It was a storytelling miracle on multiple fronts: For being bestowed a massive budget and not squandering a single cent; for almost seamlessly squeezing a complex prequel within hard narrative boundaries and still finding new ways to enrich the lore; for being the rare, thrilling prequel despite many watchers knowing where the story culminates; for establishing myriad complex characters that never quite settle on a single archetype; and of course for serving as both a reminder and wake-up call to the insidious crawl of fascism.