Masters of the Air

Billy Fish said:
Just watched the last one, enjoyable enough spoiled slightly by the Yank jingoism and need to shoehorn in too much for show.
Casting generally worked well but I just couldn't take to plastic Elvis, he just didn't suit the part at all.
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to be fair with the wooden script many would have struggled.

I re-watched episode 3 last night and I was cringing at the briefing

''largest Ariel armada the world has ever seen!!!!''

apart from the RAF bomber raids in 1942 then? Schweinfurt/Regensburg = 376 bombers, operation Millennium = c700 bombers flew
 


The aerial stuff is good. The on the ground stuff is a bit meh. Always amazes me when they are trying to shoot the fighters that they didn't hit their own planes.
0verlord44 said:
to be fair with the wooden script many would have struggled.

I re-watched episode 3 last night and I was cringing at the briefing

''largest Ariel armada the world has ever seen!!!!''

apart from the RAF bomber raids in 1942 then? Schweinfurt/Regensburg = 376 bombers, operation Millennium = c700 bombers flew
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Tbf to the writers that's probably the kind of shite the Americans would have come out with.
 
Caught the finale last night. Excellent series, but it doesn't come close to touching Band of Brothers or even The Pacific. It's a very "Hollywood" production I thought, which isn't necessarily a bad thing - it's just a bit more of a spectacle, but I suppose that's the point.
 
the dude said:
Not seen Memphis Belle since it came out! Must have forgotten.
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It's the scene where the big-head co-pilot demand a go on the guns from one of the 'waist' gunners.

He blasts away at an attacking German fighter and in the process saws the whole tail off a B-17 operated by a brand-new, rookie crew who had only just joined the squadron. Tail-less, and uncontrollable, the B-17 goes into a spiraling nose-dive and you hear the trapped crew screaming and crying for help over the intercom as they fall to their deaths.

No idea if it's based on a real-life incident or whether it's a 'composite' gleaned from several different accounts of similar happenings. Horrible, either way.
 
the dude said:
Not seen Memphis Belle since it came out! Must have forgotten.
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It wasn't direct fire though was it?

The co-pilot makes an excuse to go back and "have a go" as a waist gunner, he successfully shoots down an enemy fighter, which then crashes into another bomber and destroys it.

I'm sure there was plenty of "blue on blue" mind1
 
Well seen all episodes now, and the last 2 felt ‘rushed’, enjoyed it overall there were some really great moments but overall feel like it had no ‘guts’ I’ll give it 5 and three quarters out of 7 😜
 
Watched it all now. Like others have said the pacing was just bizarre. Really slow at the start with all the boring hanging around pubs and arguing with British officers then really rushed towards the end when stuff was actually happening.
 
jimb said:
It was ok overall but to me it doesnt seem like the sort of series many will want to rewatch.
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yeah maybe due to the more cinematic approach too it.

I'm on my re-watch now and there's bits that are better and bits that are worse second time around.

The script and much of the acting is wooden and cliche. At times its almost AI feeling

Then theres great moments that feel realistic and gritty, and just for a tiny second, ban of brothers-esque

The casting is like that. Cleven and Egan are cast badly, Crosby and Rosenthal i think are very well cast, written and performed. Especially Rosenthal
 
I’ve now binge watched it and have to say I enjoyed it, probably because I convinced myself I wouldn’t after reading the comments on here. There were however a number of annoyances which you couldn’t escape:

The portrayal of the British as stuck-up, sneering, weedy posh boys at every opportunity was downright annoying. My grandad from Hendon was the polar opposite and he was a member of a bomber crew. Also the Americans were on the whole, good looking, fine specimens of manhood. The photographs of the real life characters at the end told a different story: Buck had a head like a space hopper and Egan looked like the boy from the Mad comics.

The Oxford episode was a complete waste of time. I didn’t see any point in it, and it just reinforced the English posh idiots stereotype.

Finally, it seemed a bit odd that you didn’t see a single British POW until the final camp, where you saw one RAF uniform and a paratrooper in a red beret, as well as random uniforms from across the Commonwealth. There were twice as many British and Commonwealth POWs as there were Americans so you would’ve thought there would’ve been a few more scattered about?

Despite these annoyances it was an enjoyable watch on the whole with some great action sequences.
 
ebb said:
The last episode was farcical especially when a P51 flying at 300mph with 6 machine guns strafes the pow camp full of prisoners yet only hits the Germans on the roof.
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It seemed like they were the only bomber group of ww2 who never missed a target or killed a single civilian. :lol:
 

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