Since the start of Foundation Season 3, the big message to the audience has been pretty consistent and clear: The Mule (Pilou Asbæk) is the greatest threat not only to the Seldon plan and the future but also to the present-tense stability of both Empire and Foundation.
But, the biggest twist in Foundation Season 3, Episode 5, is that The Mule’s plans may not be the specific things that are causing entire planets to be destroyed. Instead, one of the biggest masterminds in the show has just been revealed to also be one of its greatest heroes.
Spoilers ahead for Foundation Season 3, Episode 5, “Where Tyrants Spend Eternity.”
Picking up where Episode 4 left off, Episode 5, “Where Tyrants Spend Eternity,” focuses mostly on Gaal (Lou Llobell) and Brother Dawn (Cassian Bilton) teaming up to convince Empire into sending a massive fleet to the planet Kalgan in order to contain the forces of The Mule. Since it’s been revealed that Dawn has been working with the Second Foundation in secret, this is his big chance to engage in some spycraft to help Gaal move her plans forward. Gaal makes it clear that if The Mule isn’t stopped on Kalgan, all the psychohistory predictions will be off track, and the galaxy will be much worse off for both her Foundations and his Empire.
But despite what Dawn sacrifices in this episode, it turns out the low-key villain of this episode wasn’t The Mule at all, but instead, Gaal herself.
Brother Dawn Breaks Bad
After Brother Dawn blackmails one of his colleagues and friends, Vynod Tarisk, he also murders Tarisk’s mistress in cold blood. As with previous Cleon clones, there’s always a moment in which an idealistic version of Brother Dawn turns into a colder and more cynical Brother Day. In this episode, we seem to witness this moment as Dawn becomes fully committed to the scheme, and even ditches his firearm in some grass like a stone-cold murderer.
In theory, he thinks he’s doing this all for the sake of helping keep his Empire safe, which he believes is connected to helping the super-secret Second Foundation. But, it turns out, he’s been tricked.
Foundation’s Kalgan twist, explained
In the end, by the time Dawn convinces the council to send a fleet of warships to Kalgan, the Mule is already gone. Not only that, but he uses something called a “Cobalt Spike” to destroy the entire planet, including all the innocent people there.
The Mule may have pulled the trigger on this situation, and is certainly evil. But, as Gaal reveals, she’s the one who wanted this to happen. In fact, everything in the episode with Gaal and Dawn was a long con designed to get the entire Imperial fleet in one place, so they could all be utterly decimated. This is by far one of the coldest, cruelest calls that Gaal has made throughout all of Foundation, and she justifies it by telling Dawn, “I had to fit Seldon’s initial conditions.”
Basically, Gaal wanted to make sure that Foundation was the most powerful authority in the galaxy, not neck-and-neck with Empire. Once Empire is utterly weakened, Foundation becomes the dominant power in the galaxy by default.
At least, that’s what Gaal thinks. The cliffhanger of the episode suggests that not only has Gaal’s ruthless plan overlooked Brother Dusk’s secret superweapon, but she’s also failed to take into account the tenacity of the immortal robot, Demerzel (Laura Birn). Now, in a possible showdown between Gaal and Demerzel, the entire fate of the galaxy and the future of the series will be changed forever.
