Tagomi wants Wegener to leave as quickly as possible, but he’s committed to completing his mission. Before we get to the accomplished centerpiece of “The New Normal,” though, the episode delivers a few important beats in this post-assassination-attempt world. He’s quickly jumped and taken in to be debriefed.
When Joe returns home, we finally learn more about this underwritten character. What did she actually accomplish? She needs a victory, a reason to believe. While Frank goes to work at the gun factory, Juliana struggles with her guilt about the departure and the murder on the dam. What should they do now? They can’t go back to the way they were. He can’t tell her about the gunshot he can’t risk putting her in danger too. Juliana goes home to Frank and cries in his arms. Juliana’s stepdad, Arnold (Daniel Roebuck), reveals what happened to Frank’s family, although we’re reminded that they don’t know Trudy is dead. He starts to get accusatory - “Did you find what you were looking for?” - before he tells her to talk to her mom. Frank ends up acting pretty elusive, only telling Juliana that the Kempeitai came looking. Will he reveal his torture? What will she tell him? How much do these two characters love and trust each other? It’s hard to say, given how quickly the show split them up in the first episode. Juliana slips through the checkpoint and reunites with Frank. Tension and violence slide this society right back to wartime. (Maybe buses would be faster if the Axis powers won?) Juliana encounters sirens, armed men, and checkpoints - it looks a lot like World War II.
The magic of TV makes it seem like a quick trip, but even today, that drive lasts nearly a day and a half. While Frank makes it home and the crown prince clings to life in the hospital, Juliana’s bus arrives in San Francisco. How soon will he be discovered? The sequence ends with a great low shot of Tagomi looking crestfallen, moments before he stumbles on the locket. The double agent eats the microfilm, but his passport is still taken away. Will Wegener get caught up in the investigation? He’s not only carrying a microfilm, but also has fake papers that are likely to be examined. Of course, the area around the assassination attempt is put on lockdown. Wegener (Carsten Norgaard), Kido (Joel de la Fuente), and Tagomi (Cary Hiroyuki Tagawa) look on with concern. He drops Juliana’s locket as he flees, hiding the weapon as medics tend to the crown prince. As panic ensues, people see Frank with a gun in the crowd and blood on his hand. The crown prince of Japan was indeed shot, but not by a vengeful Frank Frink (Rupert Evans). “The New Normal” picks up immediately after the end of the last episode. It’s a tight, well-directed, and promising set-up for what’s to come as we arrive at the halfway point of this season’s narrative arc.
The fifth episode of The Man in the High Castle deals with the fallout of the shooting of the crown prince, while also sending lead characters Juliana (Alexa Davalos) and Joe (Luke Kleintank) to opposite sides of the country. Rupert Evans as Frank and Alexa Davalos as Juliana.