and the episodic structure, without trying to shoehorn it into the conventional format of a single story/protagonist.

Although I think that the Mule's story from the middle book of the original trilogy, Foundation and Empire, would lend itself fairly well to the conventional Hollywood blockbuster format- male/female couple as the lead, a single main story and antagonist (with superpowers, no less), major plot twists, a quest plot and a war plot. Even the female lead in an SF blockbuster would fit well with more modern film making.

But for the whole series, and especially if you go beyond the initial trilogy... the mini-series/TV series is the obvious choice, since the episodic format of the books lends itself to that. Although their is something to be said for the scope and grandure of the big screen.

I just finished listening to the first "Foundation" book on Audible and I have no idea how or why it would be made into a movie or show.
It is a series of short episodes in a multi-century thought experiment. There are cool things in it, but I cannot imagine people watching this story which is dry, technical, and sexless (at least the first book).

See above.

I think it could be done.

Although for the first book, if I were doing it as a film, I'd be tempted to cut the latter half or third or so and just focus on the prologue and Mayor Hardin's story, since the latter is a bit more action-heavy, has a very dramatic close, and gives you a fairly interesting protagonist.

[ChiggyvonRichthofen]

I like I, Robot quite a bit, it just isn't a faithful adaptation.

Foundation is kind of heady stuff for tv. That in and of itself isn't a death knell, but the way the important points are made, at least the original trilogy, doesn't seem very translatable to me. It's also a story that deserves a big budget, so there's a lot of factors combining against a good adaptation. The Dune adaptations didn't do a great job capturing the themes of the original book(s), and Foundation is more abstract still.

I could see some good adaptations coming out of the Robot series, though. The team of Bailey and Daneel, the caves of steel, the state of AI in those stories- it all seems much more marketable than Foundation, and congruent with how recent films have dealt with similar stories about robots/androids/AI (of course many of those films owe a great deal to Asimov).

[The Romulan Republic]

Well, I feel like Game of Thrones has kind of raised the bar for serious big budget SF on television.

Edit: Granted, Game of Thrones relies far more on gore/sex/shock value than a "faithful" Foundation adaptation could.

[lsgreg]

As soon as I mentioned the preludes to Foundation, I thought of the Mule story arc and thought that would be a better starting point. The first book is more background and the prelude books are a little too into the mythos to just pick up with a miniseries.
I,Robot was a disappointment as an adaptation. The book is a collection of short stories, but the overall theme was that robots weren't the problem. It was humans who didn't know how to program them creating complications. It failed in creating that tone. The searching for the "special" robot in similar models, was taken from a short story, but it was one with a modified "first law" where "Will not harm or allow a human to come to harm" to "will not harm a human". I, Robot followed his later robot novels on a robot without the three laws.

[Fuzzy Necromancer]

...my big problem with I, Robot is that...the primary protagonist and PoV character is not a robot.

Like, I understand adaptation license, but really?

You had ONE JOB.

[The Romulan Republic]

...my big problem with I, Robot is that...the primary protagonist and PoV character is not a robot.

Like, I understand adaptation license, but really?

You had ONE JOB.

That's a fair criticism, I suppose, although Sonny is a pretty cool character.

[lsgreg]

That's a fair criticism, I suppose, although Sonny is a pretty cool character.[/quote]

I will watch Alan Tudyk playing a CGI character any day. Probably the most underrated actor in Sci-Fi and horror. They only reason to watch the third Transformers movie.