[Closed] "The Man in the High Castle" (might contain spoilers)

The imaginations of the scriptwriters 😀
I need to read the book after seeing the TV series, apparently it's a book about the alternative past in that.

I love it! Got to be an alternate reality surely?

I've only read the book, but form the trailer it looks like it might be very very different apart from the central premise.

Not necessarily a bad thing, there's plenty of scope there.

The series is well worth a watch, it ramps up nicely in the last three episodes although the very last scene is a bit WTF.

brassneck - Member

I've only read the book, but form the trailer it looks like it might be very very different apart from the central premise.

That's what you generally do with Philip Dick- take the good idea, throw away all the drug-addled rambling. Except when you film the one that's totally about drug-addled rambling

(I just realised something... Kaesae's story about being lasered in the eyes by a courier is suspiciously like Phil Dick's descent into madness- he became obsessed with a courier with a christian fish necklace, and convinced that he was having messages beamed into his brain with lasers by secret space-christians)

I seem to remember that it ended (the book that is) pretty unsatisfyingly, as there was going to be a sequel, but as his brain became more a more frizzled, he couldn't face the whole nazi-thing...

Very good so far, think we're seen up to Ep 4....

I love it! Got to be an alternate reality surely?

nickc - Member

I seem to remember that it ended (the book that is) pretty unsatisfyingly,

Yeah, I read it a few months ago. It's far from his best book, but then the TV series is only vaguely based on it. I'm enjoying the series so far. Unfortunately it is the only thing on Prime that seems worth watching so can't see me continuing with it.

nickc - Member

I seem to remember that it ended (the book that is) pretty unsatisfyingly, as there was going to be a sequel, but as his brain became more a more frizzled, he couldn't face the whole nazi-thing...

I think not even so much a sequel, but a "book 2 of 2". I remember really annoying a massive Dick fan (1) who was convinced that the ending was a piece of genius, Dick's protest against the staid forms of American writing that thought everything should have a beginning and ending. And it leaves you to write your own ending, which is how art shoud be, man. Nobody but Dick could have pulled it off. Right? Oh, wait, what?

(1)

NW, I had the same argument with my brother, who was also convinced it was a stand alone work...

It's still a source of baiting now...

Loling at your pic, I'm sure the mods haven't noticed .

It was okay, a little bit drawn out in places. As muppetWrangler said the last few episodes are the best.

So I didn't miss a subtle clue then?

If they do go ahead and make a second series and pursue the obvious big question of where do the films come from it's going to be interesting to see how they handle the transition from predominantly alternative history drama to out and out sci-fi.

Amazon are advertising it in the cinema, saw a trailer for it before Bridge of Spies yesterday.

At least they didn't decorate a subway train here like they did in New York.

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Just finished watching it, absolutely superb TV, even if the ending is a bit sudden.

Hope they make a series 2.

Not sure what all the fuss was about. As said above, the ending puts it into pure sci-fi rather than interesting alternative universe type thing.

It was ok, but there are better things on Prime (Vikings, MadMen, Mr Robot)

(First off, I'm aware this is a bit of a thread bump but I just finished the last episode and I wanted to put my thoughts down somewhere. Indulge me)

I loved this - thought it was incredibly stylish. I particularly loved the Obergruppenfuhrer Smith character - basically an all-American family guy who happened to be a Nazi. Despite the dark threats to Joe's wife/children half way through the series, you were heartened by the arc of his dealing with his son's illness and I was cheering for him by the end. That's one of the main themes of the series - how will good people act when they're put into different situations? None of the main characters are inherently 'bad' people but they all do questionable things at times.

Where did the films comes from? I am familiar with PKD and his tendency to go down very bizarre wormholes, but I don't think you need to suspend disbelief too much for this one; there's talk of time travel / alternate realities but I think it's far simpler than that. The films are simply fiction produced by an unknown artist - a "what if" scenario exploring the idea of alternative endings to the war (Ironically like the Amazon TV series exists IRL). Perhaps the artist is the 'man in the high castle', perhaps not. When Frank sees himself shot, he sees a likeness of himself - a "there but for the grace of God" sort of thing.

The Fuhrer wants the videos, partly because he's now an old obsessive living in a remote mountain lodge, but partly because he understands the strategical benefit of looking at the world in another way. He can't [i]literally[/i] see the future through the films, but he uses the imagined world to help him better understand his own - which is surely why anyone reads literature?

/ramble

If you like this try Norman Spinrad's [i]The Iron Dream[/i]

The fact that there are alternate realities involved was clear, IMO. Trudy was shot in the beginning, and yet her body was remarkably fresh in the penultimate episode. Then Juliana saw her again, and her mum also thought she was alive. The final scene shows us Tagomi flipping worlds so we know its possible. So then we can be fairly sure that the films do come from alternate realities. More than one, since they show both our reality and a future one in which San Francisco gets nuked.

He flipped using an artefact with some sort of power. So we think that the Japanese antique collectors are collecting these artefacts. Perhaps their odd questioning of the dealer guy was to establish if he was aware of any of this. It would then seem that there is a group of people who are aware of the alternate realities. Perhaps Trudy is involved in their supply?

Also - Tagomi's assistant could be from our world. We're told he's from Nagasaki, and we are shown he has terrible burns on his arm. If the flipping ability is triggered by sorrow or emotion attached to something (the collector lady called it 'wu') then he would have had no shortage of that. Sitting Bull's necklace would have had that. Of course Frank's forgery still has it for different reasons.