The Long Road Home

I meant to start watching this when it started, but forgot about it. I happened to catch it On Demand and wound up watching the first three episodes in one binge.

It's a good show. Yes, we can sit here and pick apart some of the acting or some of this or some of that, but some of these reviews are just asinine.

Honestly, I think some people could save some time and just write "I hate the military. I hate America. I hate God. I am going to bash this show, no matter what an no matter how ridiculously, unless it changes history to reflect my own personal narrative and wants".

It has a "Blackhawk Down" feel to it. The character development is fairly well done, although not necessarily done in the conventional way.

Grab a cold drink and a snack, sit down and enjoy the show. If you want an agenda driven, $$$$$$ heavy production, go watch a movie from the any major studio.

8 soldiers dead n 65 injured just to shovel shit..... wonders of the western rich elite never seize to amaze me anymore.... rip

I really can't understand all the negative reviews this series has garnered as I really enjoyed it. It's not the best acted but it depicts a true series of events and does an excellent job of showing how badly the American forces had prepared for urban warfare at that time.

Sending an open truck, without a radio and full of troops into streets of multi-storey buildings packed with well armed insurgents is obviously, in hindsight, just madness but that was what the American military did. In a similar fashion the UK sent out unarmoured Land Rover Defenders before finding out that they tended to get blown up by unscrupulous terrorists. Lessons were learned the hard way back then and the series does a good job of showing that.

Yes the "homeland" stuff is occasionally a bit cheesy but people "Get over yourselves!" and see the entire series for, overall, a relatively inexpensive good bit of TV entertainment.

Much of the cinematic coverage of Iraq War was focused on fighting against Saddam's army and the Sunni resistance. This movie focuses on the experience of a U.S. Army unit in the midst of the Shiite area of Sadr City. As such it focuses on the Army's attempt to win "hearts and minds" but also deal with an insurgent threat.

The depictions are gritty and realistic. However, the first couple of episodes have a few glitches. One, it implies that Iraq was considered peaceful prior to the unit's arrival in April 2004, when an active insurgency had been under way since the summer of 2003. Also, members of the unit repeatedly say one the name and rank of one of their fellow soldiers over the radio, which is a big communications security "no-no." However, it does a good job depicting the contemporary military, equipment, uniforms and customs.

Sure the acting isn't great but take it for what it is. It's a series depicting a true event that happened to US soldiers. As a veteran myself and living just down the road from Fort Hood, I think it's crazy the nerve that these keyboard warriors on the internet have. It tells the story well. It shows the front line battles and the battles that happen back home that some shows don't touch.