Remember how I was crying the blues because I couldn’t watch “The Pacific,” even though I had lots and lots of reasons (if you’ll recall, I went on and on about it) why I really, really wanted to?
Well, NEVER MIND. And I feel every bit as sheepish as Emily Litella having to say that.
My longtime friend Cheryl Levenbrown of The New York Times gently broke the news to me via Facebook comment last night: Just go to hbo.com, and click on “Series” and then “The Pacific,” then register, and you can watch the first episode in its entirety.
And it’s pretty high-quality. I don’t know if that was technically hi-def, but the def was certainly good enough for my standards. About the only problem I had was that motion tended to be a bit shaky and leave tracer patterns, like when you wave your hand in front of a strobe or something. Since I have a pretty good video card, I attributed that to the speed of my broadband connection. Maybe if we can get that Google Fiber thingy, the video will be perfect. (If you want to get involved in helping make that happen, check out the Facebook page. I’m a fan; you should be, too.)
Now, as to the show itself: It was good, although it didn’t quite live up to the buildup I gave it. I expected so much, that it would have been a miracle if it had.
Where it failed, for me, was that it didn’t engage me. It was so anxious to get to actual combat, there was no opportunity to get to know the characters before BAM, they’re getting shot at. One minute a guy’s telling the girl across the street that he’s joined the Marines (and she responds vaguely, and you never get a sense of whether this girl means anything to this guy or what), and you get another brief scene indicating that this same guy has an emotionally distant father, and then the next minute he experiences his baptism under fire, and becomes hardened to killing in a surprisingly short time. And then the episode is over.
I could have used an episode or two of boot camp and basic combat training to see the process of these boys becoming Marines, a process during which you get to know them as individuals before they become gyrenes. I was hoping, as I said before, for something more like Leon Uris’ Battle Cry, which goes on for a couple of hundred pages before the Sixth Marines get to Guadalcanal. That way, when a character is killed, you really care because you KNOW the guy by that time.
“Band of Brothers” did it right. It opened with two hour-long episodes, which allowed the entire first episode to be about training and molding the individuals into a fighting unit, and then you see them jumping into Normandy in the second episode that same night, and by that time you KNOW these guys (and I don’t think that’s just because I had read the book). And just in case you might lose interest on that first episode, it begins with the guys suiting up for the D-Day invasion, then suddenly standing down for that nerve-wracking one-day delay because of the weather, and they all have time with their thoughts, which allows them to think of how they got to where they were, which leads to telling the whole training story in flashback. And of course, when the combat starts, it starts with a huge bang.
To give the makers of “The Pacific” (many of the same people, actually) credit, they did an interesting thing. They begin the “combat” part with the unit’s unopposed landing at Guadalcanal — a marked contrast with the D-Day landing on a beach with every square inch-presighted by the enemy. So there’s no enemy on the beachhead, and no enemy to be found for quite some time as the Marines move on into the quiet jungle. Of course, when the shooting starts it is suitably intense and disorienting.
But my problem remains — there simply wasn’t enough character development during those quiet parts. Maybe we’ll get it as we go forward. I’m very encouraged to read in Burl’s review that “dramatically these are the weakest segments,” referring to the first two episodes. I’ll certainly be watching to see it get better. Because however disappointed I may be, I’d rather see this than anything else likely to be on television.
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It was a great start to what looks like a fabulous storytelling of what transpired over there. I enjoyed Band of Brothers, the book as well.
Looking forward to the rest.
The series is very combat-heavy, and the characters are are all dirty young men in helmets taking cover. It can be hard to track who’s who.
The script is very minimalist, and the best moments are often just a few words of dialogue weighted by situation. My favorite line, for example: “Keep it.”
It benefits from a second viewing. It also helps to see it all back-to-back so the connections are more apparent.
Sounds a lot like The Wire, but different topic…