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The HBO limited series "Band of Brothers" was the most expensive television miniseries at the time, recreating the American military unit Easy Company's European activities during World War II. Executive produced by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, the series provided an expansive and factually grounded account of American combat involvement in Western Europe during the war. Like Spielberg and Hanks' previous collaboration, the award-winning "Saving Private Ryan," "Band of Brothers" was praised for its stellar cast, realistic action, and expert attention towards historical authenticity. The series still sets the bar of quality for military shows, of any conflict, though there are a number of similar shows fans should check out next.

Whether it's other HBO television productions examining various harrowing wars or long-running shows where wartime skirmishes punctuate every episode, there are countless military shows available. The best in the genre strive towards the same level of quality and...

World War II was a global conflict of enormous proportions. Divided between the Axis and Allied powers, each side engaged in numerous battles and faced significant casualties. The war was marked by many devastating events, such as internment camps, the Holocaust, and the dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan. After the war ended, films and television shows were created to help others understand the events of WWII.

With every adaptation of WWII events, accuracy comes into question. The audience typically seeks content that provides deeper sources and authentic stories to gain a better understanding of the war. Although many shows have been produced about WWII, these particular series stand out as the most accurate portrayals of this global conflict.

Related10 Most Underrated WWII Movies

WWII movies are available in abundance for people to watch. But these are the ones that have gone under the radar and deserve more attention.

Jack Hogan, an actor who starred in ABC’s Combat! for 111 episodes, died Dec. 6 of natural causes at his home in Bainbridge Island, Wash. He was 94 years old.

The news was confirmed to Variety by his son West.

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Hogan played Pfc William G. Kirby on Combat!, starring alongside Rick Jason, Vic Morrow and Pierre Jalbert. The show...

Jack Hogan, who most famously played Pfc William G. Kirby on ABC’s WWII-set series Combat!, died in his sleep Wednesday, December 6, according to the curator of an online community dedicated to Combat! He was 94.

Hogan played Pfc Kirby on 111 episodes of the long-running drama opposite Rick Jason, Vic Morrow and Pierre Jalbert. Robert Altman directed many episodes of the show, which was on the air from 1962-1967. It was not unfamiliar terrain: Hogan had been a staff sergeant in Japan during the Korean War.

Combat! was far from Hogan’s only credit.

He made his debut in the 1956 Anthony Quinn-starrer Man From Del Rio, Hogan worked steadily. He had multiple-epsisode arcs on The Rough Riders, Have Gun – Will Travel, Sea Hunt, Lock Up, Bat Masterson, The Lawman and The Rifleman.

After Combat!, Hogan worked steadily for the better part of the next three decades. His credits during...

Jack Hogan, a retired actor who starred in the WWII drama series “Combat!” from 1962 until 1967, died of natural causes on Dec. 6 at his home on Bainbridge Island, Washington, his son West told Variety. He was 94.

Hogan played Pfc William G. Kirby on the ABC series “Combat!,” starring Rick Jason, Vic Morrow and Pierre Jalbert. The show, which ran for five seasons, follows a squad of American soldiers fighting the Germans in France during WWII.

Born Richard Roland Benson, Jr. on Nov. 24, 1929, in Chapel Hill, N.C., Hogan earned his pilot’s license at the age of 16 and joined the Air Force after graduation. He spent four years serving as a staff sergeant in Japan during the Korean War.

After moving to Hollywood, Hogan worked as a lifeguard at the Beverly Hills Hotel and began taking acting classes at the Pasadena Playhouse.

Hogan made his onscreen debut as an uncredited role...

Joan Collins in 'The Bitch': Sex tale based on younger sister Jackie Collins' novel. Author Jackie Collins dead at 77: Surprisingly few film and TV adaptations of her bestselling novels Jackie Collins, best known for a series of bestsellers about the dysfunctional sex lives of the rich and famous and for being the younger sister of film and TV star Joan Collins, died of breast cancer on Sept. 19, '15, in Los Angeles. The London-born (Oct. 4, 1937) Collins was 77. Collins' tawdry, female-centered novels – much like those of Danielle Steel and Judith Krantz – were/are immensely popular. According to her website, they have sold more than 500 million copies in 40 countries. And if the increasingly tabloidy BBC is to be believed (nowadays, Wikipedia has become a key source, apparently), every single one of them – 32 in all – appeared on the New York Times' bestseller list. (Collins' own site claims that a mere 30 were included.) Sex...

Billy Wilder directed Sunset Blvd. with Gloria Swanson and William Holden. Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett movies Below is a list of movies on which Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder worked together as screenwriters, including efforts for which they did not receive screen credit. The Wilder-Brackett screenwriting partnership lasted from 1938 to 1949. During that time, they shared two Academy Awards for their work on The Lost Weekend (1945) and, with D.M. Marshman Jr., Sunset Blvd. (1950). More detailed information further below. Post-split years Billy Wilder would later join forces with screenwriter I.A.L. Diamond in movies such as the classic comedy Some Like It Hot (1959), the Best Picture Oscar winner The Apartment (1960), and One Two Three (1961), notable as James Cagney's last film (until a brief comeback in Milos Forman's Ragtime two decades later). Although some of these movies were quite well received, Wilder's later efforts – which also included The Seven Year Itch...

By Lee Pfeiffer

It was a long road for John Steinbeck's 1947 bestseller The Wayward Bus to make it on to the silver screen. The steamy novel about sexually frustrated people who find themselves on an arduous bus ride over dangerous terrain was considered too steamy to adapt to film. At various stages George Stevens and Howard Hawks were involved in film adaptations that never saw fruition. By the time censorship had been relaxed, it was the late 1950s and Fox finally decided to push the envelope by financing the film at the urging of Darryl F. Zanuck, now an independent producer. What emerged was a pale shadow of once-prestigious product. Gone were Stevens, Hawks and Marlon Brando, who was once attached to the film. Instead, an unknown director, Victor Vicas, convinced Zanuck and Fox to allow him to helm the movie. The cast is still impressive, with two of...

I’ve always been a war film buff, maybe because I grew up with them at a time when they were a regular part of the cinema landscape. That’s why I read, with particular interest, my Sound on Sight colleague Edgar Chaput’s recent pieces on The Flowers of War (“The Flowers of War Is an Uneven but Interesting Chinese Ww II Film” – posted 2/20/12) and The Front Line (The Front Line Rises to the Occasion to Overcome Its Familiarity” – 2/16/12) with such interest. An even more fun read was the back-and-forth between Edgar and Sos’s Michael Ryan over the latter (“The Sound on Sight Debate on Korea’s The Front Line” – 2/12/12), with Michael unimpressed because the movie had “…nothing new to add to the war genre,” and Edgar coming back with “…‘new’ is not always what a film must strive for. So long as it does well what it set out to do…...

Producers Steven Jay Rubin, Steve Mitchell and Dana Walker continue to develop a $35 million feature version of "Combat!", the 1960's ABC TV series about an American infantry squad fighting in France.

Based on a screenplay Mitchell wrote, production will start in Eastern Europe this fall through Jay Rubin's Fast Carrier Pictures.

Created by Robert Pirosh, "Combat!" ran for five seasons on ABC TV, following the soldiers of 'King Company' as they try to fight their way out of France.

Regular cast members included Rick Jason as '2nd Lt. Gil Hanley', Vic Morrow as 'Sgt. "Chip" Saunders', Jack Hogan as 'Pvt. William G. Kirby', Pierre Jalbert as 'Pfc. Paul "Caje" LeMay', Shecky Greene as 'Pvt. Braddock', Steven Rogers as '"Doc" Walton', Conlan Carter as 'Doc', and Dick Peabody as 'Pvt. "Littlejohn'.

"Combat!" continues to air in broadcast syndication throughout the Us and 54 other countries.

"WWII is an 'evergreen' genre,...

In a curious but acutely unpleasant way, the crass snowboarding comedy "Out Cold" is the mutant offspring of those old '60s beach movies in which a bunch of crazy kids take time out from catching a wave to save the clubhouse.

Of course, this being 40 years later, everything has to be more extreme, including the sophomoric high jinks and the limited attention spans of first-time feature directors the Malloys (brothers Brendan and Emmett), who can't seem to hang on to any thread of story lasting longer than one of their music videos.

While the presence of pro boarders doing their thing might be a selling point for enthusiasts, the predominantly lame goings-on will leave others snow-bored. Look for this Touchstone Pictures/Buena Vista Thanksgiving offering -- which is definitely not for the kiddies -- to make a swift butt-stop at the local Blockbuster.

Set in Alaska but shot outside of Vancouver, Jon Zack's slightest hint of a script concerns the exploits of a bunch of snowboarding buddies whose endless good times on Bull Mountain could be seriously curtailed by the death of town founder Papa Muntz (the late Lewis Arquette).

It seems his son Ted (Willie Garson) has up and sold the aging hangout to slick developer John Majors (Lee Majors), who intends to convert it into a shiny ski resort.

But Rick Jason London), Luke (Zach Galifianakis), Anthony (Flex Alexander) and Pig Pen (Derek Hamilton) have other ideas -- including some that have nothing to do with flipping outhouses or having improper conduct with a Jacuzzi jet -- and manage to save the day.

There are a couple of chuckle-worthy gags, but for the most part, a collection of sports bloopers would have been funnier. Essentially the story line is simply killing time before it can cut to another snowboarding sequence or find an excuse for another lovely young woman to peel off her bra (photographed, naturally, from the back in order to preserve the integrity of that PG-13 rating).

On the plus side, the cast appears to be enjoying its winter vacation, and the budget-conscious crew gets the job done with a minimum of fussy flourishes under those impossibly blue Alaskan, er, British Columbian skies.

OUT COLD

Buena Vista

Touchstone Pictures and Spyglass Entertainment

present a Donners' Co. production

a Barber/Birnbaum production

Directors: Brendan Malloy, Emmett Malloy

Screenwriter: Jon Zack

Producers: Lee R. Mayes, Michael Aguilar, Jonathan Glickman

Executive producers: Lauren Shuler Donner, Gary Barber, Roger Birnbaum

Director of photography: Richard Crudo

Production designer: Michael Bolton

Editor: Jeffrey Wolf

Costume designer: Carla Hetland

Music: Michael Andrews

Music supervisor: Laura Z. Wasserman

Color/stereo

Cast:

Rick Rambis: Jason London

Jack Majors: Lee Majors

Ted Muntz: Willie Garson

Luke: Zach Galifianakis

Stumpy: David Koechner

Anthony: Flex Alexander

Jenny: A.J. Cook

Papa Muntz: Lewis Arquette

Pig Pen: Derek Hamilton

Running time -- 89 minutes

MPAA rating: PG-13...