The Man In The High Castle

I am watching Season One of The Man in the High Castle on Amazon.com Prime right now, and am unsurprisingly impressed.

The series is an alternative history novel, written by Philip K. Dick, and set in a time period of twenty years after World War II, and which has as its premise that the Axis had won World War II, and split the Americas up between Germany and Japan, with the Mountain States being a neutral zone that is pretty much without government.

It is a dreary, depressing, dystopian world that has never experienced the 1950s culture. Rather than rock and roll, Americans are toiling in industrial jobs, always under the control of their German or Japanese masters.

I am only a few episodes into it, but there is a side story relating to the uneasy alliance between the Germans and Japanese. While the Japanese have been satisfied to live in luxury following their victory in the war, the Germans are positioning themselves to move against the Japanese.

The Man on the High Castle might be too depressing for some but if you enjoy alternative history, this one is well acted, well produced, and free to Prime members.

 

That's what I did, I watched all of the available episodes straight through.

 

I have also heard that there was going to be a second season but I can't imagine what they'll do with it, because the first season ended with a definite ending.

 

Actually , TL, the cost of Amazon Prime is just about the same annually as the cost of Netflix, and with Prime, you also get all of the other awesome prime features.
I like Netflix; but if I were only going to have one of the other, it would definitely be Amazon Prime ! All Netflix gives you for the monthly fee IS the movies; but Amazon Prime has the free 2-day shipping, the free book each month with Kindle First, the Amazon Lending Library (if you have a Kindle); plus the option of buying or renting a new movie that is out but not on the free list yet.

 

The second season is out, but it's been so long now that I have forgotten what happened in the first season, so I have started over with season one, episode one.

 

The Man in the High Castle is very good, in my opinion. It is based on a book by one of my favorite authors, Philip K. Dick, whom I met several times, while I was living in Orange County, California. While I was in college, I would often study or work on papers in the overflow room of a restaurant in Fullerton. I'd tip them really well, and the nurses would let me occupy the overflow room, which was usually closed late at night, letting me stay there for hours, while they fed me coffee. At home, I'd get tired or find other things to distract me. Sometimes, another guy would sit on the other side of the room. He seemed to be doing pretty much what I was doing. After acknowledging one another a few times, he introduce himself as Phil Dick. He would come to the restaurant to write late at night. He drove an old military truck sometimes; a large one of the sort that had the canvas back on it. I had already read a few of his books, and knew he lived in the area because he set several of his stories in that neighborhood.

While he was alive, he had what was known as a cult following, of a fairly small number of people who followed his work closely, but was without widespread fame. Since he died, many of his books and short stories have been made into movies.

These include Blade Runner, Total Recall, Screamers, Minority Report, Imposter, Paycheck, A Scanner Darkly, Next, Radio Free Albemuth, The Adjustment Bureau, and Total Recall, although usually using different titles. The Terminator series used portions of one of his books, particularly the idea of a humanoid assassination machine.