After a pretty lacklustre outing last week, Foundation gains a bit of pace with episode 4, ‘Barbarians at the Gate’. It also manages to stay roughly in one time period for a whole show.
At the end of last week’s episode, the Anacreons had appeared and taken Salvor Hardin (Leah Harvey) prisoner. This scenario is where most of the story lies this week and it doesn’t disappoint. It’s not entirely clear from what happens, as to what the Anacreon’s true objective is, but there is lot of ‘cat and mouse’ type interaction between Salvor and the Anacreon leader, Grand Huntress Phara Keaen (Kubbra Sait). At first it seems the invading troops have the upper hand, before Salvor turns the tables on Phara, and the roles are reversed. The interrogation is relatively fruitless though and it leaves it all at a bit of stalemate, as an Anacreon army is amassed just outside the Terminus security barrier.
In the middle of all of this mess, Salvor continues to experience hallucinations of the same small boy that led her to the Anacreons in the first place. In her most vivid ‘vision’, she is back in the Imperial library on Trantor, with the same small boy. Convinced the Vault is trying warn her of something, she is deeply perturbed. Events seem to be spiralling very rapidly and they are a long distance from any help. That help may yet be on its way though, as Brother Dusk (Terrance Mann) is concerned that Terminus has gone silent and has sent agents of the Empire to investigate.
It must be said though that the Cleons are not currently the most stable trio, as there is discord between the three for varying reasons. Brother Day (Lee Pace) is convinced that Brother Dusk failed to properly heed Seldon’s (Jared Harris) warnings and begun the process they were afraid of. While the Cleons cloned lineage may be an addition to the source material, it does appear to be working here, and a wellspring of political drama. So far it has really just been used as a bridging device between time periods, but there’s real potential for much more nuanced, in-depth story. We’re beginning to see the fruits of that here.
The biggest red flag for the Empire and the Cleons supremacy comes as the leader of the religion of Luminism, the Proxima, dies and the potential successor believes in an old dogma which would undermine the Cleons. In a break from tradition, Brother Day decides to go to the enclave, rather than Brother Dusk, which may well prove to be the beginning of a self fulfilling prophecy, and a misstep. Empire vs Religion is hardly a new idea as a source of drama, so we’ll have to see how they play this out. To a degree it may well be that the best examination will be of Empire’s reaction to the religion, rather than the religious aspect itself, but they could pull something of depth out of the bag here.
One of the most interesting aspects of ‘Barbarians at the Gate’ is how they are developing Brother Dawn (Cassian Bilton). In theory, each of the Cleons is a perfect clone, but something seems awry with this new one that can’t be accounted for by an ‘emo period’, even though it does occasionally look like it. There are clearly differences between this new Cleon and the others, such as sometimes favouring a different hand, or being more independent, or even divergent of thought. He also seems quite taken with one of the gardeners, Azura (Amy Tyger), which is in contrast to how Brother Day views women. Having an outlier in the trio would definitely shake things up.
Thematically, ‘Barbarians at the Gate’ is an intriguing episode that really gets into the story proper after last week’s blandness. There are significant points made about how Seldon’s predictions concern large groups and don’t apply at the individual level, and then how particular individuals may be key to the unfolding plan. Salvor, for instance, seems to have some telepathy or intuition that separates her and she will no doubt become more central as things progress.
Overall this adds up to a much more positive step towards a driving narrative that doesn’t drift aimlessly, which was a concern. With a closing shot of the overdue return of Gaal (Lou Llobell) things look like they may continue to rise up, and we’re here for it.
