The Man in the High Castle

[Tippster]

Anyone watching? I'm limiting myself to one episode at a time.

Ep. 1: Very promising. Girl is hot, guy is spineless enough for me to be on the fence whether or not I hate him, World is very well realized. I did think "Canon City" would be Denver, not Twin Peaks, especially since there was a fucking bus to it from SF, but OK..

[LightRanger]

Watched the first 3-4 episodes before the holiday weekend. Solid.

Plan on finishing in the next week or two.

[neckdeep]

I did think "Canon City" would be Denver, not Twin Peaks, especially since there was a fucking bus to it from SF, but OK..

There is a Canon City, CO in the real world. One wouldn't use a fictional town to construct a parallel reality. But, there is a smirk inducing scene later on where they show a big ass steep slope from the Cascades. covered with giant fir trees and the caption reads; "Catskills, NY".

[WaistDeepGroomers]

Fully addicted. About to start episode six. DO IT!

[PNWbrit]

Very well done. A lot of (necessary) diversion from the very complex book which itself has an ambiguous if not unsatisfactory ending. Be interesting to see how 2nd season goes and whether they make a friendlier finish.

It's always surprised me no film adaptation had been made of it given his books have so often... Blade Runner, Minority Report, Adjustment Bureau, Total Recall...

[summit]

3 in like it so far

[Grange]

I finished the series this weekend. I thought it was pretty good. Hoping they'll have a second season.

[krp8128]

Couldn't get it to load tonight. Read some good reviews though, which is why I sat down to watch

[skideeppow]

So, the films are showing a parallel universe? I noticed the Catskill scene. I was like, that is the PNW, no way was that east coast.

[This End Up]

seasons 2 is out

[capulin overdrive]

Anybody got this shit figured out?

About halfway through 2nd, and wishing I would have payed more attention. Usually doing other crap while it's on.

[neckdeep]

It's nonsense. Some characters are inexplicably able to shift between parallel realities and the show never delves into what sort of reality bending mechanisms are going on. There are almost no answers in that department. The show is slick and shiny but if there's any depth to it, I can't really see it. If you were hoping for something about quantum realities, forget it. Apparently, the first season's show runner got fired for creative differences with the producers who wanted to move away from P. K. Dick's speculative fiction vibe to a more traditional spy thriller/action format. Given how fuzzy the non-explanations for alternate realities are, MitHC can't be considered science fiction and if this is speculative fiction...well, it's fucking hard to grasp to what ends are the writers "speculating."

The producers ran the 2nd season and the depiction of the Reich sort of becomes an end in itself. The first season showed us an entire alternate world but the second time around the show's Reich story line focuses narrowly on the privileged life of the Nazi elite. The show begins to fetishize the whole 3rd Reich thing, I think. This Reich is 95% monumental architecture and sharp uniforms and 5% cruelty and murder. We get to choose between the purist Nazis who advocate total extermination of all non-Aryans and the lesser evil, pragmatist Nazis who are content to exterminate all non-Aryans on merely two thirds of the planet. We're still being asked to empathize with Obergruppenfurher John Smith, a man who betrayed his nation and helped carry out Hitler's campaign of genocide in America. This is not "moral ambiguity" and if the writers think it is, they are closet Nazis. IMHO, this show does ten times more to make villains out of the American resistance fighters than it ever does to condemn genocidal Nazis. This show now seems to have very little moral center, for which it substitutes a whole lot of jumbled moral relativism.

[PB]

So ...... you think it's got potential????

[neckdeep]

Ask the guy who's funding it. He already turned the WaPo from America's investigative paper into his personal propaganda machine and now this is his foray into TV production. Pretty weird. If he declares against Trump in 2020....I guess we'll be in our own alternative reality. I really would like an explanation from Bezos wtf he thinks this show is about.

[summit]

I kinda thought it reminded me of Battlestar Galactica (2004) or Red Rising in that I kept thinking "all of these people are reprehensible... they only stop conniving to take a moment to be overtly evil! It is a wonder they are not all dead already!"

@Neckdeep Isn't it creepy? Yes, these sick fuckers have families and desires and normal lives when they aren't orchestrating mass murder, war, betrayal, personal killings, and more. And when they do most of the agents are doing it as a job. Juliana remarks on that very point that "I didn't think I would feel for them."

There is the banality of evil too. The scariest part of societal evils isn't the ideologues, but the ones who will carry out their orders not primarily because they primarily LIKE to follow the rules. I used to joke at the hospital that the healthcare providers who would follows stupid policy to the detriment the patient were the same motherfuckers who threw my ancestors in the gas chambers.

The resistance has the hardest job of all... not become monsters while fighting them. Study resistance movements and this is often exactly what happens. Look at other pieces that comment on this. The original Red Dawn:

(resistance members arguing before executing their friend who betrayed them under torture)
Matt Eckert: *Tell me what's the difference between us and them! (the Soviets)*
Jed Eckert: Because WE *LIVE* HERE!

The only one of two characters in the whole piece that aren't total assholes are Julianna and Ed.

[summit]

Season 3 was interesting

[beasttowest]

^binged first 2 seasons in one day, gotta go watch season 3 now

[evasive_MT]

S3 moves a lot faster.

[dookeyXXX]

Finally got around to watching Ep 1 of S3 and it felt like I'd missed at least 3 episodes.
I even watched the Amazon Prime "Season 3 Primer" and it still felt like I missed something.
I'm not a huge fan of when series do this (start the new season off feeling like you're coming into it a few episodes late).
We'll see how I feel after a few more eps.

[jono]

This thing sucked me in completely. I had been avoiding this thread as I caught up, just finished S3. I think this is one of the best film adaptations of a book I've seen, despite the mechanical departures from PKD's novel. I like how the sci-fi aspect is left unexplained until there's something worth saying rather than creating some unnatural dialog or other just to fill in the audience. The whole thing has me wondering how much better LOTR might have been handled in a series? Maybe there's hope for Dune.

It's hard to imagine a more deeply, thoroughly pacifist vehicle than this universe where even Hitler can be a protector of peace under the right circumstances. If there's been a chink in the armor, it was that the description of the films that Abendsen gives Juliana is a little too obvious: most people act differently depending on their circumstances (to varying degrees) and that's being allowed to play out without complete explanations.

The close-up portrait of John Smith is fascinating. It's necessary for the story, but any moral lesson is for the viewer: the man is a traitorous villain with the darkest of backstories; why does a close-up make him seem otherwise? Hope springs eternal? I'm very interested to see what they're building toward with him in the final season. Seems like Himmler might hold a few answers, too.

[summit]

The close-up portrait of John Smith is fascinating. It's necessary for the story, but any moral lesson is for the viewer: the man is a traitorous villain with the darkest of backstories; why does a close-up make him seem otherwise? Hope springs eternal? I'm very interested to see what they're building toward with him in the final season.

Even when he cannot hide his disgust at what he is doing and you are certain he is going to betray the Reich, he just does his dastardly Nazi duty. I'm not sure if he wants to go to the other world where his son his, or if he imagines he can somehow send minions to bring his son from that world to his current dystopia without having him killed.

[summit]

Finally finished the series. Dang!

[jono]

Final season took me a long time, too. I can see why the last season got less stars. It seemed a little plot-rushed even though none of the characters seemed forced. Kinda wish they'd found a way to just follow someone somewhere else and left it at that rather than the "resolution" they went with.

[summit]

Indeed. It took us a bit.

I think the best done episodes were the ones dealing with Smith's past.

The worst bit was the out-of-nowhere BCR that can't fail at anything they try. Where were they for 3 seasons? It could have been developed more believably.

There was at least 2-3 more seasons of material if they wanted. Whitmore, reunification, and reckoning held infinite potential. Kido's Whacky Yakuza Adventures would be great side stories.

Ending was OK if they had to end it at season 4. I've seen far worse endings though (Lost obviously).

[evasive_MT]

It took us several months to get around to watching the final season, but we worked through it quickly enough once we did.

The entire run had issues with pacing and character development but it still managed to be fascinating.