Warning: minor spoilers for Foundation Season 3, Episode 1 - “A Song for the End of Everything” are in play.
By the time Foundation Season 3 wraps on the 2025 TV schedule, we’ll be three days shy of two years since Season 2’s massive finale. That’s quite a bit of time to wait for a series to return, especially with a threat such as The Mule waiting in the wings. Teased throughout the previous season as Foundation's latest big bad that could end civilization, the Apple TV+ subscription driver introduces us to the man in the flesh - and confirms that he's given society a four month expiration date.
That sort of promise needs a moment that pulls the audience right back into the world that author Isaac Asimov created. Foundation nailed that with this week's streaming Season 3 premiere, in a moment of brutality that feels like it could only come from Game of Thrones.
Which makes the fact that HBO series vet Pilou Asbæk’s introduction as Foundation’s new Mule did include a nasty touch, which he came up with while shooting. As we spoke on behalf of this week’s first episode, “A Song for the End of Everything,” the Overlord baddie shared with CinemaBlend this tale of his creative choice:
There was a lot of scenes where I added a lot of me into it. … One of my ideas was this little element of my colleague biting his finger. And the reason why I wanted to do that was because … when he does the things with the spaceship and all of the mind control, it's beautiful. It's big, it's visually stunning, but it needs to be very concrete. It needs to be between two actors on a battlefield where I make the other person do something he really doesn't want to do. And I thought doing what my friend did in that scene was a good way of illustrating the power of The Mule.
Aptly enough, the resulting opener includes fellow Thrones vet Ralph Ineson as Archduke Bellarion, the man who controls a crucial planet to Foundation’s power struggle. Arriving with the intent to negotiate for his daughter’s return, our Archduke finds himself dispatched by The Mule’s powers of persuasion.
Of course, that’s not until Pilou Asbæk’s antagonist convinces Archduke Bellarion’s airmen and infantry to kill each other. So really, the finger biting is more of a statement - which is punctuated by Ralph Ineson’s character shooting himself in the head. You can see some of that in action through the trailer for Foundation Season 3, included below:
Even as a casual Game of Thrones fan, I can see the neat symmetry in this moment reuniting the two actors. Taking over for Mikael Persbrandt, the actor who played The Mule throughout Foundation Season 2, is something that Asbæk was reverent about.
That mindset came from not only being an actor that can feel out a character in the ways you read above. In a larger context, Pilou Asbæk drew these parallels between this project and the experiences that George R.R. Martin’s fantasy mega hit afforded him:
I think Thrones at the time was the biggest show in the world. The props, the sets, everything. So many incredible people put a massive amount of work into every single little detail. When I stepped onto Foundation, I felt that same vibe. I felt like they knew that this is, and it probably gonna become even bigger after this season, because it really deserves a massive audience.
As someone who’s frequently dabbled in Isaac Asimov’s work, Foundation is the title that actually has me convinced I need to take a week off of work and do a deep dive. I think Pilou Asbæk would agree, as he even cites the series as a crucial influence in the sci-fi lexicon; one he feels is responsible for the formation of Star Wars, Star Trek, and Blade Runner.
If you’ve somehow avoided watching Foundation, don’t worry - I haven’t spoiled much here. Those of you who want to take the journey for the first time, or need a big refresh before diving back in, can stream the first two seasons on Apple TV+.
For everyone who’s ready to see where the story goes next, new Season 3 episodes will be dropping every Friday - until the September 12th finale. By which point, we’ll probably have plenty to talk about how The Mule’s cruel charms have affected Foundation's ultimate eight season plan.
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