‘Foundation’ Season 2 — Laura Birn on the “Unique” Challenge of Playing Eto

The second season of Foundation continues the journey of a futuristic version of humanity has to deal with the imminent threat of civilization disappearing from the planet, with a small amount of time left before everyone has to create an archive for future generations to build their own culture again. During a recent interview with Collider’s Chase Hutchinson, Laura Birn, who is responsible for portraying Eto Demerzel in the Apple TV+ mystery, spoke about the challenges of playing the character in the second installment of the series. The entire second season is now available for streaming on the platform:

In this season, we get to the extreme version of being able to only express yourself with your eyes when she’s imprisoned, when Cleon I actually finds her. As an actor, that was just an amazing challenge because it’s very unique. She has a fight for her freedom, for her life, but she can only move her eyes, and she has her words, so she has her knowledge, but she can’t do anything. The writing is so beautiful in that one, and it was just an amazing challenge because it kind of puts you in a box that you have to kind of operate with very small things, and it was beautiful.

Eto is one of the most curious characters of the series when taking into account her origin. As an android, she is one of the few survivors from the ancient Robot Wars, meaning that she has seen more things than most of the main cast. Serving under the Emperors, Eto has an incredible amount of knowledge regarding the inner working of the world of the series, while never using that power for her personal goals. The character could be the key for the future considering how much she knows about the past.

The world of Foundation is ruled by three clones of the original Emperor who took the intergalactic society to its prime. Cassian Bilton plays the youngest version of the character, with Lee Pace portraying a slightly older version of him. Leading the charge as the voice of wisdom is Brother Dusk (Terrence Mann), the oldest available version of the ruler and the one that’s supposed to disappear after his time is done. However, even if the clones have been able to keep the peace in their domain throughout many years, there’s a very complicated issue headed towards them, and it could change humanity forever.

Culture Could Be Lost For Thousands of Years

When the mathematician who developed psychohistory first started talking about his invention began to let everyone know what he had seen, he couldn’t have been taken seriously. After all, Hari Seldon (Jared Harris) said that civilization would collapse in a relatively short amount of time, and that humanity wouldn’t return to a place of hope in at least thirty thousand years. The race was one to create an archive that could allow culture to return eventually, setting the stage for the events of the series.

Foundation Season 2 is streaming on Apple TV+ now.