The Pacific (TV Show)

[Crimguy]

I liked it. The girl was hot.

[John Lansford]

They're chronicling the story of the 1st Marine Division as seen through the eyes of Sledge and Leckie.  The division was sent back to Melbourne to rebuild after Guadalcanal, and it was a big deal for the men.  I've got no problem with this episode, it's basically Leckie's story on what he did there.  I reread this part of "Helmet for my Pillow" after it was over, the entire episode could have been lifted out of his book (other than Basilone's parts).  He did get stood up by her so she and her parents wouldn't suffer if (when) he got killed, he did get stinking drunk and pull a gun on an officer, he did go to the brig, and he did get reassigned to a recon company.
 
I agree that Leckie's girlfriend was insanely hot.  While the soft porn scenes were surprising, they weren't exactly unexpected either; this is HBO after all.  Remember the scene in BoB with the German girl in the barn?

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: Crimguy

I liked it. The girl was hot.

A man of few words. I agree! [&o]

[usersatch]

We need more blood, guts, dismemberment, and less tasteful sex scenes with really hot women!

I thought Part 3 was integral to the overall story. If we want to see these guys as men/people, and not as just killing machines, we need to see the "downtime", which includes the obligatory drinking, fighting, sex, etc. to let off steam and decompress. I'm a combat infantry vet, but endured nothing close to Guadalcanal, but had I been there, I know that drinking, fighting, and sex would have been a really big part of my story! lol

I have not read the books upon which this series is based on, and correct me if I'm wrong, but I suspect that the scene where he gets dumped by the Aussie girl plays a factor later on in the story.

[sfbaytf]

I think in this crowd character development means scenes of boot camp where the main characters are subjected to copious amounts of abuse heaped on them by overzealous DI's.

I think episode 3 will play into the next episode-4. If I correctly interpreted what I saw in the previews of the next episode one of the characters who found love while on leave in Australia finally has enough of killing and war in Bougainville and decides he wants out.

[John Lansford]

I think they put in an episode in Melbourne so we can see just how terrible their next "recovery" base is after they go to Cape Gloucester.  In every book I've read, Pavuvu is mentioned with disgust, hate and loathing, and even after the Marines return there after Pelieliu it was still thought of as a hellhole (even though it was much improved).

[Crimguy]

I agree that it was needed to finally give some character development. I particularly like how they portrayed Basilone as a somewhat reluctant hero. Unlike most stories which glorify the heroes to the point of deity-status, in Basilone we see him as one of many very brave soldiers during the Guadalcanal campaign. His act of heroism, while selfless, bordered on crazy. Perhaps that's what it takes to distinguish oneself to such an extent . . .

His drinking and (almost) taking the MP's jeep was very good stuff indeed.

As for Leckie - it was a bit melodramatic, but I felt for the guy which is rare coming from a cynical d**khead like me. There's been absolutely no character development until this episode, and they didn't do the obligatory boot camp episode. I might have preferred backstory in the way Oliver Stone did it in Platoon - their acts in the field defined their character. But this was ok. I'm sure we'll get back to fighting next week.

[sfbaytf]

Interesting...the sound of silence after episode 4, just like 3. No question the pace and overall action is far different than Band of Brothers. In BoB you had the first episode deal with character development and the rest was pretty much non stop action till the last episode. I thought 4 was good and fit into the overall scheme of things. Overall TP does have a feel that is different. Non sure if the pace and feel is what many were expecting though. The last 2 kinda does have something of a soap opera feel to it.

From the looks of the preview of 5, it may be getting back on track to what many wanted to see-lots of intense fighting and battle scenes.

[witpqs]

There is good and bad. Overall, though, the show gives the feeling of a series of text messages. Although in places good, continuity is quite bad.

Also, various passages critical to the feelings of the Marines and the hardships they faced are just too short to really drill the point home. Just one example is the battleship bombardment - how many seconds was that in the show? If they really wanted to drive home the impact it should have been at least twice as long. As it was - text message! Over in a flash. Did not put the matter across.

[Kwik E Mart]

mid way thru the 4th episode all i could think of was Hawkeye and the shrink he called Sigmund Freud...

[John Lansford]

I expected this one to be slow; after the Melbourne episode, the next one logically would be Cape Gloucester and Pavuvu.  Since the story is being told from the eyes of Leckie and Sledge, and Sledge isn't with the division yet, episode 4 was all Leckie, all the time. 

What's interesting is I'm reading the book "Islands of the Damned" by R.V. Burgin, who was the platoon leader of the mortar team Sledge was in.  He described Sledge as being too dangerous around a mortar to do anything but carry ammo, so that's what he did on Peleliu and Okinawa. 

[witpqs]

Just finished Sledge's With the Old Breed. He tells it differently. Nothing aggrandizing himself, but several accounts of him doing way more with mortars than carrying ammo.

[usersatch]

A brilliant idea to "rest and refit" them on a rat and mosquito infested island! Were they positioned there as a quick reaction force or were transports so scarce they couldn't put them a little southward?

[xj900uk]

Just seen the first (double) eppy on Sky 1, UK. Interesting & thought provoking, not least of which is the unsophisticated nature of the Japanese tactics - ie fix bayonets and charge straight at the USMC positions, especially if they have a heavy mg. The Japanese had better training, gear (ie combat clothing, boots), equipment (special light-weight motars, collapsable/portable light/medium artillery) for jungle fighting than the Allies, yet they couldn't come up with anything better than a good old-fashioned frontal assault at heavily defended positions. That idea didn't work in WWI and it certianly didn't at Guadalcanal, either.
On the other hand, the programme has got this dead right. All the US accoutns of island fighting with the Japanese say that the opposition hardly ever tried anything sophisticated or different, and would often suffer tremendously heavy casualties by repeated almost suicidal fixed-bayonet-type attacks against strongly fortified positions.
All over SE Asia the Japanese would usually use this crude/blunt tactic, it only ever really worked well intially in Burma and the DEI in 41/early 42, where the Dutch and Commonwealth troops would more often than not retreat quickly in something approaching panic long before they ever saw their first Japanese. However, the USMC troops even if not as experienced or as well trained/equiped as their Japanese numbers (at least in '42, training got better with experience over the course of the war) were of a rather different mettle to what the Japanes had encountered before...

[usersatch]

As crude as their tactics were, they almost worked in several battles.

You have to give some credit to the Japanese, though. As rigid as their military thinking was, they certainly adapted to what needed to be done as evidenced by the proportional rise in US casualties for all future landings in the Central Pacific.

Scary to think about the possible number of American casualties had the Japanese used tactics similar to ours, or at least something other than human wave attacks as a primary offensive tactic, at Guadalcanal.

[sfbaytf]

I watched a show recently about the Malay Campaign and it gave alot of credit to the IJAs use of bicycles, flanking tactics and ability to cross obsticles like rivers quickly using primative methods. I would guess like any army, much depended on he skill and imagination of their leaders and ability to adapt. If at Guadalcanal the Japanes were lead by the same leader that ran the Malay Campaign-Gen Yamishita would they have used the same frontal charge tactics

[witpqs]

The best of their plans for coordinated attacks were thwarted by difficulties in communications and movement. While they could have been more flexible and thereby performed better even under the circumstances, some of their attacks would have been far more effective, maybe devastating, if things had gone just a bit closer to their plans.

[usersatch]

Do you think any of it (their lack of tactical soundness on Guadalcanal) had to do with their disdain and arrogance towards allied troops? Up until then, besides little old Wake Island and Corrigedor (sp?), who put up a hard fight against them? Perhaps they thought it would be a "cake walk" so they got lazy in their planning and execution. On paper, they should have mopped up the island fairly easily.

Anyone read anything about the Solomons from the Japanese point of view to confirm/deny?

[LoBaron]

ORIGINAL: usersatch

Do you think any of it (their lack of tactical soundness on Guadalcanal) had to do with their disdain and arrogance towards allied troops? Up until then, besides little old Wake Island and Corrigedor (sp?), who put up a hard fight against them? Perhaps they thought it would be a "cake walk" so they got lazy in their planning and execution. On paper, they should have mopped up the island fairly easily.

Anyone read anything about the Solomons from the Japanese point of view to confirm/deny?

If you mean by disdain and arrogance lack of planning for beyond the first part of expansion (in the hope for an Allied capitulation), lack of training in defensive warfare against a superior opponent,
a command system that was more harsh and brutal than anything an allied soldier would have ever experienced up to then and a samurai spirit that believed in the invincibility of aggression and the
preparedness to die, then I´d answer with yes.

[usersatch]

I guess thats what I meant LOL