Is ‘The Man in the High Castle’ based on a true story?
One of the latest high-profile additions to Netflix that undoubtedly deserves the attention it has been receiving so far is The Man in the High Castle, a genre-defying television series originally created for Amazon Prime Video.
Although the streamer only added the first three seasons to its US platform, leaving out the fourth and final instalment, the absence has had no shortcomings in The Man in the High Castle’s visibility on Netflix.
Based on Philip K Dick’s 1962 Hugo Award-winning sci-fi novel of the same name, The Man in the High Castle, adapted for television by Frank Spotnitz and Ridley Scott, proposes an alternate reality of World War II. While everyone’s well aware of the real outcome of the war, the dystopian series currently streaming on Netflix is set in a reality in which WWII concludes with America falling into the Axis Powers.
For those wondering whether The Man in the High Castle is based on a true story, it is not. It portrays an alternate history of what might have happened had the Axis powers won World War II instead of the Allies.
However, it features portrayals of real-life historical figures, including J Edgar Hoover, Franklin D Roosevelt, Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Josef Mengele, Eva Braun, Emperor Hirohito of Japan, and Hirohito’s son, Crown Prince Akihito.
The story takes place in 1962, when the United States no longer exists on the map. It has been quite some time since President Franklin D Roosevelt was assassinated, a nuclear bomb obliterated DC, and the rest? Well, alternate history. In The Man in the High Castle, the former US is divided into the Japanese Pacific States and the American Reich, whereas the Rockies are the Neutral Zone.
With the Axis rulers reigning supreme, resistance is seen as a sin, and resistors are sent straight to the camp. But even the non-opposers aren’t treated any better. Yet, some people hold out their hope for a better future, working relentlessly to free fellow Americans from the shackles of Nazi colonisers. However, Juliana Crane is not one of them.
As a martial arts student living in San Francisco, she seems to have made peace with the Imperial Japanese way of life, but only until her sister, Trudy, hands over an important package. Not long after, Trudy is killed at the hands of the police force of the JPS. The incident leaves Juliana traumatised but curious for answers, leading her to open the package with her boyfriend and discover a film reel. It’s not just any reel; it shows the seemingly impossible that the Allies actually won the war.
While the buildup is nothing less than a page-turner, to find out what comes after, tune into The Man in the High Castle, currently streaming on Netflix.