Kevin Costner's the West

Bad news for Kevin Costner it takes a lot more than briefly appearing in a Ken Burns documentary to know how to make an interesting doc. Movie. Aside from any possible financial investment Costner may have made he does not come across remotely interested in the topic. Instead of a craftily constructed script that breaths life into history Costner instead reads from one of those dusty history books with all the dread that most high schoolers feel about their history class. It does provide some mild humour listening to Costner struggle with pronunciations of first nation place names like the way he mispronounced Kekionga 3 different ways. I couldn't make it to the end of the first episode voluntarily. I can only imagine the only audience that watches this series in its entirety are Junior High Schoolers who have been forcibly locked in a classroom and made to watch it.

I had been expecting the premiere of this series, mainly because of Kevin Costner's role in producing it. Sadly to say, I couldn't keep watching the first episode because I caught myself wishing that the narration shifted to the experts' comments or some action. I'm sorry to say it, but Costner's narration was lifeless, boring, no passion or anything. That made the whole thing dull, monotonous. Another thing was that it lacked acting. Too many pictures, too much narration and too little acting. I may give it another chance because the story was interesting and perhaps the whole thing improved after the 20 minutes I saw. Otherwise, I wouldn't stand it.

Yaaaawn. Kevin Costner must have been paid to just put his name in the title. His introductions to each "lesson" (episode) are

For a history series such as this is to work the host should inspire interest in the audience through impassionated oration. Excitement. A clear sense of interest. Costner conveys none of the above.

In point of fact, it seems completely the opposite. Hands in pockets. Monotonous tone of voice. A sense of just passing the time & being done with his lines ASAP. Boredom.

The end result is a docu series that is over before it even started. When Costner has finished speaking, the audience has already stopped listening, agreeing with the boredom of their host. And so it goes that, when the next "expert" begins to speak we are either sleepy, sleeping or completely disinterested.

I did watch all of episode 1 but fell asleep within the first 5-10 minutes. Highly recommend if you need a little nap.

I was looking forward to this series. Unfortunately, Kevin Costner's narration was boring, nasal, and sounded like he wasn't at all interested in the subject.

Despite that, I've watched about half of the first episode and learned a few bits of historical information I hadn't heard before.

It's a real disappointment that this wasn't more well done. There are so many things in this period of American history that are not very well-known by most people - this is a missed opportunity to present a more complete picture of the times and the impact of actions taken on all who were involved, as well as all their descendants.

If I really want to watch something I may finish it just for the informative parts. Otherwise, I know how to solve the problem of not being able to sleep.