Review: Foundation – Upon Awakening s01e05

It’s been an uneven and rocky start to this first series of Foundation, which was recently picked up for a second.  Episode 5, ‘Upon Awakening’ has a double meaning, as it flicks back to Gaal’s life before Hari, and also looks at her fresh awakening from stasis.  *Warning! Some Spoilers Ahead!*

In the ‘before’ section, we see Gaal (Lou Llobell) being a dutiful acolyte on Synnax, investigating lights seen in the abandoned university.  Here she encounters her old teacher salvaging books, and while swayed slightly by his words encouraging her to investigate the truth of science herself, she assists in his capture and execution.  After this her doubts continue in her mind, so she saves one key book for herself and starts feeding her disillusionment with the religion.

This leads to her entering the maths competition, and the events we have already seen.   While it is interesting to get some more detail, this is rehashing old ground a little, and wasn’t necessarily worth the time spent on it.  I am struggling to think of a key detail that we learn here that substantially enlightens us as to her character that we couldn’t already surmise from the previous introduction.  All it really does is underline that the planet is doomed due to turning its back on science, and that she went to Trantor on slightly false pretences.

In the present, we then see her second awakening aboard the ‘Raven’, a ship that Raych (Alfred Enoch) pre-programmed as a destination for the escape pod.  To her dismay, 34 years have passed, and the ship is on an unknown heading.  Using maths, she works out that they are on course for Helicon, not that it helps particularly.  What is more key for her is catching up on some history she was asleep for, and then encountering a ‘phasing’ hologram of Hari, which seems to be conscious.  This is where ‘Upon Awakening’ leaves her.

On Terminus, we have a little action, but a lot of pontificating, which becomes tiresome after a while.  Between Phara (Kubbra Sait), Lewis (Elliot Cowan), and Salvor (Leah Harvey) we get a whole range of speeches about destiny and various philosophical notions, instead of getting to the point.  It’s all a little too ‘Bond Villain’ at times, rather than dealing with proper interactions.  What we do get is the Empire showing up, even if their ship is taken out a little too easily, and some actual movement in the plot.

The Anacreons manage to break through the barrier, using one of those plans that relies too heavily on chance and one character choosing one particular, unknowable, course action.  It’s a contrived move that is annoying, but at least things are finally happening, even if the episode ends at an odd moment.  

One of the problems with ‘Upon Awakening’ is something we’ve come across before with Foundation, and that is the episodic, once a week release schedule.  This was an issue after episode 3 and is again an issue after ‘Upon Awakening’.  At the end of the episode, it feels incomplete and a slightly odd place to leave the threads hanging.  This doesn’t feel like a regular cliffhanger moment and is just a little bit unsatisfying.  It definitely would have been served better if you could skip to the next episode immediately and have a more rounded narrative.

That said, things are improving and the show is beginning to hit a stride.  This could be partly because we are now getting used to the characters more, but it could also be because the narrative isn’t as uneven.  Yes, there is the issue of a little too much grandstanding in ‘Upon Awakening’, but on the whole, the show is rising.