Plot Holes in World War II

[Evil Captor]

WTF was it with the whole Italians invade Ethiopia subplot? How did that contribute to the story at all? I mean, it was great to show the valiant Ethiopian fighters throwing spears at fighter planes, but after that the Italians just smash the place and it all ends with kind of a dull thump. If it had set up something meaningful further down the line, it would have been one thing, but as it was, it was a useless waste of celluloid.

[robert_columbia]

And those photos of supposed "victims" of the US's nuclear weapons? You can see the numbered props in the background.

[Malacandra]

Originally Posted by shiftless

America should have had bigger tanks too, with lazers.

Yes, indeed. The idea that the Americans would know that the evil (but cash-strapped) Nazis had these kick-ass uberpanzers that would blow the shit out of any Sherman that crossed their sights, and just shrug their shoulders and go "Meh. We've got plenty more tanks where they came from, plenty more farmboys too"... yeah, right. Americans always have to have the biggest and the best. Look at those B17s next to the Luftwaffe's piddly little bombers and tell me why the Americans wouldn't have built a 500-ton land battleship. It's not like they didn't have the resources, the way the story gets told.

Maybe not lasers - just a honkin' big naval gun.

[Koxinga]

Stanley Kubrick tried his hand at a sequel about 20 years later, kind of like how Rankin Bass did "Return of The King" as an unofficial followup to Ralph Bakshy's "Fellowship of the Ring." Kubrick's no Rankin Bass, though.

[JohnT]

Originally Posted by GIGObuster

... *Useless bit of trivia: Besides salary demands from stars like Vick Morrow, the increased cost of the switch to color was also a reason for the end of the show.

I hinted at this in post 85, but you're absolutely right.

I'm glad I'm not the only one to listen to the cinematographer's DVD commentary.

[RickJay]

Originally Posted by Malacandra

That, IMO, was partly down to this desperate need they had to get the Americans into the war with Germany after all. They'd painted themselves into a corner over this American isolationism they'd written in, so the only way they could get the fancy US hardware they'd decided to give the good guys into the European theatre - where it could face off against all those "cool Nazi" panzers and planes - was to get Hitler to declare war on America.

But we already had that happening. In Episode 1.08, "The Arsenal of Democracy," the USA was openly helping Germany's enemies; then in Episode 1.11 "Battle of the Atlantic" you actually had the USA and Germany shooting at each other. It just isn't a really big stretch to start a war over that.

It would have made a lot more sense for the writers to just have Germany actually start a war; present some kind of military necessity stemming from the Atlantic convoy battles to openly declare war. Basically the same thing worked in Episode 1.07, "The Quisling." I'm not suggesting repeating the first series' way of doing it but why not at least connect the dots? Or if an alliance with Japan is necessary tp start things up, just figure out a way to wrap up the Pacific thing in a few episodes so we can get back the the main plot.

You can come up with a hundred ways to write in American involvement that don't involve starting a completely different and unconnected plot, one that in this case doesn't even have a super hot Danaerys Targaeryn to at least make it good eye candy.

[Damfino]

Originally Posted by silenus

Did they actually think people would buy boarding parties in the 20th Century? The very idea that a modern naval commander would order "Away all boarders!" is insane. USS Pillsbury? Nice product placement, guys. Real subtle.

They did a trial run earlier on with the Altmark, and since it seemed to get a good audience reaction, they tried it again.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by Evil Captor

WTF was it with the whole Italians invade Ethiopia subplot? How did that contribute to the story at all? I mean, it was great to show the valiant Ethiopian fighters throwing spears at fighter planes, but after that the Italians just smash the place and it all ends with kind of a dull thump. If it had set up something meaningful further down the line, it would have been one thing, but as it was, it was a useless waste of celluloid.

That was an early episode and they hadn't really figured out yet where they were going with the series. It's like how Spain and Manchuria and Czechoslovakia were all supposed to be major stories and they all ended up getting dropped.

[Malacandra]

Originally Posted by RickJay

But we already had that happening. In Episode 1.08, "The Arsenal of Democracy," the USA was openly helping Germany's enemies; then in Episode 1.11 "Battle of the Atlantic" you actually had the USA and Germany shooting at each other. It just isn't a really big stretch to start a war over that.

It would have made a lot more sense for the writers to just have Germany actually start a war; present some kind of military necessity stemming from the Atlantic convoy battles to openly declare war. Basically the same thing worked in Episode 1.07, "The Quisling." I'm not suggesting repeating the first series' way of doing it but why not at least connect the dots? Or if an alliance with Japan is necessary tp start things up, just figure out a way to wrap up the Pacific thing in a few episodes so we can get back the the main plot.

You can come up with a hundred ways to write in American involvement that don't involve starting a completely different and unconnected plot, one that in this case doesn't even have a super hot Danaerys Targaeryn to at least make it good eye candy.

You argue very skilfully - it's just that I think you're making a mistake if you assume these writers could write their way out of a bowl of alphabet soup.

I wonder if you noticed a couple of things that were quite subtly handled (yeah, blind squirrel and all that)? The writers would have us believe that the P-51 didn't really get legs until the British put one of their own engines in it. Later (sorry, I don't have your faithful recall of episode numbers and titles! ) we get those same British thinking of putting a kick-ass gun in the Sherman - the conversion was called "Firefly". I haven't yet spotted the English name in the credits, but I wonder how he managed to slip that past the rest of the team.

[Malacandra]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

That was an early episode and they hadn't really figured out yet where they were going with the series. It's like how Spain and Manchuria and Czechoslovakia were all supposed to be major stories and they all ended up getting dropped.

Fact: a fair number of those panzers the Germans used later on were originally going to be Czech props. They couldn't afford to waste the budget.

[Little Nemo]

Originally Posted by phreesh

The whole Italian subplot was also a mess. Why not just keep them part of the Allies and simplify the whole thing the Hitler character being the primary lead with the Hirohito character the secondary lead? The Italian thing was superfluous.

I think Mussolini was supposed to be on the Allied side. It's the mustache rule. All the top villains had mustaches - Hitler, Tojo, Hirohito. When Chamberlain and Churchill were arguing, we were supposed to be on Churchill's side. When France quit, who took over? Petain. When they started hinting that one of the Allies was going to turn on the other two, who was the bad guy? Stalin. When Patton and Montgomery were feuding, who was supposed to be the bad guy? Montgomery.

Really, it's pretty obvious. Whenever you're watching an episode and they show a guy with a mustache, you know they want you to root for the other guy.

My guess is Mussolini was supposed to be a good guy when the show first started. I think they were going to use Franco as the third bad guy. But my guess is Franco wanted too much money or something, so they dropped him and rewrote Mussolini's part.

[silenus]

But what about Stalin? Throughout the majority of the plot, Uncle Joe is a Good Guy, and mustached.

[Mississippienne]

Okay, so first off, our heroes got their asses kicked at Hattin, so BUMMER. What, do the producers want us to suffer? They have this big build-up the previous episode to the battle, and then all of a sudden, everyone's dead or captured. I thought this show was called Outremer, not Saladin.

Anyway, Reynald dies in what is CLEARLY a Sweeps Week ploy for ratings. SO WEAK. He dies like a bitch, but Gerard manages to slip away, scot-free, AGAIN? Puh-leaze, the writers are really trying my patience with that one. And then in the next episode we find out Raymond of Tripoli died too, off-screen, in a throwaway line. So after all that build-up they're not gonna have him back this season for the aftermath of Hattin, they just quietly kill him off behind the scenes! Who writes this show? TRAINED MONKEYS?

Okay, and what's with this Conrad of Montferrat character? This guy, who's never been mentioned before until this season, just HAPPENS to be the brother of Sibylla's dead husband, and just HAPPENS to be some great warrior, and he just HAPPENS to come rescue Tyre right when it needed rescuing. DEUX EX MACHINA. There, I said it! Lemme guess, next thing that happens is he romances Sibylla's sister Isabella and becomes king of Jerusalem. MARTY STU ALERT!

Oh, and I guess next season we'll be getting a whole new cast of Crusaders, none of them ever mentioned before but all of them relatives of canon characters, showing up to save the day and fight over the kingdom just so the producers can cast lots of pouty-lipped hotties as "hot new talent". *blows raspberry*

So then Guy is ransomed and like 5 minutes later he decides to lay seige to Acre on the advice of GERARD DE RIDEFORT. Ahhhh! Guy, I'm trying to LIKE you here! When has listening to Gerard ever worked? Why don't you just kill him, hide the body, and never speak of it again?

But I haven't even gotten to the worst part yet! SIBYLLA DIES and both her daughters die too! This is inexcusable! Sibylla is like the last character left from the first episode of the first season. I am outraged that they killed her off just -- like -- that. WEAK.

If the show doesn't pick up next episode, I'm SO out of here. I'm taking down all my Guy/Sibylla fanvids from Youtube and SOMEONE ELSE can run the kink meme, because Outremer has officially jumped the shark!

[Scumpup]

That Skorzeny guy...why didn't they just dress him in tights and call him "Captain Germany" or something? The stuff they had him doing fit better in a popcorn action movie than it did in something with a serious tone like they were going for. I thought my eyes would roll clear out of my head when he rescued the Italian leader from a mountaintop prison. They did play well off of each other, your classic action hero and comedy sidekick, but they felt like they had wandered in from some other, more lighthearted, movie.

[What Exit?]

It had some touching moments too though, like General Teddy Roosevelt Jr. leading one of the beach landings on D-Day. I mean it was a little sappy and clearly played to the heartstrings but it was so well done it worked.

I mean they even had the most beloved General on the American side say it was the single most heroic action he had ever seen in combat.

[Darth Sensitive]

Originally Posted by silenus

But what about Stalin? Throughout the majority of the plot, Uncle Joe is a Good Guy, and mustached.

Foreshadowing!

But seriously, I still don't get why that singing family escaped over the Alps back into Nazi Germany. Were they really that bad at geography? At least they left the deaths of the nuns to the imagination, that would ahve been just a bit tasteless.

[MEBuckner]

Originally Posted by RickJay

My big problem with the series was the entire Pacific War side story. What the fuck did it even contribute to the series? I was waiting for that story to connect with the main plot, but it never did; we heard some vague dialogue about how the Nazis and the Japanese were allies but we never saw them BE allies. SHOW, DON'T TELL. We saw the Nazis and the Italians working together, so that made sense. But not once did Germany and Japan actually DO anything as allies, and nothing about the Pacific story arc really had much of an impact on the European arc (and why the fuck were the Soviets not at war with Japan? If it's a world war, that makes no sense at all; they even said the two sides had fought before and hated each other. What the hell?) And because it was a sub-story they ran out of time and ended it with the Magic Weapon. It was worse than "The Stand."

Really, the Pacific War thing should have been a standalone story - you still have the bullshit ending, but I kind of liked other aspects of the plot, and you could fix the ending.

They did show the Nazis and the Japanese working together every once in a while (I guess when the writers would remember "Oh, hey, they're supposed to be allies, aren't they?") Which led to a pretty cool "Hot Sub on Sub Action" episode.

[MEBuckner]

The "super-science weapons" stuff was often entertaining, but sometimes it did get a little . The whole thing kind of went through a genre shift, starting off as a pretty straight-up war movie and then transforming into some kind of Tom Swift/Buck Rogers sci-fi story (invisible rays that let you detect enemy ships and aircraft; robot airplanes and rockets that fly through outer space and hit things hundreds of miles away; and of course the already mentioned deus ex machina of the Super-Bombs that blow up whole cities).

Some of that stuff got awfully far-fetched though. (An aircraft carrier made out of ice and sawdust? ) The really went crazy with the "super-science wonder weapons" stuff on the Axis side (making it sort of ironic when the Americans win the war by pulling the whole "Super-Bomb" thing out of nowhere). A 1500-ton tank armed with a gun with a 31-inch barrel??? It's pretty obvious at that point that you've just got a bunch of Hollywood "creative" types (with no real understanding of real-world physics and engineering) coming up with this stuff.

The submarines that carried airplanes were pretty cool, but I can't help but think they'd be a bit impractical.

[JohnT]

Far fetched? What about those odd, vacuum-tubed powered adding machines in season 6 (that's the series about 1944, right?) that, by a process so badly explained that it seemed magical, somehow became the basis of a worldwide data and communications network*. Talk about far fetched!

*This last bit was from The WW2 Encyclopedia, printed in the 70s, that took the original story and extrapolated the implications of World War 2 for the next 60-odd years. It's not really canon (and out of print because of copyright claims by the heirs of the original producers), but it's wonderful stuff and I recommend it to any WW2 fans (if they can get a copy of it.)

[RealityChuck]

Originally Posted by MEBuckner

The "super-science weapons" stuff was often entertaining, but sometimes it did get a little . The whole thing kind of went through a genre shift, starting off as a pretty straight-up war movie and then transforming into some kind of Tom Swift/Buck Rogers sci-fi story (invisible rays that let you detect enemy ships and aircraft; robot airplanes and rockets that fly through outer space and hit things hundreds of miles away; and of course the already mentioned deus ex machina of the Super-Bombs that blow up whole cities).

Some of that stuff got awfully far-fetched though. (An aircraft carrier made out of ice and sawdust? ) The really went crazy with the "super-science wonder weapons" stuff on the Axis side (making it sort of ironic when the Americans win the war by pulling the whole "Super-Bomb" thing out of nowhere). A 1500-ton tank armed with a gun with a 31-inch barrel??? It's pretty obvious at that point that you've just got a bunch of Hollywood "creative" types (with no real understanding of real-world physics and engineering) coming up with this stuff.

The submarines that carried airplanes were pretty cool, but I can't help but think they'd be a bit impractical.

You want far fetched? How about those special bombs that skipped (!) over the water order to blow up German dams? The attack was like something out of a science fiction movie.

[Lumpy]

Jewish actress escapes from fascist Austria, becomes a glamourous Hollywood star, and works on radio encryption in her spare time? Why didn't they just name her Mary Sue?

[davidm]

Then there was that short bit about them catching a Japanese spy transmitting morse code on the California coast because Lucille Ball thought she could hear morse transmissions being picked up by her fillings. Give me a break.

[audit1]

Did they really have to try to get the Trekkie audience by naming one of the carriers USS Enterprise?

[Malacandra]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

You want far fetched? How about those special bombs that skipped (!) over the water order to blow up German dams? The attack was like something out of a science fiction movie.

Heh, yeah. One attack plane at a time? Check. Dead straight and level through a storm of defensive fire? Check. Tiny target that you each get one chance to hit if you get to exactly the right place, time and speed? Check. All it was missing was the arch-villain in his night-fighter tailing each of the bombers as it goes in, and then the cynical gun-runner in his tricked-out armed DC3 coming over the horizon to blow the fighter off Gibson's tail and yell "Yahoo! You're all clear, kid!". I swear I was this close to throwing a brick through the TV.

[Scumpup]

Originally Posted by Little Nemo

That was an early episode and they hadn't really figured out yet where they were going with the series. It's like how Spain and Manchuria and Czechoslovakia were all supposed to be major stories and they all ended up getting dropped.

I heard that the writers deliberately introduced these plots, built them up, and then abandoned them deliberately because "real life often doesn't have closure." I don't buy it. To me it just seems obvious they were making it up as they went along.

[Koxinga]

Ooooh, yeah, the whole pre-title credits intro thing with Manchuria. Just a little too neat to have the Japanese take the last emperor China and install him as the new puppet emperor of "Manchukuo," wasn't it? That should have warned me right then what a soap opera I was in for.

( Or maybe I'm thinking of Tales of the Gold Monkey? The two series had that "Flying Tiger" pilot crossover thing going.)

[Koxinga]

Another thing that bugs me: why did they occasionally have the seemingly paranormal "foo fighers" popping up in the aerial episodes? They seemed completely out of left field and irrelevant to the plot, and I still haven't heard any convincing explanation why the writers introduced them in the first place.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by audit1

Did they really have to try to get the Trekkie audience by naming one of the carriers USS Enterprise?

Not just named after but the most decorated ship ofthe war to boot.

[wedgehed]

They totally miscast the SS hierarchy. That Heydrich dude should have been in charge. He was the hard core, blond, strapping, personification of "the master race". I feel they wasted this character by having him OD on car seat fabric. And, puh-leeze, they make the top dog of the SS a Mr. Peepers wannabe.

Yeah.

[Levolor the Blind]

I agree with the posters who think the whole "atomic superweapon ends the war" ending was just weak.

I mean we have this big build up to an invasion of Japan and they just... end it. Kind of like the fourth season of Babylon 5. To be fair, I read somewhere (sorry no cite) that the series was losing viewers and "the suits" had decided to cancel, so maybe this was the best end they could give it.

I think it reached its peak in the Stalingrad and Kursk episodes (I know some people rave about Bagaration, but I'm just meh.) Kursk, particularly was freakin' epic.

Anyway, I remember reading some spin-off novels back in the seventies (the titles escape me). One was about an invisible American destroyer and the other about Germans going to the moon. Sci-fi, obviously, and very cheesey. Were these ever canon?

The last, Google shows me, is being made into a movie. What, has the copyright expired on the war and anyone can use the characters?

[RickJay]

Originally Posted by Malacandra

You argue very skilfully - it's just that I think you're making a mistake if you assume these writers could write their way out of a bowl of alphabet soup.

I wonder if you noticed a couple of things that were quite subtly handled (yeah, blind squirrel and all that)? The writers would have us believe that the P-51 didn't really get legs until the British put one of their own engines in it. Later (sorry, I don't have your faithful recall of episode numbers and titles! ) we get those same British thinking of putting a kick-ass gun in the Sherman - the conversion was called "Firefly". I haven't yet spotted the English name in the credits, but I wonder how he managed to slip that past the rest of the team.

You're thinking of Episode 3.04, "Europe Ablaze."

I kind of liked the device of the clever British coming up with neat little innovations that the hero gets to use. It was, I thought, a clear tribute to the Q character in James Bond films, with the Americans playing the role of Bond. And in fairness, they're consistent; it's not just in "Europe Ablaze," but also Episode 1.12, "Enigma," and 1.06, "Their Finest Hour," where they talk about radar.

I agree there's just too much of this "Wesley/Geordi come up with a magical technical fix to the problem" stuff; someone already mentioned Episode 2.11, "Dambusters." But for most of the series it was kind of set up that way, with the two sides coming up with these little incremental advantages. In a way that was kind of one of the plot drivers, and that was cool. How many shows have the adversaries winning with their BRAINS, rather than just brawn and sheer luck? Not many.

But when the Americans used this "Atomic bomb" thing, that just nuked my suspension of disbelief, because it didn't fit the pattern of the show; rather than another incremental advantage it's just "well, now we can blow up whole cities. The show's over, folks."

I think they were worried the show was going to be cancelled - it looked really expensive to make - and so they just slapped a quick ending on. It's too bad. I know a guy who knew the producer's assistant, and he got be an unshot script for what would have been Episode 6.01, "Olympic." It was about them invading Japan. It was fucking epic.

[billfish678]

I bet. They could have probably milked the Ninja meme for a couple years at least.

[Lumpy]

They could have at least made the "atomic bomb" plot device halfway believable by having it be a race between the Allies and the Axis to be the first to develop one, with America just barely in time, what with the whole "Nazi superweapons" thing. At a minimum I expected that Hitler would detonate the first prototype in Berlin and go out in a gotterdammerung blaze of glory. But to have it turn out that the Nazis were never even close, because Hitler didn't believe in "Jewish physics"?

[Malacandra]

Anyone else feel the "desperate improvisation by plucky British" card was overplayed to exhaustion? Someone mentioned the business with the torpedo biplanes already, but what about one of the few episodes I can remember by name, "Chariots Afire" (oh please). It was all about denying the Germans use of a big French dock on the Atlantic coast. Fine, a seaborne raid, lots of flashes, bangs, men rushing ashore, demolition sequences and impressive-looking models getting blown up in an interesting fashion, I've no quarrel with that. Only the writers plainly decided that it would be much too straightforward like that, so, if you please, what we're going to have is a Lend-Lease destroyer gutted, stuffed with explosives, rammed into the dock gates, while the supporting commandos come ashore from launches. Wooden launches with petrol engines. They're floating Ronsons that go up if you look at them funny. I mean, this is all meant to be going down in the mid 20th century, am I right?

I literally ed at the part where Admiral Karl Dönitz inspects St Nazaire the day before the raid and actually asks about plans for an enemy commando raid, only to be told "Oh, that would never happen, Herr Admiral - it would be far too dangerous for them to try". Cliche much, scriptwriters?

I suppose if you like that kind of thing, loads of boats blowing up in flames in the teeth of what look like hundreds of coastal gun emplacements and the sight of this wrecked ship with the bomb aboard waiting to blow while the commandos are scurrying around demolishing anything in sight, it's all right, but you get tired of watching the death-toll mounting like it was a Bloons game, and the closing credits solemnly informing us that five Victoria Crosses were awarded, two of them posthumous, along with 80-odd other medals, was just blatant heart-string tugging. I mean, seriously, who trains up an elite strike force only to see more than a quarter of it buy the farm and another third taken prisoner?

[Disposable Hero]

I don't know, while I enjoyed the series I couldn't really suspend disbelief regarding the whole 'Hitler' character. I mean if you're going for cartoonish over-the-top supervillianary at least get someone that looks the part.

Or perhaps it was concious irony on the writers part, I mean could they have found anyone who was less like a supposed leader of the blonde-haired blue-eyed Aryan master-race?

Roosevelt was interesting but I thought they played up the emotional heart-string tugging with the constant hints about his ill-health and subtle references to his wheelchair a little too much, whoever played the Churchill character looks like he had a lot of fun though with his rousing speeches and providing some occassional comic-relief.

Stalin was kind of cool but its just a pity that they killed him off, I would suggest thats a significent reason why the sequel got cancelled. Although the comedy mini-series 'Kruschev Does America' had its moments.

[Rick]

The entire thing about the Japanese not setting their depth charges to go off deep enough until a member of the US Congress mentioned this fact, and the Japanese then started setting their depth charges deeper causing more sub losses it just crazy.
That could never happen in real life.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by RickJay

You're thinking of Episode 3.04, "Europe Ablaze."

I kind of liked the device of the clever British coming up with neat little innovations that the hero gets to use. It was, I thought, a clear tribute to the Q character in James Bond films, with the Americans playing the role of Bond. And in fairness, they're consistent; it's not just in "Europe Ablaze," but also Episode 1.12, "Enigma," and 1.06, "Their Finest Hour," where they talk about radar.

I agree there's just too much of this "Wesley/Geordi come up with a magical technical fix to the problem" stuff; someone already mentioned Episode 2.11, "Dambusters." But for most of the series it was kind of set up that way, with the two sides coming up with these little incremental advantages. In a way that was kind of one of the plot drivers, and that was cool. How many shows have the adversaries winning with their BRAINS, rather than just brawn and sheer luck? Not many.

But when the Americans used this "Atomic bomb" thing, that just nuked my suspension of disbelief, because it didn't fit the pattern of the show; rather than another incremental advantage it's just "well, now we can blow up whole cities. The show's over, folks."

I think they were worried the show was going to be cancelled - it looked really expensive to make - and so they just slapped a quick ending on. It's too bad. I know a guy who knew the producer's assistant, and he got be an unshot script for what would have been Episode 6.01, "Olympic." It was about them invading Japan. It was fucking epic.

All those tech jumps really were ripped off from E.E. "Doc" Smith anyway.

[Malacandra]

We mentioned tokenism earlier - the lady riveters, the Black airmen, and so on - but did anyone spot a really glaring example from one of the early episodes? Not long after the outbreak of war, there's this English guy demanding to be "re-enlisted" to the R.A.F. as a fighter pilot despite being, if you please, a double amputee. That's right - he's had both his legs cut off. And, of course, in due deference to the differently able community, he's got to be not just a fighter pilot but a brilliant one, an inspirational leader, and eventually to be spotted, if you're paying attention, leading the victory flypast in London after Germany's been defeated.

Technical hint, guys: fighter planes also have control pedals.

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by Malacandra

We mentioned tokenism earlier - the lady riveters, the Black airmen, and so on - but did anyone spot a really glaring example from one of the early episodes? Not long after the outbreak of war, there's this English guy demanding to be "re-enlisted" to the R.A.F. as a fighter pilot despite being, if you please, a double amputee. That's right - he's had both his legs cut off. And, of course, in due deference to the differently able community, he's got to be not just a fighter pilot but a brilliant one, an inspirational leader, and eventually to be spotted, if you're paying attention, leading the victory flypast in London after Germany's been defeated.

Technical hint, guys: fighter planes also have control pedals.

Wow, I missed that episode, but it actually sounds pretty cool and amazing the way they pulled it all off.

[RealityChuck]

I hated when they invaded North Africa at "Casablanca," as a blatant product plug for the movie.

[GIGObuster]

Originally Posted by RealityChuck

I hated when they invaded North Africa at "Casablanca," as a blatant product plug for the movie.

Yeah, even then comedians that were not part of the movie complained:

"England is the place that Churchill visits when he leaves America. That man travels so much. He's been in Casablanca more than Humphrey Bogart."
-Bob Hope.

[Boyo Jim]

To be fair to the movie, I thought Bernard Montgomery was a perfect comic relief foil -- your typical arrogant yet incompetent blowhard English aristocrat. But they went too far in putting him in charge of all Allied ground forces -- I mean, who would buy it?

And him proposing the whole Arnhem "bridge too far" adventure? I can see him fucking it up, but not actually proposing it or advocating for it.

[Ike Witt]

It isn't a plot hole, but I do have a complaint about wardrobe. Clearly, they went all out with the designer Nazi threads. They were stylish and let you know they were evil at the same time. However, it seems the budget was blown by using Hugo Boss and the allied troops ended up with stock uniforms.

And wasn't there something about the English wearing shorts and pith helmets? In a shooting war? Somebody dropped the ball there.

[kunilou]

Originally Posted by Lumpy

They could have at least made the "atomic bomb" plot device halfway believable by having it be a race between the Allies and the Axis to be the first to develop one, with America just barely in time, what with the whole "Nazi superweapons" thing. At a minimum I expected that Hitler would detonate the first prototype in Berlin and go out in a gotterdammerung blaze of glory. But to have it turn out that the Nazis were never even close, because Hitler didn't believe in "Jewish physics"?

The whole "atomic bomb" storyline was just an excuse to open up the movie for some location shots that didn't fit anywhere else -- Princeton, Chicago, the Tennessee Mountains, that really good shot of the New Mexico desert. I'm surprised they didn't throw in a beach scene.

[RickJay]

Originally Posted by Boyo Jim

To be fair to the movie, I thought Bernard Montgomery was a perfect comic relief foil -- your typical arrogant yet incompetent blowhard English aristocrat. But they went too far in putting him in charge of all Allied ground forces -- I mean, who would buy it?

And him proposing the whole Arnhem "bridge too far" adventure? I can see him fucking it up, but not actually proposing it or advocating for it.

I liked this part, though. Again, there's an element of the randomness and capriciousness of fate going on, but I think the idea here is that the loudest blowhards on both sides tended to be flawed; Montgomery was shown to be pretty skilled in episode 2.06, "Road To Tunisia," and you saw a lot of weird pros and cons with guys like Patton and the dude in the Pacific story, whatshisname, MacMurray? McDonald? Something. The louder or more pompous they were the dumber they were.

The QUIET guys were the really superior leaders; Guderian, Omar Bradley, and the Japanese guy from the Pacific story... Yanamoro? Yana something. The one who died in the plane crash; it's in Episode 3.02, "Islands of Blood." There's a message of substance over style, sizzle over steak.

[Mr. Kobayashi]

The cast change for the British PM in the last episode. Can anyone even remember the name of the guy? Churchill wins the British the war and we're supposed to believe that in the first election they get they vote him out! At least Roosevelt had a poignant death scene as opposed to being unceremoniously put on a bus.

Rumour has it that the producers finally got tired of the drinking on set in a case of real life writes the plot.

[Boyo Jim]

Originally Posted by Mr. Kobayashi

The cast change for the British PM in the last episode. Can anyone even remember the name of the guy? Churchill wins the British the war and we're supposed to believe that in the first election they get they vote him out! At least Roosevelt had a poignant death scene as opposed to being unceremoniously put on a bus.

Rumour has it that the producers finally got tired of the drinking on set in a case of real life writes the plot.

They should have reversed the finales for Roosevelt and Churchill. It just seems so much more American to tell the guy in charge, "Yeah, you won the war, but that was last week. What have you done for me this week?"

[RickJay]

Sorry, I had some of my episode numbers and titles mixed up. Here is the full list:

SEASON 1

1.01 “The Corporal” (2-hour pilot)
1.02 “Uncle Joe”
1.03 “Poland, My Poland”
1.04 “Phoney War”
1.05 “Right Man, Right Time”
1.06 “The Quisling”
1.07 “Through The Ardennes”
1.08 “Off The Beach”
1.09 “Their Finest Hour”
1.10 “Desert Crossing”
1.11 “Axis of the Willing”
1.12 “A Storm In The East”

SEASON 2
2.01 “June 22, 1941”
2.02 “The Arsenal of Democracy”
2.03 “The Land of the Rising Sun”
2.04 “The Frozen Army”
2.05 “East Wind, Rain”
2.06 “Siege”
2.07 “Midway”
2.08 “The Two Deserts”
2.09 “Enigma”
2.10 “Blood In the River, Part I”
2.11 “Blood in the River, Part II”
2.12 “The Final Solution”

SEASON 3
3.01 “From Carthage to Rome”
3.02 “A Thousand Tanks”
3.03 “Ironbottom Sound”
3.04 “Europe Ablaze”
3.05 “Il Duce E Deposto”
3.06 “Scorched Earth”
3.07 “Geysers of Blood”
3.08 “Italian Sun”
3.09 “Kursk”
3.10 “Rosie the Riveter”
3.11 “Forward, Comrades”
3.12 “Thousand Bomber Raid”

SEASON 4
4.01 “Across A Frozen Lake”
4.02 “A Little Girl’s Diary”
4.03 “From Tuskegee To Ramitelli”
4.04 “The Jungles Of Burma”
4.05 “The First U.S. Army Group’s Inflatable Tank Division”
4.06 “Crusade”
4.07 “Bagration”
4.08 “Bocage Country”
4.09 “Kamikaze!”
4.10 “Resistance”
4.11 “Camps”
4.12 “Vive La France”

SEASON 5
5.01 “The Manhattan Project”
5.02 “Lieutenant Volkov’s T-34”
5.03 “A Bridge Too Far”
5.04 “A Starving Nation, And On Fire”
5.05 “Down In The Bunker”
5.06 “Nuts”
5.07 “How To Divide The World”
5.08 “The Road To Berlin”
5.09 “Across the Rhine”
5.10 “Black Sand”
5.11 “Next to the Body of His Poisoned Dog”
5.12 “…And I Remember, From the Bhagavad Gita”

[Bumbershoot]

Jeez, you guys are picky. I thought it was pretty good myself. Yes, there were a few plot holes. And a few cliches (the good guys win in the end, the hero gets the girl).

But there was some good acting- the Roosevelt character and the Churchill character both delivered some pretty good monologues. And I liked the special effects, especially considering they used no CGI.

I did get tired of the endless reruns on The History Channel. In fact, I quit watching that channel years ago because of it. Is it still playing?

[RealityChuck]

Another problem was with the whole Manhattan project subplot. Here you had the greatest scientific brain of all time (at least, this Einstein character was portrayed as such), the one who tells the president that the US needed to build the superweapon, and who was kicked out of Germany after being persecuted by the Nazis and has every reason to want them defeated, yet you don't ask him to take part at all.

And there was that ship -- the Normandy or something -- that caught fire in New York harbor in the middle of the war, and they claimed it wasn't sabotage. Right.

It also seemed strange that they rounded up all the Japanese-Americans and put them into camps, yet didn't do the same for the German-Americans.