A Mediocre Recap of Mediocre Alternate History Shows

[Laughter] and this is a show for children [Music] alternate history at the end of the day is just a genre of fiction the same type of sub genre like steampunk or grimdark like any sub-genre of science fiction it's a fancy way of saying look at that that's certainly not how things turned out we while alternate history fiction for many years mostly consisted of whatever harry turtledove decided to slap together over the last decade or so alternate history has left the pages and gone on to the biggest screen of all streaming services since there's been such a revolutionary explosion in alternate history shows lately as in like five i wanted to talk about them because i wasted a lot of time watching them and need to have that payoff somehow think of this as a recap slash review if you're super interested in watching these shows there will be a lot of spoilers so you're warned trust me this is saving you time remember how neil armstrong landed on the moon and said one small step for me one big hop for thee well in this tim apple tv original that didn't happen and instead the soviets land on the moon first oh no spanx while this doesn't seem like it'd be the most interesting premise which i thought so too going into it i have to say this bold take it was fine the soviets land on the moon and not only does this act as a wake-up call for the us and nasa so before we go back to work it's time to be pissed [Music] it also leads to the most american thing of all pointing fingers and passing blame on who blew it nixon is furious and he's going to metaphorically wreck up the place your time is going to say that kennedy started the moon race johnson ran it and then nixon tripped to the goal line everyone blames nasa for being too cautious this guy the main guy which i'll be calling him because i don't actually remember his name but you know who he is he was in the movie suicide squad he played will smith main guy blames himself and nasa for not landing on the moon a month earlier there's also subplots with a bunch of other people i don't really care about so let's move on the general atmosphere at the start of the season is a fog of failure hanging over everyone's heads and it spurs nasa to make sure this isn't the end of the space race oh no baby this ain't the end it's just the start where do you go after the first man a moon base going into this i kind of expected it involved the us fighting the soviets on the moon somehow i don't know why but the trailer gave it that vibe the show isn't really about that at all or even the competition with the soviets the main antagonist is just nasa pushing its own limited 1970s technology and the results go just about how you'd expect while the soviets just sort of taught in the background a soviet is not even on screen until near the end of the season because main guy kidnaps him but don't worry that's not a violation of international law at all they work together see they're they're good as for the alternate history elements the apollo program continues throughout the 70s creating a base called jamestown near a crater on the southern half of the moon as much as this just sounds fascinating really most of the season is main guy being stranded on the moon because nasa keeps bungling sending more people to relieve him now for some of you this might pique your interest in summation but trust me after 10 hours of content this was really the most important stuff that occurred most of the show is just the melodrama about dealing with being an astronaut and really could be any other historical space show you've ever saw your brain perceives first a duck a rabbit and a duck again it always comes back to the duck wait all right hear me out fringe is indeed not a pure alternate history show it's not typical alternate history fiction since it takes place in our world unacceptable but let me explain fringe was a network show from the mid 2000s created by jj abrams and alex kirkman who would never go on to make anything horrible ever season one begins like any typical network cop show you've ever seen a thousand times but it has a bit of a twist the crimes are weird the main cast is a part of the fringe division who investigates fringe cases uh clearly it's brilliant it's amazing all you have to know is it revolves around three main characters olivia dunham a typical fbi agent who's cold on the outside but shows emotion from time to time peter bishop who's introduced as this swarmy roguelike who does deals in war zones which they never really talk about again and dr walter bishop a crazy scientist who is best suited to dealing with these fringe crimes this man is dead like mind reading devices a futuristic dildo people's brain melting man bear pig all fun hijinks that more often than not turns out walter created back in the 80s walter bishop the personified essence of the reagan doctrine fringe is overseen by lance reddick and there's also a bunch of other characters i don't want to get into there's also these bald guys and fedoras who are basically the g-man from half-life nobody really knows where they came from and throughout the whole series they basically are just watching peter bishop doesn't really like his father he's had a weird history with him since walter always went off to commit his crimes against nature in a lab peter this is me your father bishop thank you walter i know who you are and walter doesn't really remember any of the things he's done which is eventually revealed because he took a part of his brain out he has his cow and licorice and does a lot of lsd love lsd so why is this cop show about sci-fi crimes and an acid-dropping scientist even in this video get it out of here well we get to the last two episodes of season one olivia starts having visions of an unknown place she finds out from walter that she was a part of a program as a child ran by him and his partner william bell to make child super soldiers olivia just vanishes where she goes into an office and meets the long dead william bell i'm leonard anymore but how could this be the season ends with a pan revealing the world trade center what what the frick olivia through psychic do transported universes and landed in an alternate timeline where 911 didn't destroy the towers in the span of one episode the entire show goes from a police drama with a thin veil of science fiction to a show where alternate universes exist and psychers 2 and it's one that walter knew very clearly existed this entire time because he's been well he's been doing some shenanigans i'll tell you what this universe is just a hodgepodge of every minor alternate history fun fact stuff that wouldn't dramatically change the world but it adds a nice flavor so you can tell it's different walter indeed did know that other alternate universes existed not only inventing a mirror that can view into the other world but eventually a portal that can travel to it now why would he travel to a different world because in our world his son died when he was a kid the peter us the audience now is actually from the alternate universe we just learned existed because walter created a portal to kidnap the alternate peter and bring him back to our timeline so that he could be cured of his disease all without beater even knowing about it and by doing this one act walter has tore a hole in the fabric of the multiverse itself peter merely existing in our universe has horrific ramifications that soon start ripping apart reality itself people out of the blue phase in and out of existence into objects into each other or just entire buildings disappear it's like the server of the universe constantly is lagging this quirky science man accidentally caused the universe to begin destroying itself project singing corpses [Music] and the other universe knows this full well as they've been dealing with these cosmic rifts for years and there's alternate timeline versions of everyone olivia has red hair in this universe and the whole division is much more militant walter never went crazy and remained the stoic scientist he was in the 80s he knows the other walter kidnapped his son and now the show has become a battle between timelines oh boy the game travels into the alternate universe and fun occurs and when they escape the other olivia called folivia that's actually what everyone calls her sneaks into our timeline in disguise i want you to snoop around the other universe and find out how evil they are come out of your universe with your hands up as the real olivia is stuck in the other timeline eventually it gets so bad that they use this ancient futuristic machine don't ask well peter uses the machine and it turns out it fixes everything by destroying peter yippee the multiverse is brought back into balance and the machine even creates a gateway between the universes underneath the statue of liberty everyone forgets peter ever existed and he's gone forever or is he oh yeah also peter accidentally had a baby with foe livia thinking it was our livia and with him not existing that baby is just aborted by the universe itself he never exists and nobody ever talks about it again peter is a ghost phantom thing nobody knows he existed and the only memories walter has of his son is accidentally killing him 20 years ago when he tried to cross a lake and failed but don't worry about it he comes back eventually season four is just a joy it consists of william bell who died in the alternate universe i forgot to mention that uh he continues to exist in between universes as a ghost and literally a bell he wants to use olivia's psychic powers to destroy all of reality so he can create a new reality populating it with fun little animals and without those pesky humans on an actual arc floating in the middle of the ocean but then that gets foiled by just shooting olivia in the head don't worry she heals herself i forgot how she could do that season 5 just goes full anime time skip takes place in the 2030s where the earth has been conquered by the g-men who are revealed to be future humans who destroyed their world so much they invaded the past to i guess do the same exact thing or undo a coup take your pick they're futuristic they don't have emotion they're all bald that's your backstory you've seen those you've seen this before it turns out after the events of the previous four seasons peter and olivia the real olivia had a child and everyone was happy and then they had their lives absolutely destroyed forcing the fringe team to amber themselves awaiting to be unfrozen to finish the fight season 5 becomes an entirely different show where there are no more random crimes but instead it's a resistance plot against bald people peter and olivia's daughter is killed so he goes on a rampage using a futuristic mind chip he ripped out of a guy's skull by the end walter goes into the future to save humanity using this bald kid who will somehow change the future and prevent the watchers from ever becoming a thing yeah the show ends with the reset going back to 2015 and uh as all they know he just disappeared and nobody will ever know what happened to him so i know this sounds stupid on paper but i would not expect a show that took such a detour in its final season i'll see you in spain lads to have such an emotional kick in the gut our boy walter finally gets to redeem himself by pulling the ultimate sacrifice so yeah fringe is a network cop show that ends in at least three alternate universes being created future bald humans invading an ending that wrapped up emotionally better than any modern show today wouldn't have packed a bottle of raw milk yeah i said it wow those certainly are some alternate history shows but you know what would be an interesting show one where everyone lived in a timeline where their information may be at threat online well guess what we do already we get it you're going to say nordvpn this video sponsor with nord you can protect yourself smooth transition thanks buddy nordvpn is handy not just for protecting yourself online but maybe you just don't like the options your local country gives you on streaming sites by using this link in the description nordvpn.com altist and use the code alt hist you can get 68 off a two-year plan plus viewers can use this code to get one extra month of nordvpn for free not to mention their 30-day money-back guarantee pick from their thousands of servers in 60 plus countries to remain sneaky on the internet it's quick simple and an easy preventative measure from those kids calling in the swat teams just go to and nordvpn.com the dystopia that is our modern world from creeping inside get back to the video i only watched this because if i didn't people would be asking about it this is based on a 2004 novel which has one main change charles lindbergh wins the presidency in 1940 against fdr this is actually a very short series only six episodes so i'm going to give it a very unfunny recommendation let's talk about the stupid nazi show i'm going to be honest the only reason this isn't a full video is because if i had this be the main topic youtube would probably demonetize me boy in the tall tower is one of the main books people think about when they think of alternate history as a genre the axis powers won world war ii germany and japan split the world amongst themselves italy got a free coupon to papa john's i don't know north america has been divided between the reich and the east and japan and the west with the rockies providing a neutral zone being one of the most popular alternate history novels it's not a shock that it got a show on amazon prime starting in 2015 and i will admit something up until last week i did not see this show ever i just wasn't interested and even though i saw the pilot at comic-con all those years ago they didn't give much detail on the events of season one but it sounds like season two is a real possibility i didn't feel like paying for amazon prime and then i did and i still didn't like it the plot revolves around julianna crane getting past a banned piece of propaganda by her resistance member sister in the book it's a book but in the show it's a film reel showing a reality where the axis powers lost world war ii now i know people have problems with the realism of the scenario but germany and japan couldn't have won the war and they certainly didn't have the resources for that and that's true but since this is based off of philip k dick novel from the 1960s sounds like someone breaking in this isn't really about realism it's just about hey cool setting we so the gripes i'm going to have about this show has nothing to do with the historical accuracy of whether this premise could have happened because no of course it couldn't have my gripes come down to one thing how do you have a high budget show about a nazi america and japanese west coast and somehow make it so damn boring my entire career is based on the sub genre of alternate history and yet i struggled to get through this show even season one and two the ones people say are the good part don't get me wrong there are interesting elements but they are strung together by scenes where nothing happens outside of talking and that talking is about doing something that five episodes later they sort of do this is every season of the show ninety percent talking about a plot ten percent something happens people have described this show as a slow burn but it's not it's someone forgot to put another log on the fire the flame was snuffed out and another match has to get lit to get the fire going again repeat this for four seasons so first off what are the positives uh i like how berlin looks there is a nice nod to atlantropa in season two they paid me to go see the pilot i don't think i've actively disliked a character in recent memory more than julianna crane an average woman who is given a film by her sister who tells her to go into the neutral zone to deliver it before that sister is gunned down by the japanese juliana watches the film and just knows she has to do something so she buggers off to carson city leaving her boyfriend frank to deal with the secret police himself sorry frank hope nothing bad happens to your family that the japanese kidnapped to get information that you don't have she meets up with this nice guy joe [Applause] [Music] whoops turns out at the end of the episode he was a nazi all along baby if you've seen the first episode you know juliana's character she constantly makes brash decisions that turn out to ruin the lives of everyone she comes into contact with then after doing so has the miraculous power of failing upwards because she is temporarily valuable to people in charge someone on twitter said she was a mary sue and i would have to disagree mary sues are actually good at something and people unrealistically like them for no reason you gotta deal with it juliana sucks at everything and is hated by not only the nazis and the japanese but even the resistance people she's supposed to be helping out okay rant about jewel vape over season one is pretty in line with the book in the broad sense it focuses on a few key characters juliana joe the nazi frank tagome the trade minister and chief inspector keto and on the nazi side group and fuhrer john smith season one is probably the most simplistic story-wise focusing on juliana trying to give the film to the resistance everything else is characters reacting to the existence of the film and how to get it for the most powerful characters their main goal is a balance between dealing with the resistance or the growing tension between the germans and japanese hitler is sick and for some reason he's the only one keeping the peace and keeping germany from going to war why you have to be mad this deal of convenience he made with japan has just stuck for 20 years despite the fact that germany has overwhelming military and nuclear advantage but yeah the book and show have this problem of making hitler unintentionally a good guy that's all i'm going to do dissecting history i just thought i was stooping the book how to get out there to gomi the trade minister works with a german agent to smuggle nuclear secrets to japan so they can gain the bomb and at least germany won't be so avid to go into war but while they're trying to do this the japanese prince gets shot by a camper kido tries to find out who shot the japanese prince who turns out to be the germans because they wanted to provoke a war there's this stereotypical nazi bad guy i have achieved much under the leadership of the fjord john v on nazis who tries to use the german agent to kill hitler and john smith but fails at both john smith is further promoted by a grateful hitler while juliana and joe run from this guy a nazi bounty hunter who i just can't take seriously at all you're flooding it in the end they hand the film over to the resistance who just tells them to go away by the end of the season juliana and frank reunite they discover through another film that joe what a shock is actually a nazi severed lands and stuff and oh [ __ ] oh don't look at that one don't look at that one don't look at that one juliana is tasked with luring joe into a trap to get him killed but at the last second she sends him on a boat on his way just betraying the resistance everyone is completely perplexed by this as i was but juliana just knows she did the right thing because people can change in no way will that be a terribly stupid mistake tagomy uses meditation to transportate to an alternate timeline our timeline one where america still exists and it's the cuban missile crisis wait what yeah so the show just kinda has this happen just like another show that i previously talked about suddenly established that the multiverse exists and people can travel between them anyway season two juliana meets the man in the high castle there he is annie beautiful i actually do like him he's just a guy that made a fake ultra history fan film if the axis lost the war and people just started sending him real films from another timeline wait is he oh no anyway of course the resistance isn't going to tolerate juliana just sending joe on his way so they tranquilizer put her in a trunk and wee this causes some commotion leading to a resistance member dying so what does she do well she flees to the reich of course to find joe and also another guy who she saw in a picture in reality i know she's trying to prevent san francisco from being nuked because she saw it in a film but still this is the main face of the show and she just keeps ruining people's lives the rest of her story in season two is in the american reich where she's taken in by john smith meets his family and he could kill her at any time but he just wants to see what she'll do we focus much more on the home life of john smith his wife two daughters and older son who's just an american good old boy as in a brainwashed fanatic the fear very good justice is a divine right guaranteed for all and determined by the fear he wants to serve the reich to the best of his abilities uh oh kiddo turns out he has a disease that can't be treated and by nazi ideology he'll have to be gassed this of course won't do for john smith and his wife so they do everything in their power to make sure nobody finds out but the kid finds out and intentionally turns himself in to get gassed anyway okay in the show it's meant to be the sad moment i know this is terrible but i was kind of laughing it's funny because i don't know him as for everyone else tagomy figured out how to stay long periods of time in our world frank does really nothing the main plot revolves around hitler dying and germany blames it on japan preparing for war but tagomi in the last second transports back with some film of test bombings in our timeline and john smith in the nick of time uses it to convince himmler that the japanese have the bomb and it's not worth going to war oh yeah joe was there too he had a subplot in berlin where he met his long-lost dad who turned out to be a high-ranking nazi but is then thrown in prison because it turns out he was the one who poisoned hitler and joe is thrown in for good measure joe is forgiven at the beginning of season 3 by himmler and has to prove his loyalty by shooting his father right in the head he's sent to san francisco with a new mission kill nazi suspected traitors or whatever we tell you to which he does very willingly real winner you save there juliana john smith is now whatever that is and for his loyalty he has been placed in charge of all nazi north america by this point my eyes are glazing over because nothing is really happening apparently a lot of people can travel between universes and they call themselves travelers it becomes the main focus of the show the nazis blow up the statue of liberty because they want america to start at year zero juliana talks with tagomi and learns that in the other universe he is her father-in-law joe tries to assassinate him juliana tries to give him one more chance what a shock he was a nazi bad guy all along it only took three seasons the nazis build a portal to the other universe and juliana transports herself there alright cool let's finish this there's a machine that can travel to other universes there's different versions of the other characters on the other side john smith in our timeline is an insurance salesman who took in juliana after she crossed over she's friends with his alternate family smith travels to our universe after their john smith is killed by nazi agents that he sent over to kill juliana uh all right that it's just fringe with nazis that's all season four is there's a machine alternate people fight each other what else could there be no no walter come back there's a coup in the reich and the new fuhrer allows nazi america its own independence as john smith becomes the ruler of it all even with absolute independence smith still wants to invade the states to reunite america since the japanese pulled out of the west coast apparently all it took was some bombings and they just leave john smith by the end of the season reveals his greatest plan of all to kidnap his son who died in his universe and bring him back so he can survive he just wants to pull a walter like what is happening did this copy fringe okay uh what else happens uh frank died at the end of season three forgot to say that's how little i cared then the rebels blow up the track that john smith was on and he kills himself it's been one of those days the nazi portal is permanently opened by the rebels and the multiverse can be used by everyone forever literally the end of fringe season three my brain's melting so in summary which shows do i think is the best well here's a quick rundown in case you're still here it's a long video in fourth place it's man in the high castle it ran on too long and probably 75 of the plot didn't matter the plot setting and characters were wasted just as much as my time and third it's for all mankind it suffers from the same problems as high castle but the smaller cast and better relationships really make you care more about their problems you kind of forget you're watching an alternate timeline and more a really messed up historical retelling second is the plot to destroy america it does alternate history right where it doesn't need to focus on a large cast instead it just shows the perspective of one family dealing with the fallout of a changing america and number one it's fringe while the show goes absolutely bonkers it knows what it is you know what it is she tricked my son with with her carnal manipulation city and he fell right into her agenda the gender and the development of each character's arc is incredibly satisfying for a network show from 10 years ago it took what could have been a standard cop show with sci-fi elements and twisted it into a multiverse spanning plot somehow the show actually drains you after watching even if the events are pretty far out there i know this probably isn't every single alternate history-ish series that has ever existed there's a ton of older shows that touch on alternate history like sliders or quantum leap but perhaps that's a later video who knows what the future of alternate history on tv will bring perhaps we'll see new and bright creators bringing their own visions to the small screen no i'm not talking about you two [Music] you

Channel: undefined

Views: 473,418

Rating: 4.9315825 out of 5

Keywords: AlternateHistoryHub, alternate history shows, alternate history tv show, man in the high castle, man in the high castle review, fringe, fringe review, for all mankind, for all mankind review, plot against america, plot against america review, alternate history review, alternate history tv

Id: r2bUQ3qLoUk

Length: 30min 40sec (1840 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 21 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/HistoryLord]

I watch this guy's content on a regular basis, so keep that in mind when I say I honestly don't know what he was expecting. "It's so boring! It's nothing but talking!" Guess what, genius. Nothing really happened in the book either. It was just characters talking and reacting to the events happening around them, like how it is in the show.

What makes it worse is that he cheats the list by putting Fringe in there, despite it not really being alternate history.

Though, I will agree with him on one aspect.

But, I will agree that on one point: Juliana should've faced some consequences for going to the Neutral Zone in Season 1. She got Frank's family killed. If I was Frank, I would've thrown her out of the house and never looked back, but it took Frank half the season to realize that she's working with the Resistance. So either Frank was too emotionally drained from what happened to his family or he just isn't that bright. Juliana doesn't even apologize to Frank for her part in his family's deaths. In response to your comment about Joe's murders in Season 3 being Juliana's fault, I very much disagree. Joe decided to stay in Berlin and help his father. He was tortured repeatedly and mentally broken. Joe made the choice to stay in Berlin despite his father's express wishes for him to go back to the American Reich.

[u/hagamablabla]

I forgot how little happened in Seasons 3 and 4.