The detective story is just the backdrop. I liked this one quite a bit and got a lot out of it. And, whenever he does something right, Baley feels humiliated, as if he is about to be replaced by a robot. The more human Olivaw looks, the harder it is to accept non-human behaviour from him. Baley is used to the robot Sammy who walks around the office with an inane smile on his face, but Daneel Olivaw is a more advanced robot and can blend in with the human crowd. Throughout the story, Baley struggles with his professional relationship with R. Scott Bakker is in fact a robot.) It’s just a subtle sign that humanity is adapting to having robots in their midst. Sammy walking around the police office, and Baley’s partner is R. I think it is a funny idea that the robots all get the prefix R. (Except the fifty planets, unfortunately 😥 ) Much of this sounds familiar in the 21st century. Baley himself is worried that a robot will replace him. There’s tension now that Earth itself is a backwater world among fifty other planets, which are healthier and richer. For instance, people struggle with how complicated the world has become and turn “medievalist”. The title The Caves of Steel has more to do with the future world than with robots.

Asimov takes the effort to really flesh out this future world. Baley’s headache is bound to get worse when his robot partner becomes a prime suspect in the murder.Įven though Asimov’s book is the first SF-detective crossover ever, it is not just simply a detective story with a robot in it. When an Outer World ambassador gets murdered, Baley is less than happy to hear that his Commissioner teams him up with a robot partner to investigate. Earth has strict rules about robots, but the Outer Worlds don’t have such scruples. Saying more would get into spoiler territory, but suffice it to say that 'Foundation' viewers already know more about the robot than they might think.Detective Elija Baley doesn’t like robots very much. Daneel Olivaw has a huge impact on the events of the 'Foundation' stories. If Apple wanted to expand its Asimov offerings, the studio could easily create a cinematic universe of sorts, as the two novels take place in the same continuity. There are no sprawling timelines or galactic empires - just a tense mystery with a lot of rich sci-fi flavor.Īt the same time, a 'Caves of Steel' show could benefit greatly from the preexisting mythos of the 'Foundation' series. 'The Caves of Steel,' on the other hand, is tightly focused. Inevitably, you're going to have some problems when trying to turn that saga into an hour-long TV drama. Asimov's original trilogy covers thousands of years of galactic civilization and dozens of major characters. The main criticism against 'Foundation' is that it suffers from the sheer size of its source material.

Asimov the caves of steel