Amazon Prime's first prestige drama, as far as I can remember, was "The Man in the High Castle" an alt-world science fiction thriller that I've finally sat down and started to watch.
Set in an alternate universe where the Nazi's won World War 2 and divided control of the United States with the Japanese, some 10 years later small resistance groups try to fight back against the two oppressive powers. When her sister, who is one such fighter, is killed, Juliana Crane (Alexa Davalos) risks her life to complete her mission which involves taking a mysterious film to the neutral zone. A film that shows a world where the Allies won and Hitler was defeated.
"The Man in the High Castle" is an expertly, and expensively, realised world. The first season focuses a lot of its story around San Francisco, where Japanese culture has been pervasively interwoven into the American society. This is where Crane is brought into the freedom fighter fold following her sister's murder at the hands of the Kenpeitai (Japan's military police). From the other side of the country, in a Nazi led New York, Joe Blake is tasked with infiltrating the resistance but his resolve is tested when he falls for Juliana. Sitting over all of this, you have escalating tensions between Japan and the Nazi party which threaten to boil over into a war that the Japanese won't be able to win.
I'm a quarter of the way through the series at this point, and though I don't hate it, I already feel like I'm watching it out of a sense of obligation rather than that much genuine enjoyment. I'm not sure exactly what's not clicking, maybe it's a pacing issue, maybe there's too many little diversions that haven't paid back into the main story (yet, anyway). I'm going to keep going though.
Set in an alternate universe where the Nazi's won World War 2 and divided control of the United States with the Japanese, some 10 years later small resistance groups try to fight back against the two oppressive powers. When her sister, who is one such fighter, is killed, Juliana Crane (Alexa Davalos) risks her life to complete her mission which involves taking a mysterious film to the neutral zone. A film that shows a world where the Allies won and Hitler was defeated.
"The Man in the High Castle" is an expertly, and expensively, realised world. The first season focuses a lot of its story around San Francisco, where Japanese culture has been pervasively interwoven into the American society. This is where Crane is brought into the freedom fighter fold following her sister's murder at the hands of the Kenpeitai (Japan's military police). From the other side of the country, in a Nazi led New York, Joe Blake is tasked with infiltrating the resistance but his resolve is tested when he falls for Juliana. Sitting over all of this, you have escalating tensions between Japan and the Nazi party which threaten to boil over into a war that the Japanese won't be able to win.
I'm a quarter of the way through the series at this point, and though I don't hate it, I already feel like I'm watching it out of a sense of obligation rather than that much genuine enjoyment. I'm not sure exactly what's not clicking, maybe it's a pacing issue, maybe there's too many little diversions that haven't paid back into the main story (yet, anyway). I'm going to keep going though.