In the premiere episode of Foundation season 2, Gaal and Salvor devise a plan to escape Synnax while Brother Day survives an assassination attempt. The episode is now streaming on Apple TV+.
Recap
Hari Seldon is trapped in some sort of prison. On Synnax, Gaal and Salvor get to know each other. Salvor reveals that she is her daughter. Mari Hardin carried her and raised her, but she was always Gaal’s.
Gaal is still processing all of this. She asks to start over and, for now, tells Salvor to only call her by her name.
Meanwhile, back on Trantor, Brother Day is in bed with Demerzel when some assassins show up to kill him. He uses Demerzel as a shield and then fights them. A part of Demerzel’s head is cut. However, she still comes to his defense.
All the assassins are killed, but Brother Day is left gravely injured. Demerzel carries him to the room for treatment.
Back on Synnax, Gaal wakes up to find Salvor missing. She dives into the water to look for her and soon finds her coming near her on a boat with some fish.
The two get to know the powers they share. While Gaal is able to look into the future, Salvor has the power to see the past, especially Gaal’s past. Salvor also asks Gaal why she hasn’t activated the Prime Radiant yet.
Gaal lies, and Salvor figures it out. Gaal then reveals that she has trapped Hari inside Prime Radiant. Salvor tells Gaal that she left Hari on the Terminus in the vault.
Gaal then explains that Hari must have made a second copy of his consciousness. Apparently, there are two Haris now. Gaal trapped Hari inside Prime Radiant because she doesn’t trust him; he is always holding something back.
Salvor likes to think that Gaal isn’t afraid of Hari; she is afraid of his plan. Upon being asked, Gaal shows Salvor how Prime Radiant projected the entire universe and its predictions.
Salvor has averted one crisis already. It was stopped only because of her. Now, there is a second crisis right on their doorstep. Hari’s plan has veered off its course since the averting of the first crisis. The second one is bigger than the previous one.
More crises will follow if they don’t start preparing now, and the age of darkness that Hari predicted will get longer. It will be so long that it may never end.
Back on Trantor, Brother Day is being paranoid and thinks everyone around is plotting to kill him, even Brother Dawn, because he hates the alliance and the marriage.
Once Brother Day is healed, he goes back to his room. Upon being asked, Shadowmaster reveals that the assassins were Blind Angels. Since one of the Blind Angles entered through the servant’s way, Brother Day punishes Shadowmaster by killing him.
Brother Day is so afraid at this point that he even wants Brother Dawn and Brother Dusk to submit to an independent neural audit. He sees how threatened they feel by his impending marriage.
Brother Day’s guests arrive. He is planning to marry Sareth the First, the sole descendant of Dominion. Demerzel interrupts their meeting while they are exchanging gifts to inform Brother Day of an important matter that cannot be discussed in front of the guests.
A body possessing imperial nanites has recently been recovered. It has been floating in space for a century. The body is that of Commander Dorwin, who was sent to the Outer Reach to investigate a comms buoy.
Allegedly, his ship was destroyed by a mega-flare. However, spectral reconnaissance has confirmed there was no mega-flare. The Outer Reach could be dark by design. There are rumors of an alliance at the edge of the galaxy.
It turns out that Foundation never withered away; it may have flourished. Brother Dusk suggests attacking right away, but Demerzel advises investigating it first. Brother Day agrees that they should figure out how far the influence of Foundation extends.
Amidst all of this, Gaal and Salvor see the water around them rising. The two plan to escape using the Beggar’s ship, which is down below. They dive into the water and successfully get the ship to the surface.
They struggle to start it. Salvor suggests taking Hari’s help. Gaal is hesitant because she and Hari didn’t part ways on the best of terms. Just then, after struggling for a while, Hari escapes Prime Radiant and comes to confront Gaal.
Review
- A slow and steady start to the second season. What works right is that the show hasn’t fitted in too much information about what’s to come. The first season seems to be a story of the past, and there is a new crisis that the characters will be facing.
- The arrival of another crisis does intrigue a viewer. The way Gaal explains how the plan has veered off its course leaves a viewer thinking about what went wrong, and it all sounds scary to hear.
- The first episode might be slow, but it manages to hype the viewer for all the upcoming conflicts, from Hari confronting Gaal in the next episode to Brother Day looking into Foundation.
Also Read: 50 best Apple TV+ shows – Ranked (Updated July 2023)