Warbird Information Exchange

I just finished watching the series. My wife bought it for me, and being stuck under two feet of snow and ice, I figured this would be a good time to watch it. All I can say is wow! I thought it was really good. I know what some of you are saying about how it is different than Band of Brothers. I guess that is to give it a feel all of it's own. I felt so bad seeing the episode abput Basilone and everything that happened. I would love to hear from others that watched it about their thoughts.

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Chris Henry
EAA Aviation Museum Manager

Still haven't started it yet. I need to find a block of time cuz I know once it starts i'm not gonna want to stop. If we had the snow everyone else got i'd have a week off!

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-Al Sauer
http://www.flickr.com/photos/spookythecat

I thought it was great and I was very happy it had a different vibe than Band of Brothers. I need to pick up the set to keep BOB company.

Now they need to make one about the Air War and then the Navy. Or vice versa.

I loved the series as well and thought it was phenomenal. I thought the realism was unprecedented, and it made me feel like I was really there. It did show the horrors of war with all the gore, violence and how war is not so neat and tidy, but yet at the same time it had a positive theme, painting our Veterans in a complimentary light.

My one MAJOR complaint was the haircuts on the leading characters in the movie. All of them, except the crazy old Gunny Sgt and Chesty Puller, had the "new wave" hair style which was so prevalent in the 80's. Totally, 100% INACCURATE! Come on now, they pay those actors buku bucks to act, the least they can do is accept a "buzzcut" to their head for the few months it takes to film it. Now I realize it was a combat theater and keeping personal hygiene was not a priority in a survival situation, BUT you cannot tell me that kind of style of hair existed during boot camp, right after boot camp, in combat, and home on leave, and at home after the war - their hair never changed! To me, that is a HUGE detractor from the storyline. I just have a hard time accepting the storyline and characters knowing that all the main characters look like the guitarist from circa 80's Depeche Mode.

The one thing I liked about Band of Brothers better was how they started each segment with a brief interview of a real BoB Veteran which segued into the beginning of the story.

Overall, though, I thought it was excellent, but those DAMMN haircuts!

I thought it was a superb series. I know they wanted to portray the battles as real as possible, that they definitely did, at times I found it very difficult to watch. My father refused to watch it at all.

Definitely would recommend it, although not at all for anyone younger than 18 in my book.

Not to be a prude, but I could not see why the long sex scenes where necessary at all.

Thats my 2 cents.

Cheers

I'll admit first that I haven't seen it - it's on my list, but ETO is more my thing - so if there is a particularly egregious haircut I have missed it, but...

The 'buzzcut' didn't become standard Army fare until the 50's when it was already working it's way though civilian fashion. Look at a lot of photos of US soldiers during WWII and you will find that hair in general was kept off the ears, but could be fairly long on top. A sharp demarcation between the short sides and long top was also quite normal for the day. Not quite hippie long, but the DA/pompadour would actually have conformed to Army Reg.s at the time.

An all-over buzzcut would have been the anachronism, not the norm.

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Lest Hero-worship raise it's head and cloud our vision, remember that World War II was fought and won by the same sort of twenty-something punks we wouldn't let our daughters date.

As I understand it, only two of the veterans portrayed are still alive. That is likely the reason it wasn't done like BoB.

While it was definitely different than BoB, I wasn't looking for it to be similar given the nature of the material (three different books involving different characters in different units at different times who didn't know each other). BoB was very unique in that regard given that the 506 PIR was an experimental regiment where the soldiers went through Basic, Jump School and into combat together. It allowed for much better continuity of the storylines and character development.

That having been said, I don't think that I really started enjoying the series until episode 6 or 7 (where the focus really shifted to Eugene Sledge and K Co.). Even though I recognized that the material was difficult to pull together cohesively yet still remain within the <1 hour per episode limit, the early ones came across as very disjointed and somewhat formulaic.

Nobody's wearing their chin straps! Haha, that was the first comment my old man made when we were exiting the theater after Saving Private Ryan. He was in the 41st Infantry Division in Hollandia, Biak, and the Philippines. I wish he was around to give his take on The Pacific. I liked the subtle things like the guys wrapped in blankets in the tropical heat because of malaria fever, or the purple stuff being applied to the fungus infections. I had to watch it four episodes at a time.

My wife got me the box set on Blue Ray for Christmas. I'm about two-thirds of the way through. It's very good, but a bit difficult to watch..much more dark and brutal than BoB (which of course is an accurate portrayal of the Pacific island fighting.)

SN

After expecting it to be similar to BoB, I was, at first, disappointed. But, after thinking about the difference in battle venues, I understood it a lot better. While BoB was a broad sweep of battle venues, Pacific was more confined and intense due to the relatively close quarters of the battles and the fanaticism of the Japanese. IMO the difference in attitudes was paramount. Where the German's could say, "OK, we've done our bit. We know when we're beat." The Japanese had, obviously, an entirely different mind set. That made the battles in the Pacific more vicious.

Mudge the reflective

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Land of the free because of the brave

Valid point, Basilone shaved his head prior to landing on Iwo Jima. Prior to that he did have a non squared away haircut

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Disclaimer: Photo discription, original photographer and/or original web source credit unknown unless otherwise noted.

BOB bothered me for the reality of how gruesome war really is. watching the guy next to you get his head blown off isnt a nice thing. The pacific shows how fanatical the japanese were and how US forces responded. I cant even imagine the brutality and visciousness involved. Those guys are and always will be my heros.

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"WHAT ME WORRY?"

Don't tell these Marines they aren't squared away.


"Marine Raiders, with a reputation as lethal jungle fighters, pose in front of a Japanese dugout they took on Cape Totkina on Bougainville, Solomon Islands. January 1944."




"Don Bishop USMC WWII Vet 1st Marine Divsion"




This Marine seems quite popular with the ladies despite his non squared away new wave haircut

point taken about the hair!

It was much more graphic (throwing rocks into dead Japanese open brains). More sex than was required as well. Maybe trying to appeal to a wider audience.

What a heII it was to fight on these islands. Why did they have to take each one out.., why not just isolate them and starve them out first? Like the Romans did throughout France. I guess that would have taken too many troops and equipment? It just seems in retrospect (not the most accurate way to view any battle) that so many of these little death trap islands could have been fought around rather than through.

I know the end justifies the means and my father benefited by being able to fly his B-29's off of Guam rather than from China/India. Also having a nice giant aircraft carrier (Iwo) waiting for him on the way back did not hurt either.., but some of the other smaller 'dots' in the Pacific.., good grief at what cost?

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S.