The Official Disappointed in the Pacific thread

[BenVK]

Let's not beat about the bush, The Pacific was a huge disappointed to me and I guess to a lot of other people too. I don't think I've ever expected soo much and got so little in terms of a movie or TV series.
Don't get me wrong, BoB set such a high benchmark that I was already expecting to be slightly let down by the P, but I really didn't expect to be switching channels in the middle of an episode because I was literally falling asleep.

How did they get it so wrong? They had everything in their favour and so much money at their disposal, it beggers belief how they couldn't have made a better job of it.

In the UK, the final episode finished a week or so ago on Sky. Out of the 10 episodes, I missed 2 and I can honestly say I'm not bothered about missing them at all.

Even the girlfriend who is not interested in the battle scenes at all said of the rest, "this is so dull, how many minutes of this thing are they going to waste on some guy or girl staring into space?"
That sums it up for me.

[Jeff V]

I totally agree! A massive strikeout. I hoped for and expected greatness based on the glorious previous works by those involved only to, week after week become, more and more dissappointed. One excellent episode, some so-so ones and a lot of crap.
best wishes,
jeff

[Robert Shoaf]

Ben, sadly, I must agree with you; a MAJOR disappointment. It's been 3 weeks or so since the last episode aired, and I have not given it a second thought since.
Yes, indeed BoB set the bar very high, but there didn't seem to any really compelling characters in "The Pacific", a 'la Dick Winters, save perhaps John Basilone. Leckie seemed to be a complaining pain in the ass, and Sledge an overly sensitive, emotional wreck. I don't believe they were like that in real life, so what gives?
To me, the 1st Marine Division, arguably the United States finest division sized formation of WWII, deserved much better.

Bob Shoaf

[Federico Perez]

This miniseries was a compleat floop and quite a waste of time and money, they really missed the point that in the Pacific combat front the order of the day was BATTLES,BATTLES AND MORE BATTLES, brutal, without quarters and going to the edge of reality, war is hell and if you add malaria,jungle critters,mosquitos and the unforgiving heat and humidity....you can add a big PLUS to the "hell in paradise" that the pacific front was, in my very personal opinion, the Pacific miniseries was like the latest movie Pearl Harbor, a production that laked respect for the events to the valor, sacrifices,hardship and actual historical accuracy of the real events......who ever decided to put a love story triangle in one of the most desisive moments in WW2 and American history, should be whipped....HARD!!!.......with all it's faults I still take TORA,TORA,TORA ANY day over that crap Pearl Harbor movie....the same goes for BoB over the Pacific.

Who ever see this crapy Pacific miniseries and don't follow WW2 history/events will assume that the war in the pacific front was a walk in the park compared with the european front......again if the viewer saw BoB miniseries combat actions after combat actions to compare agains the Pacific lack of them!!!!.

[redjames2004]

The Pacfic miniseries

I just finished watching the first part of the Pacific miniseries over the weekend. What a big DISAPPOINTMENT!!! It last only 65 minutes! I will give a try at part two to final part of that Pacific miniseries. I clearly prefer the Band of Brothers miniseries which was much better!

[kale010]

I can only agree with all of you. I only watched five episodes and I can't be bothered anymore with the remaining episodes.

I think there are a couple of things why this series gives people like us a bad feeling.

First of all I believe that allmost everybody saw this as Band of Brothers 2. Everybody must have had the same expectations after seeing band of brothers.

Second, Ambrose wrote the book Band of brothers and it was a perfect story to tell in the way HBO did. The result was a lot of cash for HBO. The Pacific is a story created from two seperate books. Therefore I say that this series is created for the money and the money only. Funny thing is that the son of Ambrose wrote the book: The Pacific.

Third, A story that big cannot be told in ten episodes. My opinion is that the Guadalcanal episode went way to fast. And what about the part they were in Melbourne. 50 minutes of sex between a soldier and an aussie. I thought that was not interesting at all.

I think my conclusion is The Pacific is created with the wrong ideas behind it and that's money and money only. Band of Brothers had a result and that was money.

There is one good thing I want to say about the Pacific. The casting was great again!

Bob

[Jürg]

well at least the Peleliu episodes as well as Okinawa was good in my opinion. I also dont understand why they did not focus on the Sledge book instead of focusing on 3 different charakters.

So Peleliu and even more Okinawas would have been covered with more episodes instead of only one. If you read "With the old breed" the Okinaea carnage was even worse as Peleliu also because of the constant rain!

Not sure yet if I will buy the DVD. I really hope they can finish the movie "No better place to die" which is on the Battle of the La Fiere bridge in Normandy -Bob Murphys story.

Jürg

[Federico Perez]

well at least the Peleliu episodes as well as Okinawa was good in my opinion. I also dont understand why they did not focus on the Sledge book instead of focusing on 3 different charakters.

So Peleliu and even more Okinawas would have been covered with more episodes instead of only one. If you read "With the old breed" the Okinaea carnage was even worse as Peleliu also because of the constant rain!

Not sure yet if I will buy the DVD. I really hope they can finish the movie "No better place to die" which is on the Battle of the La Fiere bridge in Normandy -Bob Murphys story.

Jürg

Several WW2 "mega" film projects are on hold at the moment in the film industry, mostly because of the economy and the "limited to male" interest subject....no joke... this are the reasons several studio executive have put forward to cancel,cut budgets or do terrible rewrites or WW2 "based" stories...ala Inglorius Bastards.

Those are the reasons we got that atrosity of a movie Pearl Harbor and it's love story triangle.....by the way this same director/producer have the right and is planiing to do a remake of "To Kill Rommel"

And on this poor miniseries The Pacific. the only thing I am really sorry about is that at least the technical/movie teams did their best with the limited resurces the producers/studio give them for a subject of this historical importance and relevance in WW2.

[stgeorge64]

I have to say 'Pacific' pales in comparison to 'Band Of Brothers' in every department.

It certainly lacks the intensity of it's forebear and just does not have the grit to keep my attention and convince a later purchase on DVD.

Furthermore, the quote in episode 1 where the Marine Commander is briefing his men prior to landing on Guadalcanal (along these lines) "Forget Hitler and Mussolini, thats for the Europeans.......until they can't whip them without us"

Enough said really, a 'snipe' even in the first episode.

Regards Richard.

[PEVO]

what a bummer. Iv'e only seen the first one & now i'm glad(no HBO) i havn't seen any more... sounds like such a disappointment!

[Jean-Loup]

I only saw a couple of episodes of BOB, and was not particularly impressed. I am not a fan of Spielberg.
I doubt I will ever see the Pacific.

JL

[paddywhack]

you really really really have to wonder just what did they spend that 200 million on?there were no huge huge battles scenes and nothing that i could see that would warrant such a big budget!! i felt it was all over the places and lacked a good story, at the end when they were showing the characters my first thought was "who are these again??" some of the guys they talked about at the end were in it only very very briefly!! what was the point in having so much time devoted to them being on leave!this is a story about the pacfic and they left many many many HUGE battles completely out!! a real waste of time!i will NOT be buying the DVD!!

[Matthew T S]

The Pacific had great visuals and battle scenes, yet very poor characterization which really hurt it. I feel they bit off more than they could chew trying to intertwine three people's stories of which in reality had very little in common other than being Marines. The whole series should have focused on Eugene Sledge and K/3/5, as his book is perfect for mini-series treatment. They could have easily made a feature film about Basilone, which would have been far superior to his treatment by the Pacific as his story felt as if it was "tacked on" at the last minute.

Despite these criticisms I still enjoyed the series, as anything Pacific War related is few and far between compared to ETO movies, series, books, etc.

[SLIM]

just finnished watching all 10 episodies back to back as i recorded them ...and it runs better when watching them like that , Nowhere near enough battle scenes maybe HBO were to blame for this as they funded it and the series had to be made to their liking i suspose ??

[Bond]

I got bored before the end of the first episode and never bothered with the rest of it

Watching BOB again at the moment, very good series and very good book

Jerry