It's the only Amazon pilot that's getting that much coverage (though there is, I think, a civil war pilot I heard was okay).

http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/01/16/the-man-in-the-high-castle-review

Love the book, and the pilot was pretty good. It's clear they've deviated from the book some, and probably will in the rest of the series, but I don't have a problem with it personally.

1/18/2015 4:04:08 PM

As a connoisseur of alt history fiction, I give this show my seal of approval.

Great pilot

1/18/2015 4:52:09 PM

this was really freakin' cool. hoping it gets picked up for series.

the lady friend was really hooked, even after explaining to her that it was just a pilot. She was all into the lead male and i thought she was going to throw her glass through my tv at the end when the big twist happened.

1/26/2015 5:02:41 PM

If this is as cool as Wolfenstein: The New Order I'll be all over it.

1/26/2015 6:31:26 PM

Picked up for full season

2/18/2015 12:16:07 PM

AWESOME

2/18/2015 5:19:20 PM

Watched the pilot last night after reading this thread. Great start to a really fascinating idea

2/19/2015 9:52:29 AM

BTTT for full release on the 20th. Pilot is really good and the second episode is available now, also very good.

11/15/2015 10:37:07 AM

I just binge watched season 1 in the past few days. I am hooked!

11/26/2015 1:02:55 AM

Yes...I love this show.

11/26/2015 7:21:21 AM

Enjoying this season even when the two main characters piss me off.

11/30/2015 8:41:37 AM

Looking forward to starting this soon.

11/30/2015 8:59:44 AM

watched two episodes so far, im impressed, this is a good show.

12/1/2015 8:06:30 PM

When is the next season out?

12/2/2015 8:03:41 PM

the next season? this season is less than a month old. this time next year if you're lucky.

12/2/2015 8:16:13 PM

Yeah it will probably be next year around the same time. I am curious to hear everyone's thoughts once they get to the end of season one. I don't want to spoil it now for those still watching.

12/5/2015 11:34:02 AM

happy to finally learn who the man in the high castle really is!

12/5/2015 1:58:13 PM

I really ;ile this show but it is a bit of a slow burn. I hope we get a second season.

12/5/2015 2:16:58 PM

The wife and I just watched episode 6.

I thought it started off really, really good. But it's dragging and I'm finding myself bored.

My wife loves it and we argue about the storyline. I want to learn more about what's going on around other parts of the country. Show me some cajun nazis!

Also, what happened to people like the Kennedy family? Did they kill Joe? I assume JFK and RFK either died in the war. What about other famous Americans? I want to know more about how we lost.

But my wife argues that my argument is stupid and a waste of time trying to debate.

12/7/2015 1:30:55 PM

Julianna Crane is insufferable.

"i love you Frank, let's run away. wait, i have to go save this other guy i love. Sorry i missed the bus, i still love you. Can i borrow $50,000 to save this other guy i love? PS he's also a Nazi. Oh shit, i never went back to work"

12/7/2015 4:42:07 PM

ok ready to talk about that final scene..

12/8/2015 8:47:25 AM

---------SPOILERS BELOW THIS LINE--------------







































Alright, it is obvious Tagomi has the ability to travel to alternate realities/universes. He awakes in 1962 America as we would know it, when JFK was dealing with the Cuban Missile Crisis. I haven't read the book, so I don't know how well this all adheres to it, but what we don't know is exactly how he has this ability. Earlier in the series we saw the Japanese Science Minister given secret information on the Heisenberg Device, but Tagomi didn't use this. Presumably that is the technological device the Germans have developed to move between realities and perhaps even times. It is not a nuke. Perhaps more importantly it leaves one to wonder which reality Tagomi is actually from, and who is he really working for? I really hope there is a season 2 because certainly this is supposed to be the lead in to that.

Side note: I am not so sure Hitler is actually the man in the high castle even though they want you to think that. If he is, is the resistance being fooled, or is there something else going on?

Finally I love the character development, including with the villains. They are all very well humanized throughout.

12/9/2015 11:44:41 AM

What makes you think the device is anything more than what is used to build the nuclear bomb. Werner Heisenberg was one of the scientists involved in the real-life German nuclear weapons program. What if in this reality the program succeeds and the bomb is named in his honor. Thus Wegener giving the secrets to the device to the Japanese Science Minister, and the military official requesting Tagomi provide the maps to the California Uranium deposits.

12/9/2015 12:10:43 PM

Trying to watch. Somehow boring

12/9/2015 12:58:14 PM

^^ I suppose I could be wrong, but I just have a feeling it isn't referring to a nuke. The Nazis in the series already had the bomb as they used it on DC during the war.

12/9/2015 3:58:26 PM

Correct. but the Japanese do not.

That was basically Tagomi's storyline in the second half of the season. He realizes he's made a huge mistake and given the Japanese military the key to building a nuclear bomb. His conversation with the military official was him pleading to not use the design schematics to build a bomb because it would cause an all out war. The military official told him that the trade minister shouldn't have any concern in the matter.

12/9/2015 4:05:50 PM

^Good point and yes that is true that they don't. Heisenberg was also involved in quantum mechanics including the uncertainty principle. Anyway you may very well be correct. I am wondering more so about Tagomi's ability to travel to alternate universes and thus what his real motives are or who he works for.

12/9/2015 4:13:33 PM

do you think Tagomi knows he can travel? He seemed to have a surprised/shocked look on his face when he opened his eyes in 1962 America.

but then again there were a couple times this season when he was "spaced out at his desk" when his assistant would come in and it would take him awhile to come to. Part of me wonders if he's been bouncing back and forth between realities trying to set things in motion.

12/9/2015 4:37:17 PM

Just finished the final S1 episode... pretty great minus Juliana's back-and-forth bullshit. I'm intrigued by Tagomi and also his assistant. His assistant sounded like he know what was up, telling Tagomi "not to give up on your meditation." They also made a point to say that the assistant was from Nagasaki and remark about how beautiful the city is. I'd imagine they'll explore the destruction and loss in Hiroshima and Nagasaki that shaped the alternate/actual reality.

Doesn't Tagomi's assistant also have some nasty burns or scars on his wrist(s)? Did we find out what was up with that and I just missed it, or was it not explained?

12/10/2015 3:06:26 PM

Yeah I think Tagomi at least knew it was possible. Perhaps it was the first time he succeeded when we saw him but perhaps not. That is the question.

12/10/2015 8:23:50 PM

just finished watching *spoilers*

Quote :

"Juliana's back-and-forth bullshit. "

pretty much this. I like this show if they could cut this out. She is so fucking back and forth it bores me.

How did hitler know that he was coming to kill him? can the germans time travel?

12/11/2015 6:29:35 AM

Spoilers




Just finished the first season... some thoughts:
- Really good acting throughout. Writers did a great job humanizing the villains.
- Felt like there was a ton of filler regarding the love triangle.
- Annoyed the films origin was not explained nor that we have not yet met the man in the high castle (unless we were supposed to take away it has been Hitler all along?)
- To those who read the book, do they explain how the films exist?
- Enjoyed the show from a character study what would have happened if we lost WWII but the "lost" fantasy aspects of the show (origin of films, how time travel works, who the man in the high castle is, other fantasy bits that haven't been explained) really annoy me. Lost has scared me too much to expect reasonable answers.

2/24/2016 9:32:52 AM

It wouldn't really make sense if Hitler made them then went to great lengths to get them back

2/24/2016 4:47:14 PM

seems like Hitler found out about Wolf Stansson being ordered to come kill him through the films

2/24/2016 6:14:24 PM

The book is incredibly different from the show. Like, very, very different.

Potential book spoilers to follow. I guess if you intend to read the book, don't read the rest of the post -- just content yourself with knowing it's incredibly different from the show.
















In the book, it's not a series of films, but rather a novel whose author is known and met in person before the end of the book. It's even acknowledged as being fiction, although the trade minister still has a flash to the "real" San Francisco, which isn't explained in the book either. Joe has a FAR less important role in the book, and his character is changed a bit. Frank and Juliana are divorced and never meet. The Japanese prince doesn't visit, nor is he shot. I mean, the differences are too many to list out here beyond that. But it was such that I legitimately didn't know what was going to happen even though I read the book after watching the show.


















End book spoilers.

[Edited on February 24, 2016 at 9:05 PM. Reason : more space]

2/24/2016 9:04:11 PM

Just finished up the first season. I loved most of it, but definitely pretty disappointed in the whole Joe/Juliana/films aspect of it

Let me preface this by saying I haven't read the book (would be interested in it), so first off I'm wondering if this season is only a small part of the book, or is it pretty much the whole story? If it turns out that there are some reasonable answers out there waiting for us in the next season or after regarding the realism of the films and Takomi's alternate reality vision, than I will stop complaining. But for now...

I just don't understand at all why the writers felt a need to make the films take on this magical or alternate universe realistic feel to them. You could totally eliminate that whole part of the story and it would be great. The idea of simply having a revisionist history of us losing the war and what life would then be like is a great base for a show. In fact, everything about the show regarding this simple premise is great. The characters are all very well done, the stories make sense, etc. etc. The characters involved with the film suck, the story doesn't make sense, and it's just disappointing.

In fact, they could have just made the films be fictional propaganda as their response to what Goebbels did in real life. Even in that scenario I would believe how badly the Nazis would want to get their hands on them and how important they would be for the resistance.

5/24/2016 10:48:12 AM

I absolutely loved this show. I'm looking forward to the next season.

5/26/2016 12:10:41 AM

Bump

Saw the trailer for season 2 is up the other day

8/4/2016 2:10:04 PM

I saw the trailer as well but no release date has been set just yet. I can't wait!

8/8/2016 7:52:51 PM

Pumped.

8/9/2016 8:12:34 PM

December 12th

8/10/2016 8:10:14 AM

December 12th marked on the calendar

8/10/2016 3:53:57 PM

yessssssss

8/11/2016 9:29:21 AM

I can't wait for the next season.

8/22/2016 10:32:04 PM

I really enjoyed this show. I can't even find many flaws. It was a little hard for me at first to swallow the whole premise, but after the second episode I was digging in for the long haul.

I do wish we could have seen a little more of what life is like under a fascist regime in America. They give you a decent sense of what it was like for the average American under Japanese Imperial rule, but not really much on the Nazi side of things.

And the marshal seemed to be a very compelling villain, but he just vanished. I guess we'll see him again in season 2.

I'm ready to read the book now. It's on Amazon Prime, and I've already added it to my Kindle.

11/16/2016 4:06:50 PM

I haven't watched it yet, but it looks like at least episode 1 of season 2 is now available. I thought it wasn't coming out until a few days from now.

12/15/2016 8:47:18 PM

Good first episode!

12/15/2016 11:25:52 PM

Season two is awesome thus far!

12/16/2016 7:42:22 PM

I should have rewatched first season. Forgot details and now confused by what's going on and so many characters and storylines.

12/16/2016 8:00:03 PM

I zoned out (was working) while she was talking to the man int he high castle. I'm going to have to rewatch it.

12/16/2016 9:41:29 PM