I still can't stop but think how stretched out the Hobbit films were, for an otherwise short book. That's a sin that stains forever with me. The Lord of the Rings films, do have their own flaws, but they're fairly contained and can be debated as to whether they were good or not. I have so much trouble excusing anything with the Hobbit though.
And I hope we never, ever see anyone tackle The Silmarillion. Simply because, there will be so much improvised fluff in that would-be film, that it'd make the Hobbit films blush.
The series changes heavily once the foundation is set in motion, which is about episode 4ish? If Hari Seldon is still alive, you haven't gotten to the good part of the show yet (sorry for the spoiler but hes about to die soon based off what you're saying) The girl is not just smart, shes a mutant (they are like in the year 12,000, she isnt the first mutant) psychic who can see her own future. She is good at math so she is at haris level when it comes to psycohistory, which is telling the future using advanced math/ai or whatever the fk from the future.
Harry has a plan which involves dying to become a martyr which eventually should lead to the coming dark age he predicted only lasting 100 years instead of forever. Almost immediately sht fucks up and they deviate from the predicted timeline with it branching in another direction.
The writing gets good or at least very enterting and fast paced after hari seldon dies which is season 1 episode 2s ending I think.