The Pacific War in Color

As a European, my knowledge of the Pacific War was quite limited. In school, I learned extensively about the Nazis, but I received little information about the Pacific War. After watching numerous documentaries about the war in Europe, I came across this series. It significantly enriched my understanding of the United States and the Pacific Theater, opening my eyes to a part of history I had previously overlooked.

I became deeply fascinated by this segment of World War II. While watching the documentary, I found myself completely engrossed; not a single moment left me uninterested. This experience sparked a desire within me to learn more about the U. S. perspective in world war II.

I highly recommend this series to the general public worldwide! It is an excellent resource for anyone interested in gaining a deeper understanding of this critical part of history. This documentary deserves the highest rating for effectively conveying its important message and providing insights that are often missing from traditional narratives in Europe (and possibly beyond?). It truly broadens one's perspective on World War II.

They might try to make the Documentary actually be more accurate by not referring to the Units invading as being all Marines! The US Army stormed these same Islands, and far out numbered the Marines. As well, there was no AirForce then, It was the US Army Air Corps. Try not to rewrite History please!

This 8-part series tries to cover the experience of the fighting man while giving an overall picture of the progress of the war. It uses real colour film with only a tiny amount of colourized footage. This naturally limits what can be shown. But it shouldn't limit the accuracy of the narration and it's here that the series falls down. When discussing Tarawa, we're told that Shermans had a 37mm gun. It didn't, they had 75's. It was the Stuarts, which were also used at Tarawa, that had 37's. When discussing the arrival of the Hellcat we're shown footage of a Corsair. (Once we're shown footage of a Corsair when discussing the Superfortress!) We're told Nimitz sent 4 carriers towards the Coral Sea but not that only 2 got there in time for the battle. In covering Midway, the attack on the Yorktown is shown before the American attacks on the Japanese carriers. These slips show a carelessness that sadly is all to frequent in documentaries that don't properly check their own documents. On the plus side I though the maps illustrated the conditions facing the fighting men nicely.

From the frequent basic errors (eg Wildcats referred to as Hellcats, misreporting of the battle of the Coral Sea, bizarre backwards sequencing of the battle of Midway, largely ignoring the contribution of the US army and other country's services, and gaps in the narrative throughout - yes some of the latter can be attributed to the lack of accompany colour footage but the narrative should still have a sound basis in documented history) to the overwhelming Macarthur-worship, I found it almost impossible to watch a full episode without a break. I eventually resorted to muting the narration and admiring the excellent colour camera work. Two stars for the footage, none for the narration.

The footage is high in quality and comes accross as special or rare. I never saw most scenes before and i've seen quite a lot. The series has the feel and taste of an highlevel production so you are taking in some important history in comfort. I also think facts (and footage) has way more rawness and less cencorship than for example the other known ww2 color series. Which I definately appreciate. If you are into ww2 a must watch, def.