Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland

Wow, what a find. First its a wonderful history of the "troubles" - if you want know the background of how it all started, the conflicting beliefs and views and where all the anger came from it does a great job. But the real tribute to this production is how it does it. Interviewing all sides, exploring all the different perspectives and revealing all the pain, anger and suffering on all sides. The futility of all this hate and violence, the unbearable suffering and pain inflicted by all parties on each other - the sheer waste of so much life. A truly remarkable insight into this terrible period of life in this part of the world. A must watch.

I didn't grow up in Northern Ireland, although the news throughout my childhood was dominated by events in Ulster.

This series is one of the best 'oral history' programmes I've seen. It's like a mini 'World at War' for the 70s, 80s and 90s in Northern Ireland. It features primary accounts from those involved in 'The Troubles' on all sides with the benefit of hindsight.

I watched it with my kids who enthralled. They were horrified at the atrocities that took place in a corner of the United Kingdom just a generation ago. It provided a hard hitting context the the lessons they're taught at school which will hopefully prevent this from happening again.

Terrascotia has taken the trouble in this forum to make a strong argument against this series. I respect that person's point of view but I profoundly disagree with those conclusions.

My wife and I finished watching the series last night and we have both urged our children and others to watch it. We are both 69 years old and lived through the events in Belfast and in Derry.

I never felt that watching this was providing vicarious thrills. Rather I felt that this format presented vividly the experiences of individuals from different traditions in ways which seemed very fresh and honest. There was no attempt to provide a detailed history - this was done very well in the Spotlight series - here it was all about what the Troubles really meant to different people at the time and in retrospect. Some of it was very difficult to listen to but so worthwhile.

Making it about individuals, not just 'sides'. I was grateful for this timely reminder of how awful things were / still are in some ways and especially for giving a voice to victims who tend to be conveniently forgotten in the rush to garner votes.

I was growing up during the time of The Troubles, but I live in America, and I am not Irish, so while I was aware of all of this going on, the immediacy was never there. Also, being an American, there are not a lot of things out there to watch and learn more about The Troubles. Maybe this documentary just barely scratches the surface for some, but for me, it was a very educational experience.

As others have noted, I was also taken aback (but in a good way) at the rawness, authenticity, honesty and the ability to self-reflect of most of the people in this documentary, both Catholics and Protestants alike who discussed their experiences. To me, this was as balanced and down-the-middle as humanly possible, and I also appreciated that very much.

Growing up in 80s in Dublin this was just something that was happening on the news. This brought the reality home to me for the first time. Two hours up the road was so far away back then. This is possibly the most important thing I have ever watched on tv. Mind blowing insight into the ordinary peoples lives at the time. I knew all of these story's but not like this. The emotion of the people talking about the time and the journeys they have been on are incredible. This should be shown to kids all over the world to show how division in a community can bring such hate and murder to the most ordinary of people.