While I love the Foundation series by Isaac Asimov(and the Empire and Robots series), I admit it may be a bit dated. The novels were written during the '50s and Asimov never described the visuals in detail.
It was therefore expected that any adaptation would diverge from the source material. And I don't mind it. A faithful adaptation would not be possible because we wouldn't know how the ships are supposed to look like, for example. I don't mind the gender swap in itself.
But the creators take too many liberties with the source materials to the point the story doesn't make sense for any science fiction fan. If Terminus is 55,000 light years away from Trantor and the colonists don't have jump ships, how do they travel? Why does it take 900 days to get there? That would mean they are travelling at 22,300 times the speed of light. This kind of oversight may be OK for a Marvel show, not for a show where math plays a central role.
I was also disheartened by changing Demerzel's gender. Not because of itself, but because in the books Eto Dermerzel is a very special character with a deep backstory. Changing his gender sends ripples everywhere. It's like making Han Solo or Ron Weasley a woman.
Hari's relationship with Raych is also changed for the worse, presumably to make room for Gaal. Sigh.
All these changes leave us with really impressive visuals and a weakened story. Not the Foundation I expected.
