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Middle Europe, sometime in the 2020s: Elena Vernham (Kate Winslet) is chancellor of a vague nation. Unrest strikes the country’s highly profitable cobalt mines. Military men massacre a dozen miners after riots strike the work sites. Mold has infiltrated the chancellor’s castle. But this too shall pass, right?
In the premiere episode of The Regime, HBO’s splashy new drama, Elena needs to do damage control following the “butchers of site five”—the miner murders—scandal. She can’t become the enemy of her nation’s military, so she can’t denounce their actions; instead, she hires one of the killers, Corporal Herbert Zubak (Matthias Schoenaerts), in a minor role on her staff. Because Elena fears she’s allergic to the mold spores growing in her castle, Herbert will follow the chancellor everywhere she goes, testing each room for moisture levels. He’s kind of like the dozens of police you see on every New York subway platform these days: somewhat dangerous, and wholly useless.
Herbert is a known killer, palace manager Agnes (Andrea Riseborough) warns the other employees. Alas, the chancellor has demanded Herbert’s presence. After so much hustle and bustle around the castle, when Elena and Herbert finally meet, it feels like a dreamy rom-com. In fact, Elena claims to have seen Herbert before in some sort of dream. They lock eyes. It’s…romantic? Maybe? It’s off-putting, for sure, but there’s some sort of tension present between the two. Elena demands that Herbert, who remains silent almost the entire time, “strive to have a graceful mind,” whatever that means.