Joe Blake

**Joseph "Joe" Blake** (born **Josef Heusmann,** April 10, 1935 - c. 1963) was the Lebensborn illegitimate son of *Reichsminister* without Portfolio Martin Heusmann and Elsa Heusmann. He was a former Schutzstaffel agent who worked under the then *Obergruppenführer* John Smith, posed as a new recruit to the underground American Resistance.

He transported a copy of the forbidden film *The Grasshopper Lies Heavy* to the Neutral Zone as part of his mission to infiltrate the American Resistance. However, he questioned his beliefs due to the influence of Juliana Crain, and refused to do further work for Smith. Afterwards he was brought to Berlin to meet his father, who was later named Acting Chancellor following the death of Hitler. Both Heusmann and Joe were imprisoned after it was discovered that Heusmann poisoned Hitler. Joe was forced to execute his father in order to prove his loyalty to the Reich, and was then sent to San Francisco under the guise of a GNR trade attache to assassinate Nazi defectors. He was killed in his hotel room by Juliana after she realized that the Nazis had brainwashed him and erased his previous personality.

## Biography

### Background

Joe was conceived as part of the Lebensborn Program to create a genetically perfect generation. He was born in one of their birthing houses in Berlin, but a year later in August his mother fled with him to America and told him his father abandoned them. His father let her go because he too disagreed with the program, saying it had good intentions but bad means. He never met his father. He and his mother were poor. In WW2 Joe and his mother as German citizens would had been likely subjected to internment or required reporting as enemy aliens.

He was in a relationship with a woman who lives in Brooklyn, Rita. She has a son, Buddy, with whom Joe has assumed a father-like role. Joe delivers a copy of *"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"* to him upon arriving home.

### Season One

Joe Blake is introduced as a junior SS agent, working undercover in the Neutral Zone. He answers directly to *Obergruppenführer* John Smith, who has tasked him with obtaining information on the Man in the High Castle from Juliana Crain. The two narrowly survive an encounter with the Resistance, but Joe manages to obtain one of the mysterious films, which he later takes back to his superiors. However, his experience with Julianna has caused him to have a change of heart.

*Needs Expansion*

### Season Two

Joe remains on a boat filled with fishermen, after quite a while on the boat a group of Reich pilots drop a excessively large sum of money onto the ship and land. Joe escapes after narrowly escaping a confrontation with the fishermen, as he climbs on, he watches the boat explode. His face would symbolize surprise, and guilt. His experiences in the field have left him disillusioned with the regime he once served. After delivering the film, he resigns from the SS, despite ample commendation from his superiors.

After he resigns, Rita begins to suspect that Joe has developed feelings for Julianna, and so she breaks off things with him. Directly before Julianna was granted political asylum in New York City, Joe was sent to Berlin on direct orders from Smith, as well as the *Reichsminister* Martin Heusmann, who Joe later finds out is his father.

After touring with his father, he feels nothing but contempt for him because he believes that his father abandoned him and his mother. However, the truth is revealed to him that he was a Lebensborn and his mother was the one that ran away and escaped to America. He then decides to stay with his father in Berlin, going with him on political meetings, and learning what he can of the Reich's politics, especially once Hitler falls ill and his father is promoted to the acting Chancellor. He then develops an interest in Nicole Dörmer, and decides to stay after forming a bond with Sylvia, his father's housekeeper.

After deciding to stay with his father, Smith comes to present a film to the Nazi High Command of the Americans (he pretends them to be Japanese) testing an H-Bomb over the Marshall Islands, and while there, he unveils the treason committed by Heusmann. Both Heusmann and Blake are then arrested.

### Season Three

After undergoing extensive re-education, Joe is forced to execute his own father. Heinrich Himmler then recruits Joe into his own secret force of Lebensborn operatives, and gives him a mission - travel to the Nazi embassy in San Francisco under the guise of a junior trade attaché, and assassinate various Nazi defectors. He briefly stops in New York, and reunites with Nicole, who is clearly horrified at what the re-education has done to him.

Upon arrival in San Francisco, he quickly gets to work with killing his first target. While being hosted by Nobusuke Tagomi, Joe notices Juliana's presence, and later finds her. The two start a brief relationship, although Joe, whose previous personality has been erased due to his re-education, uses this relationship in an attempt to manipulate Juliana and gain information. Juliana, on the other hand, is also using their relationship in an attempt to discover more about Die Nebenwelt.

After a failed assassination attempt on Tagomi, Joe holds Juliana at gunpoint in his room, and demands that she get dressed and take him to Tagomi. Juliana goes into the bathroom, and after being followed in by Joe, takes him by surprise by slitting his throat, ultimately killing him.

## Appearance & Personality

Joe is highly motivated and ambitious but falters in matters of morality. He juggles with doing what feels right in the moment and his loyalty to the Reich.

He is also very guarded, holding many of his emotions at bay even when around those he cares about. Whether this is a trait he's always had or a result of the work he does is not yet clear.

## Relationships

* Juliana Crain
* Rita
* Buddy
* John Smith
* Martin Heusmann
* Nicole Dörmer
companion; Joe meets Juliana during his time in Canon City. The two become quite close with one another, their feelings possibly romantic despite the relationships both of them are already in. Later, after they reunite in San Francisco, the two start a short relationship but it ends shortly after Juliana slits his throat in his bathroom after he holds her at gunpoint.

former significant other.

surrogate son; Rita's son who Joe acts as a father for.

superior; Joe works for John as a spy for the Greater Nazi Reich. The two last had a tumultuous relationship due to Joe's insubordination.

father.

lover and fellow Lebensborn.

## Appearances

 "**Three Monkeys**"**Appears**

 "**Kintsugi**"**Appears**

 "**History Ends**"**Appears**

## Notes & Trivia

* Joe was mostly fluent in German, in addition to his native English. He was also shown translating Japanese, before killing two undercover Kempeitai officers.
* He was the first Lebensborn to be re-educated. The second was Nicole Dörmer.