HBO's The Pacific

[nik-]

Originally Posted by T@T

BoB wasn't all that great until the 3rd or 4th episode IMO. Give it time, I have a feeling this is going to be epic when alls said and done.

what? No way, the first episode of BoB was awesome.

[wooohooo]

Originally Posted by nik-

what? No way, the first episode of BoB was awesome.

Well I really liked it, I thought it added a good touch to it. But a few of my friends and girlfriend thought it was extremely boring (beginning).

[nik-]

Originally Posted by wooohooo

Well I really liked it, I thought it added a good touch to it. But a few of my friends and girlfriend thought it was extremely boring (beginning).

These people are the type of people that go watch movies like Transformers and think they are awesome?

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by T@T

BoB wasn't all that great until the 3rd or 4th episode IMO. Give it time, I have a feeling this is going to be epic when alls said and done.

I hope so. The Pacific has been really boring so far. I don't know or care who anybody is yet, and I can't tell WTF is going on.

[FurnaceFace]

Originally Posted by Sliver

I hope so. The Pacific has been really boring so far. I don't know or care who anybody is yet, and I can't tell WTF is going on.

I think we all know the European theatre so much better the BoB story flows better for us and we know how it all goes together. We've heard of Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, but only as single fights not all put together. I doubt most of us had ever heard of Peleliu before this series. I think that'll be an interesting part of this series to see the Pacific battles all put together.

This will be a bit more difficult to care about people as they are following individuals not a specific company so there's less build up. This episode did seem a little...rushed? The preamble talked about all the hardships of the fight and while they did touch on the shelling, being cutoff, and the lack of supplies, it never seemed....a huge struggle? I dunno how to describe it. I guess it seemed like in 10 mins it went from eating maggots and rice to canned peaches. I never got the sense or hardship I was expecting them to portrait. I was expecting something more like "The Breaking Point" (BoB ep 7) where they are stuck out freezing in foxholes and getting massively shelled. I'm sure it will get there.

I also have to remember I watched BoB off the box set so I didn't have a week in between each episode which I'm sure helped in the character development and remembering who's who. I kept thinking "where's the 3rd guy" all through the first half of the movie and then realized he was still stateside.

[3 Justin 3]

The Pacific is awesome so far. Haters gonna hate.

[Fugly]

[QUOTE=worth;2412352]This episode was pretty intense. Wave upon wave of Japanese assaulting the dug in American outposts. They did a good job of creating tension with the reloading of the 30 cals. You would think the Japanese wwi frontal assault mentalities would subside after getting cut up in every major engagement on the island. QUOTE]

I'm almost finished reading Eugene Sledge's book With the Old Breed. He mentioned that Guadalcanal was pretty much the last place that the Japanese used those tacticts. Subsequent battles the Japanese made the Americans come and get them in their vast caves and fortified bunkers.

Years ago I had an incredible conversation with a Canadian vet that fought in Korea. I'm surprised he talked as much as he did, but he had a few beers in him and he could tell I was interested so he felt like talking I guess. His stories about being attacked by waves upon waves of Chinese at night were terrifying. Their machine guns got so hot, and since they didn't have any water they had to get up and piss on them to cool them down. His description of what he saw the next morning is similar to what they show in The Pacific, with piles upon piles of bodies lying in front of the trenches.

Like somebody mentioned earlier...that generation makes me feel like a giant pansie.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by FurnaceFace

I think we all know the European theatre so much better the BoB story flows better for us and we know how it all goes together. We've heard of Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, but only as single fights not all put together. I doubt most of us had ever heard of Peleliu before this series. I think that'll be an interesting part of this series to see the Pacific battles all put together.

This will be a bit more difficult to care about people as they are following individuals not a specific company so there's less build up. This episode did seem a little...rushed? The preamble talked about all the hardships of the fight and while they did touch on the shelling, being cutoff, and the lack of supplies, it never seemed....a huge struggle? I dunno how to describe it. I guess it seemed like in 10 mins it went from eating maggots and rice to canned peaches. I never got the sense or hardship I was expecting them to portrait. I was expecting something more like "The Breaking Point" (BoB ep 7) where they are stuck out freezing in foxholes and getting massively shelled. I'm sure it will get there.

I also have to remember I watched BoB off the box set so I didn't have a week in between each episode which I'm sure helped in the character development and remembering who's who. I kept thinking "where's the 3rd guy" all through the first half of the movie and then realized he was still stateside.

Yes I watched BoB the same way (one after the other on DVD) and that certainly helped with remembering who's who.

Like most of us, I don't know much about the Pacific side of the battle. This series is now 20% done and I still don't know much about the Pacific side of the battle. If they're telling a coherent story, I don't know what it is. I was surprised they even left the island last night since I had no concept of how long they'd been there.

Also, the production value of this seems piss poor. It's like the CBC did it or something. BoB you could really get a feel for the scale of things and you actually felt like you were there. With this, I feel like I'm watching actors pretending to be soldiers while being filmed in a movie studio. I understand the budget for this was huge, so hopefully things improve (and I'm sure they will).

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by 3 Justin 3

The Pacific is awesome so far. Haters gonna hate.

Do you think it's as good, better or worse than BoB so far?

[burn_baby_burn]

I really like this series so far. I really have to disagree about the production value. It has been nothing short of fantastic. The scene in episode one of the Marines climbing down the nets to the boats while the huge battle ship's guns are blazing in the back ground was incredible. I was on the edge of my seat watching the night scene last night. Every time they were reloading the machine gun I was scared they were going to get overrun. The scene at the end with the Marines sitting in the mess hall on the battle ship was very powerful as well.

Personally I don't think its fair to compare this to Band of Brothers. I watched Band of Brothers when it first came out and haven't watched it since. It is an amazing show, but I don't think I have the emotional attachment to it like some of the posters on here who have watched it numerous times.

The only similarity between the two is the Americans are involved. They took place on the opposite side of the world against very different enemies in very different conditions.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

I really like this series so far. I really have to disagree about the production value. It has been nothing short of fantastic. The scene in episode one of the Marines climbing down the nets to the boats while the huge battle ship's guns are blazing in the back ground was incredible. I was on the edge of my seat watching the night scene last night. Every time they were reloading the machine gun I was scared they were going to get overrun. The scene at the end with the Marines sitting in the mess hall on the battle ship was very powerful as well.

Personally I don't think its fair to compare this to Band of Brothers. I watched Band of Brothers when it first came out and haven't watched it since. It is an amazing show, but I don't think I have the emotional attachment to it like some of the posters on here who have watched it numerous times.

The only similarity between the two is the Americans are involved. They took place on the opposite side of the world against very different enemies in very different conditions.

BoB is the perfect comparison. It would be weird not to compare them to each other. BoB set the bar, and I was hoping Pacific would raise it. So far it hasn't, but I still think it will improve.

[Hemi-Cuda]

one thing i'm really missing compared to BoB is at the end of each episode, there's no bit of text to sum everything up, or to give historical significance to an event. i'm also not fond of Tom Hanks narrating in the beginning, i want to hear the actual vets talk and then get right to the series itself

[FurnaceFace]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

The scene at the end with the Marines sitting in the mess hall on the battle ship was very powerful as well.

Agreed, that was extremely well done. Just having a hot cup of coffee in their hands looked like it was the greatest thing ever.

There has yet to be the real jaw dropping "holy fata" scene like the D Day parachute drop scene in BoB but from some of the clips it looks like there is in an upcoming beach landing and from the making of it looks like Iwo Jima will be cranking up the "epic" level.

[Table 5]

Originally Posted by FurnaceFace

This episode did seem a little...rushed? The preamble talked about all the hardships of the fight and while they did touch on the shelling, being cutoff, and the lack of supplies, it never seemed....a huge struggle? I dunno how to describe it. I guess it seemed like in 10 mins it went from eating maggots and rice to canned peaches. I never got the sense or hardship I was expecting them to portrait.

Gotta agree that so far things are pretty scattered and hurried. With the intro that was given, I was expecting this to be a long-drawn out battle for the island, and yet the whole shebang wraps up by the end of the hour (or more like 40 minutes), and in such a way that it feels insignificant. The proportions are all wrong....right now it feels like snapshots of an event instead of a storytelling. SPR and BOB had great pacing...this one just feels off.

At the moment, I think it's relying a little too much on the viewer to know that there was hardship and skipping ahead, instead of showing what that hardship actually is. The producers want me to have a built-in relationship with the characters and war already, instead of developing one for me.

I'll keep watching, but I'd be lying if I'd say that I wasn't a little disappointed so far. After each episode, BoB made me reflect on what I'd seen and then I'd go and research into the specifics.....30 seconds after the Pacific, I'm already too busy watching the Apprentice.

[Sainters7]

I think we all need to face facts that this isn't going to be BoB. I understand the natural reaction is to compare, considering they're both done by the same person. But I think it's a little unfair to do so. BoB is one of the most(if not THE most) celebrated mini-series of all-time. Those aren't easy to duplicate, even by the person who made the original. BoB focused on the very well-known European theatre, and lets face it, no war movie about any other WWII theatre is going to top the Western offensive through Normandy all the way to Berlin. It's got it all: D-Day on the beaches of Normandy, Hitler, seeing various European capitals as they looked after German seiges, concentration camps, the Eagle's Nest...you're not going to be able to top it, you just aren't.

I'm actually glad The Pacific is taking a different approach on how they shoot it. That'd be kinda lame if they used the exact same format as BoB, as IMO it clearly wouldn't be able to match what BoB did. I think this angle's kind of cool. Not so much focused on the relationships of individual soldiers, and more on the chaos of this war. Let's not forget how brutal this theatre was, it was completely different than the European side: the Japanese fighting to the very last soldier, the Bataan death march and over-all much more cruel treatment of POW's by the Japanese compared to the Germans, the nuclear strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki...it was an ugly war. I think Tom Hanks is already portraying that general sense very well so far.

I read someone complaining about how BoB was more about tactics while this has just been Bastogne so far. Isn't that what Guadalcanal was pretty much known for? Why would it be any other way? A few companies completely cut off from their supplies and back-up and surrounded by Japanese soldiers who are bombarding them constantly. I don't think there would be too much offensive, tactical planning going on in that situation, pretty much just hunker down and play D until hopefully someone breaks the blockade. All I'm saying is just give it time, I'm sure the whole series isn't going to carry the same theme. I think they're doing a great job showing how overwhelmed and confused the U.S. was in the first year or two of the Pacific War.

Stop comparing it to an all-time classic and just enjoy it for what it is. I think it's been absolutely fantastic so far. Besides, doing it with an over-all sense instead of focusing on individual characters and their relationships at least saves us from another lame Blythe episode.

[KTown]

I think it's great so far but maybe it's because I know alot about this portion of the war.

[Sainters7]

Originally Posted by Table 5

Gotta agree that so far things are pretty scattered and hurried. With the intro that was given, I was expecting this to be a long-drawn out battle for the island, and yet the whole shebang wraps up by the end of the hour (or more like 40 minutes), and in such a way that it feels insignificant. The proportions are all wrong....right now it feels like snapshots of an event instead of a storytelling. SPR and BOB had great pacing...this one just feels off.

This is one thing I can agree with. The bouncing around between companies doesn't really allow you to feel the battle in its entirety, but more just little snippets of it. I'm not sure why they took this approach. Perhaps they want to allow the viewer to experience EVERYTHING major that occurred to soldiers during the Pacific War, and thus they need to focus on different companies. But it definitely does take away from getting to really know and like different characters, for sure.

I noticed after two episodes I'm not a big fan of most of the characters. They just seem more prettyboy'ish, cocky, and over-all more "Hollywood" types than BoB, who just seemed like regular dudes. I was actually happy when that Italian-looking guy died at the end of yesterday's episode, he was getting on my nerves.

[3 Justin 3]

Originally Posted by Sliver

Do you think it's as good, better or worse than BoB so far?

I don't think you can compare them. They are both war mini-series but they are written in two totally different ways and focus on different aspects of war.

Both are fantastic.

[Table 5]

Originally Posted by 3 Justin 3

I don't think you can compare them. They are both war mini-series but they are written in two totally different ways and focus on different aspects of war.

Both are fantastic.

Sure you can compare them. At the end of the day, these are tv shows, and inevitably you find one more entertaining and compelling than the other. I'm hoping for this to change, but as of now, I think its fairly clear that most of us were captivated by one more than the other.

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

Personally I don't think its fair to compare this to Band of Brothers.

Originally Posted by Sainters7

I think we all need to face facts that this isn't going to be BoB. I understand the natural reaction is to compare, considering they're both done by the same person. But I think it's a little unfair to do so.

Originally Posted by 3 Justin 3

I don't think you can compare them. They are both war mini-series but they are written in two totally different ways and focus on different aspects of war.

I read these as excuses for Pacific not being as good as BoB. We're talking about the same producers, the same time period, similar budget, same amount of time to tell the story, same network, same format (ie vets telling their tale followed by the show), etc. There are more similarities than differences.

The problem so far (I'm still optimistic this will be awesome when all is said and done) is they're doing a bad job. The story is incoherent. The characters are bland, unrecognizable and difficult to relate to. They're not relaying much of the suffering or hardship. Even basic things like timeframe - I can't even tell how long things are going on for. How long were they on that island? I have no idea.

I think it was a huge mistake not to develop the characters first. This watches more like a transformers movie than something on par with BoB.