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I didn't see a thread for this and being a HUGE fan of Band of Brothers, I thought I'd see what the rest of you thought. 

Here is the HBO site with a trailer. (http://www.hbo.com/the-pacific?cmpid=s4)

Think of Band of Brothers, Pacific Theater Edition. 

I, for one, am looking forward to this quite a bit.  Then again, I'm a huge sucker for the WWII era. 

I'm squeeeeeeeeeee-ing so much over this miniseries, based on how utterly awesome band of brothers was. I can't wait.

My DVR is salivating waiting to record this. If its anywhere near the quality of band of brothers its going to be an instant classic.

I, too, can't fucking wait for this. Instead of my usual piracy, I might even sub for 6 months for this!

Hey, this will keep me from dropping HBO for a while. Still need to see Band of Brothers...

I'm a little scared, to be honest. Is there any way any show, even by the same people, can match the awe of BoB without reverting to rewrapping the original conflicts and making it seem derivative? We shall see!

I saw glimpses of love story in this in the trailer I saw.

Fuck that.

The only love story I want in my historically based WWII mini-series would be some hot little grateful Asians being plowed. Let's hope that was not an indicator of things to come.

They may not have been that grateful; some estimates claim there were thousands of rapes committed by GIs after the battle of okinawa.

Love story?  Sounds like they're putting SG:U in my Band of Brothers.  Better not fuck it up  :mob:

One of the guys I know from my WW2OL squad got to play an US Marine extra when they were filming in Queensland. I think he's in the background lugging a .30cal on his shoulder up a mountain somewhere.

I read an interview somewhere with the producers that this has a much different feel than Band of Brothers.

It's a much more bleak, sober, war-is-hell kinda series. Whereas BoB was shot and released in the pre-9/11 world, when we mythologized "the good war", this was produced and shot after 8 years of war and is less hopeful and heroic.

Instead of scenes of virtuous Allied soldiers sharing chocolate with the locals, or feeling guilty after gunning down young German soldiers, you get the "no prisoners" slaughter and brutality of the Pacific War. Cooking suicidal Japs up close with flamethrowers then prying out their gold teeth while they are still alive...that kinda thing.

If you have On-Demand there are some interviews and trailers & previews available already.

I'm reading With the Old Breed right now to get some background.

It should be great.

Review by a TV critic I like who is also a huge Band of Brothers fan (http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2010/03/the_pacific_review_sepinwall_o.html)

That review says it way better than what I would have said.

Marine Corps in the Pacific was way different than the Army in France.  I froth for this both as a Marine and a fan of historical drama.  I can only hope that this sheds light on a largely unknown part of the war like it's predecessor made us understand things we'd only heard about Europe.  But I have no illusions, as if it's faithful, it will be hard for people to swallow.  No love story will ruin this.  Bet on it.  Fuck, you'll probably be grateful for a love story break, even if you're the most hardened heart.

I subbed to HBO HD last night just so I could catch this miniseries.  No one brings the authenticity of WWII like Spielberg and Hanks.  I am also a major military history buff and have read books on all the campaigns that will be covered.  From that review it sounds pretty intense!

Yes, this, exactly.  Anybody who has studied the pacific war knows how different it was from the European war, and how brutal.  ShenMolo, I don't think the difference has anything to do with 9/11 or war glorification.  There is just a legitimatly stark difference between the wars.  I think Band of Brothers captured the European war excellently, and by all accounts, this should capture the feel of the pacific war.  I've only read parts of "With the Old Breed" (which is in based off) and need to pick it up. 

A good book I read in college on this particular subject is War Without Mercy (http://www.amazon.com/War-Without-Mercy-Power-Pacific/dp/0394751728/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1268408316&sr=8-1).  Does a good job of laying out reasons why things became so brutal.

Since hbo's site is failing for me, when does this start?

21st I think.

This Sunday, the 14th

9pm EST

wow that's so awesome.

First episode wasn't anywhere near the quality of Curahee. 

I hope this gets better. 

Yeah, not too engrossing yet.  Where's David Schwimmer when you need him?  :awesome_for_real:

To be honest, I never really thought of the first episode of BoB as all that great either, it was more the calm before the storm, and happily the episode I'm most likely to skip in a marathon. I'm not really worried about the series quite yet based on these comments.

This, exactly.

I believe the show will be classic. I'm happy to have ordered HBO to support this.

Yeah but BoB had the massive advantage of following a single unit that actually played a key role in the major events, D-Day/Bulge.  From my limited understanding, the Pacific is going to be all over the place just because of the nature of the campaign.


The only thing I have bought twice, DVD & blu-ray.

The pre-war stuff felt tacked on to me. More like they felt they aught to show that stuff, then they wanted to.

On one hand, thanks for spoiler tagging everything because I haven't seen the first episode yet.  On the other hand, WTF.  This is "The Pacific" thread.  The last 8 fucking posts are nothing but a spoiler tags.  Shouldn't this be the thread where its ok to talk about whats going on in the series?

The naval battles around Guadalcanal were so severe for the Navy that they didn't release casualty figures for years.

I'm really glad someone is finally doing Peleliu.  It never gets attention, but it was some of the worst fighting in the Pacific.  It taught the Marines, the hard way, how to ferret out the enemy in coral caves and ridges.  "Devil's Anvil" is a great book on it.

For this series Chesty's wiki page should probably be required reading.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chesty_Puller

Also, on the Navy Crosses, Chesty was put in for Medal of Honor awards on some of those but inter-service politics kept them from being awarded.  

Fair enough.

But I'd rather just spoiler it and make a fucker click. If it is something general like "this show is amazing! I got HBO to see it. blah blah blah then ok."
But if you talk about certain things I think it can hurt someone's immersion that hasn't seen it before. Maybe the stuff above ended up not being so spoiler worthy, but I think my original one was :)

Also tgr, about your shooting, I'm assuming to get 94/100 with a glock 9mm at 50m (I'm calling bullshit basically) you had some type of optics and a bench. At 50 ft, I'd believe it. ;)

This was quite a few years ago, but I'm probably wrong on the distance, chances are that it was 25m. But it was without optics or a bench to lean against (I take it that's what you meant?).

Of course, we're not talking about tiny targets you might find in some Serious Business competition, we were talking about man-sized targets, where 10 was the center of the chest-area. I think that area was about 15-20cm or so in diameter, with the 9 point radius a 5-10cm layer outside of that etc.

I just remember being well chuffed with that score, since I basically just shot once a year. :grin:

As for the distance he took the shot at, I expect that to be around that distance, and I believe soldiers should receive a fair bit of training beforehand, so I don't think of that shot as that unlikely. Not an easy shot, to be sure, but not unlikely.

To qualify at the lowest level that passes you have to hit at least 60% at 25m with a 9mm, unsupported and with iron sights (Marines).

It's not like he hit him between the eyes or something retarded.

Ok, ok....sorry for even bringing it up. It is just a pet peeve of mine when movies/TV shows show a pistol as an accurate, one-shot weapon. In general, they are only accurate at close range. I'll have to check out the recording for my own distance calculations :)

I bet you love westerns!  :why_so_serious:

Let's not forget how different actual combat is versus a range. "Nothing but misses past 10 feet" is a very common and known phenomenon, at least with police.



Edit: true, true. Still, it's not like they are battle-hardened veterans.

Technically that wasn't really combat anymore, so I'm not sure this rule really applies.

Having said that, my initial thought when I saw that scene was "why? stop shooting, he's surrendered, damn you". I'm pretty sure that was 100% intentional to prepare us for what's to come in the next episode.

My first thought was "Wow these guys can't hit shit!" , then realized it turned into a sick game. I guess that is something I would expect more later in the war, after more hatred has built up against them. But I guess a maimed Jap 'nading some of your buddies might do the trick.

This is me, never having been in the shit.

They're not battle hardened veterans.  But they are Marines.  All they do is march, low-crawl, and shoot.  It wasn't combat.  He had time to take careful aim, and he did.  It may not be a shot you can reliably make at that distance, I'll give you.  But it's a TV show.  He maybe had a 20% chance in reality.  Can't we just give him a lucky shot?

The Japanese soldiers weren't surrendering.  They were making a suicide charge.  When he's beating his chest, he's looks like he's demanding they kill him.  I'd actually be curious to find out what he says there, when they're fucking with him.  I can't quite make it out.

The Marines feel like they got the short end of the stick, remember.  They got enough mileage out of the fact that they get to island hop into malaria infested jungles to fight the 'monkey men' instead of the glorious destruction of Hitler.  They're not toying with this guy out of hatred.  They don't think enough of them to hate them yet.  They're toying with him out of good old American racism.

Ok, this was a good episode.  I thought the first episode was ok, but I was a bit hesitant for it.  Coming from Band of Brothers, I felt that I wasn't bonded with all the main characters enough, or that there wasn't enough characters for me to bond to.  The whole espirit de corps thing didn't feel properly introduced like in BoB.  It sort of jumped into the middle of things without much ado.  But now seeing this episode, I'm seeing how the pacing works.  Even as I posted before, this is a different war, and much more chaotic.  Band of Brothers was about strategic platoon level action, taking towns and objectives.  This is about a bunch of guys dropped into a hot disease infested shithole, with old shitty equipment, shooting random people in the dark/bush's.  No front lines.  They killed a main character off camera.  No dramatic death sequence.  Just found him face down shot to death in the jungle after a night of fighting. 

They're already doing a good job of hammering in how under supplied, dirty, and desperate the marines are, and it will only get worst from here.  It'll help tie in with the brutality that starts to happen (Guadacanal was kind of a cakewalk compared to what came later, really), as they get put through more and more shit, dealing with an enemy that doesn't give up.

So yeah, after an unsure start, I'm sold on this.  Great episode.  Thoughts?

I'm with you. First ep was not so great, but this one had a lot more action in it and made me care more about the marines.  I do wonder why they aren't showing any .50 cal machine guns, I know the marines had them there.  Minor quibble to be sure..

Leckie really grew on me this time, hell they all did.  Basilone is  :drill:

Hell of an episode. I was pleasantly surprised by the humor in this one, and definitely started connecting with the guys more. "Runner" and "Peaches" ;)

I think they are doing a great job or bringing the differences. 2nd episode of BoB involved the paratroopers landing, being surrounded by enemy and taking on small fixed position as a squad.

The 2nd episode of Pacific involves being stuck, without supply lines, against hundreds to thousands of Japanese assaulting them. It took Easy company til Carintan (totally fuckin up the spelling) to be bombarded and as fucked as the Marines are already. Then again, that's comparing the action of an Army paratrooper company to that of Marine division. Kinda apples and oranges.

I need to do more reading, but does this generally follow how the war was for the Marines? Fuckin' meatgrinder.

Also, I hope they get into Naval battles a bit more, but that would be asking a lot I guess.

Fuck, 6 days to go.

I'm still not getting sucked in.  I think it's in part because some of the acting isn't great.  I see where they are coming from in the way that they are trying to portray the situation in the early Pacific battles, but it just isn't drawing me in like BoB did.  I have a feeling that I'll appreciate it more the second or third time I watch the series. 

Having said that, I'm still going to camp in front of my tv on Sunday nights.   

*adjusts glasses* Umm, actually, the nicknames were "Peaches" and "Ol' Faithful".

I wasn't a detracted to the first episode, though it did seem a it rushed, with having to put some "real world" context to these guys and then get them into action in the first hour, but the second episode felt a lot better and showed a bit more of these guys. I had wikipedia during the episode reading up on stuff while we watched. The fiancee surprisingly was really into it too, and wants to watch Band of Brothers now.

Yeah someone else corrected me at work, I was a little drunk last night...Not sure where I heard Runner and had it stick, unless it is actually his last name or something. :)

His nick is Runner but as Peaches is puking he says he is going to change it to Old Faithful.

When Chesty says he's going to put him in for a medal, he's talking about the Medal of Honor.  Chesty himself gets Navy Cross number 3 (out of 5 total in his career) for Guadalcanal.

This last episode was extremely weak given the historical content they had at their disposal.  READING about that particular battle is way more interesting than what we were given on the tube (just like last week).   That being said, I have to believe Spielberg and crew are just holding back because it's not his style to cop out like that.  BoB tended to have scattered moments of tension and greatness, where TP looks to be slowly building instead.

So far though, I have to say BoB is a better series.  The Marines in TP are lacking something I expected to see. 

It could seriously have fewer long blank stares and emotional close-ups. We get it, they're tormented. The father's little speech to his son couldn't have been more cliché.

You nailed it.

You read my mind completely. 

The narrative structures are completely different and if you are waiting for this to be BoB you are going to be disappointed.  BoB was a linear story about a company going from point A (Currahee) to point B (Eagle's Nest).  There were characters that developed (mostly Winters) but it was an group and event-based story.  Pacific is about 3 guys, what they went through, and how it changed them.

Uhhh no.  Hanks and 'Berg fully wanted to capture the epicness of the pacific theatre, as truthfully as possible.  They only intended the 3 guys as a conduit for that.
They never intended the series to be about "3 guys" and went on and on about how no one's really captured the pacific-side of the war yet.

As it stands now, you're better off just watching reruns of Black Sheep Squadron and old Pacific war movies (and maybe "thin red line" if I want my angsty pussy-whipped bohemian marines) than watching this series.  Which to me is a flat out shame given today's tech. and skillsets.

Put it to ya this way... the series needs more Nam-like "Platoon" perhaps combined with "Private Ryan" and less "Thin Red Line."  Maybe it'll come through later on, I dunno... we'll see.  So far they squandered 2 really good battles though.

I was expecting better but BoB was incredible, "Day of Days" totally blew me away, as I was a real D-Day nerd in my youth (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/5485/atlantic-wall).  Maybe there's a similar episode to come in the Pacific, I hope so.

The narrative structure is about 3 guys (not even acting together) as a means of illustrating what happened. 

Quote all of Ab's post.  You and he are saying something similar.

The narrative structure in the Pacific uses three main characters as POVs to tell the story of the Pacific theater.  The series is about the war, yes, not a character based drama that happens to have a war.  Having a couple of limited POVs also limits what narrative tricks you can use to tell the story.  Since you have so few main characters, they are more likely to be archetypal to set up the story arc of the average soldier's experience on that front.

BoB used "the Company" as the POV, so that you could have individual characters come in and out, be killed, and then replaced.  Blythe, for instance, has an entire episode as the POV where he has interactions with many of the big Names of the company (Winters, Welsh, Spiers, Lip) before he meets his fate.  Guarnere, Toye, and Compton are all pretty big parts of the early series until they are casualitied out and we get POVs from Webster, Ramerez and the rest.

Part of what made BoB so intriguing was the narrative style that kept the tension going, and was also a good method for inserting an unreliable narrative.  Nixon was far more troubled than is ever actually dealt with.  Spiers could be either a manipulative angel or psychotic devil.

I think the problem is the scale of the narrative.  The Marines were stranded on Guadalcanal for like four months before the Army showed up.  This show doesn't really do a good job conveying the weight of that kind of timeline.  In the show it feels like they were there for two weeks.  That's why when we get the long close up that's supposed to convey the emotion, it feels a little laborious because I don't feel like I watched someone sit on jungle island for six months.  But since I already know what happens, I'm kind of able to look past it a little. 

Also, I think they're treading a little lightly on the legendary status, and maybe that's not the best thing for a TV drama.  These stories, especially Chesty Puller, are well known in Marine Corps lore.  If they so much as remotely fucked up Chesty Puller, Marines would literally kill them.  I am not even exaggerating.  Every night before you go to bed, Marines are supposed to say, "Goodnight Chesty Puller, wherever you are."

If you don't care about spoilers, I suggest googling these guys to get a better frame of reference.

Lt. General Lewis B. "Chesty" Puller (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chesty_Puller)
PFC Robert "Lucky" Leckie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Leckie_(author))
GySgt. John "Manila John" Basilone (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Basilone)
Cpl. Eugene "Sledgehammer" Sledge (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Sledge)

I was trying to figure that out.  While I don't know much about history, the episodes made it feel like they were there for a couple of days of intense fighting, and I was utterly confused on how the army was able to get there so fast and the Navy was able to regroup and retake the seas so that they could be picked up.

I was left trying to figure out how long they had really been there, and feeling like there were only 2 major offenses.

The fact that they were down to eating WWI rations and maggot infested rice was a bit of a clue.

I think, perhaps to their detriment, that they expect a certain amount of knowledge.

I like watching history channel war stuff, but I haven't done a ton of reading on the Pacific in WW2. I think they might have done a poor job of demonstrating the time that had passed. It might have worked to even have Hanks come on halfway through, showing some old war footage, and explaining some of this stuff. If you were ask me how long Guadalcanal lasted after watching this I'd think a month or two.

Hell, a few dates may have even helped. just display whenever time had passed...

Sometimes we've seen the same scene in so many war movies that small details don't always have the impact they're supposed to.  When you've seen a bunch of old war movies where dudes are forced to eat old rations, it starts to lose its veracity.  The Pacific, so far, isn't doing a very good job with conveying the gravity of the situation unless you're like you and I and know a thing or two about it before we started watching.  I think that if they would have just had "Four Months Later" on the bottom of the screen at the beginning of this episode, it would have helped.

Also, I just re-read the past few posts and realized that I forgot to mention that The Thin Red Line is the worst war film ever made.  I don't want a derail on this, because it doesn't deserve it.  Nolte is the highlight of that movie.  That's saying a lot.  If you want to fight me on this, meet me in the movie sub-forum.  I'll find you.

Agreed.  But, the fact it does a better job than TP in many areas is quite telling of the quality of the series right now.

From the perspective someone that hasn't watched BoB or isn't some giant military buff, I'm enjoying this.  Yah, they have done a relatively poor job of explicitly conveying time, but other than that I've found it quite interesting thus far.   

A clue, but maggots in rice are very common in hot and damp places. Improperly stored rice would "spoil" in a couple of weeks, although the fact that they found LIVE maggots in boiled rice was beyond stupid. They're not Terminator maggots. I put quotation marks around spoiled since the rice wouldn't actually be the least inedible. Pick the maggots out or just swallow them, they aren't actually harmful.

Also, I ate canned soup from '79 while in the service in '03 (older than I was.) Perfectly servicable. <rimshot>

See, it's all about prior knowledge. I took the army rations to mean that their supply line had broken down, which made sense. Neither event gave me any notion of long time passing.

Werent there foraging squads for fishing and hunting?  And if I remember right, the natives helped out a bunch too.

Ouch. I earlier called the love story as being in this series...and well...fuck. As much as I like a nice T & A shot or two, I got Sparticus for that.

I'm pretty much done defending the series. Hope they come correct the rest of the way.

 :facepalm:
God what a bad episode.  I am sad.

You guys are weird. This is part of the story of the 1st Marine Division. They were in Australia longer than Easy Company was in Europe. Kinda be a big omission to leave that out.

This has been strictly mediocre thus far. I'm somewhat disappointed.

I thought that was the best episode so far and had way more of a BOB vibe to it.  The episode order obviously has to correspond to the historical record but I really think they should have had an additional one or two background episodes, like this one, before the first two heavy action ones.  Remember that sergeant who went missing in the night and was found next day?  They obviously wanted the audience to care he was dead but there's no getting around the fact that it's difficult to feel much, if you don't actually know anything about the guy, even an obituary normally gives more than name, age and cause of death.

I'm not sure what is to come but no matter how good this is at the end, I'll bet "The Pacific" would have been better split over 12 parts rather than 10 even if they had to save some money on the action sequences to do it.

I knew this was going to be the 'love interest' episode so I was ready.  Heck, this was better than the first episode.  I now care what happens to Bob Leckie, the actor finally drew me in.  Glad to see Basilone loosen up a little but then get told that he's becoming a symbol instead of a man.

I thought Leckie's acting was horrible and Basilone was still just mostly blank stares - again.  Neither are "lovable" in any sense, 'specially Leckie.

Leckie is not supposed to be lovable.  He was quite the screw up and they've actually left out a lot of his shenanigans up to this point.

Pfft. I'm done with this one.

Somehow it's far too self-aware in its role as a spiritual sequel to BoB. It's like the writers and directors had heard about all the things that people loved about BoB then just crammed those events in there without any thought of why they worked. I.e., they forgot that the primary task was to tell an interesting story about authentic people, not to pull at the viewers' heartstrings in every scene. At times it's like the score and cinematography is yelling "FEEL DAMNIT, FEEL!" at me.

I enjoyed the first two episodes but they didn't do a good job of conveying how long the marines had been in Guadal Canal. This one was ok but really felt like a completely different show from the last two and still feels rushed. I really feel like they need more episodes or should have considered axing or skipping some portions and giving more focus to others. Gonna keep watching this but it feels like it really isn't as good as it should be.

The psychological episode. Not a bad one. Not a great one either. I think the main thing I am getting from this series is how much worse it sucked to be in the crotch during WWII than any other branch. Fucking brutal.

Only things that would be worse: Being a Jew or being a Russian

It seems the next episode will be the one I have waited about 3 weeks for.

The Freudian slip of crotch for corps is appropriate.

They've currently spent 3 episodes trying to emphasize how bad it was, but for me, their methods fail to engage me. BoB had a much better feel for just how shitty it was, and for all intents and purposes the pacific war should look feel even worse. I'm disappointed so far, really. I hope it picks up, or I'll have to go back to watching BoB again.

It's just the sense of time they're still not getting right.  Everything else is so well known to the point of cliche.  We all know it sucks to be in a war.  We all know it would suck to be fighting a war in a jungle against Japanese People who we didn't understand a bit.  We know guys go crazy.  We know about shell shock.  We know all that.  What this show is failing to do is express the mind-numbing tedium, the months of sitting in the same hole, with the same stench in between fights that made this worse in some respects than other campaigns.  The amount of time they're spending in this format just isn't enough to convey the reason for the emotion that the characters are dutifully trying to express. 

I wonder if this story just deserves more episodes, or if it's just too much to try to stick all three stories into the same short format.  The most compelling part of the story has been Leckie, so far.  I guess I just end up feeling like each of the three branches of this story deserve more attention.  Even Leckie's parts kind of feel like he's pissed here because the actor read the book and he's supposed to be pissed here.  But I'm not convinced they're on Guadalcanal for months.  I'm not convinced they're in Australia for a year.  I'm not convinced they're in Cape Glaucester for four months.

What? They were in australia for a full YEAR?! I had the impression that was just a month.

I thought it was 56 minutes. :oh_i_see:

A little P.S. at the end of each episode that filled in the voids ala BoB would do this show wonders. Why the fuck they didn't include it is beyond me.

War is hell. That's all I got.

So far I've been preached:

- War is icky.

- War makes people go insane.

- War ruins relationships.

- People that win medals feel undeserving because of the death that surrounded them. 

I am not entertained. 

It's half over and I've enjoyed a few Legend of the Seeker episodes more.  That's pretty sad (for both me and the writers).

I am still entertained. That was some pretty damn intense fighting portrayed, and I have always been into the combat side.

The show is just missing something. Character attachment probably...In BoB, Winters, Lipton, Spears, (and a few others) are names I still remember from the show.

Winters: Amazing officer, cool under fire, good judge of character, Hero.

Lipton: Bad ass NCO, held Easy together, compassionate

Spears: Cold, calculated, hard as nails. Built for war.


What will I say in a few years about character on Pacific:

Leichy: Well, he was your average soldier. Pretty likable, I guess. Could have been me

Basilone: One man army, bad actor

Sledge and boyfriend: Good hearts, religious


The show lacks the officer's view that BoB had. We would have updates about WTF was going on and why they do certain things. I liked seeing Winters get assigned the assault on the 88's, and them planning it out. I guess the problem is, when every time your mission is 'slowly clear this jungle rat hole of dug-in Japs and try not to die' - it doesn't leave much room for cool strategic missions on the Marine side . Now the story of Yamamoto being hunted down, Naval Battles like Midway...Hell that might be cool.

I think it is easier to like individuals in a Platoon or company then random guys in a division. I'm just not sure where else they are going wrong.

So far, the best character in the series is the Gunny.  And he's just given bit scenes.

Yea I think, to add to what Slayerik is saying, that they missed great opportunity to tie all this shit together with Chesty Puller.  He's the Winter's guy you're looking for.  Actually, he'd kick Winters' ass.  They were using him in the beginning, and I'm not sure why they stopped.  And now his war is over after Peleliu.  He goes back to Camp Lejeune, NC to train recruits.  So that's that.  They just used him to tell Basilone's story because he was in Puller's direct command.  I know they're trying to make this show different than the one they told about Europe partly by not focusing too much attention on officers.  But it just isn't playing right.  They haven't gotten everything wrong.**  But not using Puller in a story about the Marines in the Pacific is almost unforgivable.  All I can think is that they were afraid to broach the legend.

Too much shit to cram into ten episodes.  Lacking a shitload of cohesion.  Intense fighting.  Not quite enough to pull it together.

** In fact their attention to detail is at times scary.  When they're loading up the Amtraks, and some un-named NCO is yelling, "Let's go.  Load 'em Up.  A to B.  A to B."  A to B means Asshole to Bellybutton, and they still use that in the Marines.  I loled.

It just doesn't feel the same as BoB. There's something that's missing that isn't making me say "Damn.." Sure, the fights are intense, but I still don't really get a feel for what they went through and every instance of them giving that stare that says "It was/This is hell" it just comes off as cliche. I don't know, it's not sticking with me.

Actors aren't as good and the writing isn't as good as BoB.  Very glad to see a proper amtrac amphip invasion, especially Peleliu.
Jon Seda has one expression, the 1000 yard stare even when bedding the star.  Leckie's actor is better.  Yeah Gunny gives the show some pop but 95% of my enjoyment of the show comes from the combat.  I guess the show just feels rushed, I do think they crammed too much in. 

That Gunny you guys are talking about is a Drill Instructor.  (You can tell by the Smokey Bear hat.)  They're, uh, special.  He gives me the creeps.  But that's only because I had the misfortune of spending three months with them running rough-shod all over my face.  I'm glad those guys are on our side, though.  To the casual observer, the scene where he's standing there reciting the Marine Corps Manual by heart probably makes him look like he's lost his marbles.  But DIs have to have all that shit memorized word for word.

That DI character was a real guy who was also a WWI veteran.

I am really glad to see that I am not the only one here that feels like the pacific is totally missing the mark.

So far the only one I really think I care about storywise was Leckie.  The others honestly I can't say anything about their story has reached out and grabbed me.  Most sadly are not even memorable at this point.  Ironically what grabbed me was the Australian part.  Not sure why but it seemed to humanize Leckie with me and allowed me to identify with his character.  Bassalone, honestly I don't care for his story whatsoever and I think that is a crying shame at this point.   Eugene I think has some potential.  I am quite eager to see what happens to this character at least.  I think again the reason for this is that they took  the effort to humanize him by showing you his family dynamics along with the factors that were causal to his entering the conflict.

What I would have done differently was scale the episodes to the actual time in the war (save the australian episode).  Guadal Canal probably would have worked alot more if they made it three or four episodes and showed at the same time why it actually sucked just a bit more.  As it stands now, there just doesn't seem to be a followable timeline even with Tom Hanks explaining things at the begining of each episode.  That he needs to in my opinion also tells us alot about the writing.  Sadly to this point, I have no idea as to how hard it was even after watching this.  Scenes that should have had gravity to them simply didn't.  Specifically I am thinking of when we see the navy being blown out of the water in the Guadal Canal episode, the whole scene just lacked the gravity I think it should have had for those marines when immediately afterwards we see the army arrive.

The personification of Slege's Old Breed, GySgt Elmo Haney.  :)  Somehow he could only be named Elmo.  I just looked at the credits.  One episode only for the Gunny.  Not cool.

Speaking of which, he was a bad, bad choice. He doesn't sound the least convincing as a war movie narrator.

You can stick a fork in this show. It's done.

Last episode was completely forgettable and a waste of time.

The only slightly interesting bit to me was the Gunny who showered in the rain. He seems to have more depth to his character than anyone else in the show we are supposed to care about.

That's being a little harsh. I thought the landing was insane, and well done. The part where Sledge basically had to grab his sack and realize you just gotta put one arm after another and keep pushing on. The fact that he didnt wanna leave that hole....would you?

I am not bitching about the last episode at all...this is basically a war documentary, and that was some awesome war. I'm not THAT concerned about the other parts...I want to learn about Marine combat in the Pacific.

Ok, you're right, it was abit too harsh to say it was a complete waste of time. The last 10 minutes or so when something started happening was done alright.
I won't say it was done well tho. I'm not overly impressed with that battle. I don't remember much about it, and I just watched it a couple hours ago.
It could have just as easily have been stock footage of a beach battle from Saving Private Ryan at this point.

I'm being overly critical. But I'm simply not impressed with this show at all, and it's 5 of 12 episodes in. I'm just not and I want to be. It has it's moments... but those moments are just rare. And few. And far inbetween alot of slow paced, forgettable, generic, who gives a shit crap.
I'm rewatching Band of Brothers atm just to wash this episode from my mind fully. I kid you not. Color me jaded  :|

I was assuming that I would get a sense of the misory on the same level as I did when watching the episode bastogne in band of brothers. Even the last episode isn't even close to conveying anything of the sort. Hell, I'm getting more of an emotional response from watching rambo 4 when they sack the first village.

I'm disappointed by the lack of involvement I feel, and I'm even more annoyed by all the details that are glossed over, like the huge seabattle at guadalcanal. It's ruining everything for me.

Also, I cannot see where the budget went for this series so far, so I'm hoping the remaining episodes pick up the pace.

I'm guessing it's all the location shots?

Tonight's wasn't bad.

Tonight was the best episode so far.  Too bad they've wasted half the Campaign getting here.

Great hour of TV. Screw you haters.  :awesome_for_real:

I agree, six was what I subbed to HBO for.  Great hour of TV, and I hope the show is like this the rest of the way.

You'd better not be getting my hopes up for nothing.

I'm expecting awesome levels of awesome to make up for the first 5 episodes of suck.

I don't get the love.  There was more action than prior episodes, but nothing that really tied the viewer to the action. 

The only thing this episode did for me was to really nail down just how stupid and pointless war is.  I don't think that's what they were going for, particularly with WWII. 

I don't get the hate.

That was seriously fucking intense combat. I do feel that was the best episode yet as well.

Re-watch BoB. Only thing that even comes close to the intensity of these island fights is Bastogne and the arty pounding they took. And we haven't even got to Iwo yet. The next episode is going to show just how fuckin' horrible it was to get the Japs out of their caves.

There is much about this show that doesn't live up to BoB. The acting and character attachment just isn't there (to be fair I found myself caring about Liechy and his friend there on the boat, I like em both - the guy that dug out the gold teeth is growing on me too). But the combat so far owns it. Brutal. Fucking. War.

No hate from me.  I'm just not impressed given the past history (BoB) and the budget.  While the intensity of war is important to portray, it's far from the only piece of the puzzle.  I want to know these men.  I want to know what they were fighting for.  I want to know how they feel about what they are fighting for.  I want more character development, better acting, and better dialogue.  Hanks and Spielberg know how to deliver this better which is why I'm underwhelmed. 

Slayerik: I'm not hating, I'm just seriously left wanting after watching the first 5 episodes. I get absolutely no real connection to the characters (except for the australia episode, and even then I was surprised when I was told it had actually taken place over a period of a full year), I get absolutely no feeling for just how much suffering they are going through. A reference to BoB would be bastogne. I think that episode, of all episodes, drove it through just how bad it was during that time. The Pacific hasn't done that so far, and I seriously hope episode 6 and outwards does.

Yeah, I couldn't have said it any better.   This episode was head and shoulders better than all that came before it.  Here is why it worked for me:

1.  Lots of gut check moments.
2.  For the first time, it looked like the people there fighting cared about one another. 
3.  Eugene sledge is a great character, with lots of backstory, and people can identify with him.
4.  Lecky continues to be one hell of a compelling character.  I hope he makes it out, but something tells me he doesn't.

I donno if this is a spoiler, but you saw the last episode right?  Episode 6?

Episode 7 - ok

Episode 8 - Oh FFS, enough goddamn love story bullshit. Yay, John Basilone gets mad pussy. I'm happy for him.

Ugh. About to cancel HBO.

So... you get it now?  :grin:

I found last night's episode to make the intended point, but wished it had spent more time in the field and less in the romance.   I'm about done with the Pacific as a mini-series, but may pick up the books that it was based on.  In that way, it was a success. 

Fine Nebu, you win. Though I have enjoyed watching some of the episodes a 2nd time as I am catching my brother up. It's not a bad show, just could have been so much more.

That's precisely what I've been left with, and I've only watched the episodes once each so far. It's not a bad show, but it's not a good show either, and it certainly won't inspire watching it 3-4-5 times as I've done with BoB. It's a shame, I was hoping for 11 hours (I'll allow for the first hour to set the stage) of pure awesome.

Guessing they did not want to just remake Sands of Iwo Jima (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0041841/) which is basically John Wayne playing John Basilone (though never officially credited with it to my knowledge).

There are way better ways they could have done that. Fuck they could have done this basic idea half well if they'd done the same story focusing on the Marines being trained, showing Basilone from their view as this ass-kicking gunny, make it some sort of homage to the first BoB episode and have the last 20-25 minutes being these guys shoved out into Iwo Jima following them more than Basilone. They could have thrown in some of the love stuff but concentrated on these recruits training and preparing to be thrown into a theatre of war we've seen and they haven't with Basilone driving them in the same way Schwimmer did in BoB only for a completely different reason (making sure they can survive rather than to show how good he is). It would have been a problem in terms of introducing a whole new range of characters but the alternative they went for was giving us the story of one character, most of which consisted of a crisis of conscience and falling in love. Those make a good storyline but that's not what the show's about and I'd probably have appreciated it more if there'd been less of it.

Except for what you saw was more or less what really happened to Basilone.  I'm not going to argue over whether they should have spent more or less time on love story, or in the battlefield.  Personally, I find both compelling.  But the problem this show still has is that it's trying to shoehorn too much story into too little time.  These stories deserved more show than they got.  This leaves us with little attachment, and so the love story just feels silly and out of place.  But it's not the fact that there was a love story that kills it.  It's the fact that I've only seen a cameo by Basilone here and there for the past six episodes, and now I'm expected to give a shit about his love life for a whole episode while I know Sledge is sitting on a rock in the Pacific.

I guess I'm just left wondering if this show wouldn't have been better if it would have just picked one dude - probably Leckie or Sledge - and gave him the show he deserved.  Basilone could be a compelling story if it were written as a stand-alone, but it would be an altogether different show.  It's probably not what fans of the BoB series signed up for.  I actually think the best show would be a BoB follow one unit type story with Chesty Puller as the Winters archetype.  That would actually probably be better than BoB, as Chesty is a stronger character where Winters is a little stoic and professional.

There's so much here that's good, and it's a shame too.  Obviously the fight sequences are well done.  The visuals all around are superb as expected.  But the research into little details that piss veterans off when they get it wrong, is outstanding and it deserves credit.  As it is though, if BoB is a 4.5 out of 5, then this is like a 3.  The sloppy story just fucked this up.

I actually didn't mind this love story. Was done in a context that didn't bother me, unlike the first one in this series. I'm coming to accept and expect things like this out of this series now. This love story struck me more like the medic love story in BoB, where the one with Leckie was... meh. It just didn't fit. The only thing that really bothered me is how much time they keep spending back in the States with this series.

His death scene was the same as his live scenes.

Yea.  The choice of Jon Seda is unfortunate.  There's no doubt that Basilone was conflicted about his experience, as were all people.  But I don't really know if Basilone was really as introspective as they portray him.  Seda gives us a cold, methodical performance.  Whereas I picture the real Basilone having more of a Dean Martinesque twinkle in his eye - even if in spite of his horrific experiences.

(http://dl.dropbox.com/u/963220/draft_lens7914471module86368371photo_1266896040basilone.png)

I'm not sure why, but I really enjoyed the final episode.  It gave the show a very personal touch and paid honor to the men that were used as examples.  I think it brought closure to the series with the possible exception that I would have enjoyed watching Sledge progress a bit more. 

Decent series, but certainly not up to the level of BoB.  I'm planning to watch it through again in a few months to see if the second run through helps with the appeal. 

On a side note: It pisses me off that Basilone's widow didn't get the insurance money... if that's true.  Such a decorated soldier and the government decides to be an ass about a small detail.  Grrrr.

I don't get why they threw that bit in. It isn't true. She did get the money. She gave it to his family.

http://www.awesomestories.com/assets/lena-basilone (http://www.awesomestories.com/assets/lena-basilone)

Good!  Thanks for that link. 

Well it's over. Not to the caliber of BoB, but it had its moments.  Sledge's story was my favorite and I enjoyed his crazy-eyed friend Snafu.  Not enough combat scenes for me and the show, even with 10 episodes, felt rushed.  Still, I'm glad it got made and it's a good tribute to the Marines. 

I had never seen Band of Brothers. I've watched all the episodes of the Pacific and loved it. All you motherfuckers bagging on it baffle me. Maybe BoB was better and this fails in comparison, I don't know. But I thought this had a lot of emotional impact and made me care about the characters. Hell, I didn't even know they were real people until the last bit of the finale. I guess ignorance IS bliss.

I heard that this show was good, but not quite BoB. Haemish, you shoulld just rent BoB. It is 'The Wire' of WW2 series, for real.

If you liked this, you'll like BoB even more.

This. 

BoB flowed more from story to story and you felt like you really got to know the players as well as their interpersonal relationships much better.  BoB wasn't quite as gritty, but certainly told the story of the European theater well. 

Also.  How the hell do you get away with having a penis and not watching BoB at least once?  Your answer will determine the status of your man card.  There are marathons on every national holiday on regular TV and the History Channel.  I've seen it like 12 times.

I own it.  Got it for $40 and consider it one of the best purchases of a set.  Then again, I'm a huge WWII historical nut...

I didn't have HBO when it came out and I haven't sought it out since it came out on DVD. It's on my list of things to do one of these days.

Very well.  Your man card is safe.  For now.

Without having seen The Pacific:

BoB is a completely different narrative, since it directly follows Easy Company from beginning to end.  The Company is the main character, though a couple of the actors do come close to "main character" status.  The fact that Spielberg and Hanks had a pile of research, a well polished popular history book by Ambrose, and many of the actual Company members to draw from meant it was going to immensely more nuanced.

Even then, check out reviews of BoB on Rotten Tomatoes or Metacritic...  there are quite a few negative reviews because the narrative style substantially deviated from the standard TV/miniseries style of a few major POV characters.  Many negative reviews focused on the point that there aren't really sympathetic main characters the viewer can invest in for the entire miniseries.

This style makes BoB a great series to rewatch, though...  On subsequent viewings, you pick up the little details and nuances that you missed the first time around.  A great example is Guarnere returning to the company and asking if anyone has heard of Lola's in Paris, and then a couple of episodes later in the Battle of the Bulge complaining about "pissing needles" and there was no penicilian.  Or the colorblind LT that on different occasions asks his Sgt to tap him when it's time to jump.


The Pacific follows a couple of main characters through different battles, and focuses on the POV main characters who were active in different times and portions of the war.  Necessarily, that means you have to bounce around between different settings, introduce different secondary characters, and have a different narrative focus.  



Overall, BoB is very comparable to the Wire.  They both have a diverse cast of ensemble characters that are loosely united by an overall theme.  This also means that many people, who are more comfortable with a tight narrative focus on a couple of sympathetic main characters, may not find it enjoyable viewing.

:headscratch:

It was more...brutal... than Band of Brothers, I'd say. And more of the characters who were focused upon died; there were constant replacements and deaths of replacements too

No it's not.  It's on TNT every few months as well as other Turner networks.  Hell, it was run on Memorial Day weekend AND the 4th.

Even my wife's sat down and watched it and she likes Twilight.

You going to take that, H, or were you seeking out sparkly vampire emos?

I didn't really get the more brutal bit. I felt it was just glossed over way too much, and about the only thing we got to see were a few corpses they dug up here and there, a bit of mud, and tons of thousand yard stares. I can't help but think that the bastogne episode in BoB did a better job of conveying the misery they felt.

I mean, part of the hellhole in the pacific were (if I'm correct) the constant rain, constant mud, constant lack of clean clothes etc etc, and the series to me just didn't manage to properly convey that to me. I've no real idea why, it just didn't.

It was because you didn't get to spend that much time with each of the individual stories.  There was a setup, a fight, and then the episode was over.  And then four episodes later, that arc was over.  It forced it into compartmentalized formulaic crap that didn't even come close to living up to the weighty narrative of its sources.  Read the books, and skip this piece of shit.  And shame of them for fucking this up.

Ugh.  I looked up reviews for Band of Brothers a couple of months ago, and was sure it was either rottentomatoes or metacritic but neither page has any hits for it.

From wikipedia:


A major complaint from TV critics, when BoB was released, was they couldn't tell who was who and who they should care about.  This is the flaw of show that has a revolving POV character, as some people prefer or NEED to have a single or limited number of POV characters to invest in.  

The Wire is obviously in the same category.  A couple of actors stand out (McNulty and Omar) but the story is spread out over dozens of characters, which means you have to appreciate the overarching theme and storytelling to appreciate the show.  I'll freely admit that I didn't like the second season of the Wire that much (the docks) because I couldn't stand many of the dockworkers or Carver/Herc (Carver was EXCELLENT in the later seasons), and stopped watching during the middle of the fifth season because I couldn't stand the awful newspaper storyline (doesn't help that I worked in the newspaper industry on the business side for a few years right out of college, so I thought the whole newspaper angle was preachy author tract bullshit).

To me, this was the problem one of the major problems with The Pacific, not BoB. I never had that problem with BoB.

Edit: Clarifying where the problem(s) were.

HaemishM please go watch BoB, it's really annoying just saying you will one day.

I refuse to watch something like Band of Brothers on TNT - you know what with cutting out all the cursing and such, there's no reason to do such a thing. Also, I don't watch TNT enough to see trailers telling me when it's coming on. I'll rent the DVD's at some point.

Also, my man card is safely tucked away in my wife's purse where I like it.  :drill:

^
This

http://www.amazon.com/Band-Brothers-Blu-ray-Scott-Grimes/dp/B00129H7VS/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1279312791&sr=8-2

Go go gadget creditcard man.

Pretty sure TNT doesn't censor it, but since I've dropped cable because it's an expensive waste of time I can't be certain.  I know History doesn't when they show it because that's where I first caught it.