Foundation's Showrunner Has A Perfect Spin-Off Pitch [Exclusive]

The world of "Foundation" on Apple TV+ is one of the most expansive sci-fi universes on TV. This is a universe where humanity has conquered the cosmos and spread across untold planets at a time when the universe is governed by a Galactic Empire led by three cloned Emperors, meant to represent the imperishable permanence of the Empire. It's a universe where robots not only existed, they've been extinct for thousands of years.

It's the robotics part of the "Foundation" mythology that's arguably the most exciting aspect of the show's lore. Though originally not a part of author Isaac Asimov's book series of the same name, the legendary author eventually retconned both his "Foundation" series with his "I, Robot" series of stories, combining them into a singular timeline that the Apple TV+ series is now adapting.

Across three seasons of "Foundation," we've only scratched the surface of the era of robotics in humanity's history. Given that no one alive in the show remembers a time when robots were around, much of that backstory is still shrouded in mystery ... until this season. Early in season 3, we learned the history of the Three Laws of Robotics, and how a Zeroth Law gave robots such an identity crisis that it led to the Robot Wars, and robots' eventual extinction. We've heard of the Robot Wars a few times throughout the show's run so far, but we haven't really seen it on screen — at least, not yet.

In an exclusive interview ahead of the release of the season 3 finale of "Foundation," co-creator and showrunner David S. Goyer talked to /Film about his desire to explore the Robot Wars in a spin-off TV series.

"I would love to tell that story, but there's really only two ways to tell it. One would be to tell it as a sort of B-story interwoven into a season, where we would do these flashbacks, which would be interesting, but would take up a lot of time and a lot of bandwidth," Goyer said. "Another interesting way to do it would be to do it as like a six-episode miniseries that happens in between two of the larger seasons of 'Foundation.'"

A limited series about the Robot Wars may, on the surface, feel unnecessary, an excuse to just to put more big battles on the screen. Except, nothing is that simple when it comes to Asimov's worlds. We know that the reason the Robot Wars started was because robots disagreed about whether their programming meant they should kill some humans in order to prevent them from annihilating each other, or if they should let them go extinct rather than kill a single human. A limited series about the war could be more than just exciting action, it could be an emotional story about robots literally tearing each other apart over ethical dilemmas and them pondering philosophical questions while also blowing stuff up. This has the potential to be a heartbreaking story if it's ever made. "If" being the key word here.

"Who knows if that will ever happen?" Goyer shrugged. "It was something that would have been exciting, and to be able to stretch our arms and really give that ... I don't think that story is required to enjoy 'Foundation' as a show, but it would be fun to do it."

"Foundation" was just renewed for season 4 at Apple TV+, but the dream of a Robot Wars mini-series remains a dream for the time being. Still, if we've learned anything from three seasons of heartbreak watching "Foundation," it's that there's always some hope.