The Pacific

I couldn't tell you how many times I have watched Band of Brothers. I think it is the best production ever made. However, I resisted watching The Pacific. My father had five years active duty in the Marine Corps when I was born, and remained on active duty until I was 30 years old. I was ten when he left for Viet Nam, the first time, and in high school the next. I had friends whose fathers were seriously wounded, or killed, there. I have always felt like Marines are family, and any depiction of them being killed has always been hard to see. However, I finally decided to "man-up" and watch it, on Veteran's Day this year.

I think BoB was a dream come true for the producers. They had ironclad characters to follow all the way through, and many of the men were still alive and took part in it. The story of Easy company had been put into book form, brilliantly. They didn't have that with The Pacific. The closest they could come was to base it all around three separate men; Robert Leckie,Eugene Sledge and John Basilone. The three men's paths crossed, some,but they did not belong to the same units or know each other, although Leckie and Sledge both knew Basilone's reputation.

As brutal and difficult as the war in Europe was, the Pacific war against the Japanese was almost incomprehensible. Except for their time in Australia, following Guadalcanal, they were fighting the most brutal fights in history, while in the most punishing places on earth.It is a wonder that any of them were ever able to return to civilization and dull the memories of those horrors enough to lead a more or less normal life.

Because of the brutality of both the enemy and the conditions they had to live and fight under, there isn't much in the way of light-heartedness. The Pacific is not as enjoyable as BoB. Anyone seeing it for the first time should not expect to be entertained. It is a bit more difficult to get into. I found it helpful to watch the first episode twice before going on. A little patience in getting to know the primary characters payed off. I also think being able to watch it all over the course of a few days, like I did, was much better than watching it as it was first presented, one episode each week for ten weeks.

There were some excellent performances in The Pacific. Someone else singled out Ravi Malek's portrayal of Merriel "Snafu" Sheldon as award worthy and I agree 100%! I loved William Sadler as LtCol. Lewis "Chesty" Puller, and I was also very impressed with Tom Budge as PFC Ronnie Gibson.

The three primary characters are portrayed worthily. I didn't think Joe Mazzello as Sledge developed his character as well as the other two. However, I ended up with only nine episodes on my DVR. The one I am missing is episode five, which I suspect is centered on Sledge, so perhaps the character will seem better developed to me after I see it. Jon Seda gave a fine performance as John Basilone, which was definitely the roll of a lifetime! I think my favorite of the three was James Badge Dale, as Bob Leckie.

I wasn't as depressed by seeing a portrayal of so many Marines being killed and wounded as I expected. That was partly because not many of them really looked like Marines to me. I have always said that you can put an actor in the Marine Corps uniform but you usually can't make him look like a Marine. There were a few, though, who were totally believable including Jon Seda. Others have commented on the length of the men's hair as being distracting and/or inaccurate. By my first memories, in the mid-late 50s, Marines were wearing the crew-cuts and flat-tops that they have worn ever since. However, I have pictures of my dad in uniform, from a decade earlier, with longer hair, so I think the producers knew what they were doing there.

Although I agree with most posters here, that The Pacific is not as good as BoB, it is still well-done and definitely worth seeing. I think watching it with an open mind, and avoiding comparisons, it is a good way to approach it.

One last comment I have is that I wonder why one young Marine, who was killed on Iwo Jima at age 17, was singled out in the tributes at the end. I assume they meant that to symbolize the thousands of young men who were killed, and it was very effective, IMO. But I would be interested to know why they chose the one they did; if perhaps someone involved in the production was a relative of the young man. I won't say his name for those who might not have seen it yet, but I will always remember it.

The Pacific miniseries will leave many of you in a state of awe. What a cinematic achievement. The best of the best of what American entertainment has to offer. The scenes and emotions portrayed are so vivid and lifelike that you'll think you've been transported back in time to the pacific theater of war. History has told us how horrid the war against the Japanese was. A war of attrition. This series will take you there and slap you on the wrists and then the face and remind you of the truth. War is utter diabolical hell. And the guys that fought in the pacific during WW2 were tough as nails. Tougher. It's ugly and beautiful at the same time. Enjoy and take a history lesson. You'll thank your lucky stars you did.

I'm guessing most of us watched 'The Pacific' for at least one of the following 3 reasons:

1. We have an interest in history, particularly in WW2.

2. We are fans of movies and television shows (well, the good ones anyway)

3. We had seen - and loved - the previous Hanks/Spielberg co-production 'Band Of Brothers' and expected a mini-series on the same level.

Now from reading some of the reviews here I gather that third reason was the most important one for many viewers - and it's also why 'The Pacific' apparently left quite a few people disappointed. As for me, I wasn't disappointed - I was devastated.

I'm a lucky man; I've never had to suffer through a war. But I had relatives who did, and though they're all long gone now, I'll never forget their stories. War is the most extreme and outrageous experience humans can possibly endure, but there are many different aspects and layers to it, because a war is not a single experience: it's all the experiences of all the individuals who have to suffer through it, and no single film or TV show can cover all of them. 'Band Of Brothers' focused on certain aspects of a war, and it chose a narrative that helped emphasize what the core theme of the series was: the brotherhood of war. It was about people who retain their humanity and form the closest of bonds under the worst, most horrific circumstances.

That inherently human element in 'BoB' was also why we could identify so well with the protagonists, and why we were - and still are - so deeply touched by what they had to go through. It's an outstandingly well made series, and I can't imagine how those experiences by those soldiers could have been portrayed better. Which is why 'The Pacific' doesn't even try. Instead, it goes almost in the opposite direction by choosing to focus on the sheer insanity of war: the relentless horror and despair of people losing their humanity and their struggle to regain it. Of course, just like 'BoB' it's also about the heroic sacrifices of those brave soldiers, but if there is a core theme in 'The Pacific' it's that of trauma: the trauma of having your humanity stripped from you and your personality shattered; the trauma of witnessing the complete disintegration of everything you thought you were and knowing you'll never be whole again.

What we see in 'The Pacific' is Hell, plain and simple. It's scores and scores of anonymous, young Japanese soldiers running senselessly into machine gun fire, wave after wave, until the piles of their bodies are so high they block the sight for the machine gun; it's American soldiers barely older than kids in despair or completely numb from the sheer amount of random death around them; it's vibrant young men turning into barely alive husks whose only remaining focus is to survive - which means they have to kill other barely alive young men who will stop at nothing to kill them in turn; it's kids killing other kids like rats by any means at their disposal: guns, knives, flame-throwers or with their bare hands; it's people living among the rotting corpses of their dead comrades and enemies and completely losing any regard for human life. And the few moments where we witness how those kids get a brief taste of how precious and beautiful life could be make their fate all the more heartbreaking.

Over large stretches, 'The Pacific' is devastating and depressing to watch, and though I found it never less than compelling, it's actually easy to see why many viewers who had hoped for a similarly engaging experience as in 'BoB' were left disappointed. But this is a different story about different people who fought in a different theater of the war and who went through different experiences, and once you stop comparing it to the story of the men in Easy Company from 'BoB', you'll find that, while different, in terms of sheer quality 'The Pacific' is every bit as good and as much of an outstanding achievement as its more popular predecessor.

The realism, the performances, the music and the production values in the series are superb (this was a 200 million production after all), and the attention to historic detail is simply staggering. As for me, witnessing what these men went through left me devastated; yet I am grateful I've watched 'The Pacifc': because in its relentless depiction of the horrors of war it honors the sacrifice these brave young soldiers made in the hope future generations wouldn't have to do the same. I originally rated this series 9 stars out of 10, but upon a recent rewatch and with more knowledge of the war in the Pacific theater, it's clear that this is a 10/10. Outstanding.

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I enjoyed this series very much and can see why there has been so many comparisons with Band Of Brothers. My observation is that in The Pacific many of the characters lack depth and development. The result was that I cared less when ill befell them than I did in Band of Brothers. I think that the first episode could have contained a lot more time letting us get to know the characters better before throwing them into battle.

The battle scenes were done very well and played very realistically. All in all HBO has done it again. Without the HBO and Showtime I think that US grown TV drama would be pretty thin on the ground. The Pacific is well worth the time.

The war in the Pacific was a hell of a lot different than the war in Europe. Of course both where terrible - full of death, sacrifice, and heroism. However, it seems the soldier's stories from the European theater have gotten a lot more press.

The US Marines in the Pacific lived like animals in the most horrible environments imaginable. On top of fighting an enemy committed to kill them at all cost and never surrender, they battled the mud, heat, malaria, near starvation, and isolation for months on end.

Basically, it was a total nightmare, and the heroism of all the US Marines in the Pacific theater is nothing short of awe inspiring. The Pacific tells this story well. It is a must see on the topic of WW2.