Who Is The First Speaker? How Foundation Season 3's Most Important Concept Compares To The Book

Spoilers for "Foundation" season 3 follow. If you don't want to ruin the surprises to come, abandon ship now.

"Foundation" season 3 is here, and with it, a host of familiar faces. Hari Seldon (Jared Harris) continues to guide the First Foundation on Terminus. Gaal Dornick (Lou Llobell) is back out of cryogenic sleep and in the thick of the action. Lady Demerzel (Laura Birn) continues to control the Imperial throne, and of course, the three Cleons (Lee Pace) are still doing their thing as figureheads of Empire. This show has managed to maintain remarkable character consistency despite the utter lack thereof in the source material (prompting the consistent question, how the hell does one even adapt it?).

And yet, it isn't the familiar faces but an unfamiliar one that is worth noting in the most recent episode. Just three minutes into episode 2, "Shadows in the Math," we get a rapid-fire account of how the Second Foundation evolves over the course of the 151 years between season 2 (when the mentalic colony is set up) and season 3. In the first sequence where Gaal wakes up, she's greeted by a woman who says, "Awaken, sleeper. The First Speaker welcomes you home." Gaal's lime-light soaking role (which is artificially extended in the adaptation) makes it easy to overlook the importance of this character, and in a few short minutes, we see the initial First Speaker shuffled off, replaced by Preem Palver (Troy Kotsur).

At first glance, this implies a sense of frailty and irrelevance to the position. But nothing could be further from the truth. The First Speaker isn't just a spokesperson for the Second Foundation, or someone to do the bidding of Gaal and Hari when they're not in cryosleep. They serve a very important function, one that will only grow with time.

The First Speaker is more than an administrative position. In Asimov's original books, that is the title given to the person in charge of overseeing the plan itself. In the show, this is overshadowed by Hari and Gaal's enduring involvement in the plot, but in the original version, Hari Seldon dies very early, and Gaal Doornick is an irrelevant character at the beginning of the story. By the time you get hundreds of years into the narrative, the Seldon Plan is progressing without its creator ... but it isn't unfolding on its own. The Second Foundation is very much part of the story still (it's even the title of the third book in the series), and its leader, the First Speaker, is the person helping to keep things on track.

Preem Palver hints at this midway through episode 2, when he points out that while Gaal was sleeping, he and his fellow mentalics have dragged the plan back on track after its earlier derailing decades before. In reality, the First Speakers are doing things like that all the time. Their job is to understand the plan, make sure it's being implemented, and use their mentalic powers to tastefully intervene whenever necessary. These guys are also mentalic heavyweights and mathematical geniuses. In Asimov's source material, they are chosen on rotation only from individuals who are up to snuff on their psychohistory (Asimov's fictional science that combines math, history, and psychology). In fact, First Speakers are so good at psychohistory that they must be able to add their own contribution to the ever-evolving and growing Seldon Plan as a prerequisite for office.

One of the bigger changes to the First Speaker (and the entire Second Foundation) in the Apple TV+ version is their location. In the books, they are hidden on the Imperial capital of Trantor itself, amongst the ruins of the defeated Empire. In the show, the Empire is still alive, though not well, and the Second Foundation is located on another planet. Nevertheless, it continues to guide events from afar through its growing network of mentalic agents.

This will all come to an initial head with the impending (and slightly altered) galactic duel with the Mule. But don't let show creator David S. Goyer and company pull the wool over your eyes. In episode 2, when Gaal and Hari talk about the crises before the latter shuffles off this mortal coil, they reference a future Seldon Crisis, one that is inevitable if the Mule is defeated.

While everything is focused on Pilou Asbæk's stubborn character conquering the galaxy, the truth is, there's a lot more story to tell after this hiccup in the Seldon Plan, and the First Speakers are going to be center stage in the upcoming drama as they lead the Second Foundation, the First Foundation, and all of humanity toward its mathematically deduced destiny.

Episode 2 of "Foundation" season 3 is streaming now on Apple TV+, with new episodes dropping weekly.