def _joint_mean(self):
    """
    """

    with tf.name_scope("mean_joint"):

      # The initial timestep is a special case, since we sample the
      # latent state from the prior rather than the transition model.

      with tf.control_dependencies(self.runtime_assertions):
        # Broadcast to ensure we represent the full batch shape.
        initial_latent_mean = _broadcast_to_shape(
            self.initial_state_prior.mean()[..., tf.newaxis],
            tf.concat([self.batch_shape_tensor(),
                       [self.latent_size, 1]], axis=0))

      initial_observation_mean = _propagate_mean(
          initial_latent_mean,
          self.get_observation_matrix_for_timestep(self.initial_step),
          self.get_observation_noise_for_timestep(self.initial_step))

      mean_step = build_kalman_mean_step(
          self.get_transition_matrix_for_timestep,
          self.get_transition_noise_for_timestep,
          self.get_observation_matrix_for_timestep,
          self.get_observation_noise_for_timestep)

      # Scan over all timesteps following the initial step.
      (latent_means, observation_means) = tf.scan(
          mean_step,
          elems=tf.range(self.initial_step+1, self.final_step),
          initializer=(initial_latent_mean, initial_observation_mean))

      # Squish the initial step back on top of the other (scanned) timesteps
      latent_means = tf.concat([initial_latent_mean[tf.newaxis, ...],
                                latent_means], axis=0)
      observation_means = tf.concat([initial_observation_mean[tf.newaxis, ...],
                                     observation_means], axis=0)

      # Put dimensions back in order. The samples we've computed have
      # shape `[num_timesteps, batch_shape, size, 1]`, where `size`
      # is the dimension of the latent or observation spaces
      # respectively, but we want to return values with shape
      # `[batch_shape, num_timesteps, size]`.
      latent_means = tf.squeeze(latent_means, -1)
      latent_means = distribution_util.move_dimension(latent_means, 0, -2)
      observation_means = tf.squeeze(observation_means, -1)
      observation_means = distribution_util.move_dimension(
          observation_means, 0, -2)

      return latent_means, observation_means