August 11, 2025 • 36 mins
Jason and Abu recap and dive deep into the fifth episode of Foundation season three. The Cleons have gone rogue, Toran and Bayta return home, and Gaal’s risky gambit pays off but at a huge cost.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Warning. Today's Episodekenny spoilers for Foundation season three episode five.
Be warned. Hello, my name is Jason Cepcione and my
(00:24):
name's a Boot and welcome back to x ray Vision,
the podcast where we dive deep into your favorite shows, movies, comics,
and pop culture. Coming from my Heart podcast where we'll
bring you three episodes every week Tuesday Thursday, plus digging
into the summer's biggest movies every Friday, and news on Saturday.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Today, Jason, we are halfway through season three of Foundation,
and you and I are going to be talking about episode.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Five, episode five of season three Foundation, where tyrants spend
eternity and it's getting This is a great episode episode
of the Foundation television just I mean, you are the
guy who's like I need more Empire and were getting it.
So we open uh heading down into the depths of
(01:12):
Trantor with Day on his journey down to Micagen in
order to find his love song and her cult of
android worshippers. The vibe down here is definitely a lot
more gritty, a lot more blade Runner, a lot more
like grim dark sci fi. It's humid, it's dirtier, it's forgotten,
(01:33):
it's dangerous, a gang loyal to some guy named the Sun.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Sunmaster eighteen. That was my username in the world of
warcraft years ago.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Right right, ambush Day on his cool motorcycle that he
purloined from the Commander. Only it's not Day. It's some
dupe that Day paid to wear, you know, the armor
that he had stolen, and Day has slipped away into
the darkness.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Actually, I know this is a trope, but I love when,
like a character that's been set up to be an
idiot turns out to actually be smart, and he's just
so smart that he doesn't fall in line. He's choosing
to be one of my favorites. It's a trope and
it gets used all the time, but I'm a sucker
for it every time.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I completely agree with you. It's up there with one
of my other favorite tropes, which is the annoying person
who then you fall in who you're like, wait, actually
they're great, Yeah, just not annoying. They were just like,
very nervous around other people. Anyway, I agree with you,
Day eighteen. Day showing some you know, some moves that
(02:39):
we didn't expect from him, and then you have to
remind yourself this kind of full bachanall Day, who is
you know, smoking weed and just fully enmeshed in the
pleasures of the flesh. That's the variation. Usually Day is
(03:01):
like the hard nosed, strategic, ruthless leader of an empire,
and now we're seeing that starts to come out on
the surface. Demarzelle is at the crime scene, you know,
where Day had assassinated the commander and injected with the
(03:21):
nanits in order to slip away and throw demarzl and
her forces off the scent. They're pulling the commander out
of the reservoir. She realizes that the guy has days
nan nights in him, and you know, with Dawn on
his way to Clarion Station to talk to the council
and Dusk, you know, going through it as he's like
(03:44):
a day away from being vaporized. The cleons are just
basically all over the place, ascension days looming, and you know,
Demarzelle's lieutenant is like, what do we do? And she's like,
forget about Day, let him go. I will find out
what's going on with Don. I will pursue him. Where
is Don? Don is with Gail on Gail's ship, disorientated
(04:06):
from a space jump, Gael reveals that, yes, I do
have the powers of a metallic Yes, I have been
using them on you in order to get you to
agree to like work with me and kind of betray empire,
or at least for just secret alliance with second Foundation. This,
(04:27):
I think greatly troubles Don and should because it brings
a whole host of questions to the surface.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
It also reveals a little bit about mentallic powers, because
Gail hints that, yes, some of it happens unintentionally, some
of it is like subconscious, right, she can't help, but perhaps.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
She says, I tried to use I tried not to,
but it still.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Leaks out a little bit. I think that's a bit
of interesting insight into how mentallic powers maybe work, and
how the meals powers may be.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Work tied to emotion, working on the subconscious level. I
think that's scarier in a way than someone who just
is in full control. Dawn then is like, well, I
need to I need to send a message to someone.
I need privacy. So he goes like into the storeroom
and tapes what is essentially an apology video, but we
(05:17):
do not know to whom at this time. We go
to a new Trantur. Pritchard arrives on New Trantur Or
I should ask, did you who did you think he
down was sending this tape to? At this moment, I
thought he.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Was actually going to send it to Demorsel in some
sort of like weird last minute show of loyalty to
the woman that raised him. Sort of.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
I kind of thought it was that as well. We
go to a New Trantur, Pritcheard arrives and Mayor and
Burg just calls him on the carpet and Lamb bastes him.
He's like, I don't care that you make contact with
the Mule. I don't I'm not impressed with this Mallow
and Beta Gambit, not impressed that they have DJ Magnifico
(06:04):
with them. I'm not impressed that DJ Magnifico is very
obviously a source of valuable information about the meal. I
don't care about any of this. You disobeyed orders, you
did stuff you weren't supposed to do. I'm sending you
to the dungeons where you're like gonna be fully body scanned,
like every follicle of hair, every skin cell, like everything
(06:28):
from head.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Every which from pecks from He's incredibly sculpted God to mean,
what is going on?
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Did he have to get shredded? I'm like, hold on, Pridge,
are we don't know what's going on? What's happening here?
My guy? He looks like he's be like rushing out
of the eye formation, like you know, like hitting the
gap and like, what is going on anyway? Wow, Pritchard,
(07:11):
Holy shit. We go to the Mallow the Mallows. They're
on their ship. The ship is damaged, has been damaged
in the escape from the Mule. It's breaking down in
the middle of space. They only have three space jumps left,
and Magnifico won't stop playing music. It's chaotic on there.
The Malos are then forced to flee back to the Traders,
(07:34):
back to Haven with their ship malfunctioning. You know, they're
kind of like entering the atmosphere of Haven, and the
Traders can't hail them because their communications aren't working, so
they shoot the ship down and the Mallows crashed somewhere
out on the on the wastelands. Gale and Dawn arrive
(07:55):
at Clarion to talk to where Don is meeting with
the council. Gale is is messing around with the mysterious vial.
She's like playing with a little vial like on the floor,
and Don is like, what's that And she's like, oh,
this is a zygote of someone close to I'm like, Gayle,
you fucking weirdo. And she's like, well, it's my daughter,
(08:17):
who we know to be Salvor Harden, who is dead
now these two hundred plus years or something like that.
It's been a minute. And she's talking about like this
kind of hinting at this complex relationship she has with
Salvor and the fact that she never really got to
know her, and that she as a way to comfort herself,
she will take out this zygote and kind of gaze
(08:39):
at it down then tells Gail about Vinad Tarisk, who
is a representative of like a nearby sector to Kalgan,
and they need his vote in order for Dawn to
get the enclosure put around Kalgan. Right, they're gonna, they're gonna.
(08:59):
He's to propose this measure that is extremely draconian and
hasn't been done since like Cleon the seventeenth did it,
you know, back in the day to foundation one and
it turned out terrible for empire. And he knows that
political sport is gonna be touchy. So they planned to
blackmail Terrorisk by essentially creating evidence, planting evidence that he
(09:25):
has been taking money right in order to like look
the other way on various issues right exactly. Dawn apparently
is going to have to go in and plant the
evidence himself, and Gail will do her thing. During this time.
He's like, well, aren't you worried about cameras and the
security forces. She's like, I'm like hundreds of years old.
(09:48):
My image exists in no database, and I can erase
people's minds. Really, don't worry about it. Yeah, this was
a really I love this subplot because it was like
a Born movie, like a mini Born movie. Inside of Foundation.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
I liked it a lot too, and I particularly I
liked when down in response to something that Gail said,
I think Gayle said something like, are you gonna be
okay doing this? Like are you? Are you good? And
Don's response is Cleon's aren't raised to be nice? Blackmail
is what we do.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
I was raised to do exactly this.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Actually, I'm totally fine.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
I know exactly how to do this. The Clarion authorities
scan Gail and Don ship it all comes up fine.
Of course, one of Gail's agents, Zara, gives Don a
gun and he's like, do I need this? He's like,
She's like yes. They then re enact the train sequence
seed from The Born Supremacy, with Don like moving through
the station in Gail calling the plays from a control room. However,
(10:47):
when Dawn gets to tarisks beautiful, Oh my goodness, yeah wow,
light filled home beautiful, he gets into the home and
he's like in the middle of like playing the USB
like into his terminal. Terra's like comes out of the showers,
like wet from the showers. It's like, Empire, what are
(11:07):
you doing at my computer? Can you imagine?
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Shit? What?
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I honestly a pretty palm reaction all things considered.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Could you imagine wild? That would be like if you
woke up and like jd Vance was at your laptop,
like what.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Like what the fuck? So Terra's I think, takes it
really in stride, like he is not. He is shocked,
but I would be like flabbery asted, and Dawn, now
caught red handed, essentially has to bring the hammer down immediately.
He's like, listen, evidence proves the mule bribed you. We
(11:53):
know about it. We're gonna let everybody know about it.
Now back my enclosure move or el and Tarre's is like, well,
but my family, you know, my family's going to be
inside the enclosure. All of these things that are you know,
obviously very natural to bring up. And so Terris pitches
an option. How about I tell the council that I
(12:14):
got blackmailed and then we see what happens. Empires not
very popular right now, you know, the councils kind of
flexing their muscles and they might like some evidence like this.
So then Don's like, okay, that's interesting. What if, like
you die? What if I have you killed dog? Did
(12:37):
I bury the lead? Do this? I kill you? And
so to put a perfect button on the threat, Donland
hears like a sound elsewhere in the home and he
discovers terrorists like mistress in hiding in the shower and
(12:58):
she's heard it clearly hurt every there, talking a foot
from the closet. So like she's hurt it all, Don
just cold bloodedly killed. Oh my god. And then since
the terrorist take care of this, I'll see you with
the council.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Oh my god. Don truly at his best. This was
an amazing scene.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Whoa I mean I didn't. I didn't. I really did
not think he had this kind of thing in him.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
But no I didn't.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
The Cleons clearly do they do this was that was
that was incredible?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Also terrorist, What what again about that family you're so
concerned about?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Because is this?
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Is this a cousin in your closet?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Who's this in your closet? Dress? Right? My, my, my
cousin came to shower with the thing we do here
(14:03):
at the council, Dawn makes his presentation arguing for enclosure.
Everyone's like, this is barbaric. Not since Cleon's seventeen and
the Battle of the First Foundation has this ever been done.
Then It was a disaster then, And Don's like, okay,
it's been a while, but like you know, it's the
only thing that we have right now. And this is
(14:25):
different because this is not imperial territory and therefore legally
it should be fine. Don makes a very effective speech.
The council calls on terrisk, and Terrisk is like, well,
I say, Don's making a lot of sense. The mule
(14:45):
is a danger. We got to contain him. I don't
know what to tell you, Like I know, I've said
things to the contrary on different occasions, but I've this
is how I feel. He then points out, and by
the way, you should my words carry weight because my family,
my wife and child, who I love very dearly, and
I'm so dedicated, they will be within the enclosure. And
(15:08):
therefore you know I've got skin in the game. Yeah,
so the motion passes. We go back to Haven. The
Trader first responders rescue the mallows. Beta and Torn then
hang out with Uncle Rondu, who is kind of like
the the older more Traders. He's very much a believer
(15:32):
in the trader ideology, Yes, and he is certainly on
that team, believing that the trader's right to to buy
and sell freely across the galaxy has been impinged unfairly
by Foundation, and it's only right that the traders, who
(15:55):
have been the economic engine of Foundation should break away
and do their own thing. Consider that this relationship with
Foundation is now exploitive. He believes that deeply. So they're
hanging out, they're having these kinds of conversations about the
trader's political perspective. Randu admits to Beta that the traders
(16:18):
are in the middle of undeclared civil war basically against Foundation.
And Randu is also pissed that they kidnapped Magnifico from
the Mule and then brought him to Haven, now implicating
them in this scheme and potentially bringing down the ire
of the Mule against them. They're trying to forge a
(16:40):
completely third path, separate from Foundation, from Empire, from Mule,
from everybody. They just want to make money. They don't
want to deal with all this shit right exactly. Beta
and Torn want Randu to help them bring Magnifico to
New Terminus, so like, hey, you can wash your hands
of this. Let's just get Magnifico to New Terminus, right
to Foundation, second Foundation, and we'll and then that's it
(17:04):
right right later, Torn hangs out with Magnifico, who doesn't
like the cold weather, and Magnifico is like just like
a little kid. He's like doing handsprings in the lobby
of the building. He's blown away by the sight of
a sunrise on a different planet, and he starts like
playing music on his Bluetooth speaker in the hopes that
(17:24):
it will help Beta kind of swing Rando to their side.
Because Beta Beta is more certainly the one with more charm,
and she is trying to give its Randu to help
them with this scheme to bring Magnifico to Yeah, Terminus.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
I really like to throw away line from Magnifico here
where he says something like, if you're going to toss
me over the balcony, at least do it on the
suns side. And I thought that was really cool, just
scene setting for this Trader city and the Trader planet
of Haven, because we know the sun is extremely dangerous,
but on the shade side it's also cold and dreary,
(18:00):
and we see like they happen to be. It must
be like midday or something. It's like split right down
the middle. It's split right in the middle. It's so cool.
And he crosses over to the Sun's side and that's
where he watches the sun and starts playing. I thought
it was just very early since setting, very sci fi.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
I also love this character. It's nice to just have
a character who's like space is amazing, Like this is wonderful,
Like we're having adventures. Yes, I've been kidnapped, but like, look,
I'm on a different planet and how crazy is this.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, I have a bit of a theory to share
about Magnifico at the end.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Okay, so Beta basically her pitches. Listen, you get to
know your nephew better on the trip, and who knows
what kind of information Magnifico might have that could benefit
the traders. We don't know where the mules been them.
You might have been all around the galaxy and maybe
you can open up some new markets. The Imperial armada
approaches Kalgan to perform the enclosure day in the Council,
(18:55):
they're all watching like on the in the control room,
desays Foundation and Empire should on this a long time ago,
but here we are, we're doing it now. Tarisk flees
to his apartment. He's like having real second thoughts considering
that now it's like happening and his family. Yeah, who
is actually going to be trapped in this enclosure with
(19:19):
this like genocidal pirate. The mule appears on the video
screen and he's like, oh, Calgan, nice place. I'm not there.
What he thought I was still there? Uh? Oh, you've
fallen into my trap. That's right. I used a cobalt
spike to blow up the jump gate and the planet,
(19:39):
and so the jump gate goes bye bye. All the
Imperial ships in the vicinity are like destroyed, or heavily damaged,
and the planet of Kalgan is immolated, along with Tarisk's
family and everybody else that was there. The mule is loose.
Jump gates all across space now go offline, and Gale
(20:01):
and Dawn immediately have to flee the mule. I guess
knew that this was happening somehow, must have a spy
in the Council or somewhere else. Gayle then uses her
powers to you know, help Dawn escape and then Zero
shows up and they make good their getaway. Meanwhile, on Trantor,
(20:22):
Dusk gets a type beam message from Dawn and this
is who Dawn was sending the message to, basically apologizing about,
you know, everything that happened and kind of explaining his
what he's doing right now. And we hear this over
the visual of Dawn, you know, fleeing from the Council
(20:45):
headquarters and fleeing from the planet. He's like going making
his way up to the shell of the planet in
order to escape. He tells Dusk like, I'm so sorry
I won't be there for your ascension. Gail admits that
then this is crazy. Now is Gail going to like
even Harry Sheldon Harry Seldon. This is Harry Seldon like
(21:06):
levels of what the fuck are you doing, Gail. So
Gail then admits to Day to Dawn, excuse me. She
knew the Mule would do this, that it would likely
be a trap, and that the Mule would react in
this way, and she wanted it to happen because she
(21:27):
believes that, looking at the data, the only way to
fully take on the Mule is to strengthen Foundation, because
the Empire is into tattered to state to do it,
and the only way to fully strengthen Foundation is to
weaken Empire enough so that the Council and all the
(21:52):
other players in the galaxy look to Foundation as the
only way to fight the Mule. So that's why she
had to basically cut the legs out from Empire down.
Says basically like, well, why would I help you anymore
if you're not gonna if this is how our relationship
is going to come, which is fair? Fair to do that, right,
(22:17):
I think? Because now this is really the episode where
you're meant to be like, am I all in on? Gail?
Like I'm not. I'm not sure. Don cuts The communication
turns around A task is there, which by the Way
shouts to Terrorisk for I don't even know how he
could have followed down, but sure, so that needs we
(22:39):
need to think about that. Terrask then uh, I think
it might have been maybe there's something cool. Maybe Terisk
then shoots with his eyes closed because he can't like
even bring himself to with his eyes open, shoot the
man who like ordered the death of his family, and uh,
(22:59):
and it destroys the airlock. Donn is sucked out, probably dies,
but maybe not. And you know, Dusk is listening. We
cut back the Dusk as he's was listening to the
end of the message and he's crying. Then Gail gets
on her ship. Who Gail, who is on the ship
realizes that someone has arrived on the ship. She thinks, oh,
(23:22):
don made it. It's de Marzelle, Who's like, oh Gail Dornick,
what's up? It's been a minute. This show is getting crazy? Okay,
So wow, how do you feel about Gail now? Because
I certainly, as as we said, this is the moment
where you're meant to think, do we are we all
(23:43):
in them? Gail? Like, is this the right way to
do things? And even if you knew what the future was,
this seems too ruthless to be right like this. How
can you say that this isn't causing more problems than
just letting thing take its course, you know, like, I
(24:04):
don't know. How do you feel about Gail right now?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Two things I want to say. One, I really want
to applaud the writers for not over telegraphing this. I
was genuinely caught off guard saying that Gail did this,
and it really wasn't until we were in the air
lock putting the helmet on and Gail was kind of
being weird on the phone, where I was like, wait
a second, don't tell me that she wanted this to happen,
(24:28):
And then she says she wanted this to happen. So
props to the writers really well constructed a genuine twist
that I did not see coming. As far as Gail
herself goes, and what I think about Gail at this point,
I'm very team Dawn. I thought the end of this episode,
the fat the last like ten minutes was like so
(24:50):
packed with emotion, between the voicemail message to Dusk and
Don's escape and the mule blowing up an entire planet,
a lot of high emotion happening and I think what's
interesting is much like Harry Selden, I think Gail is
like too lost in the sauce of the math, and
I think she like it's all math and pursus.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
She's got Harry disease now.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yes, And I think the problem is when you look
at something from such a high level from psychohistory, right,
you forget that there are human beings with feelings doing this,
and like, yes, you can manipulate Dawn, but to a
certain extent. Before he's going you're gonna get like an
emotional reaction and he's gonna lash back at you. He's
(25:34):
not just gonna fall in mind because you say this
is what the math shows. You need to make the
emotional appeal. You can't just make the logical appeal. And
I think that's where Gail is maybe losing sight of
the plot a little bit.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, I found it. This is gonna sound harsh, but
the moment, the scene with Gail and her baby, you know,
the zygote of it struck me a little bit as like,
you know, Hitler loved his dog kind of thing. Because
(26:08):
because she then will go on to order a man
to like goople blackmail a guy to essentially put into
motion the death of his own family, which he doesn't know,
and she does along with the how many like billions, billions, millions,
(26:29):
one hundred million, like the whole entire planet plus the fleet.
And she does this while simultaneously like communing with the
memory of her daughter that who she didn't know, and
and and musing on that personal connection. It was like,
it truly is like this is like monstrous shit, and
(26:50):
it did lead me. I think this is one of
the most fascinating questions at the heart of this story
is what if the cure is worse than to the disease,
And I maybe it is like, you know, maybe things
are gonna be bad, but like at least you didn't
make them happen, you know. And we're at the point
(27:15):
now where Gail has a billion bodies on her head.
I mean, I don't know how many people lived on Calgim,
but let's say it's like Earth, so like five billion,
little less pleasure planet, so not densely populated, right, call
it five She's not got five billion lives directly on
her head and is probably not too troubled about it
(27:38):
because she's got to go a lot further in order
to successfully take on the Mule, and after this episode,
I am less convinced. I've been fully on board. I've
been fully on board. And I'm not saying the Mule
is a good guy. Clearly a monster and terrible, yes,
but I am I I'm like, I don't know, Gail,
(28:02):
And I also think Foundation was kind of predicated on
what's happening. Is like, look at the truth. This is
the truth of what's happening. It's so terrible that we
have to do something. And to me, if you have
to lie about it, if you have to lie about
what you're doing to get the outcome, then then I can't.
(28:23):
I'm not sure I ride with you, right, do you
think that? What do you think in terms of like, yes,
please sure?
Speaker 2 (28:30):
The thorny I mean, the icky part of it is
that Harry has been lying this entire time about Yeah,
the entire time to this, the entire foundation, right, nobody
even knows second Foundation exists. That's like a that's a
secret behind the scenes group that he's formed to pull
the strings of the group. He already manipulated to go
out to Terminus and make Foundation. You know, he has
(28:52):
been manipulating people this whole time. That kind of seems
part and parcel with this job. Like, if you are
going to be the Harry Selden Profit, if you're going
to predict the future, you are constantly manipulating and lying
to people, even when you are telling them the hard truths.
And I think Gail now has to step into those
shoes and do some of that. And like, here's the thing, Like,
(29:15):
I mean, I love questions like this because there's no
clear cut answers. But is five billion now on Colgan
a trade off for five trillion later in a thousand years?
Is that the math that Gail is doing.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
I think clearly that's the math she's doing. That's the
math Harry has been doing from the beginning. Right, the
dark ages are going to be so terrible. If we
can cut that time down, Yeah, trillion, large lives saved
by a large fraction, We're going to save lives. Okay,
I'm with you. I think my problem is in light
of in light of these lies foisted on people now,
(29:54):
the fact that the math keeps changing, yes, becomes even
more It's not like Harry ran the numbers and the
numbers of the numbers, and they keep saying the same thing,
and it's and it's unfolding exactly. It's Hey, every time
you wake up, Gail, shit's going off the rails in
(30:16):
a way that we didn't know about. And also you
shouldn't be here, So like, what plan and what reality
are we even living in, right and what future are
we actually trying to avoid? Like does anybody know anything
at this point? And I would argue kind of, no,
I would argue, no, nobody knows what they're doing at
this point. No.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
And this, I think really illuminates the Pritch Gail conversation
from last episode, where Pritch is like, I don't know, man,
do we have to kill the mule? Do we have
to do what's happening in your visions? Because it feels
like we can change things. And I think like that
conversation now feels even more powerful in the context of
(30:57):
what happens in this episode, because yeah, like it feels
like our choices are still our choices, and at some
point we have to choose to make the decision that
feels right and maybe not the one that the math
tells us. And I think Gail is too married to
the math.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
I have another question for you. I agree, Gail is
very married to the mass, She's married to the mission,
and I don't think there's any way. I don't think
there's actually any evidence you could face her with that
could make her be like, Okay, this was a mistake. Yeah,
Can someone who is living for hundreds of years actually
(31:36):
connect on a personal level with a person with a
normal lifespan? I love this question because I'm going to
say no, that you actually can. You actually your ambitions,
your goals, the things you are worried about are so
drastically different from those of the day to day concerns
of a person who's going to live a normal lifespan
(31:59):
that I think. I think that your mission is like
at that point, kind of antithetical to everyone who is
alive in a normal way. And I just don't think she,
or Harry or even the Cleons like they've fallen into
the trap of the Cleons. Yes, yes, can can? I
don't think they can actually understand what people are going through?
(32:21):
Do you think that that is?
Speaker 2 (32:23):
I completely agree. I think you're spot on, and this
this is one of my favorite questions in sci fi
right because Doctor Manhattan has this same problem. He loses
connection to his humanity, not to get to doune about it.
But the god Emperor also has this problem because the
God Emperor lives for three thousand plus years and loses
this connection to humanity because of that time difference. You're
(32:47):
absolutely correct, and I think there's even data to support
this on a very very small scale, Like there are
studies that prove that as wealth increases, empathy decreases. Time
is also wealth, And if you have infinite time, or
if you have such a longer amount of time than
everyone else around you, then everyone else's problems start feeling
(33:09):
really really small and kind of pointless in the larger
scheme of things. And so I think there is this
like very interesting psychological drift that happens when you are
so different from the people around you, like Gail Is
and like Harry and specifically the Kleons also, you know,
like people are not people to them. I think that's
a really excellent question, Jason, and you're spot on. I agree.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Final question, are we going to find out that Harry
and Gayale are the bad guys?
Speaker 2 (33:39):
I mean, I just this is maybe a time, this
is maybe when I'll share my magnifico theory. Then yeah, yeah, please,
I don't know Again, it's hard to make assumptions based
off where the book goes because we are in such
a dramatically different timeline basically, But here's the thought based
off of what happens in the book. So I mentioned
a couple episodes to go to you in Rosie that
(34:02):
Magnifico in the book is actually just the name that
the Mule goes by. It's when he's incognito. He doesn't
want people to know he's the Mule. He pretends to
be Magnifico, the clown. I can't say that this is
an original thought for me. I saw this on Reddit
last night. But there are theories out there that we're
about to see us switch through this season, that Magnifico
(34:22):
is the Mule, and the mule Mule is just like
a nobody, that Magnifico is controlling with the music, and
that Magnifico let himself get caught by Mallow and Beta
on purpose to get close to Foundation to you know,
like this is all a long con. And I read
that theory and I was like, oh my god, because
(34:43):
that aligns with the book. You know, that kind of
honors the original book and would be such a great
twist this season if that happens.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Oh my god, that would be amazing. I'm like, now, holy.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Shit, right now you have to re examine every Mule
scene from this episode, from last episode like that. That
would I would love for that to happen. I don't
know if that's where we're headed, but now it feels
like it now I can't not see it.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
I mean, it's It would be an absolutely incredible twist
and would I mean, listen, every side of this conflict
right now is has a plan inside the plan. There's
a plan that most people know about. Yeah, and then
there's the plan that the leadership and maybe just like
one or two people in the leadership are actually doing.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
And the Mule doesn't have any close confidants. But this
would be an amazing plan within a plan.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Yeah, I think so too. Great TV.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Wow, great TV. This Foundation season three is it's really
getting very very deep. Yeah. Well, coming up on x
RA Vision, we're talking about X men, we're talking about
weapons in theaters near you soon and more. That's it
for this episode than you're listening to. X ray Vision
(36:03):
is hosted by Jason Concepcion and Rosie Knight and is
a production of iHeart podcasts. Our executive producers are Joel
Monique and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is Abu Zafar.
Our producers are Common, Laurent, Dean Jonathan and Bay Wag.
A theme song is by Brian Vasquez, with alternate theme
songs by Aaron Kaufman. Special thanks to Soul Rubin, Chris Lord,
(36:24):
Kenny Goodman and Heidi our discord moderator.
Warning. Today's Episodekenny spoilers for Foundation season three episode five.
Be warned. Hello, my name is Jason Cepcione and my
(00:24):
name's a Boot and welcome back to x ray Vision,
the podcast where we dive deep into your favorite shows, movies, comics,
and pop culture. Coming from my Heart podcast where we'll
bring you three episodes every week Tuesday Thursday, plus digging
into the summer's biggest movies every Friday, and news on Saturday.
Speaker 2 (00:42):
Today, Jason, we are halfway through season three of Foundation,
and you and I are going to be talking about episode.
Speaker 1 (00:48):
Five, episode five of season three Foundation, where tyrants spend
eternity and it's getting This is a great episode episode
of the Foundation television just I mean, you are the
guy who's like I need more Empire and were getting it.
So we open uh heading down into the depths of
(01:12):
Trantor with Day on his journey down to Micagen in
order to find his love song and her cult of
android worshippers. The vibe down here is definitely a lot
more gritty, a lot more blade Runner, a lot more
like grim dark sci fi. It's humid, it's dirtier, it's forgotten,
(01:33):
it's dangerous, a gang loyal to some guy named the Sun.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Sunmaster eighteen. That was my username in the world of
warcraft years ago.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
Right right, ambush Day on his cool motorcycle that he
purloined from the Commander. Only it's not Day. It's some
dupe that Day paid to wear, you know, the armor
that he had stolen, and Day has slipped away into
the darkness.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Actually, I know this is a trope, but I love when,
like a character that's been set up to be an
idiot turns out to actually be smart, and he's just
so smart that he doesn't fall in line. He's choosing
to be one of my favorites. It's a trope and
it gets used all the time, but I'm a sucker
for it every time.
Speaker 1 (02:19):
I completely agree with you. It's up there with one
of my other favorite tropes, which is the annoying person
who then you fall in who you're like, wait, actually
they're great, Yeah, just not annoying. They were just like,
very nervous around other people. Anyway, I agree with you,
Day eighteen. Day showing some you know, some moves that
(02:39):
we didn't expect from him, and then you have to
remind yourself this kind of full bachanall Day, who is
you know, smoking weed and just fully enmeshed in the
pleasures of the flesh. That's the variation. Usually Day is
(03:01):
like the hard nosed, strategic, ruthless leader of an empire,
and now we're seeing that starts to come out on
the surface. Demarzelle is at the crime scene, you know,
where Day had assassinated the commander and injected with the
(03:21):
nanits in order to slip away and throw demarzl and
her forces off the scent. They're pulling the commander out
of the reservoir. She realizes that the guy has days
nan nights in him, and you know, with Dawn on
his way to Clarion Station to talk to the council
and Dusk, you know, going through it as he's like
(03:44):
a day away from being vaporized. The cleons are just
basically all over the place, ascension days looming, and you know,
Demarzelle's lieutenant is like, what do we do? And she's like,
forget about Day, let him go. I will find out
what's going on with Don. I will pursue him. Where
is Don? Don is with Gail on Gail's ship, disorientated
(04:06):
from a space jump, Gael reveals that, yes, I do
have the powers of a metallic Yes, I have been
using them on you in order to get you to
agree to like work with me and kind of betray empire,
or at least for just secret alliance with second Foundation. This,
(04:27):
I think greatly troubles Don and should because it brings
a whole host of questions to the surface.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
It also reveals a little bit about mentallic powers, because
Gail hints that, yes, some of it happens unintentionally, some
of it is like subconscious, right, she can't help, but perhaps.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
She says, I tried to use I tried not to,
but it still.
Speaker 2 (04:48):
Leaks out a little bit. I think that's a bit
of interesting insight into how mentallic powers maybe work, and
how the meals powers may be.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
Work tied to emotion, working on the subconscious level. I
think that's scarier in a way than someone who just
is in full control. Dawn then is like, well, I
need to I need to send a message to someone.
I need privacy. So he goes like into the storeroom
and tapes what is essentially an apology video, but we
(05:17):
do not know to whom at this time. We go
to a new Trantur. Pritchard arrives on New Trantur Or
I should ask, did you who did you think he
down was sending this tape to? At this moment, I
thought he.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Was actually going to send it to Demorsel in some
sort of like weird last minute show of loyalty to
the woman that raised him. Sort of.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
I kind of thought it was that as well. We
go to a New Trantur, Pritcheard arrives and Mayor and
Burg just calls him on the carpet and Lamb bastes him.
He's like, I don't care that you make contact with
the Mule. I don't I'm not impressed with this Mallow
and Beta Gambit, not impressed that they have DJ Magnifico
(06:04):
with them. I'm not impressed that DJ Magnifico is very
obviously a source of valuable information about the meal. I
don't care about any of this. You disobeyed orders, you
did stuff you weren't supposed to do. I'm sending you
to the dungeons where you're like gonna be fully body scanned,
like every follicle of hair, every skin cell, like everything
(06:28):
from head.
Speaker 3 (06:28):
Every which from pecks from He's incredibly sculpted God to mean,
what is going on?
Speaker 1 (06:45):
Did he have to get shredded? I'm like, hold on, Pridge,
are we don't know what's going on? What's happening here?
My guy? He looks like he's be like rushing out
of the eye formation, like you know, like hitting the
gap and like, what is going on anyway? Wow, Pritchard,
(07:11):
Holy shit. We go to the Mallow the Mallows. They're
on their ship. The ship is damaged, has been damaged
in the escape from the Mule. It's breaking down in
the middle of space. They only have three space jumps left,
and Magnifico won't stop playing music. It's chaotic on there.
The Malos are then forced to flee back to the Traders,
(07:34):
back to Haven with their ship malfunctioning. You know, they're
kind of like entering the atmosphere of Haven, and the
Traders can't hail them because their communications aren't working, so
they shoot the ship down and the Mallows crashed somewhere
out on the on the wastelands. Gale and Dawn arrive
(07:55):
at Clarion to talk to where Don is meeting with
the council. Gale is is messing around with the mysterious vial.
She's like playing with a little vial like on the floor,
and Don is like, what's that And she's like, oh,
this is a zygote of someone close to I'm like, Gayle,
you fucking weirdo. And she's like, well, it's my daughter,
(08:17):
who we know to be Salvor Harden, who is dead
now these two hundred plus years or something like that.
It's been a minute. And she's talking about like this
kind of hinting at this complex relationship she has with
Salvor and the fact that she never really got to
know her, and that she as a way to comfort herself,
she will take out this zygote and kind of gaze
(08:39):
at it down then tells Gail about Vinad Tarisk, who
is a representative of like a nearby sector to Kalgan,
and they need his vote in order for Dawn to
get the enclosure put around Kalgan. Right, they're gonna, they're gonna.
(08:59):
He's to propose this measure that is extremely draconian and
hasn't been done since like Cleon the seventeenth did it,
you know, back in the day to foundation one and
it turned out terrible for empire. And he knows that
political sport is gonna be touchy. So they planned to
blackmail Terrorisk by essentially creating evidence, planting evidence that he
(09:25):
has been taking money right in order to like look
the other way on various issues right exactly. Dawn apparently
is going to have to go in and plant the
evidence himself, and Gail will do her thing. During this time.
He's like, well, aren't you worried about cameras and the
security forces. She's like, I'm like hundreds of years old.
(09:48):
My image exists in no database, and I can erase
people's minds. Really, don't worry about it. Yeah, this was
a really I love this subplot because it was like
a Born movie, like a mini Born movie. Inside of Foundation.
Speaker 2 (10:01):
I liked it a lot too, and I particularly I
liked when down in response to something that Gail said,
I think Gayle said something like, are you gonna be
okay doing this? Like are you? Are you good? And
Don's response is Cleon's aren't raised to be nice? Blackmail
is what we do.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
I was raised to do exactly this.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Actually, I'm totally fine.
Speaker 1 (10:22):
I know exactly how to do this. The Clarion authorities
scan Gail and Don ship it all comes up fine.
Of course, one of Gail's agents, Zara, gives Don a
gun and he's like, do I need this? He's like,
She's like yes. They then re enact the train sequence
seed from The Born Supremacy, with Don like moving through
the station in Gail calling the plays from a control room. However,
(10:47):
when Dawn gets to tarisks beautiful, Oh my goodness, yeah wow,
light filled home beautiful, he gets into the home and
he's like in the middle of like playing the USB
like into his terminal. Terra's like comes out of the showers,
like wet from the showers. It's like, Empire, what are
(11:07):
you doing at my computer? Can you imagine?
Speaker 3 (11:11):
Shit? What?
Speaker 2 (11:14):
I honestly a pretty palm reaction all things considered.
Speaker 1 (11:19):
Could you imagine wild? That would be like if you
woke up and like jd Vance was at your laptop,
like what.
Speaker 3 (11:29):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Like what the fuck? So Terra's I think, takes it
really in stride, like he is not. He is shocked,
but I would be like flabbery asted, and Dawn, now
caught red handed, essentially has to bring the hammer down immediately.
He's like, listen, evidence proves the mule bribed you. We
(11:53):
know about it. We're gonna let everybody know about it.
Now back my enclosure move or el and Tarre's is like, well,
but my family, you know, my family's going to be
inside the enclosure. All of these things that are you know,
obviously very natural to bring up. And so Terris pitches
an option. How about I tell the council that I
(12:14):
got blackmailed and then we see what happens. Empires not
very popular right now, you know, the councils kind of
flexing their muscles and they might like some evidence like this.
So then Don's like, okay, that's interesting. What if, like
you die? What if I have you killed dog? Did
(12:37):
I bury the lead? Do this? I kill you? And
so to put a perfect button on the threat, Donland
hears like a sound elsewhere in the home and he
discovers terrorists like mistress in hiding in the shower and
(12:58):
she's heard it clearly hurt every there, talking a foot
from the closet. So like she's hurt it all, Don
just cold bloodedly killed. Oh my god. And then since
the terrorist take care of this, I'll see you with
the council.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Oh my god. Don truly at his best. This was
an amazing scene.
Speaker 1 (13:23):
Whoa I mean I didn't. I didn't. I really did
not think he had this kind of thing in him.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
But no I didn't.
Speaker 1 (13:29):
The Cleons clearly do they do this was that was
that was incredible?
Speaker 2 (13:34):
Also terrorist, What what again about that family you're so
concerned about?
Speaker 1 (13:37):
Because is this?
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Is this a cousin in your closet?
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Who's this in your closet? Dress? Right? My, my, my
cousin came to shower with the thing we do here
(14:03):
at the council, Dawn makes his presentation arguing for enclosure.
Everyone's like, this is barbaric. Not since Cleon's seventeen and
the Battle of the First Foundation has this ever been done.
Then It was a disaster then, And Don's like, okay,
it's been a while, but like you know, it's the
only thing that we have right now. And this is
(14:25):
different because this is not imperial territory and therefore legally
it should be fine. Don makes a very effective speech.
The council calls on terrisk, and Terrisk is like, well,
I say, Don's making a lot of sense. The mule
(14:45):
is a danger. We got to contain him. I don't
know what to tell you, Like I know, I've said
things to the contrary on different occasions, but I've this
is how I feel. He then points out, and by
the way, you should my words carry weight because my family,
my wife and child, who I love very dearly, and
I'm so dedicated, they will be within the enclosure. And
(15:08):
therefore you know I've got skin in the game. Yeah,
so the motion passes. We go back to Haven. The
Trader first responders rescue the mallows. Beta and Torn then
hang out with Uncle Rondu, who is kind of like
the the older more Traders. He's very much a believer
(15:32):
in the trader ideology, Yes, and he is certainly on
that team, believing that the trader's right to to buy
and sell freely across the galaxy has been impinged unfairly
by Foundation, and it's only right that the traders, who
(15:55):
have been the economic engine of Foundation should break away
and do their own thing. Consider that this relationship with
Foundation is now exploitive. He believes that deeply. So they're
hanging out, they're having these kinds of conversations about the
trader's political perspective. Randu admits to Beta that the traders
(16:18):
are in the middle of undeclared civil war basically against Foundation.
And Randu is also pissed that they kidnapped Magnifico from
the Mule and then brought him to Haven, now implicating
them in this scheme and potentially bringing down the ire
of the Mule against them. They're trying to forge a
(16:40):
completely third path, separate from Foundation, from Empire, from Mule,
from everybody. They just want to make money. They don't
want to deal with all this shit right exactly. Beta
and Torn want Randu to help them bring Magnifico to
New Terminus, so like, hey, you can wash your hands
of this. Let's just get Magnifico to New Terminus, right
to Foundation, second Foundation, and we'll and then that's it
(17:04):
right right later, Torn hangs out with Magnifico, who doesn't
like the cold weather, and Magnifico is like just like
a little kid. He's like doing handsprings in the lobby
of the building. He's blown away by the sight of
a sunrise on a different planet, and he starts like
playing music on his Bluetooth speaker in the hopes that
(17:24):
it will help Beta kind of swing Rando to their side.
Because Beta Beta is more certainly the one with more charm,
and she is trying to give its Randu to help
them with this scheme to bring Magnifico to Yeah, Terminus.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
I really like to throw away line from Magnifico here
where he says something like, if you're going to toss
me over the balcony, at least do it on the
suns side. And I thought that was really cool, just
scene setting for this Trader city and the Trader planet
of Haven, because we know the sun is extremely dangerous,
but on the shade side it's also cold and dreary,
(18:00):
and we see like they happen to be. It must
be like midday or something. It's like split right down
the middle. It's split right in the middle. It's so cool.
And he crosses over to the Sun's side and that's
where he watches the sun and starts playing. I thought
it was just very early since setting, very sci fi.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
I also love this character. It's nice to just have
a character who's like space is amazing, Like this is wonderful,
Like we're having adventures. Yes, I've been kidnapped, but like, look,
I'm on a different planet and how crazy is this.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
Yeah, I have a bit of a theory to share
about Magnifico at the end.
Speaker 1 (18:32):
Okay, so Beta basically her pitches. Listen, you get to
know your nephew better on the trip, and who knows
what kind of information Magnifico might have that could benefit
the traders. We don't know where the mules been them.
You might have been all around the galaxy and maybe
you can open up some new markets. The Imperial armada
approaches Kalgan to perform the enclosure day in the Council,
(18:55):
they're all watching like on the in the control room,
desays Foundation and Empire should on this a long time ago,
but here we are, we're doing it now. Tarisk flees
to his apartment. He's like having real second thoughts considering
that now it's like happening and his family. Yeah, who
is actually going to be trapped in this enclosure with
(19:19):
this like genocidal pirate. The mule appears on the video
screen and he's like, oh, Calgan, nice place. I'm not there.
What he thought I was still there? Uh? Oh, you've
fallen into my trap. That's right. I used a cobalt
spike to blow up the jump gate and the planet,
(19:39):
and so the jump gate goes bye bye. All the
Imperial ships in the vicinity are like destroyed, or heavily damaged,
and the planet of Kalgan is immolated, along with Tarisk's
family and everybody else that was there. The mule is loose.
Jump gates all across space now go offline, and Gale
(20:01):
and Dawn immediately have to flee the mule. I guess
knew that this was happening somehow, must have a spy
in the Council or somewhere else. Gayle then uses her
powers to you know, help Dawn escape and then Zero
shows up and they make good their getaway. Meanwhile, on Trantor,
(20:22):
Dusk gets a type beam message from Dawn and this
is who Dawn was sending the message to, basically apologizing about,
you know, everything that happened and kind of explaining his
what he's doing right now. And we hear this over
the visual of Dawn, you know, fleeing from the Council
(20:45):
headquarters and fleeing from the planet. He's like going making
his way up to the shell of the planet in
order to escape. He tells Dusk like, I'm so sorry
I won't be there for your ascension. Gail admits that
then this is crazy. Now is Gail going to like
even Harry Sheldon Harry Seldon. This is Harry Seldon like
(21:06):
levels of what the fuck are you doing, Gail. So
Gail then admits to Day to Dawn, excuse me. She
knew the Mule would do this, that it would likely
be a trap, and that the Mule would react in
this way, and she wanted it to happen because she
(21:27):
believes that, looking at the data, the only way to
fully take on the Mule is to strengthen Foundation, because
the Empire is into tattered to state to do it,
and the only way to fully strengthen Foundation is to
weaken Empire enough so that the Council and all the
(21:52):
other players in the galaxy look to Foundation as the
only way to fight the Mule. So that's why she
had to basically cut the legs out from Empire down.
Says basically like, well, why would I help you anymore
if you're not gonna if this is how our relationship
is going to come, which is fair? Fair to do that, right,
(22:17):
I think? Because now this is really the episode where
you're meant to be like, am I all in on? Gail?
Like I'm not. I'm not sure. Don cuts The communication
turns around A task is there, which by the Way
shouts to Terrorisk for I don't even know how he
could have followed down, but sure, so that needs we
(22:39):
need to think about that. Terrask then uh, I think
it might have been maybe there's something cool. Maybe Terisk
then shoots with his eyes closed because he can't like
even bring himself to with his eyes open, shoot the
man who like ordered the death of his family, and uh,
(22:59):
and it destroys the airlock. Donn is sucked out, probably dies,
but maybe not. And you know, Dusk is listening. We
cut back the Dusk as he's was listening to the
end of the message and he's crying. Then Gail gets
on her ship. Who Gail, who is on the ship
realizes that someone has arrived on the ship. She thinks, oh,
(23:22):
don made it. It's de Marzelle, Who's like, oh Gail Dornick,
what's up? It's been a minute. This show is getting crazy? Okay,
So wow, how do you feel about Gail now? Because
I certainly, as as we said, this is the moment
where you're meant to think, do we are we all
(23:43):
in them? Gail? Like, is this the right way to
do things? And even if you knew what the future was,
this seems too ruthless to be right like this. How
can you say that this isn't causing more problems than
just letting thing take its course, you know, like, I
(24:04):
don't know. How do you feel about Gail right now?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Two things I want to say. One, I really want
to applaud the writers for not over telegraphing this. I
was genuinely caught off guard saying that Gail did this,
and it really wasn't until we were in the air
lock putting the helmet on and Gail was kind of
being weird on the phone, where I was like, wait
a second, don't tell me that she wanted this to happen,
(24:28):
And then she says she wanted this to happen. So
props to the writers really well constructed a genuine twist
that I did not see coming. As far as Gail
herself goes, and what I think about Gail at this point,
I'm very team Dawn. I thought the end of this episode,
the fat the last like ten minutes was like so
(24:50):
packed with emotion, between the voicemail message to Dusk and
Don's escape and the mule blowing up an entire planet,
a lot of high emotion happening and I think what's
interesting is much like Harry Selden, I think Gail is
like too lost in the sauce of the math, and
I think she like it's all math and pursus.
Speaker 1 (25:13):
She's got Harry disease now.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yes, And I think the problem is when you look
at something from such a high level from psychohistory, right,
you forget that there are human beings with feelings doing this,
and like, yes, you can manipulate Dawn, but to a
certain extent. Before he's going you're gonna get like an
emotional reaction and he's gonna lash back at you. He's
(25:34):
not just gonna fall in mind because you say this
is what the math shows. You need to make the
emotional appeal. You can't just make the logical appeal. And
I think that's where Gail is maybe losing sight of
the plot a little bit.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Yeah, I found it. This is gonna sound harsh, but
the moment, the scene with Gail and her baby, you know,
the zygote of it struck me a little bit as like,
you know, Hitler loved his dog kind of thing. Because
(26:08):
because she then will go on to order a man
to like goople blackmail a guy to essentially put into
motion the death of his own family, which he doesn't know,
and she does along with the how many like billions, billions, millions,
(26:29):
one hundred million, like the whole entire planet plus the fleet.
And she does this while simultaneously like communing with the
memory of her daughter that who she didn't know, and
and and musing on that personal connection. It was like,
it truly is like this is like monstrous shit, and
(26:50):
it did lead me. I think this is one of
the most fascinating questions at the heart of this story
is what if the cure is worse than to the disease,
And I maybe it is like, you know, maybe things
are gonna be bad, but like at least you didn't
make them happen, you know. And we're at the point
(27:15):
now where Gail has a billion bodies on her head.
I mean, I don't know how many people lived on Calgim,
but let's say it's like Earth, so like five billion,
little less pleasure planet, so not densely populated, right, call
it five She's not got five billion lives directly on
her head and is probably not too troubled about it
(27:38):
because she's got to go a lot further in order
to successfully take on the Mule, and after this episode,
I am less convinced. I've been fully on board. I've
been fully on board. And I'm not saying the Mule
is a good guy. Clearly a monster and terrible, yes,
but I am I I'm like, I don't know, Gail,
(28:02):
And I also think Foundation was kind of predicated on
what's happening. Is like, look at the truth. This is
the truth of what's happening. It's so terrible that we
have to do something. And to me, if you have
to lie about it, if you have to lie about
what you're doing to get the outcome, then then I can't.
(28:23):
I'm not sure I ride with you, right, do you
think that? What do you think in terms of like, yes,
please sure?
Speaker 2 (28:30):
The thorny I mean, the icky part of it is
that Harry has been lying this entire time about Yeah,
the entire time to this, the entire foundation, right, nobody
even knows second Foundation exists. That's like a that's a
secret behind the scenes group that he's formed to pull
the strings of the group. He already manipulated to go
out to Terminus and make Foundation. You know, he has
(28:52):
been manipulating people this whole time. That kind of seems
part and parcel with this job. Like, if you are
going to be the Harry Selden Profit, if you're going
to predict the future, you are constantly manipulating and lying
to people, even when you are telling them the hard truths.
And I think Gail now has to step into those
shoes and do some of that. And like, here's the thing, Like,
(29:15):
I mean, I love questions like this because there's no
clear cut answers. But is five billion now on Colgan
a trade off for five trillion later in a thousand years?
Is that the math that Gail is doing.
Speaker 1 (29:29):
I think clearly that's the math she's doing. That's the
math Harry has been doing from the beginning. Right, the
dark ages are going to be so terrible. If we
can cut that time down, Yeah, trillion, large lives saved
by a large fraction, We're going to save lives. Okay,
I'm with you. I think my problem is in light
of in light of these lies foisted on people now,
(29:54):
the fact that the math keeps changing, yes, becomes even
more It's not like Harry ran the numbers and the
numbers of the numbers, and they keep saying the same thing,
and it's and it's unfolding exactly. It's Hey, every time
you wake up, Gail, shit's going off the rails in
(30:16):
a way that we didn't know about. And also you
shouldn't be here, So like, what plan and what reality
are we even living in, right and what future are
we actually trying to avoid? Like does anybody know anything
at this point? And I would argue kind of, no,
I would argue, no, nobody knows what they're doing at
this point. No.
Speaker 2 (30:37):
And this, I think really illuminates the Pritch Gail conversation
from last episode, where Pritch is like, I don't know, man,
do we have to kill the mule? Do we have
to do what's happening in your visions? Because it feels
like we can change things. And I think like that
conversation now feels even more powerful in the context of
(30:57):
what happens in this episode, because yeah, like it feels
like our choices are still our choices, and at some
point we have to choose to make the decision that
feels right and maybe not the one that the math
tells us. And I think Gail is too married to
the math.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
I have another question for you. I agree, Gail is
very married to the mass, She's married to the mission,
and I don't think there's any way. I don't think
there's actually any evidence you could face her with that
could make her be like, Okay, this was a mistake. Yeah,
Can someone who is living for hundreds of years actually
(31:36):
connect on a personal level with a person with a
normal lifespan? I love this question because I'm going to
say no, that you actually can. You actually your ambitions,
your goals, the things you are worried about are so
drastically different from those of the day to day concerns
of a person who's going to live a normal lifespan
(31:59):
that I think. I think that your mission is like
at that point, kind of antithetical to everyone who is
alive in a normal way. And I just don't think she,
or Harry or even the Cleons like they've fallen into
the trap of the Cleons. Yes, yes, can can? I
don't think they can actually understand what people are going through?
(32:21):
Do you think that that is?
Speaker 2 (32:23):
I completely agree. I think you're spot on, and this
this is one of my favorite questions in sci fi
right because Doctor Manhattan has this same problem. He loses
connection to his humanity, not to get to doune about it.
But the god Emperor also has this problem because the
God Emperor lives for three thousand plus years and loses
this connection to humanity because of that time difference. You're
(32:47):
absolutely correct, and I think there's even data to support
this on a very very small scale, Like there are
studies that prove that as wealth increases, empathy decreases. Time
is also wealth, And if you have infinite time, or
if you have such a longer amount of time than
everyone else around you, then everyone else's problems start feeling
(33:09):
really really small and kind of pointless in the larger
scheme of things. And so I think there is this
like very interesting psychological drift that happens when you are
so different from the people around you, like Gail Is
and like Harry and specifically the Kleons also, you know,
like people are not people to them. I think that's
a really excellent question, Jason, and you're spot on. I agree.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
Final question, are we going to find out that Harry
and Gayale are the bad guys?
Speaker 2 (33:39):
I mean, I just this is maybe a time, this
is maybe when I'll share my magnifico theory. Then yeah, yeah, please,
I don't know Again, it's hard to make assumptions based
off where the book goes because we are in such
a dramatically different timeline basically, But here's the thought based
off of what happens in the book. So I mentioned
a couple episodes to go to you in Rosie that
(34:02):
Magnifico in the book is actually just the name that
the Mule goes by. It's when he's incognito. He doesn't
want people to know he's the Mule. He pretends to
be Magnifico, the clown. I can't say that this is
an original thought for me. I saw this on Reddit
last night. But there are theories out there that we're
about to see us switch through this season, that Magnifico
(34:22):
is the Mule, and the mule Mule is just like
a nobody, that Magnifico is controlling with the music, and
that Magnifico let himself get caught by Mallow and Beta
on purpose to get close to Foundation to you know,
like this is all a long con. And I read
that theory and I was like, oh my god, because
(34:43):
that aligns with the book. You know, that kind of
honors the original book and would be such a great
twist this season if that happens.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Oh my god, that would be amazing. I'm like, now, holy.
Speaker 2 (34:55):
Shit, right now you have to re examine every Mule
scene from this episode, from last episode like that. That
would I would love for that to happen. I don't
know if that's where we're headed, but now it feels
like it now I can't not see it.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
I mean, it's It would be an absolutely incredible twist
and would I mean, listen, every side of this conflict
right now is has a plan inside the plan. There's
a plan that most people know about. Yeah, and then
there's the plan that the leadership and maybe just like
one or two people in the leadership are actually doing.
Speaker 2 (35:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
And the Mule doesn't have any close confidants. But this
would be an amazing plan within a plan.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Yeah, I think so too. Great TV.
Speaker 1 (35:42):
Wow, great TV. This Foundation season three is it's really
getting very very deep. Yeah. Well, coming up on x
RA Vision, we're talking about X men, we're talking about
weapons in theaters near you soon and more. That's it
for this episode than you're listening to. X ray Vision
(36:03):
is hosted by Jason Concepcion and Rosie Knight and is
a production of iHeart podcasts. Our executive producers are Joel
Monique and Aaron Kaufman. Our supervising producer is Abu Zafar.
Our producers are Common, Laurent, Dean Jonathan and Bay Wag.
A theme song is by Brian Vasquez, with alternate theme
songs by Aaron Kaufman. Special thanks to Soul Rubin, Chris Lord,
(36:24):
Kenny Goodman and Heidi our discord moderator.
Hosts And Creators
Jason Concepcion
Rosie Knight
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